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On March 27 2013 11:50 NAPoleonSC wrote:Show nested quote +On March 27 2013 10:38 Myrddraal wrote:On March 27 2013 06:04 Toadvine wrote:On March 27 2013 05:31 sAxiS wrote:
HOTS is a dream so far, so much closer to the positional style of BW. It's not perfect yet, but they are making positive progress. Yeah bro, nothing screams POSITIONAL like medivacs teleporting around the map with afterburners. Okay bro, fill in the blank in these two sentences for me: Faster Medivacs allow you to punish your opponent more harshly when he is out of ________. He used boosted his Medivacs to get into ________ quicker. In all seriousness Medivac boost should encourage good positional play and discourage bad positional play, with an emphasis on quick decisions since you have less time to react to them. For example, someone who sees an opponents army out of position can punish them quicker with drops, while someone who sieges outside an opponents base (in TvT) must either make efficient use of their good position (rather than just sitting their sieged forever) and make sure any units at home are in a good position to defend against drops. I just want to say something, and I don't mean to argue, but what I see from HotS streams, Viper just says "Oh, your Collosus/Tanks are in optimal position? Fuck that shit!" I just got home buying HotS so I don't have any actual experience yet, so I'm getting pumped. And scared. 
I was really only trying to make a point about Medivac boost, not HotS as a whole, but since you mentioned it, Vipers are pretty much another way to punish bad positioning. With a an abduct range of 9 you should get a similar situation as with Vikings, where you need to keep your anti air between your high priority targets and the Vipers such that you can attempt to target them down when they get close, while of course trying not to let your Stalkers/Marines get out of position themselves.
Edit: To clarify, since I read your post again and noticed that you said optimal position, if Vipers are on the field optimal position would be one that does not leave them vulnerable to being abducted.
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On March 27 2013 14:30 aksfjh wrote:Show nested quote +On March 27 2013 14:21 BrokenMirage wrote:On March 27 2013 13:19 Emzeeshady wrote:On March 27 2013 12:41 Orek wrote:Let's discuss something a bit different that has nothing to do with specific race or unit. In general, what % do you guys think is the acceptable line for a "balanced" match-up?50% each is obviously the best, but that ideal doesn't happen. So, in reality, we say that a match-up is balanced enough when winrates are relatively close. For the sake of discussion, assume that top-level sample size is large enough to alleviate a few players' extreme records, no particular strategy is OP, games are entertaining for spectators, the balance has already stabilized etc. These are not the main topic here. Having somehow satisfied all these side factors, would you say 55% for the advantageous race is acceptable? or should it be closer like 51%? For reference, this is how balance would look in best of series. 60% in a best of 1 translates into 68.26% winrate in a best of 5 series for example.
Bo1 Bo3 Bo5
50.00% 50.00% 50.00%
51.00% 51.50% 51.87%
52.00% 53.00% 53.75%
53.00% 54.49% 55.61%
54.00% 55.99% 57.47%
55.00% 57.48% 59.31%
56.00% 58.96% 61.14%
57.00% 60.43% 62.95%
58.00% 61.90% 64.75%
59.00% 63.35% 66.51%
60.00% 64.80% 68.26%
55% lets advantageous side win a best of 5 about 60% (59.31%) which I think is huge. Personally, I feel 52% would be the acceptable line. Also, among race A,B,C, the relationship of A>B>C>A within such balance for all 3 match-ups would be fair. What do you guys think? Am I too lenient to think 52% is OK? I would say 55 because you have to account for all the possible variables and a 4 percent margin of error is too small. Well, if it was within 55%, intelligent mapmaking could help bring the value even closer to 50%, so I'd say 55% would be good enough. I'd love to trust mapmakers to shore up numbers, but they didn't do a damn thing for a year while Zerg was the powerhouse. We still have overlord nooks, gigantic pathways, and a lack of overlooks that siege units can take advantage of. Maybe BW mapmakers did a good job, but SC2 have largely been close minded and awful.
Actually mapmakers DID try to do a great deal, making plenty of new maps which attempted to shift balance - however tournaments picked hardly any new maps at all during that time and mostly stuck to the old standards which were gradually shown to be Zerg favored (Daybreak is the big one that comes to mind). It isn't the mapmakers' fault when the mapmakers are largely ignored.
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am i the only one thinking that phoenix are potentially too strong, especially against zerg?
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Austria24422 Posts
On March 27 2013 15:42 Graphix wrote:
am i the only one thinking that phoenix are potentially too strong, especially against zerg?
They're really not. Phoenixes are extremely potent in the hands of capable players but not so much for lower league players. Their range got buffed to counter the new muta speed but let me tell you - playing phoenix vs muta is HARD. It's hard as hell. I'd go as far as saying it's the most difficult protoss strategy to execute well and one of the most difficult styles to play in the entire game. Phoenixes vs muta require the most babysitting you'll ever see. You cannot look away for a second if your phoenixes are fighting.
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On March 27 2013 14:44 nomyx wrote:Show nested quote +On March 27 2013 13:32 TerranosaurusWrecks wrote:On March 27 2013 13:27 kidcrash wrote:
Too many units are hard countering zealots at the moment. I'd like to see a late game upgrade similair to combat shields giving them +20 shields. Our beloved zealots are becoming obsolete so why don't we give them something to get them back on their feet!
I'd also like to see Blizzard implement something they've never had before in the SC universe. Afterburners should have their own fuel source that eventually runs out completely. Meaning once it's empty you're back to regular old medivac. Really puts some tension on decision making and makes it way less spamable. zealots getting more health? that just gives me shivers they had 160 in BW, only 150 in SC2. Also speed was the same as stim was permanently, now it's 2.75 vs 3.375
And Zealots never had charge ability. And siege tanks did 70. Different games, a buff to Zealots is unnecessary.
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On March 27 2013 16:12 DarkLordOlli wrote:Show nested quote +On March 27 2013 15:42 Graphix wrote:
am i the only one thinking that phoenix are potentially too strong, especially against zerg? They're really not. Phoenixes are extremely potent in the hands of capable players but not so much for lower league players. Their range got buffed to counter the new muta speed but let me tell you - playing phoenix vs muta is HARD. It's hard as hell. I'd go as far as saying it's the most difficult protoss strategy to execute well and one of the most difficult styles to play in the entire game. Phoenixes vs muta require the most babysitting you'll ever see. You cannot look away for a second if your phoenixes are fighting.
why would you need to look away while effectively raping 100/100 enemy units? Phoenixes seems okay.
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I think a bigger problem with phonex vs Zerg is that you never know how many to make, scouting Zerg tech with your first 3-5 can be dangerous as if u loose one of two it's so much wasted money early on... But if you stop making them and then they go muta your kinda in trouble and if you make too many and they go hydra your kinda in trouble.
Personally I'd be happy with mutas and phonex going back to WoL spec as now the stargate gives you units that are worth while it's not so much a huge investment as it was in WoL
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Austria24422 Posts
On March 27 2013 16:31 rj rl wrote:Show nested quote +On March 27 2013 16:12 DarkLordOlli wrote:On March 27 2013 15:42 Graphix wrote:
am i the only one thinking that phoenix are potentially too strong, especially against zerg? They're really not. Phoenixes are extremely potent in the hands of capable players but not so much for lower league players. Their range got buffed to counter the new muta speed but let me tell you - playing phoenix vs muta is HARD. It's hard as hell. I'd go as far as saying it's the most difficult protoss strategy to execute well and one of the most difficult styles to play in the entire game. Phoenixes vs muta require the most babysitting you'll ever see. You cannot look away for a second if your phoenixes are fighting. why would you need to look away while effectively raping 100/100 enemy units? Phoenixes seems okay.
Because you don't pop out 15 phoenixes at once. You slowly build up their count and you can't afford to lose any. Also, you may have heard that you have to look away to warp in as protoss. It's called "macro". Not saying phoenixes are bad, they're not. Reactively playing phoenix vs muta is hard as hell though.
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On March 27 2013 16:33 baldgye wrote:
I think a bigger problem with phonex vs Zerg is that you never know how many to make, scouting Zerg tech with your first 3-5 can be dangerous as if u loose one of two it's so much wasted money early on... But if you stop making them and then they go muta your kinda in trouble and if you make too many and they go hydra your kinda in trouble.
Personally I'd be happy with mutas and phonex going back to WoL spec as now the stargate gives you units that are worth while it's not so much a huge investment as it was in WoL
I think that if you continue into skytoss and putting more emphasis on air dominance while expanding, you will do just fine with phoenix builds. Going early phoenix will be quite an investment, and very micro-dependant, so losing one or two due to missmicro is almost comparable to lose 5-10 lings to banelings.
Also, if you have a huge problem with mutas, try going for HT's, storms really tear mutas apart when you have supporting units.
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On March 27 2013 16:33 baldgye wrote:
I think a bigger problem with phonex vs Zerg is that you never know how many to make, scouting Zerg tech with your first 3-5 can be dangerous as if u loose one of two it's so much wasted money early on... But if you stop making them and then they go muta your kinda in trouble and if you make too many and they go hydra your kinda in trouble.
Personally I'd be happy with mutas and phonex going back to WoL spec as now the stargate gives you units that are worth while it's not so much a huge investment as it was in WoL
You have the same problem with many units. It's just how an RTS works out.
But yeah, I agree that they should not have buffed mutas/phoenix. Or only buffed pheonix and differently, like to make them slightly better against ground. There really was no need for any mutalisk buff and we get the bill for it now in the form of terrible ZvZ.
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On March 27 2013 17:41 Zeweig wrote:Show nested quote +On March 27 2013 16:33 baldgye wrote:
I think a bigger problem with phonex vs Zerg is that you never know how many to make, scouting Zerg tech with your first 3-5 can be dangerous as if u loose one of two it's so much wasted money early on... But if you stop making them and then they go muta your kinda in trouble and if you make too many and they go hydra your kinda in trouble.
Personally I'd be happy with mutas and phonex going back to WoL spec as now the stargate gives you units that are worth while it's not so much a huge investment as it was in WoL I think that if you continue into skytoss and putting more emphasis on air dominance while expanding, you will do just fine with phoenix builds. Going early phoenix will be quite an investment, and very micro-dependant, so losing one or two due to missmicro is almost comparable to lose 5-10 lings to banelings. Also, if you have a huge problem with mutas, try going for HT's, storms really tear mutas apart when you have supporting units.
That's how I tend to transition because 50% of the time after opening phonex Z does a huge hydra attack and a handful of phonex arnt so useful in that situation, but I find HTs to be pretty poor at dealing with mutas because (I've found) that mutas can run into your base take a storm run out heal up fully and come back before you've got enough to really deal with them.
And due to how phonex and mutas work you can only really attack by running your phonex away which means Z can kill pylons powering tech and loosing fairly little.
EDIT; I'm not saying I think mutas are imbalanced but they force you to have to play far more than Z does and it can mean that one mistake and your probablly never coming back from.
Phonex got a buff without the range upgrade because now stargate play is more viable, so I just don't see the need for longer range phonex and super powerful mutas.
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On March 27 2013 17:47 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On March 27 2013 16:33 baldgye wrote:
I think a bigger problem with phonex vs Zerg is that you never know how many to make, scouting Zerg tech with your first 3-5 can be dangerous as if u loose one of two it's so much wasted money early on... But if you stop making them and then they go muta your kinda in trouble and if you make too many and they go hydra your kinda in trouble.
Personally I'd be happy with mutas and phonex going back to WoL spec as now the stargate gives you units that are worth while it's not so much a huge investment as it was in WoL You have the same problem with many units. It's just how an RTS works out. But yeah, I agree that they should not have buffed mutas/phoenix. Or only buffed pheonix and differently, like to make them slightly better against ground. There really was no need for any mutalisk buff and we get the bill for it now in the form of terrible ZvZ.
I disagree. Mutas were solid units, but once you get Storms/Fungals/Thors, they really lose their effectiveness. Two good Storms, and your flock of 20 Mutas is on red, two "lucky" Thor shots, and they are barely alive, and you have to sacrifice them so you can make other units, because they take up to 40 supply, or you can wait 5+ minutes for them to heal...
Their regeneration supports micro even more, so you can back off with injured Mutas and have them 1-2 minutes later on full HP again so they can harass again. That is actually the reason why players in WoL didn't stay on Mutas for too much or skipped them completely. Once you have counters to them, they are pretty worthless because they already aren't that good for engaging armies, and whenever you tried to harass you would take much more damage with them than you dealt to the opponent.
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And yeah watching ZvZ atm it's pretty clear it's kinda a mess... Like in PvP VRs are kinda dumb but there are FT builds that can work and Storm is amazing vs them... But ZvZ (from a Ps perspective) is like; I think I have more mutas so I'll attack... No wait he had more, GG...
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On March 27 2013 18:31 baldgye wrote:
And yeah watching ZvZ atm it's pretty clear it's kinda a mess... Like in PvP VRs are kinda dumb but there are FT builds that can work and Storm is amazing vs them... But ZvZ (from a Ps perspective) is like; I think I have more mutas so I'll attack... No wait he had more, GG...
So, would you like more if the game is decided for who lands a better Fungal? :/
Not saying that ZvZ is perfect, but it is still a breath of fresh air. Watching first game of Symbol vs. Roro last WoL GSL finals was painful. Both players camped and didn't want to attack each other because of the fungals, and then both of them went for Brood Lords, and we had a 10 minute FIGHT(!?) of Broodlings. It was terrible experience, I mean, it was pretty funny to me, but that was like the most retarded fight ever.
I would like if both strategies were viable against each other, something like Bio and Mech in TvT, but we will see, they might be.
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On March 26 2013 08:28 Scones wrote:
Even if zerg players do see a drop coming, the dps from marine and marauders in a medivac, coupled with the ability to fly away unscathed make it almost always worth it
The thing is terran got lots of early game changes were as zerg got later ones. That means zerg has to learn to adapt to a whole bunch of new timings. Short term, they are likely to have a lower winrate. Terran is also stronger with an identical playstyle thanks to speedvacs. Conversely zerg is stronger later with a new hive caster and stronger ultras both easily added to death balls. If terran (eg speedvacs) get nerfed now the balance is likely to swing towards zerg favoured once people adapt. As it is terran is underrepresented in grandmaster and over represented in bronze. They did well in mlg but it had a very very stacked terran line up (compared to zerg and toss). There hasn't been any other high level tournaments to use to gauge balance yet. I think its too early to call for balance changes personally.
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On March 27 2013 17:47 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On March 27 2013 16:33 baldgye wrote:
I think a bigger problem with phonex vs Zerg is that you never know how many to make, scouting Zerg tech with your first 3-5 can be dangerous as if u loose one of two it's so much wasted money early on... But if you stop making them and then they go muta your kinda in trouble and if you make too many and they go hydra your kinda in trouble.
Personally I'd be happy with mutas and phonex going back to WoL spec as now the stargate gives you units that are worth while it's not so much a huge investment as it was in WoL You have the same problem with many units. It's just how an RTS works out. But yeah, I agree that they should not have buffed mutas/phoenix. Or only buffed pheonix and differently, like to make them slightly better against ground. There really was no need for any mutalisk buff and we get the bill for it now in the form of terrible ZvZ.
I kinda have to disagree with you on the "problem with many units" and that this is a general RTS thing.
Too many units in SC2 have "stupid design" which gives them some opponents they are totally useless against ... and yet they are "core units". This is a design decision made by the dev team around Dustin Browder because they did not want to copy too many BW units. Since there is only a limited amount of design options available we have A LOT of these units with limited usefulness.
- Roach: ground only
- Marauder: ground only
- Viking: air only OR ground only with a stupidly slow transformation which makes ground mode basically useless
- Phoenix: air only with a needlessly complicated anti-ground mechanic (it is fun to look at, but still complicated to use)
- Corruptor: air only
These units are ALL pretty much core units and yet their SC1 & BW counterparts either were not that important (Firebat was rarely built) OR they had at least a minor attack against the "other sphere" and thus werent completely useless. The Scout(*) and Wraith had at least a decent ground attack, the Roach didnt exist and the main (only) Zerg ranged army unit was the Hydralisk; the same for the air unit, where the upgrades evolved from Mutalisks instead of half-useless Corruptors ...
This "design decision" of "do something other than BW units" is what gave SC2 so terrible units ... and I wish they hadnt done that.
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(*) Obviously the Corsair was the predecessor of the Phoenix, but that had at least a good supportive spell for ground units which you did NOT have to cast every time and which was far easier to aim in the midst of battle than the single-target Graviton Beam. I just listed the Scout to give the example of "great air defense and still a mediocre ground attack" because the Corsair was added with the BW expansion and the Scout was all Protoss had at first.
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That's not at all what happened in the GSL finals lol... And why would putting mutas back to WoL suddenly make infesters the go to unit? Sure you'd build them but making mutas less good would allow Zerg to play around with the new units more easily making the match up more interesting.
The GSL finals, the BL game was both dumb and insane at the same time, the BL battle forced the lions share of there at armies to be in one place, but because of that run bys where more effective and building 200+ armies became a powerful thing. That match was more like a war with little battles happening all over the place once the two main armies collided.
The rest of the sets where interesting for diffrent reasons.
I just think that all match ups should be as diverse as possible and (atm) muta play is so strong in ZvZ and it sucks to watch lol
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On March 27 2013 19:09 Rabiator wrote:
(*) Obviously the Corsair was the predecessor of the Phoenix, but that had at least a good supportive spell for ground units which you did NOT have to cast every time and which was far easier to aim in the midst of battle than the single-target Graviton Beam. I just listed the Scout to give the example of "great air defense and still a mediocre ground attack" because the Corsair was added with the BW expansion and the Scout was all Protoss had at first.
Scout was about as useless as you can get with some unit, and Corsair got upgrade for a support spell which was almost never used. Design wise, Phoenix is better than both of the units, just because YOU don't like it, doesn't make it a bad design. The phrase "bad design" is overused as hell these days. Phoenix is anti-air unit that because of Graviton Beam works as Protoss "Mutalisk" in terms of harassment, and can pick up key units in the battle, which I saw many times. It can even pick up your own units so you can save them. Saw HerO picking up Immortal that was focused down by Roaches, and picking up Infestors with full energy in the middle of the battle, so like 5-6 Infestors were non-existent in that battle. I also saw the same thing happening with the Siege Tanks, picking them up, while Protoss is engaging the army. The Phoenix is great, multi-dimensional unit, just because it is a bit more complicated unit doesn't make it a "bad design".
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I love the phonex as a unit it's fantastic and rewards players who have more skill
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muta vs muta was for a long time staple for SC1 ZvZ pro-games. it is not simply a matchup with mutalisks but with the heavily mobile zerglings as well...
it was a battle of low economy through zerglings and seemingly obscure(to the viewers) timings with them, or midgame mutalisk play that may or may not have lead into an extremely long ZvZ involving all of the zerg's unit arsenal.
(see: yellOw vs jaedong for a good example)
--that's to say most of this matchup we saw in pro-games came down to 2-base vs 2-base and the denial of the third base.
This changed ever so slightly over time; i'm guessing it was through attempts by the progamers to make the matchup more interesting. If anything, i see the exact same pattern of strategy in the muta play of WoL and HotS, except you have more options--arguably in the ways you can defend yourself early on, and you have less options if you're unable to establish your third base later in the game.
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EPT
