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On December 22 2013 05:17 Survivor61316 wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2013 05:01 Big J wrote:On December 22 2013 02:56 Survivor61316 wrote:On December 21 2013 18:44 Big J wrote:
I'd say it's a balance problem, not a design problem. The Units are not properly balanced against each other, so if you were forced into a situation in which you know nothing about an opponent but you had to choose which units to fight with, there are way to clear winners. Nothing against one unit being "universally a little stronger", but a few of the units - mutas, marines - are just over the top.
Thing with the Marine in particular is that it is somewhat needed to be so strong because zealots and zerglings are quite strong as well. Imo that's one of the real problems the game suffers from, early Tier units are very strong and mineral only while midtier units often don't bring a lot of extra strength to the table and cost gas.
This influences strongly how we play and perceive the game, strong armies are easy to reach (because mineral heavy armies are strong) and require few bases (because you need little gas).
The only race that breaks out of this a tiny bit is Zerg who often mines from 4-5bases simultanously, since they have the mapcontrol to do so and they really benefit from the extra gas income. And even then they usually fully mine the minerals on 4bases, since it's still so rewarding to build low tier stuff. Balance problems and design problems are far from being mutually exclusive. All balance tweaks have to be based around the core design of the race in question. Warp gate in particular comes to mind: the ability for toss to reinforce across the map mid battle is one of the first concerns when balancing any gateway units. In fact, WG is one of the biggest reasons the toss race is so broken, but thats another tangent entirely. My point though is that balance stems from design, they are not separate ideas. Definitely. But since what I'm talking about is less about what roles a unit should fullfill, but rather to what degree it should fullfill it, I'd mostly call it a balance problem. E.g. Tanks are not dead against Protoss because Protoss can counter tanks, but rather because they can counter them so efficiently. And I'd say a designquestion is whether Immortals should counter tanks, a balance question is whether Immortals should 3-4 shoot them while tanking 14+ hits or whether it wouldn't be enough to have Immortals with less damage done to armored or hardened shields with a reduction to only 12damage. Neither of those changes would change the core role of the Immortal, but it would change the balance and gameplay of Immortals. And that's basically what I'm saying above. I think everybody wants lowtier units to stay viable all game long, but I think it would be more interesting if the Zergling wasn't the bigass mapdomination unit it is for how little it costs and the marine wouldn't be the bigass combat threat that you have to base your whole vs Terran gameplan around since it costs so little, nor do we want a zealot warpin destroying a base that actually has some amount of defending units in it. Since you mention Warpgate, imo there we have the opposite situation. It's not that limiting for the balance of the Gateway Units. Stalkers are very versatile, therefore not extremly strong combatants. Sentries are very powerful casters, therefore not extremly strong combatants. Zealots are actually quite good combatants anyways. And higher Tier units like Archons and HTs are really not weak either. DTs rely on stealth and surprise and can't be top combatants. It's more that it limits the design of units that can be on the Warpgate (and mostly early on). You can obviously not have anything that costs more or less than 2supply on the warpgate, since it would be too strong or too weak per production cycle. You can't put much more variety on the warpgate than there already is, since mass warpgates without too much tech would become too strong. But all of the units you can put and that are on the Warpgate can be and are quite strong in the roles they have. The lowtier WP-Units just don't offer the pure power (without the subtile versatility) that some other 2supply units like a Marauder or a Roach do offer, but they still excel at certain roles. Yeah I agree with most everything you said. When I say design, I'm mostly talking about macro mechanics (WG, Reactors, Spawn Larva, ect.). I think having unit counters is good for the game, and youre right that balance comes from deciding just how efficient those counters are. I disagree about WG though; if it were to be removed from the game, gateway units like stalkers, even with their versatility, would be able to become much stronger as straight combat units because toss wouldnt be able to warp 10 of them in 1 second away from the fight. Though I do agree that zealots are already strong enough as a combat unit (could use a nerf in my Terran opinion, though I know they cant be bc it would wreck PvZ).
I don't like how Charge makes it so a zealot runby requires no micro for P to trade efficiently (especially considering it is only gas) and Terran HAS to pay attention to it to minimise losses.
The burden of micro.
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Warpgate is a fundamental race feature of Protoss in SC2. If you remove that, you have to bring another unique feature to the race.
The problem in SC2 is, that in comparison to BW, only 2 of the 3races were given very powerful race features. Zerg got Larva injects, which make the production incredible efficiant and creep mechanic, which makes the army very efficiant if it fights onto it. Protoss got Chrono boost, which make them very strong in aquiring upgrades and producing special tech units and warpgate, which offers just an incredible tactical and strategical advantage.
Terran got..... the Mule. A race feature, that´s main purpose is evening out the economical advantages the race features of protoss and zerg offer. Mules are basically just making up for the enormous worker production, that you get out of chrono boost and larva inject. And that´s all we have.
So from a basical view at the core designs of each race, terran is at a big disadvantage from the start. So you have to make up for that somehow and that is the difficulty, that´s showing in the messy balance we had for most of the time in SC2. BW was much easier to design, because the races were much closer together in the strength of their core design features. Zerg hat no super cheap production, Protoss had no turbo upgrades and warpgates etc.. So the task there was just to make sure, that the unit mix of each race evens out in the end. In SC2, you have to correct the core mechanic imbalance between the 3 races through the stats of the units.
Zerg and Protoss are just too flexible in comparison to terran. Terran needs to react to the strategy of the opponent right the moment he decides to do it. You didn´t start marauder production early against a blink allin? you are dead. You didn´t start viking production, when the first colossus was out? You are dead. and so on. In WoL this was the same in TvZ, but in HotS we had with bio mine a very robust unit composition, that was able to fight on even footing against everything zerg could field. I don´t know yet, if this is still true after the nerf.
But they either need to nerf the flexibility of protoss and zerg or need to buff it on the terran side. And then nerfing overpowered terran features like stim or medivac boost becomes also possible.
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Another thing is that comparing the game design of BW and SC2 is that Terran is on the lower end of easier mechanics.
Protoss: Deathball, very few micro needed in SC2 (e.g. Chargelots), Only Templar and Colo positioning
Zerg: Autosurround, all units attack if you just A-click. In BW you had to surround by yourself.
Terran: Constantly needs to hit&run with stutter step, make a concave and dodge AOE (Colofire, Storm).
Where can you say that this game design is fair, when a player of a certain race has to do way more in order to win than his opponent?
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On December 22 2013 07:48 TeeTS wrote:
Warpgate is a fundamental race feature of Protoss in SC2. If you remove that, you have to bring another unique feature to the race.
The problem in SC2 is, that in comparison to BW, only 2 of the 3races were given very powerful race features. Zerg got Larva injects, which make the production incredible efficiant and creep mechanic, which makes the army very efficiant if it fights onto it. Protoss got Chrono boost, which make them very strong in aquiring upgrades and producing special tech units and warpgate, which offers just an incredible tactical and strategical advantage.
Terran got..... the Mule. A race feature, that´s main purpose is evening out the economical advantages the race features of protoss and zerg offer. Mules are basically just making up for the enormous worker production, that you get out of chrono boost and larva inject. And that´s all we have.
So from a basical view at the core designs of each race, terran is at a big disadvantage from the start. So you have to make up for that somehow and that is the difficulty, that´s showing in the messy balance we had for most of the time in SC2. BW was much easier to design, because the races were much closer together in the strength of their core design features. Zerg hat no super cheap production, Protoss had no turbo upgrades and warpgates etc.. So the task there was just to make sure, that the unit mix of each race evens out in the end. In SC2, you have to correct the core mechanic imbalance between the 3 races through the stats of the units.
Zerg and Protoss are just too flexible in comparison to terran. Terran needs to react to the strategy of the opponent right the moment he decides to do it. You didn´t start marauder production early against a blink allin? you are dead. You didn´t start viking production, when the first colossus was out? You are dead. and so on. In WoL this was the same in TvZ, but in HotS we had with bio mine a very robust unit composition, that was able to fight on even footing against everything zerg could field. I don´t know yet, if this is still true after the nerf.
But they either need to nerf the flexibility of protoss and zerg or need to buff it on the terran side. And then nerfing overpowered terran features like stim or medivac boost becomes also possible.
I think it's much less about nerfing Warp Gate but making Gateway more attractive to use. If you look at macro mechanics like Terran and Zerg have... Terran has to make the choice between reactor and tech lab. It might be mindless now, but a lot of early innovations and timings were due to this. The one that comes to mind is a TvP one where MKP (I think), used double reactors against a Protoss and hit with a ton of marines and it gave him a lot of wins cause Protoss would think a smaller, marauder heavy army, while he came at them with tons of marines. Zerg has to make the choice between larva and creep spread (though I think if it was a decision that made more of an impact, it'd be good - then again, I don't play Zerg so I'm not sure how big of a decision it really is)
A lot of what I think is wrong with Protoss is how single minded it is. I can't think of really too many cases in terms of choices in the game that Protoss makes that's different from other Protoss. I'm not really too sure how to phrase this better, but I don't mean choices in defending, but more like what they do with their production structure/macro(?)
If we had a Protoss race that had both Warp Gates and Gate Ways, it would mean that if they were near the Terran base, and wanted to attack, they could open the Gateways into Warp Gates and do a big doom warp after. But you'd have to time it correctly. That takes a lot of skill to do, especially in a big fight. If Gateways were viable and not just something to proxy 2 gate with, it could have faster production and would promote constant production among Protoss players. Having to choose between warp gate and gate way means different games, means Protoss can add their own flair to how MU's work.
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On December 22 2013 08:16 TurboMaN wrote:
Another thing is that comparing the game design of BW and SC2 is that Terran is on the lower end of easier mechanics.
Protoss: Deathball, very few micro needed in SC2 (e.g. Chargelots), Only Templar and Colo positioning
Zerg: Autosurround, all units attack if you just A-click. In BW you had to surround by yourself.
Terran: Constantly needs to hit&run with stutter step, make a concave and dodge AOE (Colofire, Storm).
Where can you say that this game design is fair, when a player of a certain race has to do way more in order to win than his opponent?
I think that's oversimplifying other race's control. A big part of Protoss's micro is before the fight where they have to position their units correctly, especially vs a good Terran that doesn't take the first engagement possible. Zergs can't just a move into stuff, and even though they can auto surround, if a Zerg is going to a move into a Terran, they're gonna get destroyed by mines. I think Terran has a lot more micro to do, but it's not "hard" micro.
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Northern Ireland26032 Posts
On December 22 2013 10:50 Chaggi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2013 07:48 TeeTS wrote:
Warpgate is a fundamental race feature of Protoss in SC2. If you remove that, you have to bring another unique feature to the race.
The problem in SC2 is, that in comparison to BW, only 2 of the 3races were given very powerful race features. Zerg got Larva injects, which make the production incredible efficiant and creep mechanic, which makes the army very efficiant if it fights onto it. Protoss got Chrono boost, which make them very strong in aquiring upgrades and producing special tech units and warpgate, which offers just an incredible tactical and strategical advantage.
Terran got..... the Mule. A race feature, that´s main purpose is evening out the economical advantages the race features of protoss and zerg offer. Mules are basically just making up for the enormous worker production, that you get out of chrono boost and larva inject. And that´s all we have.
So from a basical view at the core designs of each race, terran is at a big disadvantage from the start. So you have to make up for that somehow and that is the difficulty, that´s showing in the messy balance we had for most of the time in SC2. BW was much easier to design, because the races were much closer together in the strength of their core design features. Zerg hat no super cheap production, Protoss had no turbo upgrades and warpgates etc.. So the task there was just to make sure, that the unit mix of each race evens out in the end. In SC2, you have to correct the core mechanic imbalance between the 3 races through the stats of the units.
Zerg and Protoss are just too flexible in comparison to terran. Terran needs to react to the strategy of the opponent right the moment he decides to do it. You didn´t start marauder production early against a blink allin? you are dead. You didn´t start viking production, when the first colossus was out? You are dead. and so on. In WoL this was the same in TvZ, but in HotS we had with bio mine a very robust unit composition, that was able to fight on even footing against everything zerg could field. I don´t know yet, if this is still true after the nerf.
But they either need to nerf the flexibility of protoss and zerg or need to buff it on the terran side. And then nerfing overpowered terran features like stim or medivac boost becomes also possible. I think it's much less about nerfing Warp Gate but making Gateway more attractive to use. If you look at macro mechanics like Terran and Zerg have... Terran has to make the choice between reactor and tech lab. It might be mindless now, but a lot of early innovations and timings were due to this. The one that comes to mind is a TvP one where MKP (I think), used double reactors against a Protoss and hit with a ton of marines and it gave him a lot of wins cause Protoss would think a smaller, marauder heavy army, while he came at them with tons of marines. Zerg has to make the choice between larva and creep spread (though I think if it was a decision that made more of an impact, it'd be good - then again, I don't play Zerg so I'm not sure how big of a decision it really is) A lot of what I think is wrong with Protoss is how single minded it is. I can't think of really too many cases in terms of choices in the game that Protoss makes that's different from other Protoss. I'm not really too sure how to phrase this better, but I don't mean choices in defending, but more like what they do with their production structure/macro(?) If we had a Protoss race that had both Warp Gates and Gate Ways, it would mean that if they were near the Terran base, and wanted to attack, they could open the Gateways into Warp Gates and do a big doom warp after. But you'd have to time it correctly. That takes a lot of skill to do, especially in a big fight. If Gateways were viable and not just something to proxy 2 gate with, it could have faster production and would promote constant production among Protoss players. Having to choose between warp gate and gate way means different games, means Protoss can add their own flair to how MU's work.
Yeah pretty much on the money, to me at least.
I like the WG mechanic, just not as a core mechanic. It's cool and fits the high-tech alien aesthetic well. Ah well I don't believe it will ever be touched alas
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On December 22 2013 11:00 Wombat_NI wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2013 10:50 Chaggi wrote:On December 22 2013 07:48 TeeTS wrote:
Warpgate is a fundamental race feature of Protoss in SC2. If you remove that, you have to bring another unique feature to the race.
The problem in SC2 is, that in comparison to BW, only 2 of the 3races were given very powerful race features. Zerg got Larva injects, which make the production incredible efficiant and creep mechanic, which makes the army very efficiant if it fights onto it. Protoss got Chrono boost, which make them very strong in aquiring upgrades and producing special tech units and warpgate, which offers just an incredible tactical and strategical advantage.
Terran got..... the Mule. A race feature, that´s main purpose is evening out the economical advantages the race features of protoss and zerg offer. Mules are basically just making up for the enormous worker production, that you get out of chrono boost and larva inject. And that´s all we have.
So from a basical view at the core designs of each race, terran is at a big disadvantage from the start. So you have to make up for that somehow and that is the difficulty, that´s showing in the messy balance we had for most of the time in SC2. BW was much easier to design, because the races were much closer together in the strength of their core design features. Zerg hat no super cheap production, Protoss had no turbo upgrades and warpgates etc.. So the task there was just to make sure, that the unit mix of each race evens out in the end. In SC2, you have to correct the core mechanic imbalance between the 3 races through the stats of the units.
Zerg and Protoss are just too flexible in comparison to terran. Terran needs to react to the strategy of the opponent right the moment he decides to do it. You didn´t start marauder production early against a blink allin? you are dead. You didn´t start viking production, when the first colossus was out? You are dead. and so on. In WoL this was the same in TvZ, but in HotS we had with bio mine a very robust unit composition, that was able to fight on even footing against everything zerg could field. I don´t know yet, if this is still true after the nerf.
But they either need to nerf the flexibility of protoss and zerg or need to buff it on the terran side. And then nerfing overpowered terran features like stim or medivac boost becomes also possible. I think it's much less about nerfing Warp Gate but making Gateway more attractive to use. If you look at macro mechanics like Terran and Zerg have... Terran has to make the choice between reactor and tech lab. It might be mindless now, but a lot of early innovations and timings were due to this. The one that comes to mind is a TvP one where MKP (I think), used double reactors against a Protoss and hit with a ton of marines and it gave him a lot of wins cause Protoss would think a smaller, marauder heavy army, while he came at them with tons of marines. Zerg has to make the choice between larva and creep spread (though I think if it was a decision that made more of an impact, it'd be good - then again, I don't play Zerg so I'm not sure how big of a decision it really is) A lot of what I think is wrong with Protoss is how single minded it is. I can't think of really too many cases in terms of choices in the game that Protoss makes that's different from other Protoss. I'm not really too sure how to phrase this better, but I don't mean choices in defending, but more like what they do with their production structure/macro(?) If we had a Protoss race that had both Warp Gates and Gate Ways, it would mean that if they were near the Terran base, and wanted to attack, they could open the Gateways into Warp Gates and do a big doom warp after. But you'd have to time it correctly. That takes a lot of skill to do, especially in a big fight. If Gateways were viable and not just something to proxy 2 gate with, it could have faster production and would promote constant production among Protoss players. Having to choose between warp gate and gate way means different games, means Protoss can add their own flair to how MU's work. Yeah pretty much on the money, to me at least. I like the WG mechanic, just not as a core mechanic. It's cool and fits the high-tech alien aesthetic well. Ah well I don't believe it will ever be touched alas
I really believe that even if it was overpowered, or underpowered for a bit, as long as there was some light at the end of the tunnel that made the game more fun/deep/whatever - I'd take it.
Like to give an example: HoTS Beta when Warhounds came out, there were some really damn vocal Terrans that wanted the Warhound to be removed cause it was nothing even close to what made Terran an awesome race.
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On December 22 2013 11:11 Chaggi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2013 11:00 Wombat_NI wrote:On December 22 2013 10:50 Chaggi wrote:On December 22 2013 07:48 TeeTS wrote:
Warpgate is a fundamental race feature of Protoss in SC2. If you remove that, you have to bring another unique feature to the race.
The problem in SC2 is, that in comparison to BW, only 2 of the 3races were given very powerful race features. Zerg got Larva injects, which make the production incredible efficiant and creep mechanic, which makes the army very efficiant if it fights onto it. Protoss got Chrono boost, which make them very strong in aquiring upgrades and producing special tech units and warpgate, which offers just an incredible tactical and strategical advantage.
Terran got..... the Mule. A race feature, that´s main purpose is evening out the economical advantages the race features of protoss and zerg offer. Mules are basically just making up for the enormous worker production, that you get out of chrono boost and larva inject. And that´s all we have.
So from a basical view at the core designs of each race, terran is at a big disadvantage from the start. So you have to make up for that somehow and that is the difficulty, that´s showing in the messy balance we had for most of the time in SC2. BW was much easier to design, because the races were much closer together in the strength of their core design features. Zerg hat no super cheap production, Protoss had no turbo upgrades and warpgates etc.. So the task there was just to make sure, that the unit mix of each race evens out in the end. In SC2, you have to correct the core mechanic imbalance between the 3 races through the stats of the units.
Zerg and Protoss are just too flexible in comparison to terran. Terran needs to react to the strategy of the opponent right the moment he decides to do it. You didn´t start marauder production early against a blink allin? you are dead. You didn´t start viking production, when the first colossus was out? You are dead. and so on. In WoL this was the same in TvZ, but in HotS we had with bio mine a very robust unit composition, that was able to fight on even footing against everything zerg could field. I don´t know yet, if this is still true after the nerf.
But they either need to nerf the flexibility of protoss and zerg or need to buff it on the terran side. And then nerfing overpowered terran features like stim or medivac boost becomes also possible. I think it's much less about nerfing Warp Gate but making Gateway more attractive to use. If you look at macro mechanics like Terran and Zerg have... Terran has to make the choice between reactor and tech lab. It might be mindless now, but a lot of early innovations and timings were due to this. The one that comes to mind is a TvP one where MKP (I think), used double reactors against a Protoss and hit with a ton of marines and it gave him a lot of wins cause Protoss would think a smaller, marauder heavy army, while he came at them with tons of marines. Zerg has to make the choice between larva and creep spread (though I think if it was a decision that made more of an impact, it'd be good - then again, I don't play Zerg so I'm not sure how big of a decision it really is) A lot of what I think is wrong with Protoss is how single minded it is. I can't think of really too many cases in terms of choices in the game that Protoss makes that's different from other Protoss. I'm not really too sure how to phrase this better, but I don't mean choices in defending, but more like what they do with their production structure/macro(?) If we had a Protoss race that had both Warp Gates and Gate Ways, it would mean that if they were near the Terran base, and wanted to attack, they could open the Gateways into Warp Gates and do a big doom warp after. But you'd have to time it correctly. That takes a lot of skill to do, especially in a big fight. If Gateways were viable and not just something to proxy 2 gate with, it could have faster production and would promote constant production among Protoss players. Having to choose between warp gate and gate way means different games, means Protoss can add their own flair to how MU's work. Yeah pretty much on the money, to me at least. I like the WG mechanic, just not as a core mechanic. It's cool and fits the high-tech alien aesthetic well. Ah well I don't believe it will ever be touched alas I really believe that even if it was overpowered, or underpowered for a bit, as long as there was some light at the end of the tunnel that made the game more fun/deep/whatever - I'd take it. Like to give an example: HoTS Beta when Warhounds came out, there were some really damn vocal Terrans that wanted the Warhound to be removed cause it was nothing even close to what made Terran an awesome race.
Anyone with eyes wanted the warhound removed.
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On December 22 2013 11:50 Sabu113 wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2013 11:11 Chaggi wrote:On December 22 2013 11:00 Wombat_NI wrote:On December 22 2013 10:50 Chaggi wrote:On December 22 2013 07:48 TeeTS wrote:
Warpgate is a fundamental race feature of Protoss in SC2. If you remove that, you have to bring another unique feature to the race.
The problem in SC2 is, that in comparison to BW, only 2 of the 3races were given very powerful race features. Zerg got Larva injects, which make the production incredible efficiant and creep mechanic, which makes the army very efficiant if it fights onto it. Protoss got Chrono boost, which make them very strong in aquiring upgrades and producing special tech units and warpgate, which offers just an incredible tactical and strategical advantage.
Terran got..... the Mule. A race feature, that´s main purpose is evening out the economical advantages the race features of protoss and zerg offer. Mules are basically just making up for the enormous worker production, that you get out of chrono boost and larva inject. And that´s all we have.
So from a basical view at the core designs of each race, terran is at a big disadvantage from the start. So you have to make up for that somehow and that is the difficulty, that´s showing in the messy balance we had for most of the time in SC2. BW was much easier to design, because the races were much closer together in the strength of their core design features. Zerg hat no super cheap production, Protoss had no turbo upgrades and warpgates etc.. So the task there was just to make sure, that the unit mix of each race evens out in the end. In SC2, you have to correct the core mechanic imbalance between the 3 races through the stats of the units.
Zerg and Protoss are just too flexible in comparison to terran. Terran needs to react to the strategy of the opponent right the moment he decides to do it. You didn´t start marauder production early against a blink allin? you are dead. You didn´t start viking production, when the first colossus was out? You are dead. and so on. In WoL this was the same in TvZ, but in HotS we had with bio mine a very robust unit composition, that was able to fight on even footing against everything zerg could field. I don´t know yet, if this is still true after the nerf.
But they either need to nerf the flexibility of protoss and zerg or need to buff it on the terran side. And then nerfing overpowered terran features like stim or medivac boost becomes also possible. I think it's much less about nerfing Warp Gate but making Gateway more attractive to use. If you look at macro mechanics like Terran and Zerg have... Terran has to make the choice between reactor and tech lab. It might be mindless now, but a lot of early innovations and timings were due to this. The one that comes to mind is a TvP one where MKP (I think), used double reactors against a Protoss and hit with a ton of marines and it gave him a lot of wins cause Protoss would think a smaller, marauder heavy army, while he came at them with tons of marines. Zerg has to make the choice between larva and creep spread (though I think if it was a decision that made more of an impact, it'd be good - then again, I don't play Zerg so I'm not sure how big of a decision it really is) A lot of what I think is wrong with Protoss is how single minded it is. I can't think of really too many cases in terms of choices in the game that Protoss makes that's different from other Protoss. I'm not really too sure how to phrase this better, but I don't mean choices in defending, but more like what they do with their production structure/macro(?) If we had a Protoss race that had both Warp Gates and Gate Ways, it would mean that if they were near the Terran base, and wanted to attack, they could open the Gateways into Warp Gates and do a big doom warp after. But you'd have to time it correctly. That takes a lot of skill to do, especially in a big fight. If Gateways were viable and not just something to proxy 2 gate with, it could have faster production and would promote constant production among Protoss players. Having to choose between warp gate and gate way means different games, means Protoss can add their own flair to how MU's work. Yeah pretty much on the money, to me at least. I like the WG mechanic, just not as a core mechanic. It's cool and fits the high-tech alien aesthetic well. Ah well I don't believe it will ever be touched alas I really believe that even if it was overpowered, or underpowered for a bit, as long as there was some light at the end of the tunnel that made the game more fun/deep/whatever - I'd take it. Like to give an example: HoTS Beta when Warhounds came out, there were some really damn vocal Terrans that wanted the Warhound to be removed cause it was nothing even close to what made Terran an awesome race. Anyone with eyes wanted the warhound removed.
but it was such an easy unit to a move and win with! isn't that how we always argue against the other race?! only wins matter!
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On December 22 2013 10:50 Chaggi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2013 07:48 TeeTS wrote:
Warpgate is a fundamental race feature of Protoss in SC2. If you remove that, you have to bring another unique feature to the race.
The problem in SC2 is, that in comparison to BW, only 2 of the 3races were given very powerful race features. Zerg got Larva injects, which make the production incredible efficiant and creep mechanic, which makes the army very efficiant if it fights onto it. Protoss got Chrono boost, which make them very strong in aquiring upgrades and producing special tech units and warpgate, which offers just an incredible tactical and strategical advantage.
Terran got..... the Mule. A race feature, that´s main purpose is evening out the economical advantages the race features of protoss and zerg offer. Mules are basically just making up for the enormous worker production, that you get out of chrono boost and larva inject. And that´s all we have.
So from a basical view at the core designs of each race, terran is at a big disadvantage from the start. So you have to make up for that somehow and that is the difficulty, that´s showing in the messy balance we had for most of the time in SC2. BW was much easier to design, because the races were much closer together in the strength of their core design features. Zerg hat no super cheap production, Protoss had no turbo upgrades and warpgates etc.. So the task there was just to make sure, that the unit mix of each race evens out in the end. In SC2, you have to correct the core mechanic imbalance between the 3 races through the stats of the units.
Zerg and Protoss are just too flexible in comparison to terran. Terran needs to react to the strategy of the opponent right the moment he decides to do it. You didn´t start marauder production early against a blink allin? you are dead. You didn´t start viking production, when the first colossus was out? You are dead. and so on. In WoL this was the same in TvZ, but in HotS we had with bio mine a very robust unit composition, that was able to fight on even footing against everything zerg could field. I don´t know yet, if this is still true after the nerf.
But they either need to nerf the flexibility of protoss and zerg or need to buff it on the terran side. And then nerfing overpowered terran features like stim or medivac boost becomes also possible. I think it's much less about nerfing Warp Gate but making Gateway more attractive to use. If you look at macro mechanics like Terran and Zerg have... Terran has to make the choice between reactor and tech lab. It might be mindless now, but a lot of early innovations and timings were due to this. The one that comes to mind is a TvP one where MKP (I think), used double reactors against a Protoss and hit with a ton of marines and it gave him a lot of wins cause Protoss would think a smaller, marauder heavy army, while he came at them with tons of marines. Zerg has to make the choice between larva and creep spread (though I think if it was a decision that made more of an impact, it'd be good - then again, I don't play Zerg so I'm not sure how big of a decision it really is) A lot of what I think is wrong with Protoss is how single minded it is. I can't think of really too many cases in terms of choices in the game that Protoss makes that's different from other Protoss. I'm not really too sure how to phrase this better, but I don't mean choices in defending, but more like what they do with their production structure/macro(?) If we had a Protoss race that had both Warp Gates and Gate Ways, it would mean that if they were near the Terran base, and wanted to attack, they could open the Gateways into Warp Gates and do a big doom warp after. But you'd have to time it correctly. That takes a lot of skill to do, especially in a big fight. If Gateways were viable and not just something to proxy 2 gate with, it could have faster production and would promote constant production among Protoss players. Having to choose between warp gate and gate way means different games, means Protoss can add their own flair to how MU's work.
Not sure what Starbow has currently implemented, but I have played with different versions of Warpgate/Gateway build times on it and I can't remember that it ever worked like you say (and like Kabel tried to implement it).
Either you have such a build time advantage with Gateways that transforming and warping in actually weakens nearly anything you do compared to just rallying units, or you still just use warpgates after a certain point in the game. Not to mention that the "mixed" (some in warpgate mode for warp prism harass and emergency warp ins, most in gateway form for production) doesn't really work out either, since then your warp ins are so tiny that anything you warp in just gets picked off immidiatly.
Also there is hardly anything as boring as clicking transformation buttons and waiting for transformations to be completed over and over again during a game.
So from my experience with it there is simply no sweetspot where warpgate and gateway production can really properly coexists, apart from turning warpgate into "that thing you do in the endgame when you are maxed and you can afford 20+ warpgates instead of your 10-15gateways". Well, I guess apart from making certain units exclusively viable for one or the other.
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On December 22 2013 10:52 Chaggi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2013 08:16 TurboMaN wrote:
Another thing is that comparing the game design of BW and SC2 is that Terran is on the lower end of easier mechanics.
Protoss: Deathball, very few micro needed in SC2 (e.g. Chargelots), Only Templar and Colo positioning
Zerg: Autosurround, all units attack if you just A-click. In BW you had to surround by yourself.
Terran: Constantly needs to hit&run with stutter step, make a concave and dodge AOE (Colofire, Storm).
Where can you say that this game design is fair, when a player of a certain race has to do way more in order to win than his opponent? I think that's oversimplifying other race's control. A big part of Protoss's micro is before the fight where they have to position their units correctly, especially vs a good Terran that doesn't take the first engagement possible. Zergs can't just a move into stuff, and even though they can auto surround, if a Zerg is going to a move into a Terran, they're gonna get destroyed by mines. I think Terran has a lot more micro to do, but it's not "hard" micro.
Every race has to position their army correctly before a fight though, that's not unique to toss. I'd even argue that Terran's pre-battle positioning is more important than toss because they have to be pre-split multiple control groups in a wide area, whereas toss can just dance their entire death ball back and forth while waiting for the opponent to look weak. And I dont think you've ever tried playing a late game TvP if you think the micro is not hard.. Splitting and kiting bio simultaneously, microing ghosts and vikings separate from the bio while making sure ghosts arent sniped by colossi and vikings aren't focused by stalkers.. And what is toss doing? A-moving the majority of their army and just waiting for ht to come in range of the bio while its kiting chargelots.. And maybe focusing vikings with stalkers (though colossi really start losing their importance as the ghost numbers dwindle). If you lose focus for one second your army can just evaporate.
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On December 22 2013 12:27 Big J wrote:Not sure what Starbow has currently implemented, but I have played with different versions of Warpgate/Gateway build times on it and I can't remember that it ever worked like you say (and like Kabel tried to implement it).
Either you have such a build time advantage with Gateways that transforming and warping in actually weakens nearly anything you do compared to just rallying units, or you still just use warpgates after a certain point in the game. Not to mention that the "mixed" (some in warpgate mode for warp prism harass and emergency warp ins, most in gateway form for production) doesn't really work out either, since then your warp ins are so tiny that anything you warp in just gets picked off immidiatly.
I have to call bullshit on the "uselessly small warp in." Not every Protoss has to warp in 15 Zealots to make a WP harass worthwhile. Five Zealot warp ins have been known to do the trick. So have six, seven, and eight, and four, depending on context.
I understand that in your experience they did not manage to find a sweet spot, but neither their testing nor your singular opinion of their testing are conclusive proofs of anything. There's no way we could really know unless this was tested with pros over a lenghty period of time.
Also there is hardly anything as boring as clicking transformation buttons and waiting for transformations to be completed over and over again during a game.
I don't know, building reactors and tech labs and then switching them is pretty boring. Spreading creep is pretty boring, too. Larva, Mules, Chronoboost, building Supply Depots/Overlords/Pylons...
Protoss needs more macro busywork to spread their attention thinner. And it's not just busywork if it requires decision making, which this does.
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That is really well written!
And I like how one of the comments mention along the lines of "instead of limiting protoss options, the terran options should be somehow made viable.." And its true. The inflexibility of T infrastructure is one of the major reasons why it hamstrings the race in this matchup because each tech tree is somewhat independent of one another.
I think Blizzard made a mistake in trying to make factory/starport units support units only by complementing barrack units. Its like being Protoss (one or two robos / factory, maybe a stargate / starport + warpgates / barracks) but way less efficient in terms of production cost/macro + upgrades etc. Instead each tech tree should be able to handle these threats at least independently instead of each specific responses requiring specific units from the different tech tree.
This is why i somewhat disliked how they merged the Ground/Air mech upgrades and somewhat taking away what makes Terran in starcraft unique. Instead what they should be focusing is how can T survive when going factory first play? or what if the T doesn't go standard 3 rax bio? can they survive with the 1-1-1 to late transition into mech or bio?
Theres so many things which can help:
- Cheaper Armories e.g. 100/50
- Cheaper Upgrades e.g. blue flame is currently at 150/150 , transformation servos currently at 150/150 ..???
- +Shield damage from mech units so it only affect TvP.
- Reintroduction of the warhound as half a thor for ease of accessibility/cost (not the mech-marauder 1A) + allow the factory to respond to sudden P air units.
- Hellbats not being light (archon/no healing from medivac + increase cargo hold to 4 now), Tanks do +massive damage (archon/colossus/ultralisks)
Bio play is still there, but there could be incentives to go pure mech, or add in factory/other starport units etc. Make it more dynamic and interesting... somewhat like PvZ/TvZ.
I guess at the end of the day, if they can make Terran more viable in terms of builds and not just bio, it forces Protoss to do something different.. rather than having them choose from 10+ builds which all eventually lead to the eventual P deathball or various 2 base all-ins.
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On December 22 2013 07:48 TeeTS wrote:
Warpgate is a fundamental race feature of Protoss in SC2. If you remove that, you have to bring another unique feature to the race.
The problem in SC2 is, that in comparison to BW, only 2 of the 3races were given very powerful race features. Zerg got Larva injects, which make the production incredible efficiant and creep mechanic, which makes the army very efficiant if it fights onto it. Protoss got Chrono boost, which make them very strong in aquiring upgrades and producing special tech units and warpgate, which offers just an incredible tactical and strategical advantage.
Terran got..... the Mule. A race feature, that´s main purpose is evening out the economical advantages the race features of protoss and zerg offer. Mules are basically just making up for the enormous worker production, that you get out of chrono boost and larva inject. And that´s all we have.
So from a basical view at the core designs of each race, terran is at a big disadvantage from the start. So you have to make up for that somehow and that is the difficulty, that´s showing in the messy balance we had for most of the time in SC2. BW was much easier to design, because the races were much closer together in the strength of their core design features. Zerg hat no super cheap production, Protoss had no turbo upgrades and warpgates etc.. So the task there was just to make sure, that the unit mix of each race evens out in the end. In SC2, you have to correct the core mechanic imbalance between the 3 races through the stats of the units.
Zerg and Protoss are just too flexible in comparison to terran. Terran needs to react to the strategy of the opponent right the moment he decides to do it. You didn´t start marauder production early against a blink allin? you are dead. You didn´t start viking production, when the first colossus was out? You are dead. and so on. In WoL this was the same in TvZ, but in HotS we had with bio mine a very robust unit composition, that was able to fight on even footing against everything zerg could field. I don´t know yet, if this is still true after the nerf.
But they either need to nerf the flexibility of protoss and zerg or need to buff it on the terran side. And then nerfing overpowered terran features like stim or medivac boost becomes also possible.
Yes sc2 has so much design flaws (balance are ok), this isn't funny to watch anymore, plus all hots units are incredibly to watch like collosus and corruptors.
From my view, larvas are the worst production at early (too much luck involved). One of my most experiences at early: you have 10 larvas, then you build 10 drones, then one sec later you notice that protoss or a bunch of lings come out to attack you. you are dead. If the opponent would have come ~2sec early you could have built 10 raoches/lings instead of 10 drones.
I like protoss and terran production a lot better especially in HotS.
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On December 22 2013 11:54 Chaggi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2013 11:50 Sabu113 wrote:On December 22 2013 11:11 Chaggi wrote:On December 22 2013 11:00 Wombat_NI wrote:On December 22 2013 10:50 Chaggi wrote:On December 22 2013 07:48 TeeTS wrote:
Warpgate is a fundamental race feature of Protoss in SC2. If you remove that, you have to bring another unique feature to the race.
The problem in SC2 is, that in comparison to BW, only 2 of the 3races were given very powerful race features. Zerg got Larva injects, which make the production incredible efficiant and creep mechanic, which makes the army very efficiant if it fights onto it. Protoss got Chrono boost, which make them very strong in aquiring upgrades and producing special tech units and warpgate, which offers just an incredible tactical and strategical advantage.
Terran got..... the Mule. A race feature, that´s main purpose is evening out the economical advantages the race features of protoss and zerg offer. Mules are basically just making up for the enormous worker production, that you get out of chrono boost and larva inject. And that´s all we have.
So from a basical view at the core designs of each race, terran is at a big disadvantage from the start. So you have to make up for that somehow and that is the difficulty, that´s showing in the messy balance we had for most of the time in SC2. BW was much easier to design, because the races were much closer together in the strength of their core design features. Zerg hat no super cheap production, Protoss had no turbo upgrades and warpgates etc.. So the task there was just to make sure, that the unit mix of each race evens out in the end. In SC2, you have to correct the core mechanic imbalance between the 3 races through the stats of the units.
Zerg and Protoss are just too flexible in comparison to terran. Terran needs to react to the strategy of the opponent right the moment he decides to do it. You didn´t start marauder production early against a blink allin? you are dead. You didn´t start viking production, when the first colossus was out? You are dead. and so on. In WoL this was the same in TvZ, but in HotS we had with bio mine a very robust unit composition, that was able to fight on even footing against everything zerg could field. I don´t know yet, if this is still true after the nerf.
But they either need to nerf the flexibility of protoss and zerg or need to buff it on the terran side. And then nerfing overpowered terran features like stim or medivac boost becomes also possible. I think it's much less about nerfing Warp Gate but making Gateway more attractive to use. If you look at macro mechanics like Terran and Zerg have... Terran has to make the choice between reactor and tech lab. It might be mindless now, but a lot of early innovations and timings were due to this. The one that comes to mind is a TvP one where MKP (I think), used double reactors against a Protoss and hit with a ton of marines and it gave him a lot of wins cause Protoss would think a smaller, marauder heavy army, while he came at them with tons of marines. Zerg has to make the choice between larva and creep spread (though I think if it was a decision that made more of an impact, it'd be good - then again, I don't play Zerg so I'm not sure how big of a decision it really is) A lot of what I think is wrong with Protoss is how single minded it is. I can't think of really too many cases in terms of choices in the game that Protoss makes that's different from other Protoss. I'm not really too sure how to phrase this better, but I don't mean choices in defending, but more like what they do with their production structure/macro(?) If we had a Protoss race that had both Warp Gates and Gate Ways, it would mean that if they were near the Terran base, and wanted to attack, they could open the Gateways into Warp Gates and do a big doom warp after. But you'd have to time it correctly. That takes a lot of skill to do, especially in a big fight. If Gateways were viable and not just something to proxy 2 gate with, it could have faster production and would promote constant production among Protoss players. Having to choose between warp gate and gate way means different games, means Protoss can add their own flair to how MU's work. Yeah pretty much on the money, to me at least. I like the WG mechanic, just not as a core mechanic. It's cool and fits the high-tech alien aesthetic well. Ah well I don't believe it will ever be touched alas I really believe that even if it was overpowered, or underpowered for a bit, as long as there was some light at the end of the tunnel that made the game more fun/deep/whatever - I'd take it. Like to give an example: HoTS Beta when Warhounds came out, there were some really damn vocal Terrans that wanted the Warhound to be removed cause it was nothing even close to what made Terran an awesome race. Anyone with eyes wanted the warhound removed. but it was such an easy unit to a move and win with! isn't that how we always argue against the other race?! only wins matter!
You make it sound dumb, but it's actually how most people work.
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You know, perhaps protoss should be nerfed and buffed at the same time by introducing more micro-ability of their units and thus making unit control less forgiving and highly rewarding.. I think this is one of the biggest issue that Im surprised hasn't been tackled.
Like zealots and auto cast charging to colossus having zero collision size with ground units. Perhaps, it's more appropriate to add in things that can really differentiate P players just like how Life can really show that with lings, or MKP in the past with marines instead of playing the numbers game although I think some key units do need somewhat of a nerf.
Things that pop into my mind are:
- Higher storm damage in return for no smartcast on this particular spell
- Remove charge and bring back faster ms
- Very slow colossus movement speed
- Oracles that fire AOE based projectiles that require precision and timing while dealing moderate damage (maybe with glide and shoot mechanic.. this would be really cool to watch)
Maybe its the design of the race.. since when units like voidrays, tempests, carriers they all have literally no micro-ability other than 1A back and forth or simple target firing or one click abilities. Something that could be a big factor in what makes protoss look like a race with "less skill" compared to Ts and Zs.
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On December 22 2013 12:32 Survivor61316 wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2013 10:52 Chaggi wrote:On December 22 2013 08:16 TurboMaN wrote:
Another thing is that comparing the game design of BW and SC2 is that Terran is on the lower end of easier mechanics.
Protoss: Deathball, very few micro needed in SC2 (e.g. Chargelots), Only Templar and Colo positioning
Zerg: Autosurround, all units attack if you just A-click. In BW you had to surround by yourself.
Terran: Constantly needs to hit&run with stutter step, make a concave and dodge AOE (Colofire, Storm).
Where can you say that this game design is fair, when a player of a certain race has to do way more in order to win than his opponent? I think that's oversimplifying other race's control. A big part of Protoss's micro is before the fight where they have to position their units correctly, especially vs a good Terran that doesn't take the first engagement possible. Zergs can't just a move into stuff, and even though they can auto surround, if a Zerg is going to a move into a Terran, they're gonna get destroyed by mines. I think Terran has a lot more micro to do, but it's not "hard" micro. Every race has to position their army correctly before a fight though, that's not unique to toss. I'd even argue that Terran's pre-battle positioning is more important than toss because they have to be pre-split multiple control groups in a wide area, whereas toss can just dance their entire death ball back and forth while waiting for the opponent to look weak. And I dont think you've ever tried playing a late game TvP if you think the micro is not hard.. Splitting and kiting bio simultaneously, microing ghosts and vikings separate from the bio while making sure ghosts arent sniped by colossi and vikings aren't focused by stalkers.. And what is toss doing? A-moving the majority of their army and just waiting for ht to come in range of the bio while its kiting chargelots.. And maybe focusing vikings with stalkers (though colossi really start losing their importance as the ghost numbers dwindle). If you lose focus for one second your army can just evaporate.
if your bias is this strong, you might as well don't comment.
Protoss can't just walk around their entire deathball back and forth without vision, this is why they constantly move their deathball AND obs (and spare obs nearby).
Unlike Terran who can move around with clear vision of army movement when it comes to actual engagement. (factory and scan)
your micro for Terran is not even correct.
You are meant to cloak and emp in pre engagement, not micro them mid way, thus the ghost/HT dance. (unless you doing emps during engagement, just like how HTs do storm...?)
You don't even need to split and kit for every engagement, you are meant to kite only if Toss is chargelot heavy and you don't have enough emps for chargelots and hts.
Toss deathball is so much more than just a move and storm.
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Why are you all so hellbent on changing protoss? Apart from the oracle, nothing in protoss is complained about by protoss players. If it doesn't feel nice to play against it as terran, why should we change protoss instead of terran? You have a race where it's admittedly impossible to make transitions, resulting in a lot of units hardly ever being produced, and you want to change the other? Things would be so much easier if terran wasn't the hero and protoss wasn't the villain.
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Personally, I'm in favor of DeMuslim's idea of giving Terran more options, instead of taking away Protoss options.
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EPT
