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On December 02 2011 02:41 BBQSAC wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2011 01:58 Kwanny wrote:On December 02 2011 01:43 BBQSAC wrote:
@ WaSa
I agree with what you are saying, Terran are definitely single player oriented and they are kinda the crutch of the fluff (or should i say lore as this isn't a GW game) which is why I think they are a jack of all trades. The expansions hopefully will sort out supply call-downs and just how good marines are all game long, but mostly I think some tweaks and changes to toss and zerg to increase their stylistic options will be better over all for the game. I know, not a balance thread, but terran economically, supply depots firstly cost more than overlords or pylons, and they take longer to build, aswell. Another note, all terran buildings basically cost 200 minerals + some gas (and longer to build), compared to 150 for each gateway. That's probably why there are still supply drops, and mules. It doesn't seem right to say that Terran buildings cost more because of lost SCV mining time seeing as Zerg lose the drone forever and need to replace it which means more larvae need to be spent on drones. It isn't as though Terran CC's are unable to build SCVs while barracks are building. By your logic a spawning pool costs a minimum of infinity + two zerglings. Terran also have mules which add to mineral gathering much more than build time detracts from it, therefore I would have to say there is no disadvantage with regards to fundamental economic mechanisms. As for marines, especially with stim + combat shield, WTF? Which would you prefer 10 chargelots, 20 marines or 40 cracklings? The marine, I think, needs to be a little less incredible as the OP has a point in that controlled marines devastate most of the stuff that's supposed to kill them and it doesn't need to be gosu control by any means. I have a friend that is as bronze as you can get and has been since season one and he very competently deals with banes and zealots and the like against much higher level opponents because the micro is not hard.
Your comparison with the drone isn't quite right, as that specific drone hasn't been made for the purpose of mining, but for the purpose of morphing to a building. You should consider that additional mining before morphing as an extra, and not think of future income as opportunity cost.
And at least you agree, that terran needs mules. That's exactly the point I'm trying to make, that terran needs mules in order to keep up with mineral income due to the race mechanics/costs. And regarding the supply drop: it hurts and punishes terran more to miss/lose a supply depot than a pylon or overlord (mainly buildtime 30 secs vs 25 for pylon, 25 overlord, but also lost minerals for the walking distance and building time).
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I completely agree with what OP said.
As i see it, there is clearly a game design flaw on how big engagements are processed in SC2, and the bigger the battle, the worse it gets.
Most if not all Terran units require defensive micro to be effective, and by defensive micro i mean you either micro your units or you die. This may be OK in small skirmishes but when a big fight takes place the ease with which you can lose all your stuff is uncanny.
To make things worse both protoss and zerg have this big aoe low micro units like banelings and colossus. And again this would not be a problem in a small engagement that allows you to focus on that specific combat and do your best micro like some sick marine split but it becomes a problem late game, like when you are sitting in the middle of the map with tanks, distracted by a thousand stuff going on like mutas picking off tanks and then suddenly comes an a-moved tsunami of banelings and speedlings that just clean everything off.
You may argue that this just my personal experience, but if you look at top top terran players like MvP, especialy the lastest games, this is definetly an issue. Even if you are playing great, doing damage all over the map, you can still lose everything, including tanks to just a mass of a-moved banelings.
Zerg could argue that banelings are highly inefficient against non-light units, however when the game reaches a certain point, this becomes a non-issue, because a) the core of the terran army was wiped b) zerg can remax much faster.
Note however that im not saying speedlings or banelings more specificly are imbalanced, i am just pointing out that for a unit that forces that much "defensive micro" it takes very little effort to use.
If baneling was removed and lurker was implemented again the matchup would become 10x better and more entertaining to watch right there.
The same happens in TvP.
Lets see how much "defensive micro" do you have to do.
- Try to emp the HT so you dont eat storms left and right.
- Kite zealots with marauders
- Dodge storms
- Micro vikings away from the stalkers if they get focused.
- Try to minimize colossus effect.
Failure in any of these will result in a lose right there, emp doesnt land, HT now have enough storm to cover everything, dont kite zealots efficiently ? marauders get wiped, fail do dodge a storm ? All units get in the red, lose too many vikings? Not enough dps on the colossus, colossus burn everything on the ground.
What does the protoss has to do if not aiming for maximum efficiency ? Put zealots in the front, a-move the ball and just focus microing the HT.
Again the same combination of offensive units that force defensive micro coupled with big aoe damage seems to be the issue here.
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On December 01 2011 22:02 petro1987 wrote: But have you guys ever stopped to think that it's not feasible for everyone to just keep getting better?
On December 02 2011 01:28 petro1987 wrote:
I've never said is not feasible to get better.
Lol, sure you didn't.
I know what you meant, but that's the game. If you can't get better because you have limited time, then go to this thread and this one so you can improve with minimal grinding. SC2 is not something you must have 300 apm to compete. A diamand/low master player probably already has the 120-ish that they need. They just need to make the right decisions.
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On December 02 2011 03:56 Alexstrasas wrote:
I completely agree with what OP said.
As i see it, there is clearly a game design flaw on how big engagements are processed in SC2, and the bigger the battle, the worse it gets.
Most if not all Terran units require defensive micro to be effective, and by defensive micro i mean you either micro your units or you die. This may be OK in small skirmishes but when a big fight takes place the ease with which you can lose all your stuff is uncanny.
To make things worse both protoss and zerg have this big aoe low micro units like banelings and colossus. And again this would not be a problem in a small engagement that allows you to focus on that specific combat and do your best micro like some sick marine split but it becomes a problem late game, like when you are sitting in the middle of the map with tanks, distracted by a thousand stuff going on like mutas picking off tanks and then suddenly comes an a-moved tsunami of banelings and speedlings that just clean everything off.
You may argue that this just my personal experience, but if you look at top top terran players like MvP, especialy the lastest games, this is definetly an issue. Even if you are playing great, doing damage all over the map, you can still lose everything, including tanks to just a mass of a-moved banelings.
Zerg could argue that banelings are highly inefficient against non-light units, however when the game reaches a certain point, this becomes a non-issue, because a) the core of the terran army was wiped b) zerg can remax much faster.
Note however that im not saying speedlings or banelings more specificly are imbalanced, i am just pointing out that for a unit that forces that much "defensive micro" it takes very little effort to use.
If baneling was removed and lurker was implemented again the matchup would become 10x better and more entertaining to watch right there.
The same happens in TvP.
Lets see how much "defensive micro" do you have to do.
- Try to emp the HT so you dont eat storms left and right.
- Kite zealots with marauders
- Dodge storms
- Micro vikings away from the stalkers if they get focused.
- Try to minimize colossus effect.
Failure in any of these will result in a lose right there, emp doesnt land, HT now have enough storm to cover everything, dont kite zealots efficiently ? marauders get wiped, fail do dodge a storm ? All units get in the red, lose too many vikings? Not enough dps on the colossus, colossus burn everything on the ground.
What does the protoss has to do if not aiming for maximum efficiency ? Put zealots in the front, a-move the ball and just focus microing the HT.
Again the same combination of offensive units that force defensive micro coupled with big aoe damage seems to be the issue here.
PLEASE show me a game that IMMVP lost in the late game to massive amounts of a-moved banelings.
Because when I watch MVP I see him insta target banelings with tanks and make them look like wasted supply.
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On December 02 2011 04:05 Flonomenalz wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2011 03:56 Alexstrasas wrote:
I completely agree with what OP said.
As i see it, there is clearly a game design flaw on how big engagements are processed in SC2, and the bigger the battle, the worse it gets.
Most if not all Terran units require defensive micro to be effective, and by defensive micro i mean you either micro your units or you die. This may be OK in small skirmishes but when a big fight takes place the ease with which you can lose all your stuff is uncanny.
To make things worse both protoss and zerg have this big aoe low micro units like banelings and colossus. And again this would not be a problem in a small engagement that allows you to focus on that specific combat and do your best micro like some sick marine split but it becomes a problem late game, like when you are sitting in the middle of the map with tanks, distracted by a thousand stuff going on like mutas picking off tanks and then suddenly comes an a-moved tsunami of banelings and speedlings that just clean everything off.
You may argue that this just my personal experience, but if you look at top top terran players like MvP, especialy the lastest games, this is definetly an issue. Even if you are playing great, doing damage all over the map, you can still lose everything, including tanks to just a mass of a-moved banelings.
Zerg could argue that banelings are highly inefficient against non-light units, however when the game reaches a certain point, this becomes a non-issue, because a) the core of the terran army was wiped b) zerg can remax much faster.
Note however that im not saying speedlings or banelings more specificly are imbalanced, i am just pointing out that for a unit that forces that much "defensive micro" it takes very little effort to use.
If baneling was removed and lurker was implemented again the matchup would become 10x better and more entertaining to watch right there.
The same happens in TvP.
Lets see how much "defensive micro" do you have to do.
- Try to emp the HT so you dont eat storms left and right.
- Kite zealots with marauders
- Dodge storms
- Micro vikings away from the stalkers if they get focused.
- Try to minimize colossus effect.
Failure in any of these will result in a lose right there, emp doesnt land, HT now have enough storm to cover everything, dont kite zealots efficiently ? marauders get wiped, fail do dodge a storm ? All units get in the red, lose too many vikings? Not enough dps on the colossus, colossus burn everything on the ground.
What does the protoss has to do if not aiming for maximum efficiency ? Put zealots in the front, a-move the ball and just focus microing the HT.
Again the same combination of offensive units that force defensive micro coupled with big aoe damage seems to be the issue here.
PLEASE show me a game that IMMVP lost in the late game to massive amounts of a-moved banelings. Because when I watch MVP I see him insta target banelings with tanks and make them look like wasted supply.
I think he was thinking about the Nada vs. Nestea game where banelings wiped the floor with a bunch of clumped up thors.
Those situations are rare though, if Z can afford enough banes to actually kill thors then he probably should win regardless.
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What comes to terran using high-tier units, thors were actually a really interesting unit when they had their energy removed and immortals only had 5 range. Who could forget Thorzains thor builds in the TSL? Thor/hellion actually seemed like a good alternative to bio for a while, one that wasn't so micro-intensive either. You really can just focus fire with thors at most, otherwise its a-move and hope to win.
Then Blizzard decided thors were a "support unit" and nerfed them again, before players even really had time to experiment with the unit. One of the weirdest decisions I've seen in the history of SC2.
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On December 02 2011 04:08 RavenLoud wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2011 04:05 Flonomenalz wrote:On December 02 2011 03:56 Alexstrasas wrote:
I completely agree with what OP said.
As i see it, there is clearly a game design flaw on how big engagements are processed in SC2, and the bigger the battle, the worse it gets.
Most if not all Terran units require defensive micro to be effective, and by defensive micro i mean you either micro your units or you die. This may be OK in small skirmishes but when a big fight takes place the ease with which you can lose all your stuff is uncanny.
To make things worse both protoss and zerg have this big aoe low micro units like banelings and colossus. And again this would not be a problem in a small engagement that allows you to focus on that specific combat and do your best micro like some sick marine split but it becomes a problem late game, like when you are sitting in the middle of the map with tanks, distracted by a thousand stuff going on like mutas picking off tanks and then suddenly comes an a-moved tsunami of banelings and speedlings that just clean everything off.
You may argue that this just my personal experience, but if you look at top top terran players like MvP, especialy the lastest games, this is definetly an issue. Even if you are playing great, doing damage all over the map, you can still lose everything, including tanks to just a mass of a-moved banelings.
Zerg could argue that banelings are highly inefficient against non-light units, however when the game reaches a certain point, this becomes a non-issue, because a) the core of the terran army was wiped b) zerg can remax much faster.
Note however that im not saying speedlings or banelings more specificly are imbalanced, i am just pointing out that for a unit that forces that much "defensive micro" it takes very little effort to use.
If baneling was removed and lurker was implemented again the matchup would become 10x better and more entertaining to watch right there.
The same happens in TvP.
Lets see how much "defensive micro" do you have to do.
- Try to emp the HT so you dont eat storms left and right.
- Kite zealots with marauders
- Dodge storms
- Micro vikings away from the stalkers if they get focused.
- Try to minimize colossus effect.
Failure in any of these will result in a lose right there, emp doesnt land, HT now have enough storm to cover everything, dont kite zealots efficiently ? marauders get wiped, fail do dodge a storm ? All units get in the red, lose too many vikings? Not enough dps on the colossus, colossus burn everything on the ground.
What does the protoss has to do if not aiming for maximum efficiency ? Put zealots in the front, a-move the ball and just focus microing the HT.
Again the same combination of offensive units that force defensive micro coupled with big aoe damage seems to be the issue here.
PLEASE show me a game that IMMVP lost in the late game to massive amounts of a-moved banelings. Because when I watch MVP I see him insta target banelings with tanks and make them look like wasted supply. I think he was thinking about the Nada vs. Nestea game where banelings wiped the floor with a bunch of clumped up thors. Those situations are rare though, if Z can afford enough banes to actually kill thors then he probably should win regardless.
That only worked because the Thors were clumped and Nada attacked right before his upgrade finished. Pretty unlucky. Or Nestea being a genius. Who knows? But if the upgrade finishes and those Thors are even a little less clumped, GG Nestea.
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As a terran play who switched from protoss a while ago, I must say I do agree with this post to a certain extent.
No matter what says, there are a few irrefutable points that we have to make.
1. Terran units are generally the most fragile out of the three races, in terms of production (2x zerglings = 70hp/marine = 45/55)
2. Terran (combat) units are ALL ranged
3. Terran units are generally specialized to deal with specific threats. Besides the generalized Marine (which I will admit, probably the best unit in the game), all of their units have specific counters and weaknesses.
Now, we'll see how each of these points factors into why Terran may be balanced at high levels, but fall off a little bit in mid and low-level play.
1: Fragility means you must be careful with your engagements. A part of your army left in a storm for too long, or an unscanned baneling mine will decimate a portion of your forces, while a Protoss or Zerg army will still be alive (and dealing DPS).
2. Ranged units means that you are fundamentally stronger, since you can hit them from further away. But coupled with fact one, you will need to actually exploit your range, be it terrain, or kiting, for maximum effectiveness. 4 marines can easily take out 8 slowlings with proper micro, but don't stand a chance if they sit still.
3. Specialized units means that you must carefully cater your composition to handle specific threats. Marauders are amazing against roaches, but don't fare well against Zerglings and cannot even retaliate against mutalisks. Siege tanks are expensive but can eradicate ground forces, but must require careful positioning and sieging at the right time for maximum effectiveness.
With these points combined, it really does support the argument that OP is trying to make. To be honest though, I think this is the trademark of Terran. It'll be interesting to see what Blizzard adds or changes in HotS.
EDIT: Typo, added an extra sentence.
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On December 02 2011 04:08 Bagi wrote:
What comes to terran using high-tier units, thors were actually a really interesting unit when they had their energy removed and immortals only had 5 range. Who could forget Thorzains thor builds in the TSL? Thor/hellion actually seemed like a good alternative to bio for a while, one that wasn't so micro-intensive either. You really can just focus fire with thors at most, otherwise its a-move and hope to win.
Then Blizzard decided thors were a "support unit" and nerfed them again, before players even really had time to experiment with the unit. One of the weirdest decisions I've seen in the history of SC2.
The decision made perfect sense looking at the game and other thor builds coming out at the time. Jjijaki's observer sniping build is one I have waited to see for a long while.
More to the point, why can't ghosts emping your own thors/ BCs make such builds viable? Essentially the inclusion of energy potentially neutered certain timings. Now when you move your ball of metal death across the map, you merely have to emp your units before the energy reaches crippling heights. Considering what people used to do to avoid rogue vulture mine placement it doesn't seem too high a hurdle.
*I say timing fully aware of the increased gas costs. Maybe replace any hellion component of the build with additional marines ?
small Marine/ghost force accompanying your thor force?
edit: all the complaints about zealots though seem insane. I understand you like winning but do you want some sort of competition? or back to TvT all the time?
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As i see it, the problem is the a-move AI of especially zealots with charge and speedlings. Zeals without charge and slow lings gives some really nice microbattles with each other and with marines so i guess its the micro-discouraging upgrades that is the problem. They make up for the upgrades with battle helions in HOTS, but that may just dumb down terran which imo is a bad thing.
And the Colossus is probably the easiest unit in the game. Vision of everything, close to no collision, attack that deals tons of damage with no micro required, and little positioning required while still covering insane distances. I have no clue why they make Thors unique and not the Colossus.
I am Platinum League and if they 'fixed' these two, the TvZ and TvP matchups would be at least double the fun.
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It's Warp Tech and Weak Terran Mech (Against P) that is biting our Terran asses really.
I don't like playing Bio very much, especially not in the lategame. I'm hoping for HOTS but I'm not sure.
Also if Protoss manages to turtle and defend drops/allins and get up 3+ bases they get so strong lategame.
In the scenarios we're I'm fighting while trying to macro lategame i always feels its so much easier as P. Just warping in some Chargelots to your ball and a-move and the terran needs to spend valuable seconds kiting while you macro up nicely.
I've been Terran/Random since Beta but i still can play PvT almost as decently as TvP. My lategame PvT is better imo  .
All the all-ins you can do as Terran makes it hard to balance - because at that stage it's always much harder for the P to hold them then for the Terran to kill them.
It's not really a balance issue, the matchup just feels wierd. Both races are fragile in different points of the game (Which i guess is fair, but i still dislike it) TvZ is soo much better  .
Maybe Terrans just have to get used to playing against the clock or switch? Gah i wish i could enjoy half ZvZ as much as i enjoy TvT
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On December 02 2011 04:08 Bagi wrote:
What comes to terran using high-tier units, thors were actually a really interesting unit when they had their energy removed and immortals only had 5 range. Who could forget Thorzains thor builds in the TSL? Thor/hellion actually seemed like a good alternative to bio for a while, one that wasn't so micro-intensive either. You really can just focus fire with thors at most, otherwise its a-move and hope to win.
Then Blizzard decided thors were a "support unit" and nerfed them again, before players even really had time to experiment with the unit. One of the weirdest decisions I've seen in the history of SC2.
I'm still waiting for the revival of thor banshee marine timing attacks (or even late game switch!). Seems like terrans are silently protesting and not getting thors in TvP at all. Bliz probably anticipated that it would be too good against toss so they renerfed it.
I think the immortal is a really badly designed "hard counter" unit too. When I talked with one of my Dota/Wc3 fan friends about watching SC2, he said he was turned off by those types of rock paper scissor units in SC2 and that BW is way better to watch.
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On December 02 2011 03:56 Alexstrasas wrote:
I completely agree with what OP said.
As i see it, there is clearly a game design flaw on how big engagements are processed in SC2, and the bigger the battle, the worse it gets.
Most if not all Terran units require defensive micro to be effective, and by defensive micro i mean you either micro your units or you die. This may be OK in small skirmishes but when a big fight takes place the ease with which you can lose all your stuff is uncanny.
To make things worse both protoss and zerg have this big aoe low micro units like banelings and colossus. And again this would not be a problem in a small engagement that allows you to focus on that specific combat and do your best micro like some sick marine split but it becomes a problem late game, like when you are sitting in the middle of the map with tanks, distracted by a thousand stuff going on like mutas picking off tanks and then suddenly comes an a-moved tsunami of banelings and speedlings that just clean everything off.
You may argue that this just my personal experience, but if you look at top top terran players like MvP, especialy the lastest games, this is definetly an issue. Even if you are playing great, doing damage all over the map, you can still lose everything, including tanks to just a mass of a-moved banelings.
Zerg could argue that banelings are highly inefficient against non-light units, however when the game reaches a certain point, this becomes a non-issue, because a) the core of the terran army was wiped b) zerg can remax much faster.
Note however that im not saying speedlings or banelings more specificly are imbalanced, i am just pointing out that for a unit that forces that much "defensive micro" it takes very little effort to use.
If baneling was removed and lurker was implemented again the matchup would become 10x better and more entertaining to watch right there.
The same happens in TvP.
Lets see how much "defensive micro" do you have to do.
- Try to emp the HT so you dont eat storms left and right.
- Kite zealots with marauders
- Dodge storms
- Micro vikings away from the stalkers if they get focused.
- Try to minimize colossus effect.
Failure in any of these will result in a lose right there, emp doesnt land, HT now have enough storm to cover everything, dont kite zealots efficiently ? marauders get wiped, fail do dodge a storm ? All units get in the red, lose too many vikings? Not enough dps on the colossus, colossus burn everything on the ground.
What does the protoss has to do if not aiming for maximum efficiency ? Put zealots in the front, a-move the ball and just focus microing the HT.
Again the same combination of offensive units that force defensive micro coupled with big aoe damage seems to be the issue here.
Lists of the micro people have to do are not helpful because everyone has a huge list of things that may or may not be just as hard. Its not like there is a Random player who is top 20 (which by the way would be awesome so we could get some of these questions answered).
I play random and I find my winrate with all races is within the margin of error. I don't understand how you can just state, "terran micro is the hardest" then list whatever you want. I can make lists for every race that range from simple to complex.
If you are at the level where terran is stim kiting and engaging in even rudimentary splits, A-moving banelings does not work well, nor do poorly placed FF's work (actually FF's that are placed poorly sometimes hurt the Protoss). IMO feedbacking ghosts is 2-3x harder than EMPing templars/infestors, but I think storm placement is fairly easy. Vikings/Corruptors are just as easy to use as Colossus, I think.
FF placement is easily the most unforgiving micro tactic, but it does have a skill cap that is low enough for most of us to achieve, while marine splitting is hard to do perfectly. On the other hand, perfect Zealot Charge micro would be absurdly devastating, and no one ever talks about that as part of the Protoss skill cap, very few people talk about how perfect creep spread could probably cover the entire map by the 10 minute mark (and open up a ton more micro options for zerg).
With some empirical evidence (not a sampling of 10 foreign players) I'd be willing to accept the Terran=hardmode argument, but listing random things is not helpful.
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On December 02 2011 04:19 cLutZ wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2011 03:56 Alexstrasas wrote:
I completely agree with what OP said.
As i see it, there is clearly a game design flaw on how big engagements are processed in SC2, and the bigger the battle, the worse it gets.
Most if not all Terran units require defensive micro to be effective, and by defensive micro i mean you either micro your units or you die. This may be OK in small skirmishes but when a big fight takes place the ease with which you can lose all your stuff is uncanny.
To make things worse both protoss and zerg have this big aoe low micro units like banelings and colossus. And again this would not be a problem in a small engagement that allows you to focus on that specific combat and do your best micro like some sick marine split but it becomes a problem late game, like when you are sitting in the middle of the map with tanks, distracted by a thousand stuff going on like mutas picking off tanks and then suddenly comes an a-moved tsunami of banelings and speedlings that just clean everything off.
You may argue that this just my personal experience, but if you look at top top terran players like MvP, especialy the lastest games, this is definetly an issue. Even if you are playing great, doing damage all over the map, you can still lose everything, including tanks to just a mass of a-moved banelings.
Zerg could argue that banelings are highly inefficient against non-light units, however when the game reaches a certain point, this becomes a non-issue, because a) the core of the terran army was wiped b) zerg can remax much faster.
Note however that im not saying speedlings or banelings more specificly are imbalanced, i am just pointing out that for a unit that forces that much "defensive micro" it takes very little effort to use.
If baneling was removed and lurker was implemented again the matchup would become 10x better and more entertaining to watch right there.
The same happens in TvP.
Lets see how much "defensive micro" do you have to do.
- Try to emp the HT so you dont eat storms left and right.
- Kite zealots with marauders
- Dodge storms
- Micro vikings away from the stalkers if they get focused.
- Try to minimize colossus effect.
Failure in any of these will result in a lose right there, emp doesnt land, HT now have enough storm to cover everything, dont kite zealots efficiently ? marauders get wiped, fail do dodge a storm ? All units get in the red, lose too many vikings? Not enough dps on the colossus, colossus burn everything on the ground.
What does the protoss has to do if not aiming for maximum efficiency ? Put zealots in the front, a-move the ball and just focus microing the HT.
Again the same combination of offensive units that force defensive micro coupled with big aoe damage seems to be the issue here.
Lists of the micro people have to do are not helpful because everyone has a huge list of things that may or may not be just as hard. Its not like there is a Random player who is top 20 (which by the way would be awesome so we could get some of these questions answered). I play random and I find my winrate with all races is within the margin of error. I don't understand how you can just state, "terran micro is the hardest" then list whatever you want. I can make lists for every race that range from simple to complex. If you are at the level where terran is stim kiting and engaging in even rudimentary splits, A-moving banelings does not work well, nor do poorly placed FF's work (actually FF's that are placed poorly sometimes hurt the Protoss). IMO feedbacking ghosts is 2-3x harder than EMPing templars/infestors, but I think storm placement is fairly easy. Vikings/Corruptors are just as easy to use as Colossus, I think. FF placement is easily the most unforgiving micro tactic, but it does have a skill cap that is low enough for most of us to achieve, while marine splitting is hard to do perfectly. On the other hand, perfect Zealot Charge micro would be absurdly devastating, and no one ever talks about that as part of the Protoss skill cap, very few people talk about how perfect creep spread could probably cover the entire map by the 10 minute mark (and open up a ton more micro options for zerg). With some empirical evidence (not a sampling of 10 foreign players) I'd be willing to accept the Terran=hardmode argument, but listing random things is not helpful.
Cool post and it's even cooler that your are random.
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On December 02 2011 04:14 Sabu113 wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2011 04:08 Bagi wrote:
What comes to terran using high-tier units, thors were actually a really interesting unit when they had their energy removed and immortals only had 5 range. Who could forget Thorzains thor builds in the TSL? Thor/hellion actually seemed like a good alternative to bio for a while, one that wasn't so micro-intensive either. You really can just focus fire with thors at most, otherwise its a-move and hope to win.
Then Blizzard decided thors were a "support unit" and nerfed them again, before players even really had time to experiment with the unit. One of the weirdest decisions I've seen in the history of SC2. The decision made perfect sense looking at the game and other thor builds coming out at the time. Jjijaki's observer sniping build is one I have waited to see for a long while. More to the point, why can't ghosts emping your own thors/ BCs make such builds viable? Essentially the inclusion of energy potentially neutered certain timings. Now when you move your ball of metal death across the map, you merely have to emp your units before the energy reaches crippling heights. Considering what people used to do to avoid rogue vulture mine placement it doesn't seem too high a hurdle.
Well, using the old strike cannons was a big part of the strategy as you could disable immortals with them. EMPing means you won't be able to do that.
I'd say the immortal range is an even bigger problem though, the one thing thors had over immortals was 2 extra range which allowed them to either use cannons or just FF them quickly. Now immortals are sure to get some shots in before they go down. Thors mow down gateway units with ease, but I'm pretty convinced that immortal/colossus beats thors cost-for-cost no problem.
You can still make a decent 1-2 base all-in with thors but it becomes impossible to keep up in army strength in the long run. Thors are also so ridiculously slow that your only hope is to crush the protoss ball head on, you don't have all the options to outmaneuver your opponent that you get with bio.
BC's were never viable to begin with really.
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On December 02 2011 04:15 Osteriet wrote:
As i see it, the problem is the a-move AI of especially zealots with charge and speedlings. Zeals without charge and slow lings gives some really nice microbattles with each other and with marines so i guess its the micro-discouraging upgrades that is the problem. They make up for the upgrades with battle helions in HOTS, but that may just dumb down terran which imo is a bad thing.
And the Colossus is probably the easiest unit in the game. Vision of everything, close to no collision, attack that deals tons of damage with no micro required, and little positioning required while still covering insane distances. I have no clue why they make Thors unique and not the Colossus.
I am Platinum League and if they 'fixed' these two, the TvZ and TvP matchups would be at least double the fun.
Agree with this 100%, the whole point i was trying to make in my own post.
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I think the issue of different micro requirements is a general problem of SC2.
Due to the easier mechanics macroing has become way easier than it was in BW for instance. This on the other hand means that players should be able to focus more on battles.
Look at WC3 for example. The macro mechanics were pretty rudimentary and not such an important factor, games were decided in the battles. And those were amazing to watch imo and also insanely difficult. If you watch high-level WC3 players micro, it is really impressive.
Looking at SC2 it is somehow between BW and WC3. Macro is more demanding than it is in Warcraft, but a lot less apm-intensive than it is in BW.
By that logic micro in battles should be relatively important in SC2, as it is the case with WC3.
Looking at WC3 though, you will realize that all 4 races demand a ton of micro in battles in order to come out victorious.
In SC2 I have the feeling the micro-bility of the races' units differ a lot.
It actually gets to the point where the micro of one race can completely negate any micro efforts from the other races.
Examples:
- Terran/Zerg engages a Protoss early game. Protoss lands very good force fields. The battle will end in the Protoss' favour
and the T/Z can't do anything about it.
- Terran has 6 ghosts, scans ahead and sees aToss army. T cloaks the ghosts and EMPs the whole Toss army, then stims runs in and kills the Protoss. No matter how good you are as Protoss, this "mistake" costs you the game, you can't win the engagement since you can hardly run from a Terran army.
And this is plainly bad. If a good Terran lands good EMPs it is most of the time GG. You can't micro against it. You can't micro against FF, nore Fungal.
On top of this different units benefit differently from micro. Look at the difference between a microed and unmicroed marine/marauder: These units become so much stronger in the hands of a good player.
Why is a Banshee able to kite marines, but Stalker's not? Look at how pathetic Stalkers look when trying to kite Marines.
Due to animation issues microing Stalkers is a farce.
Don't get me started about Zerg units. Someone quoted Day9 saying: "If you lose to Roaches, your macro was bad. There is nothing special about Roaches." In other words: There is almost no difference between the Roach control of a pro and a "good" player. What you wanna do with Hydras, Corrupters, Lings, Ultras or Broodlords other than a-moving?
So far - apart from ling-bling mirror wars - no Zerg has impressed me with great unit control. I feel like there is no Zerg excelling because of how he controls his armies during battles.
To me it looks like good Zergs need to stay on top of their macro (which is difficult I admit) and adequately prepare for the crap Terrans and Tosses throw at them.
But when it comes to late game Zerg vs T/P engagements, I feel that the Zerg's victory depends on the Terran and Protoss messing up their micro, not on the Zerg controlling their units in a superior fashion.
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On December 02 2011 02:48 aTnClouD wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2011 02:44 superstartran wrote:On December 01 2011 09:53 aTnClouD wrote:On December 01 2011 09:34 ZenithM wrote:On December 01 2011 09:21 aTnClouD wrote:On December 01 2011 08:55 ZenithM wrote:On December 01 2011 08:24 XRaDiiX wrote:On December 01 2011 07:02 aTnClouD wrote:
Well terran is by an huge amount the hardest race in the game, no doubt. I am not sure if the game is balanced at the current korean highest level but I can see for sure the level of knowledge and mechanics protoss and zerg require is incomparably inferior. Especially protoss. Zerg can be hard aswell but to a very good and experienced mechanical player from scbw there's not much else to learn. This is the reason foreign terrans do bad. They simply don't have a structure and practice with good enough players to keep up with korean terrans so they just lose to the easier to play races. I agree with your post 100% i have a hard time respecting Protoss players as much (at my level) because of how easier IMO personal opinion the Race is . I agree with you that Terran is probably the Hardest Race at the High Level (Top Master, GM) I play ZvT and i love it i feel its balanced and all really well ---PvZ (I don't feel its balanced at my level (Mid Master). I really think Protoss is the Strongest Race at Certain levels (maybe the Strongest possibly at levels a little lower than Nestea,MVP) Although Naniwa has proven this wrong in the Latest MLG. (He beat the two best Players(Beating Nestea Twice in a B03) in world with Protoss) Which actually reinforces your Argument. So with that happening at MLG i really think it brings into attention how strong Protoss really is in terms of balance. (Hero won Dreamhack Winter too (Not to take anything away from that He's an amazing player) Yeah, let's shit on every Protoss player regardless of their actual skill. What you don't understand is that your master gameplay is not comparable to ClouD's gameplay. And I would go as far as to say that ClouD's gameplay is not comparable to Nestea, MVP, and Naniwa (yeah, deal with it, Naniwa is a good player). Goddammit man, these three are training non stop in Korea while ClouD takes his time posting balance whine (twice!) on a trash thread on TL. Who do you think will win the most?? Protoss...obviously. You know top players don't spend every single second of their life practicing. If I post here just because I am used to do so for years and state protoss is way easier to play than terran it doesn't mean I am less dedicated than any of the other players you consider better than me. Actually I've talked to Naniwa recently and he told me he takes his time to do what he likes to do just as much or more than I do. Thing is you don't have to try to shit on my image just because I said a race takes considerably less skill and effort to be played at a foreign high level, because it doesn't change the reality of what I'm saying or the fact every foreign tournament result completely proves my point. Yeah, sorry, I admit I went out of line there. Wasn't trying to imply that you're not good or anything. So what do you propose? Wait for HotS? Straight up buff Terran? Terran still seems pretty strong at the GSL (in Code A today for example, no Protoss won). I don't think we're at a level of imbalance where a much worse player than you can beat you if he plays Protoss (http://sc2ranks.com/ranks/eu you don't lose much btw, gj ;D), so I don't really understand why you complain. And in my book you got a pretty decent run at DH where you beat Naniwa, a protoss. Is it just the feeling when you're playing? That you must do much more than the other guy to win? I say it doesn't matter if you still win, it's that much more satisfying. It's just weird that you, a good player with 76% winrate in EU GM, want to have your race made easier to play. But I mean, I kinda understand in a way, your livelihood depends on it, not mine. I think this game was made wrong for a tons of reasons and I am just frustrated cause I ended up getting the shortest end of the stick. When I see players like Seiplo who can't even explain why they do what they do randomly beating players 10 times better than them at DH and a monster like Kas playing all day long the best players in Europe losing in the groupstage like he did then I can't help but thinking this game is bad and unfair. Of course there are really good protoss players and they get the merit they deserve, but in Europe there's so many joke all in protoss players who just randomly take risks and can win because the race just requires no mechanics (bling or elfi being other good examples) and can be played with overall very poor understanding of RTS. I mean look at Titan he's actually a really good and skilled protoss player, he picked up the game very late and it took him very little time to compete at the highest level in Europe. There's nothing to do right now, this game has been fucked up by the bad pathing that makes units clump too much, the smart casting system and super smart AI a-move units. Also warpgate mechanic is ridicolous and makes me wonder if blizzard balance team has any clue about how RTS games work since the distance between production buildings and where you want to have your units is one of the biggest things a player has to consider in order to perform well. So I'm assuming you raged alot in BW when Protoss players were doing 1a move with 2 base Carrier on every map that they could right? I love how in BW people just simply accepted the fact that Terran players had to work harder for their wins, and yet over here despite the fact that Terran players have dominated both the foreign and international scene in terms of overall tournament wins, that they can't accept the fact that Protoss players might have finally figured out how to actually win for once after getting NUMEROUS amounts of nerfs. I was protoss in brood war and while I always admitted it was a bit easier it still took insane skill, multitasking macro and micro to play protoss at high level while the skill ceiling for protoss in sc2 is just so low even really bad players can touch some of it. It's not fair even for the good protoss players who get to face bad players in their broken mirror and lose to them cause the game is flawed.
Is this some kind of a joke?
You could beat a FAR significantly better Terran player just by running dumb shit like bulldog reaver drop styles or just simply a-moving when he makes a crucial positional mistake with his Tanks. It took infinitely more skill to ever play Terran than it did to play Protoss in BW, it's just not even anywhere close. Just standard 2 base Carrier was like lol ez for Protoss to beat Terran on a plethora of maps, even if he goes double armory Goliaths.
Yes, alot of good P players lose because of mirror match-ups in SC2. However, I don't think anyone is ever going to dispute the fact that the game should be balanced around top level play. And right now at top level play, this is almost as balanced as it has ever been. You have Terran players still placing very high all around, and Zerg AND Protoss players finishing with good results in the recent major tournaments.
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On December 02 2011 04:41 Iamyournoob wrote:
I think the issue of different micro requirements is a general problem of SC2.
Due to the easier mechanics macroing has become way easier than it was in BW for instance. This on the other hand means that players should be able to focus more on battles.
Look at WC3 for example. The macro mechanics were pretty rudimentary and not such an important factor, games were decided in the battles. And those were amazing to watch imo and also insanely difficult. If you watch high-level WC3 players micro, it is really impressive.
Looking at SC2 it is somehow between BW and WC3. Macro is more demanding than it is in Warcraft, but a lot less apm-intensive than it is in BW.
By that logic micro in battles should be relatively important in SC2, as it is the case with WC3.
Looking at WC3 though, you will realize that all 4 races demand a ton of micro in battles in order to come out victorious.
In SC2 I have the feeling the micro-bility of the races' units differ a lot.
It actually gets to the point where the micro of one race can completely negate any micro efforts from the other races.
Examples:
- Terran/Zerg engages a Protoss early game. Protoss lands very good force fields. The battle will end in the Protoss' favour
and the T/Z can't do anything about it.
- Terran has 6 ghosts, scans ahead and sees aToss army. T cloaks the ghosts and EMPs the whole Toss army, then stims runs in and kills the Protoss. No matter how good you are as Protoss, this "mistake" costs you the game, you can't win the engagement since you can hardly run from a Terran army.
And this is plainly bad. If a good Terran lands good EMPs it is most of the time GG. You can't micro against it. You can't micro against FF, nore Fungal.
On top of this different units benefit differently from micro. Look at the difference between a microed and unmicroed marine/marauder: These units become so much stronger in the hands of a good player.
Why is a Banshee able to kite marines, but Stalker's not? Look at how pathetic Stalkers look when trying to kite Marines.
Due to animation issues microing Stalkers is a farce.
Don't get me started about Zerg units. Someone quoted Day9 saying: "If you lose to Roaches, your macro was bad. There is nothing special about Roaches." In other words: There is almost no difference between the Roach control of a pro and a "good" player. What you wanna do with Hydras, Corrupters, Lings, Ultras or Broodlords other than a-moving?
So far - apart from ling-bling mirror wars - no Zerg has impressed me with great unit control. I feel like there is no Zerg excelling because of how he controls his armies during battles.
To me it looks like good Zergs need to stay on top of their macro (which is difficult I admit) and adequately prepare for the crap Terrans and Tosses throw at them.
But when it comes to late game Zerg vs T/P engagements, I feel that the Zerg's victory depends on the Terran and Protoss messing up their micro, not on the Zerg controlling their units in a superior fashion.
Theres a few things I disagree with, first off if your army gets scanned you might not want to stand still and more so the toss should have a scouting observer ahead of his army by this point when they KNOW ghosts will be out. Its easy to send a small pack of stalkers/chargelots to pick off someone the ghosts, because most terrans will want to lead with them.
One thing to note is that I dont think perfectly landed emp's are auto GG at all, I think with the reduction in shield upgrades costs combined with the fact that many toss go double forge these days means that while the toss army won't be as efficient from the emp the lag of production compared between the races allows the toss to still be effective. Also if the toss is able to save a colossus or 2 and a few units, they are still able to defend what should be a damaged Terran army. This is happened to me time and time again, and its double sad when they are the one attacking but have a pylon in front of my base and able to resupply almost instantly.
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On December 02 2011 04:57 superstartran wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2011 02:48 aTnClouD wrote:On December 02 2011 02:44 superstartran wrote:On December 01 2011 09:53 aTnClouD wrote:On December 01 2011 09:34 ZenithM wrote:On December 01 2011 09:21 aTnClouD wrote:On December 01 2011 08:55 ZenithM wrote:On December 01 2011 08:24 XRaDiiX wrote:On December 01 2011 07:02 aTnClouD wrote:
Well terran is by an huge amount the hardest race in the game, no doubt. I am not sure if the game is balanced at the current korean highest level but I can see for sure the level of knowledge and mechanics protoss and zerg require is incomparably inferior. Especially protoss. Zerg can be hard aswell but to a very good and experienced mechanical player from scbw there's not much else to learn. This is the reason foreign terrans do bad. They simply don't have a structure and practice with good enough players to keep up with korean terrans so they just lose to the easier to play races. I agree with your post 100% i have a hard time respecting Protoss players as much (at my level) because of how easier IMO personal opinion the Race is . I agree with you that Terran is probably the Hardest Race at the High Level (Top Master, GM) I play ZvT and i love it i feel its balanced and all really well ---PvZ (I don't feel its balanced at my level (Mid Master). I really think Protoss is the Strongest Race at Certain levels (maybe the Strongest possibly at levels a little lower than Nestea,MVP) Although Naniwa has proven this wrong in the Latest MLG. (He beat the two best Players(Beating Nestea Twice in a B03) in world with Protoss) Which actually reinforces your Argument. So with that happening at MLG i really think it brings into attention how strong Protoss really is in terms of balance. (Hero won Dreamhack Winter too (Not to take anything away from that He's an amazing player) Yeah, let's shit on every Protoss player regardless of their actual skill. What you don't understand is that your master gameplay is not comparable to ClouD's gameplay. And I would go as far as to say that ClouD's gameplay is not comparable to Nestea, MVP, and Naniwa (yeah, deal with it, Naniwa is a good player). Goddammit man, these three are training non stop in Korea while ClouD takes his time posting balance whine (twice!) on a trash thread on TL. Who do you think will win the most?? Protoss...obviously. You know top players don't spend every single second of their life practicing. If I post here just because I am used to do so for years and state protoss is way easier to play than terran it doesn't mean I am less dedicated than any of the other players you consider better than me. Actually I've talked to Naniwa recently and he told me he takes his time to do what he likes to do just as much or more than I do. Thing is you don't have to try to shit on my image just because I said a race takes considerably less skill and effort to be played at a foreign high level, because it doesn't change the reality of what I'm saying or the fact every foreign tournament result completely proves my point. Yeah, sorry, I admit I went out of line there. Wasn't trying to imply that you're not good or anything. So what do you propose? Wait for HotS? Straight up buff Terran? Terran still seems pretty strong at the GSL (in Code A today for example, no Protoss won). I don't think we're at a level of imbalance where a much worse player than you can beat you if he plays Protoss (http://sc2ranks.com/ranks/eu you don't lose much btw, gj ;D), so I don't really understand why you complain. And in my book you got a pretty decent run at DH where you beat Naniwa, a protoss. Is it just the feeling when you're playing? That you must do much more than the other guy to win? I say it doesn't matter if you still win, it's that much more satisfying. It's just weird that you, a good player with 76% winrate in EU GM, want to have your race made easier to play. But I mean, I kinda understand in a way, your livelihood depends on it, not mine. I think this game was made wrong for a tons of reasons and I am just frustrated cause I ended up getting the shortest end of the stick. When I see players like Seiplo who can't even explain why they do what they do randomly beating players 10 times better than them at DH and a monster like Kas playing all day long the best players in Europe losing in the groupstage like he did then I can't help but thinking this game is bad and unfair. Of course there are really good protoss players and they get the merit they deserve, but in Europe there's so many joke all in protoss players who just randomly take risks and can win because the race just requires no mechanics (bling or elfi being other good examples) and can be played with overall very poor understanding of RTS. I mean look at Titan he's actually a really good and skilled protoss player, he picked up the game very late and it took him very little time to compete at the highest level in Europe. There's nothing to do right now, this game has been fucked up by the bad pathing that makes units clump too much, the smart casting system and super smart AI a-move units. Also warpgate mechanic is ridicolous and makes me wonder if blizzard balance team has any clue about how RTS games work since the distance between production buildings and where you want to have your units is one of the biggest things a player has to consider in order to perform well. So I'm assuming you raged alot in BW when Protoss players were doing 1a move with 2 base Carrier on every map that they could right? I love how in BW people just simply accepted the fact that Terran players had to work harder for their wins, and yet over here despite the fact that Terran players have dominated both the foreign and international scene in terms of overall tournament wins, that they can't accept the fact that Protoss players might have finally figured out how to actually win for once after getting NUMEROUS amounts of nerfs. I was protoss in brood war and while I always admitted it was a bit easier it still took insane skill, multitasking macro and micro to play protoss at high level while the skill ceiling for protoss in sc2 is just so low even really bad players can touch some of it. It's not fair even for the good protoss players who get to face bad players in their broken mirror and lose to them cause the game is flawed. Is this some kind of a joke? You could beat a FAR significantly better Terran player just by running dumb shit like bulldog reaver drop styles or just simply a-moving when he makes a crucial positional mistake with his Tanks. It took infinitely more skill to ever play Terran than it did to play Protoss in BW, it's just not even anywhere close.
Lol calm down with the hyperbole. From what I understand, Cloud is just saying that the skill ceiling for protoss is much lower in SC2 than Sc1, that's all.
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EPT
