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Active: 711 users

Unit Clumping in SC2 - Good or Bad - Page 5

Forum Index > SC2 General
Post a Reply
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magnaflow
Profile Joined August 2011
Canada1521 Posts
December 29 2011 05:51 GMT
#81
Unfortunatley only 1 of 3 races actually have to micro, and if you fuck it up the game is over
UmiNotsuki
Profile Blog Joined April 2011
United States633 Posts
December 29 2011 05:55 GMT
#82
I think it's just a basic nature of SC2; without it, the game would have to be dramatically reworked because otherwise marines would be terrible in large numbers due to issues with getting in range, for instance, so they'd have to buff marines greatly to make them useful later on, which would make them overpowered in the early game so they'd have to either buff other race's early games or change the entire Terran economy system which in turn...

You see where I'm going with this.
UmiNotsuki.111 (NA), UNTReborn.932 (EU), UmiNotsuki (iCCup) -- You see that text I wrote above this? I'll betcha $5 that you disagree :D
dekarp
Profile Joined December 2011
286 Posts
December 29 2011 06:02 GMT
#83
On December 29 2011 12:13 CampinSam wrote:
As noted before, it is not visually appealing when you see a ball of units, clumped together, trying to do something.

I absolutely adore watching broodwar, and honestly wish that I could have enjoyed the time that broodwar was popular.
Course, I'm stuck with SC2 now, so I guess I'll just have to deal.


No one is forcing you to watch SC2, it's not something you're stuck with... especially since Brood War is still living and the PL is ongoing.

https://dotabuff.com/players/110773298 divinereps on reddit.
Josh_rakoons
Profile Joined December 2011
United Kingdom1158 Posts
December 29 2011 06:08 GMT
#84
Could of added a poll :/ oh well.
Delvin
Profile Joined August 2007
Finland141 Posts
December 29 2011 06:16 GMT
#85
On December 29 2011 14:49 Carmine wrote:
Thread is pointless. The movement system is fluid and the units move well. The AoE units were designed around current clumping (storm size and tank nerfed relative to BW). So, if anything, Blizzard would just nerf AoE units more instead of redesigning the way all the units move.

Non-issue. If clumping is reduced we can easily rebalance AoE back to their original values (storm radius was massively nerfed exactly because of this -- emp too recently).

Plenty of examples already provided in this thread and the previous one that show why less clumping looks so much better.
jellyjello
Profile Joined March 2011
Korea (South)664 Posts
December 29 2011 06:17 GMT
#86
On December 29 2011 14:31 OopsOopsBaby wrote:
[image loading]

self explanatory pic.


Each unit has a dotted circle under them. Those circles shouldn't be overlapping each other. That would make the clumping more realistic in visual way.
nttea
Profile Blog Joined July 2008
Sweden4353 Posts
December 29 2011 06:26 GMT
#87
oh shit! did we go back in time or what is this?
aka_star
Profile Blog Joined July 2007
United Kingdom1546 Posts
December 29 2011 06:26 GMT
#88
I often struggle vs Tanks as my units keep clumping up so I'd like to see it changed in some way.
FlashDave.999 aka Star
WCX
Profile Joined July 2011
74 Posts
December 29 2011 06:29 GMT
#89
dustin browder already answered the question about clumping in various interviews at several different points in time. it is basically a result of sc2's improved pathfinding, and it's not going away. to paraphrase him, blizz has no intentions of gimping their pathfinding just so it can unclump units.
Golbat
Profile Blog Joined September 2011
United States499 Posts
December 29 2011 06:32 GMT
#90
In Age of Empires, you have different formation options for your armies. I think that if blizzard added a similar idea, where you could select if you wanted a tightly packed (Clumpy) ball or if you wanted a more spaced out (Split) ball. The clumpy option would make the units form a deathball like they do currently, and the spaced option would cause the units to double their spacing or some such. that way, for zerglings for example, you would be able to reduce (albeit however slightly) the damage a siege line would do as you were running up, or reduce the amount of marines killed by a baneling landmine.
Like why do u use an oven instead of a fire? Coz its fucking better at cooking, that doesnt mean you want the shit to burn.
SpaceFighting
Profile Joined January 2010
New Zealand690 Posts
December 29 2011 06:32 GMT
#91
On December 29 2011 11:58 leo23 wrote:
Show nested quote +
On December 29 2011 11:56 DibujEx wrote:
On December 29 2011 11:54 PhiliBiRD wrote:
its intended because it forces micro, otherwise the game would be even easier. and ive never heard much about this ever being an issue o_O. seems fine to me


I gotta say, In BW they didnt clump up.. and it was So much hard than SCII to micro...


harder to micro because the units were retarded (dragoon)


lmao yup.. so true
kuz pro
Dissonance23
Profile Joined September 2010
United States259 Posts
December 29 2011 06:35 GMT
#92
On December 29 2011 14:51 magnaflow wrote:
Unfortunatley only 1 of 3 races actually have to micro, and if you fuck it up the game is over


Z in ZvZ? I agree.

+ Show Spoiler +
No I think all 3 races have to micro.
SilverLeagueElite
Profile Joined April 2010
United States626 Posts
December 29 2011 06:47 GMT
#93
Easy solution: Force players to micro and spread their units against strong aoe spells.
Problem: People bitch and moan about aoe spells when their death ball gets wrecked.
Aoe gets nerfed. Clumped deathballs persist. Quite a vicious circle we've got going on.
kineSiS-
Profile Blog Joined September 2009
Korea (South)1068 Posts
December 29 2011 06:48 GMT
#94
On December 29 2011 11:58 mrtomjones wrote:
Show nested quote +
On December 29 2011 11:56 DibujEx wrote:
On December 29 2011 11:54 PhiliBiRD wrote:
its intended because it forces micro, otherwise the game would be even easier. and ive never heard much about this ever being an issue o_O. seems fine to me


I gotta say, In BW they didnt clump up.. and it was So much hard than SCII to micro...

And unclumping them seems more useful than having them clumped so you can avoid AOE... just because bad mechanics forced you to click each dragoon 30 times so it didnt wander off on its own doesn't make it a better thing. Microing small groups of units to unclump them can be every bit as hard.


But it obviously isn't because everyone is in consensus that SC: BW is a much harder game to master.
Sadist
Profile Blog Joined October 2002
United States7219 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-12-29 06:55:59
December 29 2011 06:54 GMT
#95
On December 29 2011 13:07 Kluey wrote:
So in Broodwar you couldn't actually control your Dragoon. It was like a retarded child. The reaver attack was glitched as fuck. Units came out of the same corner of the building so they'd get stuck if you didn't place them correctly. Not many people complained.

In Starcraft 2, units clump up in a ball and all you have to do is make two boxes and click twice. People freak out.



Reavers were never glitched.

If they hit 100% of the time with full damage the game wouldve been horrible. There was a micro aspect to choosing where to attack with your reaver and micro/reaction time to avoiding taking full damage on the other side.

Also, dragoons werent retarded, you just needed a lot of practice to get the most out of them.


Also,

I dont agree with people saying BW is harder to master necessarily. I think SC2 is plenty hard enough because it seems like the game is pretty much based on decision making.... I am actually quite amazed some guys such as MVP can have incredibly high win rates.
How do you go from where you are to where you want to be? I think you have to have an enthusiasm for life. You have to have a dream, a goal and you have to be willing to work for it. Jim Valvano
ScythedBlade
Profile Joined May 2010
308 Posts
December 29 2011 06:55 GMT
#96
On December 29 2011 15:48 kineSiS- wrote:
Show nested quote +
On December 29 2011 11:58 mrtomjones wrote:
On December 29 2011 11:56 DibujEx wrote:
On December 29 2011 11:54 PhiliBiRD wrote:
its intended because it forces micro, otherwise the game would be even easier. and ive never heard much about this ever being an issue o_O. seems fine to me


I gotta say, In BW they didnt clump up.. and it was So much hard than SCII to micro...

And unclumping them seems more useful than having them clumped so you can avoid AOE... just because bad mechanics forced you to click each dragoon 30 times so it didnt wander off on its own doesn't make it a better thing. Microing small groups of units to unclump them can be every bit as hard.


But it obviously isn't because everyone is in consensus that SC: BW is a much harder game to master.


False Statement. Disproven by logic statements and parameterizing.

The only true statement lies in that they are both different games, and you can apply various different functions to come out with either SC2 being harder or SC:BW being harder.

One could easily say SC2 is so much harder because units die so easy that the amount of micro you could do in SC may be higher, but skillwise, it might be "harder" to micro in SC2 because events happen so fast. See this problem with human beings?
HowardRoark
Profile Blog Joined February 2010
1146 Posts
December 29 2011 06:57 GMT
#97
It is bad, but somehow Blizzard actively works against the breaking of death balls: First they nerf Fungal that really punished the a-moving Protoss ball, and then they nerf the area of EMP that also punished the clumped Protoss ball. I think the ball and clumpyness really turns to the bizarre when you have Voidrays _inside_ of Colossus that are standing on the heads of Stalkers, Sentries, Zealots. All of these that basically has the same speed aswell. Throw in some tempests aswell for good non punishable splash.
"It is really good to get the double observatory if you want to get the speed and sight range for the observer simultaneously. It's a little bit of an advanced tactic, and by advanced, I mean really fucking bad."
FeyFey
Profile Joined September 2010
Germany10114 Posts
December 29 2011 06:57 GMT
#98
mmm in bw you microed to keep your deathball together especially as toss. in sc2 you micro to keep it apart from each other. I think keeping it apart is harder. Thats why many people don't do it, which is like a consent between players, to not play optimal, because its easier.

But i think its neither good nor bad. It was a choice they did and i think it was the best matching the overall game. Since there is magic boxing, and all the other stuff, you aren't forced to clump at all anyway. Overall i like this, and they balanced it around it. My only issue is that ranged instant hit units are pretty good, while ranged non instants are pretty bad, because they overkill terribly due to the ai.
If people would get their wish and units would be unclumped, melee units would become weaker(slower zerglings), ranged units stronger(marine, range upgrade *-*) and aoe units would become stronger as well (colossi, their old attack maybe).
And then again players would try to clump their units instead of trying to unclump them. So i guess it is what you prefer, do you want to have unclumped units on noob level, which means you will see deathballs in high level. Or do you want deathballs at noob level and unclump micro at high level.

I want the later. And imo bw unit micro was easy against sc2 unit micro, it just felt hard because you had to commit most of your time to reproduce units while the fight was going on. But thats debatable.

PS: i don't find unit clumping less unrealistic then what was up in bw if you didn't kept your units together. Line of doom ... Bumping into each other for 3 hours, ht dances when morphing archons ... Of course the sc2 thing has its issues, but its better then bw. And thats why i doubt the unit clumping will have a negative impact on sc2. At the end this is one of the things that makes sc2 hard, and people yet again want to remove the hard parts of the game.
emc
Profile Joined September 2010
United States3088 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-12-29 07:07:12
December 29 2011 06:58 GMT
#99
it's intentional and it isn't going anywhere. Blizzard has been asked this question in past interviews and said that it will be forever part of SC2. It's not a bad thing, it's just that many players aren't utilizing their extra APM that they've lost from BW into controlling their units better. Some of the best moments have been players like MMA splitting units in the blink of an eye, something that didn't happen so gracefully in BW.

I always go back to this argument because I feel like it's true, but it's that BW was a game that players had a lot of time to master and unit control was one of those. This game I feel will have an unlimited ceiling as far as unit control goes because of how precise and responsive the AI is and we've only been at this for a year.

The only pathing type problem I have are colossus, not how they move but how they shoot. You could dodge lurker spines in BW, I think you should be able to dodge colossus volleys but you can't because the damage is instant. Definitely would be cooler if you could micro units to not take splash but with the the way the colossus is currently programmed it isn't possible.
oxxo
Profile Joined February 2010
988 Posts
December 29 2011 07:04 GMT
#100
In BW you fight against bad pathing/AI to enhance unit effectiveness.
In SC2 you fight against good pathing/AI to enhance unit effectiveness.

There's no real difference.
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