On March 24 2012 00:44 Barrin wrote: He was probably comparing Fastest in BW to Normal in SC2 btw (if you look at the in-game clock, that is Normal). That is indeed almost exactly the same.
The standard setting, 'faster', is ~38% faster than real time, so that one real minute is 1.38 game minutes. Consequently, 8 mineral patches yields up to 1126 minerals per real minute. http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/Game_Speed
...according to which, ~3.1 workers per patch (which pretty much saturates 9 patches) mine an average of 41 minerals per minute each. 28 workers * 41 minerals per real minute per worker = 1148 minerals per real minute. This is almost exactly the same as the SC2 mining rate for 8 patches, measured in real time.
For gas, two SC2 geysers provide 228 gas per game minute --> 228 *1.38 = ~314 gas per real minute, whereas Broodwar's single geyser provides 288 gas per real minute. One high-yield geyser, consequently, provides ~235 gas per real minute.
Reinstalling Broodwar to double check, but the accepted values seem to contradict your premise that SC2's 8m 2gas standard provides resources meaningfully faster than Broodwar's 9m 1gas standard did.
I don't think it matters how closely the mining situation mimics another game. You guys should really stop worrying about that, it's dangerous to the project. Just focus on how the 6m change affects games of sc2- specifically, how it encourages spreading out and taking multiple expansions.
Personally, I feel that the 3 base "cap" from before was too few. I think that mining would ideally take place at 5 bases :D Configuring the maps in that way would hit the nail on the head and make gameplay cooler, which it has. The BW comparisons are only helpful qualitatively, not quantitatively, and even then...
I just like the lower resources, spread out ness of the game with 6m.
As many players in channel 7m have seen, I am attempting to get a regular King of The Hill going. The one thing that has really stood out to me from playing in and watching all these games is that most of the existing maps that were not made for 6m are not nearly as exciting to watch as the ones that were created with 6m in mind.
Any specific thoughts about things about the maps that makes them more exciting? Which maps created for 6m have you seen and why do they seem better? I agree and think all the maps should be custom, but knowing what about existing maps is good can help us make better ones.
(I have a second 6m map in the works, btw, and it's about ready for some type of reveal.)
Arrival IMO is a extremely fun map. I think its a combination of the size, number of expansions, variety of terrain and variety of attack paths.
Maps that don't seem to work are the ones were there is a clear cut 3rd then 4th then 5th and the expansions seem to have a natural pattern. that everyone follows.
I agree with this 100 percent. I would often find myself wondering why pros bother getting so many bases in SC2 like in BW. The benefit just isn't as great. This pretty much puts it in perspective. The game is supposed to be the way you are describing. It makes me so frustrated when a game developer cheapens their game to make it more accessible to the casual players--the least dedicated players. Smash Brothers, Halo, Streetfighter, when does it end? I miss the days when the people making games were the people playing games. The gaming industry resembles something akin to the movie industry now, and it sickens me. IMO Starcraft 2 is a game this sort of thing should not be tolerated in. It's practically a national pass time in Korea for Christ's sake.
Arrival is pretty simple so it's probably the easiest for players to learn and start playing well on, for sure. It's also set up so it's not like a sequence of bases, it's more like a 4p map where the bases are just around, and you pick the one that works best for whatever you are trying to do in the game.
@TheRealPaciFist: You will mine at about the same rate until you have 13 workers, so it should be unaffected.
On March 24 2012 04:01 Natespank wrote: I don't think it matters how closely the mining situation mimics another game. You guys should really stop worrying about that, it's dangerous to the project. Just focus on how the 6m change affects games of sc2- specifically, how it encourages spreading out and taking multiple expansions.
The comparison to BW is one of the largest points in Barrin's post. The only hard evidence by Barrin for his idea is the comparison of mining rates, and therefore yes, it does matter how SC2 mimics BW.
On March 24 2012 03:13 Severedevil wrote: Reinstalling Broodwar to double check, but the accepted values seem to contradict your premise that SC2's 8m 2gas standard provides resources meaningfully faster than Broodwar's 9m 1gas standard did.
I've now run tests. In Broodwar, one mineral field -- mined perfectly, on Fastest -- delivers up 136 or 144 minerals in one minute (in longer tests, ~140/minute), modestly less than one SC2 mineral field mined perfectly on SC2's fastest setting. The tests cited in the OP appear not to have BW running on Fastest, or are using a timer that counts faster than real time. A standard BW main (9 mineral patches) produce slightly more minerals/minute than a standard SC2 main (8 mineral patches.)
8-mineral mains and 6 minerals in every other base is a closer match to Broodwar than is 6 minerals in all bases.
On March 24 2012 04:01 Natespank wrote: I don't think it matters how closely the mining situation mimics another game. [..] I just like the lower resources, spread out ness of the game with 6m.
Sure! That's perfectly reasonable. It's just that the OP argues SC2 mains are mining too fast compared to Broodwar mains, when they're actually mining at a very similar rate. It's the naturals and the other expansions that are out of sync with BW.
On March 24 2012 04:22 Shadyf0o wrote: I agree with this 100 percent. I would often find myself wondering why pros bother getting so many bases in SC2 like in BW. The benefit just isn't as great. This pretty much puts it in perspective. The game is supposed to be the way you are describing. It makes me so frustrated when a game developer cheapens their game to make it more accessible to the casual players--the least dedicated players. Smash Brothers, Halo, Streetfighter, when does it end? I miss the days when the people making games were the people playing games. The gaming industry resembles something akin to the movie industry now, and it sickens me. IMO Starcraft 2 is a game this sort of thing should not be tolerated in. It's practically a national pass time in Korea for Christ's sake.
You get so many bases in sc2 because you need the gas, at least for zerg you normally are gas starved not mineral starved. Also staying on just 3 bases is bad cause once you mine out you lose lol.
On March 24 2012 05:01 Severedevil wrote: A standard BW main (9 mineral patches) produce slightly more minerals/minute than a standard SC2 main (8 mineral patches.)
8-mineral mains and 6 minerals in every other base is a closer match to Broodwar than is 6 minerals in all bases.
We are NOT trying to make this like Brood War, we're just trying to make StarCraft 2 better than it is now. Barrin has made that perfectly clear I believe.
3 Terrans are in a game. Player A starts on an 8m2g base, player B on a 6m1hyg base, player C on a 6m2lyg base. Each player does a 10 depot 12 barracks 13 refinery, and saturates their single gas. At this point, their mineral income will each be nearly identical, but player B will have more gas income than player A, and player A more than player C. Eventually when all three players saturated their bases with workers they will have the same mineral:gas income ratio, but during that crucial moment in the opening, the ratio will be thrown off.
6m1hyg mean that gas can be saturated faster and 6m2lyg means that gas is saturated much more slowly. This means that the choice between 6m1hyg and 6m2lyg will significantly impact the viability of gas-heavy openings.
What about adjusting the cost of refineries (or equivalent) to compensate for the change in gas saturation? For instance, in the case of 6m1hyg, if a refinery cost 100 minerals (or even 125) and took slightly longer to build, it might help balance out the mineral:gas ratio that early in the game. (Note: I realize that changing the cost of a building is something that Blizzard would have to do, but I really think that if this movement is going to be successful we need Blizzard behind it.)
Decreasing the cost of refineries for 6m2lyg would not, I believe, help as much. This is because it takes 6 workers to fully saturate gas on 2lyg, which makes the issue less about the cost of the refineries and more about the cost in minerals, supply, and lost mineral income of those workers that need to be on gas.
On a side, note, I noticed last night that there are a couple expansions on Devolution 6m1hyg towards the middle that are 6m2hyg. I like this idea—gas-heavy expansions that are difficult to defend, but could be very valuable late-game when you’ve got a ton of minerals but no gas.
On March 24 2012 05:01 Severedevil wrote: A standard BW main (9 mineral patches) produce slightly more minerals/minute than a standard SC2 main (8 mineral patches.)
8-mineral mains and 6 minerals in every other base is a closer match to Broodwar than is 6 minerals in all bases.
We are NOT trying to make this like Brood War
You partly are, and you're using Brood War mining to lend credence to the reduced-resource mains. Brood War mining does not support reducing the 8 mineral mains to 6 mineral mains, unless you use faulty data.
we're just trying to make StarCraft 2 better than it is now. Barrin has made that perfectly clear I believe.
I'm greatful for your efforts, and I agree that reducing most mineral fields to ~6 patches and 1 gas or 1 hyg will improve the game in more or less the ways you've advertised, forcing players to expand faster and sprawl out more. Three mining bases is almost as good as 5 mining bases, and that's clunky design which limits harassment and multitasking and fun.
However, I disagree that tampering with the mains will improve gameplay, and I think it cripples any possibility of the pro scene incorporating your new style of maps because it would break every opening. I think 8m 2g mains are a good thing, and are here to stay.
@Sketchius: That's a good point. It shouldn't really matter, though, unless it creates certain windows for one player to abuse an imbalance during those early periods. I think 1hyg is more likely to be that way than 2lyg, since less gas should probably mean less ability to apply pressure. Of course testing will show how it really plays out.
On March 24 2012 05:01 Severedevil wrote: A standard BW main (9 mineral patches) produce slightly more minerals/minute than a standard SC2 main (8 mineral patches.)
8-mineral mains and 6 minerals in every other base is a closer match to Broodwar than is 6 minerals in all bases.
We are NOT trying to make this like Brood War
You partly are, and you're using Brood War mining to lend credence to the reduced-resource mains. Brood War mining does not support reducing the 8 mineral mains to 6 mineral mains, unless you use faulty data.
we're just trying to make StarCraft 2 better than it is now. Barrin has made that perfectly clear I believe.
However, I disagree that tampering with the mains will improve gameplay, and I think it cripples any possibility of the pro scene incorporating your new style of maps because it would break every opening. I think 8m 2g mains are a good thing, and are here to stay.
What would happen if someone expanded to a main in a four player map?
On March 24 2012 05:01 Severedevil wrote: A standard BW main (9 mineral patches) produce slightly more minerals/minute than a standard SC2 main (8 mineral patches.)
8-mineral mains and 6 minerals in every other base is a closer match to Broodwar than is 6 minerals in all bases.
We are NOT trying to make this like Brood War
You partly are, and you're using Brood War mining to lend credence to the reduced-resource mains. Brood War mining does not support reducing the 8 mineral mains to 6 mineral mains, unless you use faulty data.
we're just trying to make StarCraft 2 better than it is now. Barrin has made that perfectly clear I believe.
However, I disagree that tampering with the mains will improve gameplay, and I think it cripples any possibility of the pro scene incorporating your new style of maps because it would break every opening. I think 8m 2g mains are a good thing, and are here to stay.
What would happen if someone expanded to a main in a four player map?
The same thing as happened in Broodwar -- they'd have one extra-valuable mining base, with the option of tying it to that base's natural for two mining bases with one choke.
However, to do so, your bases have to stretch from your main all the way to another main. That's a lot of spread to defend, especially against aerial harassment or drop play.
Having the same income in the beginning on a 6m1hyg map vs. a 8m2g map isn't a really big deal, and indeed is a good thing. We want the action to pick up sooner rather than later both from a player and viewer's standpoint, as waiting for 6 minutes every game for something meaningful to happen is very dull.
What's great about the current setup is that all the old early attacks still work, just slightly less well (in the case of a 1/1/1) or require you to commit to more aggression (as in the case of a 2 rax). No longer can you 2 rax an opponent and expand easily after, you need to make more intelligent choices about when you've done enough damage and need to end the attack to save money for a Command Center. I'll post a link to a game below that showcases an extremely successful 2 rax attack on a Protoss player, so the early game definitely still has some good action.
I'm going to reiterate my concerns about using low yield gas again: I feel that it makes the variant require a far higher number of workers than is fun for the late game. In order to be gathering gas at a good rate you would need 3 additional workers per base, so if you had between 5-7 running bases it could require 15-21 more workers. Running 5 bases at optimal efficiency would go from 12*5=60 on minerals with 3*5 = 15 on gas, for a total of 75, to 60 on minerals to 5*6=30 on gas for a total of 90. Considering the number of bases I've seen working on the really late game FRB maps I think this would unduly punish the player for trying to maintain a gas-heavy strategy. This problem would be further multiplied as more bases were taken, as even more workers would need to be pulled off the mineral line to go into gas.
I also suspect it would mess with gas heavy early plays, but I don't have any real evidence to back up that suspicion so I'll avoid making claims I can't support with facts. Still, placing heavy limitations on things like sentry expand, cloaked banshees and zergling/baneling attacks would make the early game much less interesting to me and balance problems would need to be closely watched in any 6m2lyg games.
EPT
