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Talking Balance with David Kim - Page 10

Forum Index > SC2 General
1416 CommentsPost a Reply
Prev 1 8 9 10 11 12 71 Next
emjaytron
Profile Joined June 2011
Australia544 Posts
April 27 2012 05:17 GMT
#181
On April 27 2012 14:09 IshinShishi wrote:
Show nested quote +
On April 27 2012 13:15 Doublemint wrote:
On April 27 2012 13:09 avilo wrote:
I think at this point I may have to start collecting and casting TvP replays from pro players where the Terran wins the big battles and is up 30-70 supply and protoss still is in the game and ends up winning from hitting psi storms. It's depressing they still do not address TvP lategame after all this time (TvZ lategame isn't much better after the ghost nerf).

It's also disappointing that a balance designer is equating winrate statistics with how the game is currently being played/the metagame. Statistics have NOTHING, absolutely nothing to do with the current metagame.


I am genuinely interested in games like the ones described by you. Terran has to eat ALL the storms and mess up big time to still lose after being ahead 30 - 70(!) supply - and I am not even sure then it´s a done deal for the Toss.

You only need to watch the recent highest level TvP games, plenty of games where terran has a 30+ supply advantage and nothing happens, while when the protoss manages to get the same supply advantage, the game is kinda over, terran can't hold anything down in supply vs toss, that's just made up bullshit, this concept only applies to TvZ where tanks are reliable.


You should be talking about army value here not supply. We've seen often enough with zerg that a supply lead doesn't necessarily mean anything if the other player is loaded up on tier 3 units.
Grubby - SaSe - Oz - Hero
BoxingKangaroo
Profile Blog Joined December 2011
Japan955 Posts
April 27 2012 05:33 GMT
#182
On April 27 2012 14:15 Empirimancer wrote:
This is silly. Are we supposed to take these statistics on faith? We have no clue what they are or how they were arrived at. And why would Blizzard withhold this information if there wasn't something wrong with their stats?


Either they release their methods or their stats are wrong? False dichotomy. Maybe they just think explaining some complex shit to a bunch on players convinced "their" race is underpowered isn't the best use of their time.

I like a bit of skepticism, but it's got to be healthy. What reason do you have to believe that Blizz would make these up?
Neurosis
Profile Joined October 2010
United States893 Posts
Last Edited: 2012-04-27 05:35:41
April 27 2012 05:34 GMT
#183
I like their stance on map imbalances being alright as it encourages players to explore new strategies. That said, those stats truly don't represent how messed up this game is in the balance department. Not saying they made the win percentages up, but there is just no denying that certain aspects of certain match ups are extremely unfair.
Scarecrow
Profile Blog Joined July 2009
Korea (South)9175 Posts
April 27 2012 05:35 GMT
#184
On April 27 2012 14:04 ContrailNZ wrote:
I think they need to look at the results of games based on the length of time of games.

eg.

P > T 65% past 25 minutes
Z > P 65% past 25 minutes
T > Z 65% before 10 minutes

This would help identify eg.

IF Broodlords are imbalanced late game vs Protoss etc etc

-.- you can't balance around game lengths... you nerf broods and suddenly zerg is getting smashed overall in the mu. BW has always been balanced around overall statistics and not game length. Zerg turtles to 3-4 gas defilers, terran tries to win before then or restrict bases (sounds alot like TvP). I prefer david kim's approach to all the retards whining about tvp when terrans are still doing ok. It's probably one of the more balanced times for the mu since release. The better player is still generally winning TvP BoX's so i don't see the issue.
Yhamm is the god of predictions
0neder
Profile Joined July 2009
United States3733 Posts
April 27 2012 05:35 GMT
#185
If Kim and Browder worried more about fun and less about balance, SC2 would be further along by now. If they worried more about creating imba splash and deadly lightning-fast harass, then it would be more exciting.The more time goes on, the more I think Kim's job is PR rather than contributing much to game design.
0neder
Profile Joined July 2009
United States3733 Posts
Last Edited: 2012-04-27 05:36:32
April 27 2012 05:36 GMT
#186
If Kim and Browder worried more about fun and less about balance, SC2 would be further along by now. If they worried more about creating imba splash and deadly lightning-fast harass, and less about preventing it for someone just starting to play, then SC2 would be more exciting. The more time goes on, the more I think Kim's job is PR rather than contributing much to game design.
Scila
Profile Joined October 2010
Canada1849 Posts
April 27 2012 05:43 GMT
#187
Nothing about late game TvP. Nothing about Terran late game being weak in general. Nothing about Protoss being easier to play than the other two races. Nothing about early/mid/late game win ratio imbalances. Still the same old Blizzard.
All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.
shockaslim
Profile Joined December 2010
United States1105 Posts
April 27 2012 05:44 GMT
#188
On April 27 2012 14:17 emjaytron wrote:
Show nested quote +
On April 27 2012 14:09 IshinShishi wrote:
On April 27 2012 13:15 Doublemint wrote:
On April 27 2012 13:09 avilo wrote:
I think at this point I may have to start collecting and casting TvP replays from pro players where the Terran wins the big battles and is up 30-70 supply and protoss still is in the game and ends up winning from hitting psi storms. It's depressing they still do not address TvP lategame after all this time (TvZ lategame isn't much better after the ghost nerf).

It's also disappointing that a balance designer is equating winrate statistics with how the game is currently being played/the metagame. Statistics have NOTHING, absolutely nothing to do with the current metagame.


I am genuinely interested in games like the ones described by you. Terran has to eat ALL the storms and mess up big time to still lose after being ahead 30 - 70(!) supply - and I am not even sure then it´s a done deal for the Toss.

You only need to watch the recent highest level TvP games, plenty of games where terran has a 30+ supply advantage and nothing happens, while when the protoss manages to get the same supply advantage, the game is kinda over, terran can't hold anything down in supply vs toss, that's just made up bullshit, this concept only applies to TvZ where tanks are reliable.


You should be talking about army value here not supply. We've seen often enough with zerg that a supply lead doesn't necessarily mean anything if the other player is loaded up on tier 3 units.



Army "value" isn't necessarily an accurate thing to measure either. Look at meching players that get owned up by people playing bio.
Dirty Deeds...DONE DIRT CHEAP!!!
Scila
Profile Joined October 2010
Canada1849 Posts
April 27 2012 05:45 GMT
#189
On April 27 2012 14:35 Scarecrow wrote:
Show nested quote +
On April 27 2012 14:04 ContrailNZ wrote:
I think they need to look at the results of games based on the length of time of games.

eg.

P > T 65% past 25 minutes
Z > P 65% past 25 minutes
T > Z 65% before 10 minutes

This would help identify eg.

IF Broodlords are imbalanced late game vs Protoss etc etc

-.- you can't balance around game lengths... you nerf broods and suddenly zerg is getting smashed overall in the mu. BW has always been balanced around overall statistics and not game length. Zerg turtles to 3-4 gas defilers, terran tries to win before then or restrict bases (sounds alot like TvP). I prefer david kim's approach to all the retards whining about tvp when terrans are still doing ok. It's probably one of the more balanced times for the mu since release. The better player is still generally winning TvP BoX's so i don't see the issue.


Are you kidding me dude? BW was almost perfectly balanced at early/mid/late game. It wasn't like "Oh hey, I'm Terran and its 15 minutes against zerg or protoss, time to leave".
All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.
rauk
Profile Blog Joined February 2009
United States2228 Posts
April 27 2012 05:46 GMT
#190
On April 27 2012 14:45 Scila wrote:
Show nested quote +
On April 27 2012 14:35 Scarecrow wrote:
On April 27 2012 14:04 ContrailNZ wrote:
I think they need to look at the results of games based on the length of time of games.

eg.

P > T 65% past 25 minutes
Z > P 65% past 25 minutes
T > Z 65% before 10 minutes

This would help identify eg.

IF Broodlords are imbalanced late game vs Protoss etc etc

-.- you can't balance around game lengths... you nerf broods and suddenly zerg is getting smashed overall in the mu. BW has always been balanced around overall statistics and not game length. Zerg turtles to 3-4 gas defilers, terran tries to win before then or restrict bases (sounds alot like TvP). I prefer david kim's approach to all the retards whining about tvp when terrans are still doing ok. It's probably one of the more balanced times for the mu since release. The better player is still generally winning TvP BoX's so i don't see the issue.


Are you kidding me dude? BW was almost perfectly balanced at early/mid/late game. It wasn't like "Oh hey, I'm Terran and its 15 minutes against zerg or protoss, time to leave".

no, it's "oh hey, i'm protoss and terran has 3-3, time to leave" :p
SuperYo1000
Profile Joined July 2008
United States880 Posts
April 27 2012 05:47 GMT
#191
On April 27 2012 14:43 Scila wrote:
Nothing about late game TvP. Nothing about Terran late game being weak in general. Nothing about Protoss being easier to play than the other two races. Nothing about early/mid/late game win ratio imbalances. Still the same old Blizzard.



oh cry me a river. Terran have a slight tilt for first time ever and its crying time. How about work on your strategy.
Naphal
Profile Joined December 2010
Germany2099 Posts
April 27 2012 05:50 GMT
#192
We are concerned that protoss players seem to be having a slower start compared to zerg or terran players. For quite some time after StarCraft II was released, especially at the highest levels of professional play, protoss players were primarily only focusing on 1 base or 2 base warp gate all-ins. It was only after we toned down these builds that protoss players really started exploring their various tech options in the same way that the other two races have been doing for a long time.


made my day xD

so when protoss have finished learning to play, blizzard might increase their difficulty?
perhaps they should realize that at GSL at last, protoss increasingly "get" how to win...

dunno what the zerg scouting will be, maybe the first overlord will be slightly faster or has more hp, a veteran of sorts, but we will see, still, a bit disappointing that they leave lategame balance alone and wait for HOTS.
RaiD.RaynoR
Profile Joined February 2012
United States294 Posts
April 27 2012 05:55 GMT
#193
so basically... nothing came out of this. Sure kim is always aware of these things but lets face it, no more decent changes to WOL and HOTS is already looking to be a very different game anyways. Hope Toss finally wins another GSL this year. But I just have a baaaad feeling about that.
Redemption is the consequence of forgiveness
mell0w
Profile Joined September 2010
United States102 Posts
April 27 2012 05:56 GMT
#194
Blizzard wouldnt know what balance was even if it presented itself to them in the form of a cake with a half naked showgirl poping out of it.

"That doesnt look right. Replace the girl with a guy, and make the cake jellow. Damn, we're good."
Cyro
Profile Blog Joined June 2011
United Kingdom20343 Posts
April 27 2012 05:56 GMT
#195
On April 27 2012 14:43 Scila wrote:
Nothing about late game TvP. Nothing about Terran late game being weak in general. Nothing about Protoss being easier to play than the other two races. Nothing about early/mid/late game win ratio imbalances. Still the same old Blizzard.



Nothing about protoss requiring less skill than T/Z to play at levels that are inconsequential to game balance, you mean? (below mid-high masters).


I actuly think protoss is significantly harder than terran/zerg in a lot of aspects at that point.
"oh my god my overclock... I got a single WHEA error on the 23rd hour, 9 minutes" -Belial88
mrjpark
Profile Joined March 2011
United States276 Posts
April 27 2012 05:59 GMT
#196
On April 27 2012 12:54 Sadistx wrote:
Show nested quote +
On April 27 2012 12:49 FlamingTurd wrote:
This difficulty scouting as Z has always been an issue and has been spoken about countless times by pros. Finally some response years into the game about it.

Because it's actually not an issue. Zerg is the safest early game race after they establish their natural and trading early gas for easier scouting (like overseer tier 1) is actually not worth delaying ling speed or lair for.

Just because IdrA has mentioned it in 2010 in a few interviews(and I wish people would stop living in beta balance-world), doesn't mean it was true then (it probably was), is true now, or will be true in HotS.


Overall I'm still convinced David Kim has no idea what he's doing. While it is true that their winrates (including lower leagues) have somewhat balanced out, I don't believe it was due to any sort of preconceived design. They just pick a number from their box and then wait half a year to see if it works or not, then pretend like it was what they intended if the winrates are close to 50%.


Not necessarily true. You scout 1 gas with your drone and need to get out of that base before 3:10 or steal the gas. Even if you steal that, he can still technically go cloaked banshees -- he's just a bit more all-in. But that banshee is going to serve as huge map control as long as you don't let it die initially. After you leave that base, you have one shot to scout anything with your overlord at about 6 minutes into the game. If they're preparing for that ovie, you see nothing.

This is for a race who has to preemptively delay tech to stop air rushes. I don't want to cry too hard, but a reactive race needs the information to react to. I don't think bringing overlord speed to T1 is a good idea, as there won't be any denying the scout. What's probably better is either slightly increasing their speed, their HP, or some fragile combination of both.

On some of his notes:

1. Zerg has the lowest representation at the general pro level, but has been showing the best standings at the highest tournament levels until very recently.

Translation: Zerg never had a ton of players in Code S, but the ones they had were all at the top. Except now, because they're all gone. Woops.

Just as confirmation, Zerg has pretty much had 1 player in the round of 8 of Code S any given season in the GSL. I think the numbers came to 13 Zergs in the round of 8 over 8 seasons, 3 came from one season (NesTea, LosirA, and CoCa). This stat is further skewed because 4 of those seasons were NesTea (3) or DRG (1). I believe FruitDealer was the only Zerg in Season 1, too. I think it's safe to say that if a Zerg is good enough to reach the round of 8, he'll probably win the finals. This doesn't really scream balance to me, but what do I know.

2. We are concerned that protoss players seem to be having a slower start compared to zerg or terran players. For quite some time after StarCraft II was released, especially at the highest levels of professional play, protoss players were primarily only focusing on 1 base or 2 base warp gate all-ins. It was only after we toned down these builds that protoss players really started exploring their various tech options in the same way that the other two races have been doing for a long time.

I just loved this quote, as it's something everyone -- including a ton of pros -- were saying this whole time, at the rabid denial of Protoss players. Thankfully, it seems this era is over with MC adopting a wider variety of play and Inca, the last of his kind, dropping out of Code A.
MildSeven
Profile Joined October 2010
Canada311 Posts
April 27 2012 06:04 GMT
#197
David Kim is supposed to be a great player as well, but he relies too much on these statistics. He needs to actually watch matches instead of relying on these statistics.
sertas
Profile Joined April 2012
Sweden890 Posts
April 27 2012 06:12 GMT
#198
agree with many others.. why no mention of the most glaring imbalance the PvT lategame? I never see protoss lose if the game goes for 20+ min beacuse archon, collosus, high templar just melt the bio terrans are making, to the point that protoss is allways slightly more cost effective and can just keep trading and winning comortably.. Would like to see it at least acknowledged.
FATJESUSONABIKE
Profile Joined November 2011
184 Posts
April 27 2012 06:16 GMT
#199
when i read this thread i can't help but notice that about 80% of the users acknowledge there's an issue with PvT late game (absurdly favoring P). i'm seriously doubtful that all of em play terran, so it must be sort of objective.

and yeah david kim is a joke.
][Primarch][
Profile Joined February 2012
Sweden302 Posts
April 27 2012 06:18 GMT
#200
David Kim has no idea about balance, he speaks about win ratios but have no idea how the game looks. TvP is a joke, terran late game is a joke. If terran wants to win they have to damage their opponent early on, especially for us causal gamers who can't manage late-game marine-marauder like the best terrans can. I would once again say that David Kim is not competent at all if he is going to continue to be fixated on win ratios.
Huge fan of Empire Kas, The Destroyer of Worlds, The Machine, The Second Terminator, The Supreme Robot!
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