On July 02 2012 09:31 Falling wrote: I wonder if adding magic box for ground units back into the game would fix some of the death ball problems. Perhaps I'm doing it wrong because I'm rubbish, but I was testing both BW and SC2 to see if you could the units would stay in formation, but it just doesn't work in SC2 without constantly giving more orders to separate.
BW could pack units pretty tight, but with magic box you could spread them out and keep them spread out. Once again, it's a fix that doesn't 'break' unit ai, but adds more options for the player. Pack them in tight it you want or separate them if you want. I still find the constant adjusting due to unit pushing rather irritating as it adds an element of unpredictability of where my units are going to be. But even if you kept unit pushing and shoving, ground magic box would be nice.
As for the Oracle being a fix for Deathball... I know that' it's intended purpose and we will have to see how it plays out; however, it doesn't really change the Protoss army does it? I think it was Tyler that saying that except for the Tempest the core of the Protoss army remains unchanged. So if there is or isn't a problem with deathball, the Oracle isn't going to change it as the composition remains unchanged. You'll just divert a small amount of supply to constantly debuffing the mineral line.
magic box ai already exists in sc2
but the easiest way to explain it is just by saying its "smaller"
1 thing blizzard could do is remove 2 unit sizes of units and only have 1. (1 is used while attackinging standing still etc, and a smaller one is used when they are moving). 100 lings moving can take as small space as 50 lings standing still basically. i never understood why they did this in the first place
On July 02 2012 09:05 IOvEggY wrote: discussing about a game that hasnt come out even in beta and will change drastically is really retarded imo.
Disagree. Why do I disagree?
Because Browder didn't begin creating SC2 around the foundation of BW's successful principles, he created his own foundation and then tried to make it like Starcraft. And in large measure he has succeeded, but there are still a few key points that he ignored that artificially limit the excitement/enjoyment ceiling. The longer we wait to talk about it, the less likely it is that Blizzard will implement something on their own and improve things while maintaining a unified scene. Sure we could do something like CSS pro mod, or Project M for Smash Bros, but that would splinter the scene and be difficult to adopt as a standard. Ideally we want the ultimate starcraft experience built into the bnet 2.0 ladder.
On July 02 2012 09:31 Falling wrote: I wonder if adding magic box for ground units back into the game would fix some of the death ball problems. Perhaps I'm doing it wrong because I'm rubbish, but I was testing both BW and SC2 to see if you could the units would stay in formation, but it just doesn't work in SC2 without constantly giving more orders to separate.
BW could pack units pretty tight, but with magic box you could spread them out and keep them spread out. Once again, it's a fix that doesn't 'break' unit ai, but adds more options for the player. Pack them in tight it you want or separate them if you want. I still find the constant adjusting due to unit pushing rather irritating as it adds an element of unpredictability of where my units are going to be. But even if you kept unit pushing and shoving, ground magic box would be nice.
As for the Oracle being a fix for Deathball... I know that' it's intended purpose and we will have to see how it plays out; however, it doesn't really change the Protoss army does it? I think it was Tyler that saying that except for the Tempest the core of the Protoss army remains unchanged. So if there is or isn't a problem with deathball, the Oracle isn't going to change it as the composition remains unchanged. You'll just divert a small amount of supply to constantly debuffing the mineral line.
magic box ai already exists in sc2
but the easiest way to explain it is just by saying its "smaller"
1 thing blizzard could do is remove 2 unit sizes of units and only have 1. (1 is used while attackinging standing still etc, and a smaller one is used when they are moving). 100 lings moving can take as small space as 50 lings standing still basically. i never understood why they did this in the first place
That IS really bizarre. So many weird decisions/oversights, it's very unfortunate we have to put all this effort into trying to fix them. Like the inverted Raven splash and Phoenix 'moving shot,' it's very disconcerting as someone who wants to love SC2 but still just likes it and my interest is waning as I see stuff like CS:GO with Valve/Hidden Path being hyper responsive to the community, working directly with pros on a daily basis to get the foundation of the game right.
I just hope they make Protoss take more than 80 apm to reach top masters and I'll be happy.
But in all seriousness I think they need to do away with the deathball bs. It's stupid in my opinion to have the game basically rely on a player defending and massing then a moving in hopes of coming out on top. see it way too often in macro games that someone gets completely outplayed and they still manage to win. That needs to stop, thus killing the deathball which is what wins it for those folks.
Well the irony is that the deathball is simultaneously dumbed down for unlimited noob selection (like myself), but also some aspects of it make the skill ceiling too high to permit maximized micro opportunities, because everything is so hyper-concentrated.
On July 02 2012 09:31 Falling wrote: I wonder if adding magic box for ground units back into the game would fix some of the death ball problems. Perhaps I'm doing it wrong because I'm rubbish, but I was testing both BW and SC2 to see if you could the units would stay in formation, but it just doesn't work in SC2 without constantly giving more orders to separate.
BW could pack units pretty tight, but with magic box you could spread them out and keep them spread out. Once again, it's a fix that doesn't 'break' unit ai, but adds more options for the player. Pack them in tight it you want or separate them if you want. I still find the constant adjusting due to unit pushing rather irritating as it adds an element of unpredictability of where my units are going to be. But even if you kept unit pushing and shoving, ground magic box would be nice.
As for the Oracle being a fix for Deathball... I know that' it's intended purpose and we will have to see how it plays out; however, it doesn't really change the Protoss army does it? I think it was Tyler that saying that except for the Tempest the core of the Protoss army remains unchanged. So if there is or isn't a problem with deathball, the Oracle isn't going to change it as the composition remains unchanged. You'll just divert a small amount of supply to constantly debuffing the mineral line.
magic box ai already exists in sc2
but the easiest way to explain it is just by saying its "smaller"
1 thing blizzard could do is remove 2 unit sizes of units and only have 1. (1 is used while attackinging standing still etc, and a smaller one is used when they are moving). 100 lings moving can take as small space as 50 lings standing still basically. i never understood why they did this in the first place
Everything in SC2 seems to take up less space. If you look at BW, a marine is almost the same size as a zergling. Dragoons take up the same space as tanks. The amount of space on the screen was smaller, the photon cannons were bigger. The reaver is bigger than the shuttle it zips around in.
Personally, I don't think making everything require micro to be efficient will kill the death ball. Even after that, the path finding will still be the same and it will come down to which units are most efficient without micro. It is better to pick units that require minimal micro for each race and make sure that those trade with each other well (Battle Hellion, Zergling, Zealot). They then need to make other units benefit more from micro, such as spell casters, long range units like the warhound, or units that can be used in the heat of battle, like widow mines(we don't know their target priority compared to attacking units). Then it will come down to who sets up, prepares and controls better, once players can deal with micro-free units with their own micro-free units.
For god's sake removing unlimited unit selection wouldn't make a difference. Do you really think the extra effort of having to 1a2a3a instead of 1a would cause people to abandon the tried and true playstyles that they've grown so comfortable with?
What prevents deathballs in BW isn't the 12 unit cap, it's that AoE is so strong and that the defender's advantage is much greater due to the pathing AI and high ground. If you take away storm from BW, hydra deathballs would be unstoppable in zvp. If you take away lurkers, MM deathballs would be unstoppable in tvz. Even tanks would be much worse if units would just get in range and shoot them instead of durdling around whenever there's some kind of obstacle between it and the tank. (An aside: ever try to get goons to attack a tank behind a wall? Right clicking it doesn't work, you have to move it right up to the wall itself and use the attack command only when it's in range. This unit behaviour in the context of a larger battle is a large contributor to defender's advantage in BW.)
I'm not saying bring BW pathing back (I'm pretty strongly against it), but we do need a stronger form of defender's advantage. The most anti deathball situation possible was when defender's advantage was basically infinite - when 2 lurkers and a defiler could hold off any infinite sized terran army. Incidentally late game zvt before the mech transition arose was the most multitasking intensive situation in the game. I've dug up a post by Ver explaining why this reduces deathballs:
On November 23 2011 13:35 Ver wrote: The other reason for favoring big battles and massive 1a armies is the ease of movement. Movement in bw is much more subtle and difficult to organize and execute. Position (like high ground) meant much more, all races had various tools which favored defense over offense (reavers/storm in pvz, tanks/mines, scourge/swarm/lurker vs vessels, better static defense, etc). Furthermore, the smooth a.i in sc2 means that it's really easy to attack bases without bothering to micro and do insane damage. Plus there are a number of tools which effectively fight defensive setups (banelings, infested terrans, forcefields, immortals, colossus, marines, marauders) These reasons are exactly why backstabs so good in sc2 compared to bw and why you get many, many more base trades. Ironically, base trades and backstabs happen the most in the matchups most like BW in terms of skill, defense, and positioning: tvz and tvt.
How does this lend itself to big 1a armies? Because if you are devoting say 15-20 supply to a distraction or secondary maneuver, that means your main army will have that much less supply. Therefore it's much easier for you to just get run over by a-move, and that will lose you the game outright in most cases because it's so hard to comeback. You can overcome this advantage to some degree as defense isn't entirely meaningless, particularly in tvz and tvt, but an extra 20ish supply is a lot more meaningful in most cases than a good position. In bw, position is much more important than army size, and you'd routinely see large armies improperly wielded be defeated or warded off by well employed tactics or setups.
I also agree somewhat with the people who want to buff AoE, but with the auto-clumping behaviour of SC2 it'd almost surely become overpowered. Like many have said it really annoys me when I meticulously spread my units out before a single move command undoes all of that. A possible solution would be to add a 'formation movement' option like WC3 had, which would also mitigate effects of the proposed AoE buff. But then splitting would become much easier and banelings would become useless. It's such a tight spot the game has gotten itself into balance-wise that the only viable way of introducing such features is in a balance upheaval like an expansion.
On July 02 2012 09:31 Falling wrote: I wonder if adding magic box for ground units back into the game would fix some of the death ball problems. Perhaps I'm doing it wrong because I'm rubbish, but I was testing both BW and SC2 to see if you could the units would stay in formation, but it just doesn't work in SC2 without constantly giving more orders to separate.
BW could pack units pretty tight, but with magic box you could spread them out and keep them spread out. Once again, it's a fix that doesn't 'break' unit ai, but adds more options for the player. Pack them in tight it you want or separate them if you want. I still find the constant adjusting due to unit pushing rather irritating as it adds an element of unpredictability of where my units are going to be. But even if you kept unit pushing and shoving, ground magic box would be nice.
As for the Oracle being a fix for Deathball... I know that' it's intended purpose and we will have to see how it plays out; however, it doesn't really change the Protoss army does it? I think it was Tyler that saying that except for the Tempest the core of the Protoss army remains unchanged. So if there is or isn't a problem with deathball, the Oracle isn't going to change it as the composition remains unchanged. You'll just divert a small amount of supply to constantly debuffing the mineral line.
magic box ai already exists in sc2
but the easiest way to explain it is just by saying its "smaller"
1 thing blizzard could do is remove 2 unit sizes of units and only have 1. (1 is used while attackinging standing still etc, and a smaller one is used when they are moving). 100 lings moving can take as small space as 50 lings standing still basically. i never understood why they did this in the first place
Everything in SC2 seems to take up less space. If you look at BW, a marine is almost the same size as a zergling. Dragoons take up the same space as tanks. The amount of space on the screen was smaller, the photon cannons were bigger. The reaver is bigger than the shuttle it zips around in.
Personally, I don't think making everything require micro to be efficient will kill the death ball. Even after that, the path finding will still be the same and it will come down to which units are most efficient without micro. It is better to pick units that require minimal micro for each race and make sure that those trade with each other well (Battle Hellion, Zergling, Zealot). They then need to make other units benefit more from micro, such as spell casters, long range units like the warhound, or units that can be used in the heat of battle, like widow mines(we don't know their target priority compared to attacking units). Then it will come down to who sets up, prepares and controls better, once players can deal with micro-free units with their own micro-free units.
No no no no, you don't build a game around most units requiring 0 micro and then throw in a bunch that require some micro and call it a day, that's terrible design and that's where all the problems SC2 has come from.
Everything needs to be able to scale with the skill of a player especially the units you use most (!!!), that is how you make a good e-sport game. A pro can't do more with a single zergling or single marine than I can for example, and that's a problem.
On July 02 2012 03:29 Bleak wrote: The way to fix deathball problem is simple: Making early to midgame and midgame small skirmishes happen more often. For that to happen though, the fights should last longer. The units should take longer to kill each other.
Sorry I took the first 2 lines here, but I think a lot of people will disagree with this. (I myself am not quite out of it yet, I think we should see the different scenario's play out before we make any calls)
AOE units that kill other units fast make it so that clumping gets punished hard. 1 reaver shot will make you think twice about running around with big groups of zerglings, just like banelings do now. From most posts ive seen here, most people agree on the following : 'because our units dont kill fast enough, we need to stack a lot of 'em together, so we CAN kill stuff fast.' So in light of this : aoe units should kill ALOT, FAST, but should be VERY VULNERABLE, MICROINTENSIVE, EXPENSIVE. (edit : the colossus kills stuff mediocre-ly fast, but is only so-so micro intensive, not THAT vulnerable either, whereas reaver was slow as hell and very vulnerable.)
again, I think we should see it play out first before we can say 'its this or that', but I just saw a big contrast here between you and other posters and thought it would be worth mentioning.
What do you think?
True, a reaver really hits like a freight train but...if you think about reaver, it's extremely slow, needs another unit to be transported into battle, and needs that same unit to be really effective in combat.
Colossus is a thousand times more mobile than Reaver, supplements Gateway army well, has huge range, and it hits like a truck. See my point?
Also, imagine the relationship between scrabs and forcefields. That would be very intresting.
On July 02 2012 09:31 Falling wrote: I wonder if adding magic box for ground units back into the game would fix some of the death ball problems. Perhaps I'm doing it wrong because I'm rubbish, but I was testing both BW and SC2 to see if you could the units would stay in formation, but it just doesn't work in SC2 without constantly giving more orders to separate.
BW could pack units pretty tight, but with magic box you could spread them out and keep them spread out. Once again, it's a fix that doesn't 'break' unit ai, but adds more options for the player. Pack them in tight it you want or separate them if you want. I still find the constant adjusting due to unit pushing rather irritating as it adds an element of unpredictability of where my units are going to be. But even if you kept unit pushing and shoving, ground magic box would be nice.
As for the Oracle being a fix for Deathball... I know that' it's intended purpose and we will have to see how it plays out; however, it doesn't really change the Protoss army does it? I think it was Tyler that saying that except for the Tempest the core of the Protoss army remains unchanged. So if there is or isn't a problem with deathball, the Oracle isn't going to change it as the composition remains unchanged. You'll just divert a small amount of supply to constantly debuffing the mineral line.
magic box ai already exists in sc2
but the easiest way to explain it is just by saying its "smaller"
1 thing blizzard could do is remove 2 unit sizes of units and only have 1. (1 is used while attackinging standing still etc, and a smaller one is used when they are moving). 100 lings moving can take as small space as 50 lings standing still basically. i never understood why they did this in the first place
Everything in SC2 seems to take up less space. If you look at BW, a marine is almost the same size as a zergling. Dragoons take up the same space as tanks. The amount of space on the screen was smaller, the photon cannons were bigger. The reaver is bigger than the shuttle it zips around in.
Personally, I don't think making everything require micro to be efficient will kill the death ball. Even after that, the path finding will still be the same and it will come down to which units are most efficient without micro. It is better to pick units that require minimal micro for each race and make sure that those trade with each other well (Battle Hellion, Zergling, Zealot). They then need to make other units benefit more from micro, such as spell casters, long range units like the warhound, or units that can be used in the heat of battle, like widow mines(we don't know their target priority compared to attacking units). Then it will come down to who sets up, prepares and controls better, once players can deal with micro-free units with their own micro-free units.
No no no no, you don't build a game around most units requiring 0 micro and then throw in a bunch that require some micro and call it a day, that's terrible design and that's where all the problems SC2 has come from.
Everything needs to be able to scale with the skill of a player especially the units you use most (!!!), that is how you make a good e-sport game. A pro can't do more with a single zergling or single marine than I can for example, and that's a problem.
I would argue that they can and we see it all the time. Most pros get much more mileage out the 4 early game zerglings than any of my opponents. I am not talking about all units, but being aware that there are some units, like most melee units, that have an upper limit to how much more efficient they can be made through micro. Beyond target firing, there is only so much a siege tank can benefit from micro. Accepting this, while making units that can benefit from micro and that can make a difference in a large battle will do a lot to remove the death ball.
On July 02 2012 09:31 Falling wrote: I wonder if adding magic box for ground units back into the game would fix some of the death ball problems. Perhaps I'm doing it wrong because I'm rubbish, but I was testing both BW and SC2 to see if you could the units would stay in formation, but it just doesn't work in SC2 without constantly giving more orders to separate.
BW could pack units pretty tight, but with magic box you could spread them out and keep them spread out. Once again, it's a fix that doesn't 'break' unit ai, but adds more options for the player. Pack them in tight it you want or separate them if you want. I still find the constant adjusting due to unit pushing rather irritating as it adds an element of unpredictability of where my units are going to be. But even if you kept unit pushing and shoving, ground magic box would be nice.
As for the Oracle being a fix for Deathball... I know that' it's intended purpose and we will have to see how it plays out; however, it doesn't really change the Protoss army does it? I think it was Tyler that saying that except for the Tempest the core of the Protoss army remains unchanged. So if there is or isn't a problem with deathball, the Oracle isn't going to change it as the composition remains unchanged. You'll just divert a small amount of supply to constantly debuffing the mineral line.
magic box ai already exists in sc2
but the easiest way to explain it is just by saying its "smaller"
1 thing blizzard could do is remove 2 unit sizes of units and only have 1. (1 is used while attackinging standing still etc, and a smaller one is used when they are moving). 100 lings moving can take as small space as 50 lings standing still basically. i never understood why they did this in the first place
Everything in SC2 seems to take up less space. If you look at BW, a marine is almost the same size as a zergling. Dragoons take up the same space as tanks. The amount of space on the screen was smaller, the photon cannons were bigger. The reaver is bigger than the shuttle it zips around in.
Personally, I don't think making everything require micro to be efficient will kill the death ball. Even after that, the path finding will still be the same and it will come down to which units are most efficient without micro. It is better to pick units that require minimal micro for each race and make sure that those trade with each other well (Battle Hellion, Zergling, Zealot). They then need to make other units benefit more from micro, such as spell casters, long range units like the warhound, or units that can be used in the heat of battle, like widow mines(we don't know their target priority compared to attacking units). Then it will come down to who sets up, prepares and controls better, once players can deal with micro-free units with their own micro-free units.
No no no no, you don't build a game around most units requiring 0 micro and then throw in a bunch that require some micro and call it a day, that's terrible design and that's where all the problems SC2 has come from.
Everything needs to be able to scale with the skill of a player especially the units you use most (!!!), that is how you make a good e-sport game. A pro can't do more with a single zergling or single marine than I can for example, and that's a problem.
I would argue that they can and we see it all the time. Most pros get much more mileage out the 4 early game zerglings than any of my opponents. I am not talking about all units, but being aware that there are some units, like most melee units, that have an upper limit to how much more efficient they can be made through micro. Beyond target firing, there is only so much a siege tank can benefit from micro. Accepting this, while making units that can benefit from micro and that can make a difference in a large battle will do a lot to remove the death ball.
In BW the difference between a pro's units and a newbie's units is just immense, it's like completely different units all together.
That's just not the case at all in SC2, yes pros will obviously be better, like better splitting and positioning, but that's it. You never say to yourself "omg, I had no idea this unit could do that!", it never happens in SC2.
The only exception I can think of would be MarineKing and his marine micro against banelings.
On July 02 2012 09:31 Falling wrote: I wonder if adding magic box for ground units back into the game would fix some of the death ball problems. Perhaps I'm doing it wrong because I'm rubbish, but I was testing both BW and SC2 to see if you could the units would stay in formation, but it just doesn't work in SC2 without constantly giving more orders to separate.
BW could pack units pretty tight, but with magic box you could spread them out and keep them spread out. Once again, it's a fix that doesn't 'break' unit ai, but adds more options for the player. Pack them in tight it you want or separate them if you want. I still find the constant adjusting due to unit pushing rather irritating as it adds an element of unpredictability of where my units are going to be. But even if you kept unit pushing and shoving, ground magic box would be nice.
As for the Oracle being a fix for Deathball... I know that' it's intended purpose and we will have to see how it plays out; however, it doesn't really change the Protoss army does it? I think it was Tyler that saying that except for the Tempest the core of the Protoss army remains unchanged. So if there is or isn't a problem with deathball, the Oracle isn't going to change it as the composition remains unchanged. You'll just divert a small amount of supply to constantly debuffing the mineral line.
magic box ai already exists in sc2
but the easiest way to explain it is just by saying its "smaller"
1 thing blizzard could do is remove 2 unit sizes of units and only have 1. (1 is used while attackinging standing still etc, and a smaller one is used when they are moving). 100 lings moving can take as small space as 50 lings standing still basically. i never understood why they did this in the first place
Everything in SC2 seems to take up less space. If you look at BW, a marine is almost the same size as a zergling. Dragoons take up the same space as tanks. The amount of space on the screen was smaller, the photon cannons were bigger. The reaver is bigger than the shuttle it zips around in.
Personally, I don't think making everything require micro to be efficient will kill the death ball. Even after that, the path finding will still be the same and it will come down to which units are most efficient without micro. It is better to pick units that require minimal micro for each race and make sure that those trade with each other well (Battle Hellion, Zergling, Zealot). They then need to make other units benefit more from micro, such as spell casters, long range units like the warhound, or units that can be used in the heat of battle, like widow mines(we don't know their target priority compared to attacking units). Then it will come down to who sets up, prepares and controls better, once players can deal with micro-free units with their own micro-free units.
No no no no, you don't build a game around most units requiring 0 micro and then throw in a bunch that require some micro and call it a day, that's terrible design and that's where all the problems SC2 has come from.
Everything needs to be able to scale with the skill of a player especially the units you use most (!!!), that is how you make a good e-sport game. A pro can't do more with a single zergling or single marine than I can for example, and that's a problem.
I would argue that they can and we see it all the time. Most pros get much more mileage out the 4 early game zerglings than any of my opponents. I am not talking about all units, but being aware that there are some units, like most melee units, that have an upper limit to how much more efficient they can be made through micro. Beyond target firing, there is only so much a siege tank can benefit from micro. Accepting this, while making units that can benefit from micro and that can make a difference in a large battle will do a lot to remove the death ball.
In BW the difference between a pro's units and a newbie's units is just immense, it's like completely different units all together.
That's just not the case at all in SC2, yes pros will obviously be better, like better splitting and positioning, but that's it. You never say to yourself "omg, I had no idea this unit could do that!", it never happens in SC2.
The only exception I can think of would be MarineKing and his marine micro against banelings.
Yes, that's about the only one unfortunately, To be honest, even a Silver player like me can approach psi-storm blankets in SC2 like Jangbi did in BW (which was the most inhuman task I have ever seen, only 2-3 players are capable of that).
On July 02 2012 12:04 Plansix wrote: I would argue that they can and we see it all the time. Most pros get much more mileage out the 4 early game zerglings than any of my opponents.
Zerglings and marines are about the only exceptions, and that's because they are fast/have instantaneous cooldown. Fantasy built a career off of vulture patrol micro in BW. Is he expected to get the same satisfaction from SC2 from avoiding banelings? That's not even a universal application, nor can it be offensive (which is usually the most fun way to play). SC2 needs more fast units and moving shot, rather than having everything more or less move at the same speed. All sc2 air is slow except for the phoenix, and very powerful. The air dynamic would be more interesting if some air units were faster but weaker.
For anyone curious about the unit spread/fluid movement thing that was talked about earlier in the thread, I made a quick video showing the differences. I'm not suggesting that this movement should directly be used, I'm just showing how this type of movement is a lot more spread out and doesn't clump, giving ideas on what could be done to SC2 in the future. I've never actually seen this used in a match.
Thanks to Bommes for letting me know about this. It's definitely very interesting.
I'm all for buffing aoe but the problem is that units auto clump, so that wouldn't solve a thing unless the units pathing started acting like BW. All buffing aoe would do is make battles end even quicker.
On July 02 2012 13:35 pzea469 wrote: For anyone curious about the unit spread/fluid movement thing that was talked about earlier in the thread, I made a quick video showing the differences. I'm not suggesting that this movement should directly be used, I'm just showing how this type of movement is a lot more spread out and doesn't clump, giving ideas on what could be done to SC2 in the future. I've never actually seen this used in a match.
Thanks to Bommes for letting me know about this. It's definitely very interesting.
if they added this and buffed aoe I would be happy. since you can still ball units up, buffing aoe would punish people who purposefully ball their units.
On July 02 2012 11:48 Wonders wrote: For god's sake removing unlimited unit selection wouldn't make a difference. Do you really think the extra effort of having to 1a2a3a instead of 1a would cause people to abandon the tried and true playstyles that they've grown so comfortable with?
What prevents deathballs in BW isn't the 12 unit cap, it's that AoE is so strong and that the defender's advantage is much greater due to the pathing AI and high ground. If you take away storm from BW, hydra deathballs would be unstoppable in zvp. If you take away lurkers, MM deathballs would be unstoppable in tvz. Even tanks would be much worse if units would just get in range and shoot them instead of durdling around whenever there's some kind of obstacle between it and the tank. (An aside: ever try to get goons to attack a tank behind a wall? Right clicking it doesn't work, you have to move it right up to the wall itself and use the attack command only when it's in range. This unit behaviour in the context of a larger battle is a large contributor to defender's advantage in BW.)
I'm not saying bring BW pathing back (I'm pretty strongly against it), but we do need a stronger form of defender's advantage. The most anti deathball situation possible was when defender's advantage was basically infinite - when 2 lurkers and a defiler could hold off any infinite sized terran army. Incidentally late game zvt before the mech transition arose was the most multitasking intensive situation in the game. I've dug up a post by Ver explaining why this reduces deathballs:
Removing unlimited unit selection would help. And so would removing MBS. The harder it is to macro and micro, the less likely people will just sit and wait to hit 200/200 and 1a. People will abandon current playstyles when they require more than 2 hot keys just to manage an army. The ball style play will exist, but it wouldn't be as bad as the 1a armies we see today.
In other words, APM factors into playstyle. Require more APM, less deathball shenanigans. It takes a true macro beast to develop a deathball really fast in BW and not die. BW mechanics is a prime example of what makes starcraft....starcraft. Players can win with pure execution and mechanics in BW. Strategies can fail, but players can still come back with superior mechanics and playstyle throughout a match. SC2 is too dumbed down, a majority of the game plays itself for you, you just have to remember to scout and 4sd, 4sz, etc. then 1a. Make it harder to do everything and people will realize they can abuse weaknesses in their opponents playstyle without having to go 200/200 with the right unit composition to counter every single unit the opponent has.
On July 02 2012 15:13 emc wrote: I'm all for buffing aoe but the problem is that units auto clump, so that wouldn't solve a thing unless the units pathing started acting like BW. All buffing aoe would do is make battles end even quicker.
On July 02 2012 13:35 pzea469 wrote: For anyone curious about the unit spread/fluid movement thing that was talked about earlier in the thread, I made a quick video showing the differences. I'm not suggesting that this movement should directly be used, I'm just showing how this type of movement is a lot more spread out and doesn't clump, giving ideas on what could be done to SC2 in the future. I've never actually seen this used in a match.
Thanks to Bommes for letting me know about this. It's definitely very interesting.
if they added this and buffed aoe I would be happy. since you can still ball units up, buffing aoe would punish people who purposefully ball their units.
Exactly what I'm thinking. I still have to see what type of impact this would have on actually playing a match though, but it looks very promising.
What seals the deal for me is that you could have many different tactics via formation that would be useful in certain situations.
For example balling up versus pure zergling would be good but not standard. You could arrange your army to have marauders leading the pack to tank banelings or use various other formations based on the map around you; it's a very dynamic change that nerfs the overkill syndrome we have with clumps of units and storms, fungals thermal lance and tank splash.
On July 02 2012 11:48 Wonders wrote: For god's sake removing unlimited unit selection wouldn't make a difference. Do you really think the extra effort of having to 1a2a3a instead of 1a would cause people to abandon the tried and true playstyles that they've grown so comfortable with?
What prevents deathballs in BW isn't the 12 unit cap, it's that AoE is so strong and that the defender's advantage is much greater due to the pathing AI and high ground. If you take away storm from BW, hydra deathballs would be unstoppable in zvp. If you take away lurkers, MM deathballs would be unstoppable in tvz. Even tanks would be much worse if units would just get in range and shoot them instead of durdling around whenever there's some kind of obstacle between it and the tank. (An aside: ever try to get goons to attack a tank behind a wall? Right clicking it doesn't work, you have to move it right up to the wall itself and use the attack command only when it's in range. This unit behaviour in the context of a larger battle is a large contributor to defender's advantage in BW.)
I'm not saying bring BW pathing back (I'm pretty strongly against it), but we do need a stronger form of defender's advantage. The most anti deathball situation possible was when defender's advantage was basically infinite - when 2 lurkers and a defiler could hold off any infinite sized terran army. Incidentally late game zvt before the mech transition arose was the most multitasking intensive situation in the game. I've dug up a post by Ver explaining why this reduces deathballs:
Removing unlimited unit selection would help. And so would removing MBS. The harder it is to macro and micro, the less likely people will just sit and wait to hit 200/200 and 1a. People will abandon current playstyles when they require more than 2 hot keys just to manage an army. The ball style play will exist, but it wouldn't be as bad as the 1a armies we see today.
In other words, APM factors into playstyle. Require more APM, less deathball shenanigans. It takes a true macro beast to develop a deathball really fast in BW and not die. BW mechanics is a prime example of what makes starcraft....starcraft. Players can win with pure execution and mechanics in BW. Strategies can fail, but players can still come back with superior mechanics and playstyle throughout a match. SC2 is too dumbed down, a majority of the game plays itself for you, you just have to remember to scout and 4sd, 4sz, etc. then 1a. Make it harder to do everything and people will realize they can abuse weaknesses in their opponents playstyle without having to go 200/200 with the right unit composition to counter every single unit the opponent has.
EPT
