|
On July 03 2012 03:07 Archerofaiur wrote:
History is the best predictor of the future. Just look at previous "pitchfork movements" such as MBS and LAN.
The best you get from this, if you gather the community around this issue is a community solution like macro mechanics or load game from replay. Asking a company to completely redesign a game from ground up for an expansion is about as fruitful as asking your dog for more money.
I don't think changing one simple value in the editor and buffing splash accordingly counts as redesigning the game from ground up. Rather a minor adjustment.
|
On July 03 2012 03:02 Darneck wrote:Show nested quote +On July 03 2012 02:56 larse wrote:
The best solution is in fact adding an option that let the units move in their original formation, but with different speed. So if you spread out your units in advance, then move them, you will have a very spread out army. This will decrease the damage of AOE, but it also reduces the DPS density of the range units, and increase the melee surface of the melee units. It's not like some naive observations "oh! we need to buff AOE then!".
In sum
If let units move in their original formation:
1. AOE damage decreases
2. Range DPS Density decreases
3. Melee damage increases
The balance issue will be not as bad as many believed. Not quite sure why you call it naive observations. If we just add a spread which could make AOE useless it would just be a case of armies a moving into each other with no need to micro out of aoe spells and stuff. AOE should be OP, it should melt units in seconds, it should work like storm does vs marines at the moment.
What I mean naive is that people only observed that the consequence of non-deathball mechanics is a less effective AOE, but overlook the impact on range DPS density and melee surface area.
|
Aren't some of the early available spells and passives another factor that lead into deathballs?
For example a Force Field, if it traps the enemy's units correctly makes him lose most of his army, therefore most players avoid applying early pressure, but rather go all-in or just sit and wait for a bigger army.
Same thing with Concussive Shells, which disencourages the Protoss to just apply some mild pressure on the Terran (like the 1-2 Dragoons in BW, forcing the Terran to constantly repair his bunker until siege tanks are out). So instead of risking to lose most of your units on the retreat, again, people rather sit and wait for their good ol' deathball.
To some extend, the new Queen buff also reduced the possibilities of pressuring.
If early pressure was encouraged, or let's say more frequent engagements were encouraged (I don't know how, since Protosses would die without Force Fields and the game is balanced around that and around Concussive Shells) players could "cripple" themselves more early to mid, without killing each other and therefore reduce the size of the deathball significantly.
|
On July 03 2012 03:26 Poplicola wrote:Show nested quote +On July 03 2012 03:07 Archerofaiur wrote:
History is the best predictor of the future. Just look at previous "pitchfork movements" such as MBS and LAN.
The best you get from this, if you gather the community around this issue is a community solution like macro mechanics or load game from replay. Asking a company to completely redesign a game from ground up for an expansion is about as fruitful as asking your dog for more money. I don't think changing one simple value in the editor and buffing splash accordingly counts as redesigning the game from ground up. Rather a minor adjustment.
But that one variable would affect just about every match-up, counter and unit in the game.
|
On July 03 2012 03:07 Archerofaiur wrote:Show nested quote +On July 03 2012 02:29 Rabiator wrote:On July 03 2012 02:05 Archerofaiur wrote:On July 03 2012 02:02 larse wrote:Good pathing is a pretext. Dustin Browder always said that "oh we have deathball because we have good pathing. We will never sacrifice good pathing". It's simply a pretext. There are tons of other solutions. This thread has so many solutions that can actually solve the deathball problem: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=223889But I'm calling it, Blizzard will not change it. So the choice is strive for the solutions you cant have. Or the ones you can. Well if a significant and important part of the community would "gather with pitchforks outside Blizzard HQ" or if certain spokespersons would tell them that they are doing bad things they might consider listening to them. I mean if a bunch of pro players from many teams and a bunch of analytical casters could be made to agree on the blatantly obvious problems of SC2 and would tell that to Blizzard they would be forced to listen or lose yet another bit of credibility. History is the best predictor of the future. Just look at previous "pitchfork movements" such as MBS and LAN. The best you get from this, if you gather the community around this issue is a community solution like macro mechanics or load game from replay. Asking a company to completely redesign a game from ground up for an expansion is about as fruitful as asking your dog for more money.
Community solutions wont work since Blizzard is keeping the lid on the competitive laddering scene which defines what SC2 as an eSport looks like, BUT if Blizzard does huge changes to the game themselves - like removing the Carrier entirely - they could just as well change their macro mechanics and movement AI and unit selection. The game has to be totally rebalanced in any case and toning down MULE, Chronoboost and Inject Larva as well as adding dynamic unit movement and limiting the number of units in a control group should be doable by changing a few variables in the code, i.e. within 30 minutes. HotS is a "whole new game" from the balancing standpoint; just look at the value of the Siege Tank for example ... it is a useless heap of scrap metal with all the Vipers and Tempests now.
There wasnt any "pitchfork movement" for MBS and LAN ... not really. Such a movement starts at Blizzcon (or wherever lead designers show their faces) with some rotten eggs and tomatoes en masse ... protests on forums are largely ignored.
|
On July 03 2012 02:36 Darneck wrote:Show nested quote +On July 03 2012 02:24 tehemperorer wrote:
The deathball "problem" is kind of overblown, and really is only one way to play the game that has its share of advantages and disadvantages. I think we should be thankful that we can play a blob style if we want; for some people it's easier and can be quite effective, while you can also play a more spread out harassing style and be an effective player as well. BW's pathing was a pain in the ass and made the game more mechanically difficult for a lot of players, and it became less about strategy and more about how fast you can move your hands which is kind of against the point of an RTS BW isn't less about strategy at all on the highest level. The mechanics just seperated the best players from the average/good players which is really good because that's what's needed. There needs to be something that allows you to keep a consistency by purely being better than your opponent. You can still get caught off guard by tactics by worse players but not amazingly worse which can still happen in sc2.
The point is (to which you attest) that from an average/good level all the way to the top it is about mechanics more than strategy in BW. We're into opinions here, but an RTS should be about strategy more than a minimum skill threshold that must be passed before being able to play the game decently. This idea is excused for BW because BW was developed under a certain level of technological restrictions and was lucky enough to gain traction beyond it's normal lifecycle, but for newer RTS's, mechanics that are base and simple should be managed by the platform and not by the player. SC2 achieves this.
My problem is most of the opinion in this thread seems to be based off of nostalgia and not what fundamentally makes an RTS. When SC1 came out I was excited for it but quickly found that it wasn't primarily about strategy when compared to the other games that were available at around the same time, like CnC and Dune. Again, you can argue this because it's a declaration of my opinion but I don't think you can argue that CnC and Total Annihilation were more mechanically challenging than SC:BW, and that's the point: don't add mechanical challenges to an RTS title that aren't necessary. If getting more spectators for the eSport is the goal, how are you going to explain arbitrary limitations on SC2 gameplay to someone if they had no idea what SC:BW was like? I thought selecting 12 units max in BW was extremely lame, since at the same time you could select however many you wanted in CnC. Try explaining that to a new spectator who is used to norms from today's gaming environment.
|
I still think that the most simple thing for all of this would be to add a tournament mode which would have its seperate ladder and you could also change to tournament settings in custom games and the tournament settings would be specific balance changes and mechanics changes. This way they could still keep the exact game that they've got right now and just add another option for the less casual players.
|
On July 03 2012 00:07 IamTheArchitect wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On July 02 2012 23:37 Lurk wrote:Show nested quote +On July 02 2012 23:17 Rabiator wrote:EDIT: Here is a question for all those who think the Deathball isnt that bad: Why do you think there is no range upgrade for Marines anymore (which they had in BW)? Simple answer: It would be totally OP in a tight ball of death because Marines is a really small unit. I think marines are about the only unit that doesn't qualify as a deathball. It sure is scary as hell - but unlike for example a collossus ball - it can be effectively destroyed with AoE (banes, fungal, collossi, storm, tanks). That's why you see bio terrans spreading their army out in large concaves and try to split the enemy army with multi-pronged attacks - because their bio-centered army is so vulnerable as one big blob. This is at least partly correct and highlights what needs to change. Marines have become the default deathball unit for terran because they're so strong and everything else has been nerfed to compensate for that. This means terran struggles is deathball play, because their deathballs can be severely dented by a limited number of AOE units. Think about how just a couple burrowed banelings combined with some infestors, or just a few storms, or some high ground siege tanks can cripple a terran bio attack without committing much supply to it. This is how it should be for ALL races. If all deathballs could be held up with a small number of units, then it would constrict DB play. A few siege tanks with thor backup can conceivably hold off a "deathball" of zerg lair tech, but once brood lords come into play it's really difficult to hold that off supply effectively, so you have to group your whole army. Protoss deathball meanwhile laugh at anything that isn't nearly equal in supply. This is what has to fundamentally change.
This is the most intelligent thing i've read here.
There needs to be a risk/reward factor in clumping units up into a deathball. You should always have to consider whether the gain in damage dealing in a specific area (more things firing at one spot at once) is worth the risk of crippling or losing your army.
|
The death ball isnt a bad thing and it can work but the deathball in SC2 require so little control or thinking and it just a big 1-A. That the reason why it a big problem. In sc1, there is a death ball too but it require alot more control and thinking. An example would be mech in TvP, the terran has to control tanks and place them nicely and be very methodical about it. In SC2.....an example would be TvP where protoss just A-move their collosus ball into you and it game over. They can cast FF and Psy-storm but it just not that difficult because smart casting is just part of the game. It reqiure very little placement or anything since smart casting is just part of the game. I think this is why blizzard buff warp prism hoping to see more of it usage and it did! just not to the extent they would like and I would love for storm drop to be used more to break the death ball up.
If the death ball would reqiure more micro, then I think it perfectly fine to have death ball. But at the current stage of the game and how starcraft unit are, it just simply not possible. I am afraid with the new unit introduced in HOTS how the new terran mech will work is going to probably be the same as the toss ball where they just a-move :/
|
On July 03 2012 04:39 tehemperorer wrote:
My problem is most of the opinion in this thread seems to be based off of nostalgia and not what fundamentally makes an RTS. When SC1 came out I was excited for it but quickly found that it wasn't primarily about strategy when compared to the other games that were available at around the same time, like CnC and Dune. Again, you can argue this because it's a declaration of my opinion but I don't think you can argue that CnC and Total Annihilation were more mechanically challenging than SC:BW, and that's the point: don't add mechanical challenges to an RTS title that aren't necessary. If getting more spectators for the eSport is the goal, how are you going to explain arbitrary limitations on SC2 gameplay to someone if they had no idea what SC:BW was like? I thought selecting 12 units max in BW was extremely lame, since at the same time you could select however many you wanted in CnC. Try explaining that to a new spectator who is used to norms from today's gaming environment.
It's not all about it being impressive for the spectators. It would help with keeping a consistency among the top players, the #1 pro wouldn't be losing to the #300 pro every week here and there and to the game itself, I think it helps making the game more enjoyable to watch since the styles that are used and the way games are played out with only being able to move 12 units at a time is more fun and exciting and looks better to the eye than how it is currently.
Of course the people that have tried to game and know how difficult it is would be even more impressed but that's not the main point.
|
On July 03 2012 04:10 Archerofaiur wrote:Show nested quote +On July 03 2012 03:26 Poplicola wrote:On July 03 2012 03:07 Archerofaiur wrote:
History is the best predictor of the future. Just look at previous "pitchfork movements" such as MBS and LAN.
The best you get from this, if you gather the community around this issue is a community solution like macro mechanics or load game from replay. Asking a company to completely redesign a game from ground up for an expansion is about as fruitful as asking your dog for more money. I don't think changing one simple value in the editor and buffing splash accordingly counts as redesigning the game from ground up. Rather a minor adjustment. But that one variable would affect just about every match-up, counter and unit in the game.
Yes, that's the point.
|
On July 03 2012 05:55 Poplicola wrote:Show nested quote +On July 03 2012 04:10 Archerofaiur wrote:On July 03 2012 03:26 Poplicola wrote:On July 03 2012 03:07 Archerofaiur wrote:
History is the best predictor of the future. Just look at previous "pitchfork movements" such as MBS and LAN.
The best you get from this, if you gather the community around this issue is a community solution like macro mechanics or load game from replay. Asking a company to completely redesign a game from ground up for an expansion is about as fruitful as asking your dog for more money. I don't think changing one simple value in the editor and buffing splash accordingly counts as redesigning the game from ground up. Rather a minor adjustment. But that one variable would affect just about every match-up, counter and unit in the game. Yes, that's the point.
But thats not even necessarily. All that may be needed is to change the pathing/unit radius of a few select units. For example what would protoss deathballs look like if stalkers spaced out more? And changes to one units movement is something Blizzard has shown it is willing to do. Remember when the phoenix received the ability to move and shoot? Completely changed the match up.
![[image loading]](http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft/images2/b/bb/Phoenix.gif)
|
On July 03 2012 02:29 Rabiator wrote:Show nested quote +On July 03 2012 02:05 Archerofaiur wrote:On July 03 2012 02:02 larse wrote:Good pathing is a pretext. Dustin Browder always said that "oh we have deathball because we have good pathing. We will never sacrifice good pathing". It's simply a pretext. There are tons of other solutions. This thread has so many solutions that can actually solve the deathball problem: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=223889But I'm calling it, Blizzard will not change it. So the choice is strive for the solutions you cant have. Or the ones you can. Well if a significant and important part of the community would "gather with pitchforks outside Blizzard HQ" or if certain spokespersons would tell them that they are doing bad things they might consider listening to them. I mean if a bunch of pro players from many teams and a bunch of analytical casters could be made to agree on the blatantly obvious problems of SC2 and would tell that to Blizzard they would be forced to listen or lose yet another bit of credibility. The core of the problem IMO is the perfect unit movement, the unlimited unit selection and the macroing capabilities of all three races. This sums up to having engagements of "maximum available army" vs "yet another maximum available army" and only very rarely do we have engagements at multiple fronts. The problem of the Deathball goes much deeper IMO because it also makes balancing unnecessarily hard. Example: If you have a Siege Tank capable of oneshotting Zerglings and twoshotting Roaches they are ridiculously powerful, but only if you have 20 Roaches inside the targeting area. For SC2 this has been solved by nerfing both damage and radius ... which has made the unit much less powerful and forces the Terran to use many more of them in an area to get some measure of safety. This also means that he cant have some tanks back home for defense ... The same is true for High Templars, which could be kept at home for drop defense ... if Psi Storm hadnt been nerfed. And now they plan on introducing more units which make Siege Tanks useless and call it "buffing mech" ... thats some strange logic IMO.
templars can still be left at home for defense, in fact you have to leave them behind for defense, since the amulet was removed. It used to be that you didn't even have to leave anything home for defense, and you just warp in a storm or two... that was what you call a retarded mechanic.
|
The problem of the Death Ball can be solved with two deisgn philosophies:
1. Amazing AOE spells/Abilities:
If AOE in the game is absolutely game breakingly good, then clumping your units will result in units being inefficeint. However, if AOE becomes too good, then its either an incredible harass tool or just not fun to play with or against.
Spells like Psy Storm and Fungal for example. Storm you can atealst move out of, HTs are super slow, and sufficiently far along the tech path. Fungal on the other hand, has to be pre-spread and is not Hive tech, AND infestors can burrow. Therefore, when Fungal is really good, its plain boring to play against. Storm on the other hand atleast allows for some wiggle room.
But what about a more interesting mechanics...
Say something like Zerg Tremor, which is a target AOE spell that causes the ground to shake where each unit that gets hit radiates their own mini Tremor. Hit a ball of units, and they all die as they shockwave each other, hit one unit you do low base dmg.
Or take the Collosus, and change it to sweep in a larger X formation with the ability for it to either A move OR target the ground where the X would converge.
I just gave the Collosus so much more potential to control space and dettered against pure deathball with a Zerg spin on the Storm.
2. Units which are Better Alone:
Blizzard has toyed with the idea, but in the wrong way. Instead of giving the unit a fundamental mechanic which makes it amazing alone, why not just give it sufficient "micro-ability" which makes it unique by itself. The issue here is the potential to add yet another unit to the death-ball.
You could change two things about the Stalker, make it fire in 360 degress and lengthen the animation to benefit from stutter stepping, which combined with blink would make the unit quite micro intensive, which when put in a sentry-Collossus death-ball is significantly worse as you can't benefit from its own unique micro properties while micro other stuff (you now have to forcefield, micro the collossus, and then blink/stutter the stalkers, well gl).
|
lmao @ butthurt terrans and zergs who can't deal with dat_deathball
|
i was watching proleague last night (sc:bw) and i was thinking that the reason sc2 is so deathballish is because of the maps. they encourage deathball type play because its so hard to effectively harass/attack multiple places at once. maybe we need larger maps. the trend seems to be smaller maps with few access points, which makes the games deathball battles.
|
On July 03 2012 07:58 dAPhREAk wrote:
i was watching proleague last night (sc:bw) and i was thinking that the reason sc2 is so deathballish is because of the maps. they encourage deathball type play because its so hard to effectively harass/attack multiple places at once. maybe we need larger maps. the trend seems to be smaller maps with few access points, which makes the games deathball battles.
The maps are not the issue any longer, people thought so and maps got larger and it helped a bit but not enough, making them even larger is not the way to go.
Also if I'm not wrong the sc2 maps already are as big or even bigger than the largest bw maps? It's just the engine, pathing, speed and everything else that makes them seem smaller.
|
On July 02 2012 05:11 BronzeKnee wrote:Show nested quote +On July 02 2012 01:16 Snoodles wrote:On July 02 2012 01:07 xsnac wrote:
I dont understand why ppl dont like deathball ? a big battle with high tier units is the best thing you can ask for if you are a spectator . Are you serious? As a spectator when I'm watching a ZvP I tab out for a few minutes because everything in the first 10 minutes is just watching two guys macro. That is because of the map pool. If there was a map that had a wide open natural that was difficult to Forge fast expand on, and yet had no easy to take third for Zerg (and didn't have an easy to take 3rd for Toss like Shattered Temple) we would actually see some action in the first few minutes. Instead we get maps with easy to take bases and no action.
:/ I guess the irony here is that what you describe is exactly what we USED to have. Yet everyone complained about 1 base allins and no macro games and here we are now.
|
|
|
Read page 10 in this thread / watch the video. Profit.
If so many ppl think its the solution just try it and play some real games and record/commentate them, hasn't been done so far and everyone would profit.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
