Heart of the Swarm TvP Battle Report! - Page 39
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Zennith
United States795 Posts
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ETisME
12276 Posts
On August 14 2012 13:51 KissMeRed wrote: I don't know what kind of play level you are expecting. There are no GM / Code S HotS players to produce a battle report. This is a couple of guys (gals?) giving you a sneak preview of the new units/game mechanics. Showing all the new mechanics obviously taxes the players' ability to perform the traditional WoL tasks, like the lack of splitting which you are so annoyed with. I think most people can see there will be more opportunities to multitask and put supply in different locations, which will break apart the 'ball' to a degree. Not that there is anything wrong with being a baller... can't deny that this battle report is a lot more boring than that TvZ one we had before. | ||
AnachronisticAnarchy
United States2957 Posts
On August 14 2012 14:01 Vindicare605 wrote: Well one of the main purposes of the Warhound is actually for it to be an Anti-Siege Tank unit, capable of rushing tank lines easier than bio can because it's beefier. As for its role in the TvP match up, Mech doesn't have a unit quite like it, it's more similar to a Marauder than it is anything else, but it can't be healed by Medivacs and doesn't have stim which already makes it much different. I think after playing in the alpha that Warhounds might be a little too strong right now especially considering their cost, but the unit design itself is something that will fit rather nicely into the mech playstyle once its been tuned a bit. The Haywire missle in particular I think is too strong, it either needs a longer cooldown or reduced damage. True, I forgot about the siege-line breaking role. That should be interesting, comparing its bust capabilities versus that of bio. Still not sure about the TvP thing, though. I mean, mech has three parts, right? The tanks, which kick ass and take names. The buffer for the tanks, which make it so that the tanks can keep kicking ass and taking more names. Then, the AA, because tanks can't shoot up. Where does the warhound fit into that equation? Without the warhound, mech TvP is going to be a game of buffers, air battles and positioning, where catching the mech player unsieged is important, as well as having your buffer outlast his, because the fragile, expensive units behind the buffer die easily on both sides. In addition, the air battle will be keeping the match dynamic and increasing the skillcap somewhat. Vikings versus tempests will play a crucial role in maintaining leads in positioning and army. Nice and pat, with a nice level of skill. Now, what happens if we throw in the warhound? The warhound's ability bypasses the buffer completely, which I guess makes it useful, but it does weird things with how mech TvP is going to be played. It's also a 1a unit, even more so than a valuable, long range unit like, say, the colossus, because it's a cheap unit with no significant range or speed advantage, thus making it a dispensable front-line fighter. The warhound will likely be a part of the buffer, probably just behind the hellions, but it changes the way the buffer works. I don't know man, I just don't like it. Maybe it's the fact that it's a low skill unit in its current form. Maybe I just don't like how it sort of doesn't feel "pat", overlapping roles with some things and fundamentally different in other ways. Either way, I'm pretty uncertain about this unit, and still feel a micro-intensive, skill-based unit would add more to TvP mech than this thing. | ||
vesicular
United States1310 Posts
On August 14 2012 13:51 KissMeRed wrote: I don't know what kind of play level you are expecting. There are no GM / Code S HotS players to produce a battle report. This is a couple of guys (gals?) giving you a sneak preview of the new units/game mechanics. David Kim was GM for a long time as random. It's not like he doesn't know how to play SC2. I certainly don't expect perfection (there isn't even a metagame yet) but I do expect something more than safe macro and a-move. These BR's are supposed to be marketing to players to get them excited for the game. If anything this should be the easiest part of Blizzard's job because they can script this to be however they want to really show off the intricacies of the new strategies involved. Unfortunately they didn't show much of that. | ||
AndAgain
United States2621 Posts
On August 14 2012 14:13 Zennith wrote: Everything about this just seems like it is designed to prevent counter attacks and clever play in favor of funky unit compositions and wacky ranged units. Cool. Yeah, I really like that recall would reduce base trade games. Those are so annoying as protoss. | ||
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ZeromuS
Canada13379 Posts
On August 14 2012 14:15 AnachronisticAnarchy wrote: True, I forgot about the siege-line breaking role. That should be interesting, comparing its bust capabilities versus that of bio. Still not sure about the TvP thing, though. I mean, mech has three parts, right? The tanks, which kick ass and take names. The buffer for the tanks, which make it so that the tanks can keep kicking ass and taking more names. Then, the AA, because tanks can't shoot up. Where does the warhound fit into that equation? Without the warhound, mech TvP is going to be a game of buffers, air battles and positioning, where catching the mech player unsieged is important, as well as having your buffer outlast his, because the fragile, expensive units behind the buffer die easily on both sides. In addition, the air battle will be keeping the match dynamic and increasing the skillcap somewhat. Vikings versus tempests will play a crucial role in maintaining leads in positioning and army. Nice and pat, with a nice level of skill. Now, what happens if we throw in the warhound? The warhound's ability bypasses the buffer completely, which I guess makes it useful, but it does weird things with how mech TvP is going to be played. It's also a 1a unit, even more so than a valuable, long range unit like, say, the colossus, because it's a cheap unit with no significant range or speed advantage, thus making it a dispensable front-line fighter. The warhound will likely be a part of the buffer, probably just behind the hellions, but it changes the way the buffer works. I don't know man, I just don't like it. Maybe it's the fact that it's a low skill unit in its current form. Maybe I just don't like how it sort of doesn't feel like it has a role of it's own, overlapping roles with some things and fundamentally different in others. Either way, I'm pretty uncertain about this unit, and still feel a micro-intensive, skill-based unit would add more to TvP mech than this thing. Yeah I agree. If you want mech to be viable, you can't have an anti mech unit. It still will lose to the immortal so I dont know what its doing. I would rather see a couple thors, with strike cannons to disable immortals against the tanks. | ||
Tel Maethor
United States11 Posts
And the Warhound is crazy ugly, change this crap as soon as possible. This for the Tempest too. | ||
Ewic
Canada121 Posts
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Probe1
United States17920 Posts
On August 14 2012 14:15 vesicular wrote: David Kim was GM for a long time as random. It's not like he doesn't know how to play SC2. I certainly don't expect perfection (there isn't even a metagame yet) but I do expect something more than safe macro and a-move. These BR's are supposed to be marketing to players to get them excited for the game. If anything this should be the easiest part of Blizzard's job because they can script this to be however they want to really show off the intricacies of the new strategies involved. Unfortunately they didn't show much of that. If they staged battle reports instead of showing actual games, you or ten other people would be here right now bitching that we didn't get to see a real game. It's lose lose so why not give us something honest instead of a cover art match? | ||
vesicular
United States1310 Posts
On August 14 2012 14:08 Hall0wed wrote: I don't think people should be so up in arms about anything in HotS right now. The game is still in an Alpha build, do you realize how far that is from an actual release point? The only problem is if you watch the original WoL BR's, most of what they had in there made it into the game. While some of this will be tweaked, and they may even remove a unit, 90% of it is going to ship with the release. | ||
FHC Nex
Bulgaria44 Posts
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Zennith
United States795 Posts
On August 14 2012 14:17 AndAgain wrote: Yeah, I really like that recall would reduce base trade games. Those are so annoying as protoss. See, personally I think that's a bad things. Counters and the ability to do so are so important to the game and distinguishing between decent and actually good players. | ||
eviltomahawk
United States11133 Posts
On August 14 2012 14:00 Fyrewolf wrote: The macro mechanics and placing buildings are the only macro things you actually have to look at your base to do in SC2, you can do 90% of your macro while looking at your army now, the "tradeoff" is nowhere near comparable, not in the slightest. But still, the 20-second duration for a Chronoboost only gives you a 20 second window to do other things before you have to go back to base to re-Chronoboost, assuming that you're trying to constantly Chronoboost something. | ||
Bippzy
United States1466 Posts
On August 14 2012 12:43 Doko wrote: Some thoughts: - Rock towers are awesome. You don't have to use them on your map. They are there and they give map makers options. Options are always good. If they turn out to not be good for the game... the community will simply not use them. Just like it did with steppes of war. - The tempest is a very weird unit. While the ground attack seems to be all the rage the main purpose of the unit in its original concept was air dominance over everything. From what I was able to see the unit seems to do an ok job at it but it dint feel as OP as it should considering their cost. Interesting possibilities arise when you start thinking about sniping infestors / ghosts with 22 range ground attack, vikings / corruptors clumping up. They could even spell doom for war of the worlds PvP if the ground attack can be used on colossus (as in the ai doesn't bug out and try to fly to air attack range even though its in range for ground attack) - The warhound is a beefed up marauder that can't stim or be medvac healed. But it does have enough HP and mobility to break siege lines. Thors could do this to a certain extent but there movement speed prohibited from really getting past the point of tanking the first couple siege tank volleys. I'm really exited to see them how they interact in major battles. If the colossus / zealot charge breaks the line fast enough immortals are gonna have a field day. EMP could play a major role here but i do think its gonna add complexity to battles. You might not want to throw every zealot at the front right away and save some when the hellions die (remember toss can reinforce directly if the battle is going your way) effectibly putting light armor to play soaking warhound / siege tank fire. Overall I do think the unit seems a little lame, specially the missiles but I'm writing them off as garbage/OP just yet. - Battle hellions... I'm really scared this unit might break the game in TvZ more than anything it can do in TvP. Hellion marauder pushes just seem so scary. In TvP they add an interesting feature to terran. They are not marines! They can't do damage to every armor type at the same rate. Warhounds seems expensive enough to not want to be throwing them around all your bases to defend. While hellions might be very fast they don't do so well vs stalkers. Thus opening up protoss to weird stuff we haven't seen in wings yet. like colossus drops (remember mech is very limited on anti air) more stalker harassment. - Mothership core... where to start... This thing is insane. Maybe a little too insane. Bunker rushes are a thing of the past to say the least. As long as you don't die right away you'll be in good shape. Recall might be a little too powerful but its expensive enough to make you think twice about recalling over warping nearby. The range 13 60 damage cannon is an odd addition to toss defenses Almost like blizzard is really scared of them getting killed in the 6-8 min range, its not gonna do much if 20 lings are attacking your nexus but you sure as hell wont be dying to marines, those poor suckers are getting 1 shot from almost a screen away. Refilling your recently emped high templars for that one storm that will win you the game could bring us some awesome moments. - The widow mine while simple will certainly add to those OOOOOOHhhhhhh moments in pro games. Can't really say if it will accomplish its goal of splitting the death ball but it will certainly be interesting to spectate its use. tldr: I don't think the units are bad. But they do need polishing. And HoTs will certainly be more interesting to spectate and hopefully play if some of these units accomplish their stated goals. You almost win the thread, in my opinion. Just for not bitching out about how "Blizzard needs to hear us bitch so that they don't put horrible unit design in beta" My first impressions: All of the sudden, it looks like protoss has the capability and will HAVE to endlessly harass their opponents. Ideally, oracles will never get an entomb off. You know, unless blink stalkers are in your main and targeting down tech labs and then get recalled out while you are not mining. It looks cool. and the Tempest has me sold(atleast for now). I can just imagine all the fun kiting on that thing is. Weeeee! One concern i have is that there is too much, but it makes the game more complex and harder to figure out and makes compositions more varied. It could be good(it could just be a new game i don't understand yet), but it could be like OMG any build works. Warhounds don't shoot up(i think?), and that compounds mechs weakness. Although it looks like terran mech eats toss for breakfast, some sort of mothership core into phoenix opening probably discourages mech quite a bit. It looks cool, but i want beta and i want pros. Watching these videos really are like proof of concept. | ||
Integra
Sweden5626 Posts
You can now actually see how many harvesters you have... and that's it.... + Show Spoiler + WTF is this.. seriously | ||
monitor
United States2403 Posts
-Tempest was cool but looked bad to micro, especially since it has a ridiculous cooldown -This "mech" play didn't look very mech- he was spread out and was moving quick enough to defend bases -Warhound and battlehelion were both extremely boring to watch and didn't require much micro other than some target and stutter -Oracle harass was decent but it wasn't exciting and it could be easily stopped by any good player -Mothership core was ok but the problem with recall is that the caster has to click around at every base to see how many units survived -Widow mines are cool but without health bars+quick math casters have to guess what it will kill | ||
AnachronisticAnarchy
United States2957 Posts
On August 14 2012 14:08 Hall0wed wrote: I don't think people should be so up in arms about anything in HotS right now. The game is still in an Alpha build, do you realize how far that is from an actual release point? One thing I would love (even though it would probably be dumb), though it would never happen, is PvP with mass Tempest for both players. Though just thinking about it there are so many things that makes that next to impossible that it makes me sad. (This post is probably going to come off as condescending, so apologies in advance, it is not my intention) Just curious, why would you like mass tempest? The only reason I can think of off the top of my head is EP1C L4Z4RS!!!!1!1111!!! It is basically a mashup of all the bad qualities of colossus wars, with none of the redeeming factors. Since it is a 23 range, flying unit, there is no need to be concerned about micro, positioning or anything of the sort. The only factor that will ever matter is how many of those things you can mass up. Of course, that is only if that strategy is actually viable, but I'm not sure if it is. If it is though, I would be a very sad panda. | ||
Vindicare605
United States16032 Posts
On August 14 2012 14:15 AnachronisticAnarchy wrote: True, I forgot about the siege-line breaking role. That should be interesting, comparing its bust capabilities versus that of bio. Still not sure about the TvP thing, though. I mean, mech has three parts, right? The tanks, which kick ass and take names. The buffer for the tanks, which make it so that the tanks can keep kicking ass and taking more names. Then, the AA, because tanks can't shoot up. Where does the warhound fit into that equation? Without the warhound, mech TvP is going to be a game of buffers, air battles and positioning, where catching the mech player unsieged is important, as well as having your buffer outlast his, because the fragile, expensive units behind the buffer die easily on both sides. In addition, the air battle will be keeping the match dynamic and increasing the skillcap somewhat. Vikings versus tempests will play a crucial role in maintaining leads in positioning and army. Nice and pat, with a nice level of skill. Now, what happens if we throw in the warhound? The warhound's ability bypasses the buffer completely, which I guess makes it useful, but it does weird things with how mech TvP is going to be played. It's also a 1a unit, even more so than a valuable, long range unit like, say, the colossus, because it's a cheap unit with no significant range or speed advantage, thus making it a dispensable front-line fighter. The warhound will likely be a part of the buffer, probably just behind the hellions, but it changes the way the buffer works. I don't know man, I just don't like it. Maybe it's the fact that it's a low skill unit in its current form. Maybe I just don't like how it sort of doesn't feel "pat", overlapping roles with some things and fundamentally different in other ways. Either way, I'm pretty uncertain about this unit, and still feel a micro-intensive, skill-based unit would add more to TvP mech than this thing. The thing is, I think the unit will work fine in the mech army provided there's a penalty for overmaking them. Look at Hellions for a good example, they fill their role as a buffer unit great, but because they're a melee unit if you make too many they start to become redundant really quickly, same with Corruptors, Vikings, Immortals, etc. At a certain point you get penalized for overmaking them for while they're good against a particular unit too many of them starts to hog supply away from your other units that could fit in a certain situation better. From what I experienced on the MLG build, there's literally no reason not to make Warhounds against Protoss. They're good against everything mechanical that Protoss has on the ground including Immortals, but they also hold their own decently well against Zealots, the only real unit that really does in the Warhound that Protoss has on the ground is the DT or the Archon. So, my suggestion would be that a properly tuned warhound, one that was good for taking out Immortals or Collosus for example and not good for much else, would fit in nicely to a Terran army that's going against a heavily Robo Tech army, but loses its usefuleness once a significant amount of Templar Tech is fielded which Siege Tanks and Hellions would be better against. | ||
Al Bundy
7257 Posts
About the warhound; I agree it looks kind of bad, however its animations look extremely cool. | ||
AnachronisticAnarchy
United States2957 Posts
On August 14 2012 14:24 Integra wrote: I will go against the trend in this thread and say some positive stuff about this Battle Report. You can now actually see how many harvesters you have... and that's it.... + Show Spoiler + WTF is this.. seriously If you do not like the part about harvesters, I am happy to inform you that, from what I've heard, it is only visible in replays. Also, in the hypothetical scenario that that is not the case, I'm sure the collective bitching of the SC2 community can get that change revoked, posthaste. | ||
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