I'm regiment from the german community page MyStarCraft.de. When we visited gamescom last week, we asked players about their opinion on the Heart of the Swarm demo after they played. Here's the results:
Keep in mind that the HotS version that was playable at gamescom is not the final version of Heart of the Swarm. According to the Blizzard guys, it was in fact already outdated at gamescom.
Some things that were already considered to be changed:
* The Mothership Core's Energize ability will not be able to target Nexuses * The Mothership with ground only Vortex and Stasis field will be removed and replaced by the Wings of Liberty Mothership * The Widow Mine's timer will be removed (=instant explosion), its splash damage will be drastically reduced and single target damage increased * The Battle Cruisers speed boost will be removed, Battle Cruisers will have increased damage * Ultralisk Charge will not give the Ultralisk a speed boost
These points are of course not set in stone aswell. Listening to Blizzard employees like David Kim I wouldn't be surprised if they would completely remove or rework some units and concepts until they release the game or even the beta.
I want to say thank you to all the pro players we could interview. To those players I told to interview but didn't end up doing so: I am sorry. I had a busy schedule and couldn't find you before I left. Also, I am sorry for the audio quality and my shaky hands. I hope you can still enjoy.
You can find the original news at MyStarCraft.de. If you understand german, we would like you to check out our other content aswell. Our progamer ranking can be found here in english, too.
The Mothership with ground only Vortex and Stasis field will be removed and replaced by the Wings of Liberty Mothership
really hating this decision. mother ship should have been thrown in the garbage alone time ago tbh. i still have no idea why they decided to keep Mship but remove carrier. its not that hard to figure out a place/buff for the carrier. if they are going to keep the Mship i thought that removing vortex or making it ground only would be a good idea atleast, but keeping it the same as WoL Mship ontop of having the Mship core is facepalm worthy. such a flawed unit design. as it stands now the Mship is just one gigantic arbiter.
The Mothership with ground only Vortex and Stasis field will be removed and replaced by the Wings of Liberty Mothership
really hating this decision. mother ship should have been thrown in the garbage alone time ago tbh. i still have no idea why they decided to keep Mship but remove carrier. its not that hard to figure out a place/buff for the carrier. if they are going to keep the Mship i thought that removing vortex or making it ground only would be a good idea atleast, but keeping it the same as WoL Mship ontop of having the Mship core is facepalm worthy. such a flawed unit design. as it stands now the Mship is just one gigantic arbiter.
The Mothership with ground only Vortex and Stasis field will be removed and replaced by the Wings of Liberty Mothership
really hating this decision. mother ship should have been thrown in the garbage alone time ago tbh. i still have no idea why they decided to keep Mship but remove carrier. its not that hard to figure out a place/buff for the carrier. if they are going to keep the Mship i thought that removing vortex or making it ground only would be a good idea atleast, but keeping it the same as WoL Mship ontop of having the Mship core is facepalm worthy. such a flawed unit design. as it stands now the Mship is just one gigantic arbiter.
Don't insult the arbiter. That was a badass unit.
never was insulting the arbiter... what im saying is that blizzard took the arbiter, made it to where u can only spawn one of them, blew it up in size, and called it the mothership. Mship was always flawed from day 1. and no im not saying its OP either. the fact that u can vortex a zerg army and instant win the game OR the fact that one infestor can NP a Mship and vortex the toss army and zerg instantly wins the game is a flawed design. and im not going to even talk about how stupid it is in pvp.
The Mothership with ground only Vortex and Stasis field will be removed and replaced by the Wings of Liberty Mothership
really hating this decision. mother ship should have been thrown in the garbage alone time ago tbh. i still have no idea why they decided to keep Mship but remove carrier. its not that hard to figure out a place/buff for the carrier. if they are going to keep the Mship i thought that removing vortex or making it ground only would be a good idea atleast, but keeping it the same as WoL Mship ontop of having the Mship core is facepalm worthy. such a flawed unit design. as it stands now the Mship is just one gigantic arbiter.
Whine hard when the beta come out about this issue. Blizzard may change it.
Cloud does bring up good points, though worded quite immaturely. Why not make the game harder? Core units and solid mechanics should be the determining factor of games. Adding all these super low skill cap, press- a- button- and- everything dies- units really makes me sad.
Would someone please be so kind and explain what that "stasis" ability is? I've checked google translate to find out the swedish word for it but can't find anything that actually explains what the mothership ability will do to the units... haven't found any videos of it being demonstrated either :/
Wow, I don't know why they don't consult Cloud on balance and other issues. He is clearly articulate and makes really good points. Nothing like opening criticism of a pre-beta build with calling the lead balance designer an idiot. Keep is real man, keep is real.
On August 21 2012 20:06 NVRLand wrote: Would someone please be so kind and explain what that "stasis" ability is? I've checked google translate to find out the swedish word for it but can't find anything that actually explains what the mothership ability will do to the units... haven't found any videos of it being demonstrated either :/
Stasis was new ability on the Mothership, it is ability to freeze all air units around the Mothership, including yours too, because Vortex is working only vs. ground units.
On August 21 2012 20:06 NVRLand wrote: Would someone please be so kind and explain what that "stasis" ability is? I've checked google translate to find out the swedish word for it but can't find anything that actually explains what the mothership ability will do to the units... haven't found any videos of it being demonstrated either :/
It's from the arbiter. It makes all units in the statis area invulnerable and unable to do anything. Basically the same as vortex, but the units aren't sucked in and rather stay on the field.
On August 21 2012 20:06 NVRLand wrote: Would someone please be so kind and explain what that "stasis" ability is? I've checked google translate to find out the swedish word for it but can't find anything that actually explains what the mothership ability will do to the units... haven't found any videos of it being demonstrated either :/
Stasis was new ability on the Mothership, it is ability to freeze all air units around the Mothership, including yours too, because Vortex is working only vs. ground units.
On August 21 2012 20:03 xrapture wrote: Cloud does bring up good points, though worded quite immaturely. Why not make the game harder? Core units and solid mechanics should be the determining factor of games. Adding all these super low skill cap, press- a- button- and- everything dies- units really makes me sad.
Seems silly for people to complain about 'low skill cap' when they aren't even close to the top of the game. It's how you use the units. If it were as easy as '1A win' then there would be more people at Mvp's level.
Also, how are Widow Mines, Tempests, Oracles, Vipers, or Swarm Hosts '1A'? They aren't. The only units being added that are are Warhounds and Battle Hellions... and T already has plenty of high skill cap stuff.
On August 21 2012 20:06 NVRLand wrote: Would someone please be so kind and explain what that "stasis" ability is? I've checked google translate to find out the swedish word for it but can't find anything that actually explains what the mothership ability will do to the units... haven't found any videos of it being demonstrated either :/
Stasis was new ability on the Mothership, it is ability to freeze all air units around the Mothership, including yours too, because Vortex is working only vs. ground units.
lol they added statis? another bw spell
stasis bro :D and yeah cloud speaks his mind. i dont see anything wrong with that.
On August 21 2012 20:06 NVRLand wrote: Would someone please be so kind and explain what that "stasis" ability is? I've checked google translate to find out the swedish word for it but can't find anything that actually explains what the mothership ability will do to the units... haven't found any videos of it being demonstrated either :/
Stasis was new ability on the Mothership, it is ability to freeze all air units around the Mothership, including yours too, because Vortex is working only vs. ground units.
lol they added statis? another bw spell
It was there, but they said that it somehow felt awkward(whatever that means), so they will probably remove it.
Seems silly for people to complain about 'low skill cap' when they aren't even close to the top of the game. It's how you use the units. If it were as easy as '1A win' then there would be more people at Mvp's level.
Also, how are Widow Mines, Tempests, Oracles, Vipers, or Swarm Hosts '1A'? They aren't. The only units being added that are are Warhounds and Battle Hellions... and T already has plenty of high skill cap stuff.
In my opinion the warhound needs to be changed. I played HOTS a couple of games and its just insanely strong AND cheap. I am a Terran player so I'd love such an imbalanced unit but the way its now it can't be put into the game.
I played against mouzMarine and we agreed that he'll mech while I'll play bio / biomech a 7 warhounds + bio completely stomped an even if not superior army that was fully put in place and sieged up. (I engaged, not him)
Warhounds have 220HP, 1 armor, range 7 and a movement speed that is faster than a stalker or any other Protoss unit that would be on the field early. It deals 23 base damage and has a haywire missile cooldown ability (6 seconds) which deals 30 damage to mechanical units and fires automatically. Thats 53 damage every 6 seconds + the normal damage in between. In addition to that, they cost 150/75 and build very fast (45) seconds with just the factory + techlab.
I think bio+warhounds (could replace viking possibly in the early phase) could pressure Protoss too much in the early game due to its speed and range. Also the warhound alone makes mech viable, which is not a bad thing but since battlehellion is insane vs zealots and warhounds against everything mechanical, mech seems to be insanely strong.
Well I'm looking forward to it, but I cannot believe its staying like it is now.
Wow, there are actually guys that care about that Cloud insulted David Kim. I really don't get it. The insults don't mean shit, they don't matter, they change nothing, they bring nothing to the discussion. What matters is the point that Cloud made and it's spot on. The game is being dumbed down for the race requiring the most skill, instead of making the other races harder and more rewarding. This is terrible for the game and this should be cared about, not some meaningless insults. TL drama seekers never disappoint.
Try to see past the insult that Cloud did, drama seekers and stick to arguing the point he made.
On August 21 2012 20:29 Type|NarutO wrote: In my opinion the warhound needs to be changed. I played HOTS a couple of games and its just insanely strong AND cheap. I am a Terran player so I'd love such an imbalanced unit but the way its now it can't be put into the game.
I played against mouzMarine and we agreed that he'll mech while I'll play bio / biomech a 7 warhounds + bio completely stomped an even if not superior army that was fully put in place and sieged up. (I engaged, not him)
Warhounds have 220HP, 1 armor, range 7 and a movement speed that is faster than a stalker or any other Protoss unit that would be on the field early. It deals 23 base damage and has a haywire missile cooldown ability (6 seconds) which deals 30 damage to mechanical units and fires automatically. Thats 53 damage every 6 seconds + the normal damage in between. In addition to that, they cost 150/75 and build very fast (45) seconds with just the factory + techlab.
I think bio+warhounds (could replace viking possibly in the early phase) could pressure Protoss too much in the early game due to its speed and range. Also the warhound alone makes mech viable, which is not a bad thing but since battlehellion is insane vs zealots and warhounds against everything mechanical, mech seems to be insanely strong.
Well I'm looking forward to it, but I cannot believe its staying like it is now.
Well, this is alpha, numbers will change for sure, because right now, for 25/25 more you get a unit that is a lot superior than Stalker(except that it can't attack air). Numbers aren't a bit off, they are a lot off the charts.
I am pretty sure that they will change it/nerf it in the end.
On August 21 2012 20:03 xrapture wrote: Cloud does bring up good points, though worded quite immaturely. Why not make the game harder? Core units and solid mechanics should be the determining factor of games. Adding all these super low skill cap, press- a- button- and- everything dies- units really makes me sad.
Seems silly for people to complain about 'low skill cap' when they aren't even close to the top of the game. It's how you use the units. If it were as easy as '1A win' then there would be more people at Mvp's level.
Also, how are Widow Mines, Tempests, Oracles, Vipers, or Swarm Hosts '1A'? They aren't. The only units being added that are are Warhounds and Battle Hellions... and T already has plenty of high skill cap stuff.
they are more close than you think, the skill cap of this game isn't reaching automation 2000 level, i think that all the current pro(mvp drg, mkp), are not too far from reaching the sc2 skill cap, they are very close to reaching the HUMAN possibility skill cap
kinda sux that vortex only targets ground units, the only thing protoss can really vortex atm is broodlords because they move so slow, i dunno how effective vortexing ground units is going to be.. imo its going to be way too easy to dodge. mothership will be useless vs z unless it has a new ability like stasis
ive said this before but protoss's unit diversity is terrible in hots, were going to end up having the same army comps as we did in WoL =/.
edit: and imo the widow mine is way too strong edit: oh yea and energize is ridiculously OP LOL, retardedly powerful. it would break the game
On August 21 2012 20:06 NVRLand wrote: Would someone please be so kind and explain what that "stasis" ability is? I've checked google translate to find out the swedish word for it but can't find anything that actually explains what the mothership ability will do to the units... haven't found any videos of it being demonstrated either :/
Stasis was new ability on the Mothership, it is ability to freeze all air units around the Mothership, including yours too, because Vortex is working only vs. ground units.
lol they added statis? another bw spell
They also added a namechange where the mothership would be called "arbiter" and look like my icon.
It's never been done before though, so they're keeping it hushed for now.
On August 21 2012 20:03 xrapture wrote: Cloud does bring up good points, though worded quite immaturely. Why not make the game harder? Core units and solid mechanics should be the determining factor of games. Adding all these super low skill cap, press- a- button- and- everything dies- units really makes me sad.
Seems silly for people to complain about 'low skill cap' when they aren't even close to the top of the game. It's how you use the units. If it were as easy as '1A win' then there would be more people at Mvp's level.
Also, how are Widow Mines, Tempests, Oracles, Vipers, or Swarm Hosts '1A'? They aren't. The only units being added that are are Warhounds and Battle Hellions... and T already has plenty of high skill cap stuff.
Did you even watch the video? You're reaffirming Clouds point that instead of making the other races harder, they are just making Terran easier, with those units you mentioned. Easier = worse.
Units like widow mines, Tempests, oracles, and vipers aren't 1 a perse, but they can have a large impact on a game that seems pretty luck and RNG based-- also bad for the game.
Do you know why Terran is the best matchup on the game? (I'm not talking about entertainment wise, but rather the fact that the better players wins in TvT more than any other matchup) Because there aren't units like infestors, HTs, and motherships that can instantly end the game. Go watch IEM Violet vs Nerchio. Both players are maxed, nerchio lands 1 fungal on 30 mutas and that's the end of the game. At that point it didn't matter who the better player was.
Now Blizzard is just adding more units like that and the game will get more random (like Cloud pointed out). Foreigners couldn't even take games off of Koreans in BW. Bonjwas existed also, and this is purely because the game had a higher skill cap and less randomness so the better player won as much as he was supposed to.
On August 21 2012 20:33 ROOTT1 wrote: kinda sux that vortex only targets ground units, the only thing protoss can really vortex atm is broodlords because they move so slow, i dunno how effective vortexing ground units is going to be.. imo its going to be way too easy to dodge. mothership will be useless vs z unless it has a new ability like stasis
If they remove the Stasis, Vortex will probably be able to target air units again. They probably wanted to change that because Vortex was supposed to be the control spell, you cast Vortex and reposition so you have the edge when he leaves the Vortex, and not using Archon toilet to destroy every air unit that got caught in a second.
Units like widow mines, Tempests, oracles, and vipers aren't 1 a perse, but they can have a large impact on a game that seems pretty luck and RNG based-- also bad for the game.
All I see is that these units require positional play, which seems good to me, I don't know how they are RNG based. Please enlighten me.
Do you know why Terran is the best matchup on the game? (I'm not talking about entertainment wise, but rather the fact that the better players wins in TvT more than any other matchup) Because there aren't units like infestors, HTs, and motherships that can instantly end the game. Go watch IEM Violet vs Nerchio. Both players are maxed, nerchio lands 1 fungal on 30 mutas and that's the end of the game. At that point it didn't matter who the better player was.
Nerchio lands one fungal on 30 Mutas? So, it isn't actually because Violet didn't spread the Mutas, but because Fungal is that type of spell? Yes, it could never happen vs. Terran, just forget all those games where you didn't watch Mutas for one second and 20+ Mutas die from 2 Thor Shots, or when you forgot to split in time and got hit with 2 Seeker Missiles, resulting in losing all your Corruptors/Mutas/Infestors whatever. Yeah, that isn't game ending at all... After loss like that, even Terran can a-click and win, when you lose ~60 population in 1 second.
Agreed whit cloud. Tought wer gonna see good ol' hydralisk busts and other agressive stuff? Not gonna happen says blizz. Macro to 15 (overkill but you get my point) min point whit little to none engagements continues. Terran to a move to get it even more boring to watch and play.
I dont see the widw mines point now. How does it emphasize map control if you can just FE. ran some random zerglings and not even get them all killed. Or is it purpose now to use offencively? Haven't tried it but it seems pretty pointless to me now.
Argh, so disappointed that you can't use energise on your nexus!
I like the idea of mothership core being a key part of Protoss strategy. You can prioritise its energy for upgrade-centric timing attacks, you could pool energy to perform raids and recall, you could leave it to pool for drop/runby defence in the late game etc.
I've always felt the Protoss macro mechanics need to be of equivalent importance to the other races. Outside of the early/midgame even top Protoss tend to neglect chronoboost for example, I thought the mothership core might be good in augmenting chrono and showcasing its potential
On August 21 2012 20:56 NATO wrote: Lol, a toss player complaining about detection? They have the best detection in the game, combined with the best cloaked unit in the game.
It's a legitimate point when you consider how PvP functions, for example going Stargate is a very risky play if they've hidden DT tech or something, it's a bit coinflippy which a lot of people dislike
On August 21 2012 20:59 Arpayon wrote: Cloud best whiner, it's sad to be from Italy in these cases
I feel Cloud is mischaracterised as a whiner, he's a bit blunt but he doesn't tend to excuse his own losses by using balance whine or whatever. He just has issues with the direction the game is going in a design sense, and some of his criticisms are pretty legitimate even if you disagree with them
On August 21 2012 20:56 NATO wrote: Lol, a toss player complaining about detection? They have the best detection in the game, combined with the best cloaked unit in the game.
It's a legitimate point when you consider how PvP functions, for example going Stargate is a very risky play if they've hidden DT tech or something, it's a bit coinflippy which a lot of people dislike
Cloud is so damn cool.
I'm not protoss player but it seems to be a problem in PvT when vikings snipe observers and ghost can run free with cloak.
On August 21 2012 20:03 xrapture wrote: Cloud does bring up good points, though worded quite immaturely. Why not make the game harder? Core units and solid mechanics should be the determining factor of games. Adding all these super low skill cap, press- a- button- and- everything dies- units really makes me sad.
Seems silly for people to complain about 'low skill cap' when they aren't even close to the top of the game. It's how you use the units. If it were as easy as '1A win' then there would be more people at Mvp's level.
Also, how are Widow Mines, Tempests, Oracles, Vipers, or Swarm Hosts '1A'? They aren't. The only units being added that are are Warhounds and Battle Hellions... and T already has plenty of high skill cap stuff.
they are more close than you think, the skill cap of this game isn't reaching automation 2000 level, i think that all the current pro(mvp drg, mkp), are not too far from reaching the sc2 skill cap, they are very close to reaching the HUMAN possibility skill cap
Well, I think the gap between Cloud's and Mvp's skill are wider then we think.:D
On August 21 2012 20:59 Arpayon wrote: Cloud best whiner, it's sad to be from Italy in these cases
I feel Cloud is mischaracterised as a whiner, he's a bit blunt but he doesn't tend to excuse his own losses by using balance whine or whatever. He just has issues with the direction the game is going in a design sense, and some of his criticisms are pretty legitimate even if you disagree with them
He does. He is known for publicly claiming that bad players can succeed in the game; known for spiting on the work of casters; making up excuses for not being able to qualify in WCS Italy even though he is supposed to be the best player there, and all that while not being at the top of the scene.
It's fine to express critics but being arrogant while doing so is unacceptable when oneself isn't at the top of the pyramid.
On August 21 2012 20:59 Arpayon wrote: Cloud best whiner, it's sad to be from Italy in these cases
I feel Cloud is mischaracterised as a whiner, he's a bit blunt but he doesn't tend to excuse his own losses by using balance whine or whatever. He just has issues with the direction the game is going in a design sense, and some of his criticisms are pretty legitimate even if you disagree with them
He does. He is known for publicly claiming that bad players can succeed in the game; known for spiting on the work of casters; making up excuses for not being able to qualify in WCS Italy even though he is supposed to be the best player there, and all that while not being at the top of the scene.
It's fine to express critics but being arrogant while doing so is unacceptable when oneself isn't at the top of the pyramid.
It's kinda weird when there's a guy who can't even compete at the top level talking about the game having low skill cap. I know it's an opinion but well....
The David Kim being stupid comment. Yeah I agree with cloud about closing the skill gap. Terran doesn't have any thing new that's interesting micro wise. The Tempest is either really bad or really good, personally I am leaning towards gimmicky and bad.
I like them keeping the mothership as is, simply because it started out as this useless unit that noone used. But protoss were forced into adapting it, forcing it to get nerfed...and in HOTS spilliting vortex IMO was going to make it useless again.
On August 21 2012 20:59 Arpayon wrote: Cloud best whiner, it's sad to be from Italy in these cases
I feel Cloud is mischaracterised as a whiner, he's a bit blunt but he doesn't tend to excuse his own losses by using balance whine or whatever. He just has issues with the direction the game is going in a design sense, and some of his criticisms are pretty legitimate even if you disagree with them
He does. He is known for publicly claiming that bad players can succeed in the game; known for spiting on the work of casters; making up excuses for not being able to qualify in WCS Italy even though he is supposed to be the best player there, and all that while not being at the top of the scene.
It's fine to express critics but being arrogant while doing so is unacceptable when oneself isn't at the top of the pyramid.
Isn't that what a lot of people on TL do? You can't have debate if the prerequisite is that you have to be a top, top player to do so.
He often opens his mouth and talks on an issue prior to actually articulating his thoughts properly and non-aggressively, but the crux of what he is saying often has validity to it.
1. He was right that bad players can beat superior players with far too much regularity. The great players never really exhibit the same kind of dominance that the BW greats did. It's not 100% terrible in this sense, the cream does tend to rise to the top in SC2 but there's a lot of volatility in the scene precisely because of this. 2. He was right about the casting situation, but in my view expressed it in too aggressive a manner. Cloud too thought this and apologised for how he articulated himself, but equally didn't back down from his points. There's a homogenised pool of casters that rarely changes, and some of those guys are increasingly getting a bit lazier in terms of following players and the general trends in the game. The money issue is a salient one here too, casters have a stable income in this sense, players have volatile incomes based on results. At the very least they should be expected to do their job to the best of their abilities 3. Haven't seen his excuses regarding WCS Korea, but I haven't personally seen him going 'TvP joke matchup, this guy's a scrub' when he's lost. The complaints I've heard from him occur in discussions regarding the game/trends, and not to discredit his actual opponents.
On August 21 2012 20:03 xrapture wrote: Cloud does bring up good points, though worded quite immaturely. Why not make the game harder? Core units and solid mechanics should be the determining factor of games. Adding all these super low skill cap, press- a- button- and- everything dies- units really makes me sad.
Seems silly for people to complain about 'low skill cap' when they aren't even close to the top of the game. It's how you use the units. If it were as easy as '1A win' then there would be more people at Mvp's level.
Also, how are Widow Mines, Tempests, Oracles, Vipers, or Swarm Hosts '1A'? They aren't. The only units being added that are are Warhounds and Battle Hellions... and T already has plenty of high skill cap stuff.
Wow, you completely missed the point that ClouD made.
What you said is the exact problem. Players like MVP and TaeJa do so well above the rest because Terran currently has the skill ceiling that the other two races don't; this is why we see a mass of good players in both of those races but no one is able to dominate with them. Warhounds and Battle Hellions are so effective and 1a friendly that they lower the skill cap necessary to do well with Terran, which is only bad for the game.
This material is NASL sound-guy approved. But seriously there hasn't been much more said than HotS custom didn't show so far. Except of-course for the whining about additions to other races.
It think whining about the skill cap, even for not top players is legitimate. Because skill caps affect the pro-scene so much. As others have said, inferior players more often beat superior players because of this. A bit of a changing pro-scene, with tournament winners changing often can be exciting, but to me it's more important that the skills of the superior players shine through.
On August 21 2012 20:29 Type|NarutO wrote: In my opinion the warhound needs to be changed. I played HOTS a couple of games and its just insanely strong AND cheap. I am a Terran player so I'd love such an imbalanced unit but the way its now it can't be put into the game.
I played against mouzMarine and we agreed that he'll mech while I'll play bio / biomech a 7 warhounds + bio completely stomped an even if not superior army that was fully put in place and sieged up. (I engaged, not him)
Warhounds have 220HP, 1 armor, range 7 and a movement speed that is faster than a stalker or any other Protoss unit that would be on the field early. It deals 23 base damage and has a haywire missile cooldown ability (6 seconds) which deals 30 damage to mechanical units and fires automatically. Thats 53 damage every 6 seconds + the normal damage in between. In addition to that, they cost 150/75 and build very fast (45) seconds with just the factory + techlab.
I think bio+warhounds (could replace viking possibly in the early phase) could pressure Protoss too much in the early game due to its speed and range. Also the warhound alone makes mech viable, which is not a bad thing but since battlehellion is insane vs zealots and warhounds against everything mechanical, mech seems to be insanely strong.
Well I'm looking forward to it, but I cannot believe its staying like it is now.
you know, there is a unit called a void ray, you know there is a unit called the mother ship core, you know there is a unit called the tempest.
For how long has terran been using an inferior army (bio) and going up against mass chargelot/archon/storm/colosus/stalkers and still managed to win by microing their heart out.
Protoss will find a way to win, Old strategys will make a return ( 3 gate void ray all in) , and mech based pushes especially if tried early game lack any sort of Anti air capablitites, which looks like yummy food for Tempests. If you want to get aggressive with tempest, have a recall ready. You say protoss will have hard time early game defending pushes, while you seem to ignore the mother ship core cannon that does 60 damage at 13 range. More like good bye early aggression you mean.
I just hate when people come to conclusions so fast, Like how you are saying Oh ma god, broken warhound blah blah.
I can predict a pvt matchup right now in hots based of what i know /having played the HOTS custom map many times with my friends. Protoss will more than likely always opt for an Stargate opener ( with orcale) and after orcale scouts , if mech get tempest or slam down a robo for mass immortal/colosus, if bio carry on as usual threw the tech tree with robo or templar archives. If you want to be cheeky and you know mech is coming for sure, 3 gate void ray bust.
Its way to early to just wright off certain units claiming massive imbalance.
On August 21 2012 20:56 NATO wrote: Lol, a toss player complaining about detection? They have the best detection in the game, combined with the best cloaked unit in the game.
I'll take scans over observers any day of the week, thank you very much.
The Mothership with ground only Vortex and Stasis field will be removed and replaced by the Wings of Liberty Mothership
really hating this decision. mother ship should have been thrown in the garbage alone time ago tbh. i still have no idea why they decided to keep Mship but remove carrier. its not that hard to figure out a place/buff for the carrier. if they are going to keep the Mship i thought that removing vortex or making it ground only would be a good idea atleast, but keeping it the same as WoL Mship ontop of having the Mship core is facepalm worthy. such a flawed unit design. as it stands now the Mship is just one gigantic arbiter.
Whine hard when the beta come out about this issue. Blizzard may change it.
I have been tempted to post on these subject often, but yea, this is always what stops me, i'll wait till beta, then we get to pass jugdement on blizzard
On August 21 2012 20:29 Type|NarutO wrote: In my opinion the warhound needs to be changed. I played HOTS a couple of games and its just insanely strong AND cheap. I am a Terran player so I'd love such an imbalanced unit but the way its now it can't be put into the game.
I played against mouzMarine and we agreed that he'll mech while I'll play bio / biomech a 7 warhounds + bio completely stomped an even if not superior army that was fully put in place and sieged up. (I engaged, not him)
Warhounds have 220HP, 1 armor, range 7 and a movement speed that is faster than a stalker or any other Protoss unit that would be on the field early. It deals 23 base damage and has a haywire missile cooldown ability (6 seconds) which deals 30 damage to mechanical units and fires automatically. Thats 53 damage every 6 seconds + the normal damage in between. In addition to that, they cost 150/75 and build very fast (45) seconds with just the factory + techlab.
I think bio+warhounds (could replace viking possibly in the early phase) could pressure Protoss too much in the early game due to its speed and range. Also the warhound alone makes mech viable, which is not a bad thing but since battlehellion is insane vs zealots and warhounds against everything mechanical, mech seems to be insanely strong.
Well I'm looking forward to it, but I cannot believe its staying like it is now.
you know, there is a unit called a void ray, you know there is a unit called the mother ship core, you know there is a unit called the tempest.
For how long has terran been using an inferior army (bio) and going up against mass chargelot/archon/storm/colosus/stalkers and still managed to win by microing their heart out.
Protoss will find a way to win, Old strategys will make a return ( 3 gate void ray all in) , and mech based pushes especially if tried early game lack any sort of Anti air capablitites, which looks like yummy food for Tempests. If you want to get aggressive with tempest, have a recall ready. You say protoss will have hard time early game defending pushes, while you seem to ignore the mother ship core cannon that does 60 damage at 13 range. More like good bye early aggression you mean.
I just hate when people come to conclusions so fast, Like how you are saying Oh ma god, broken warhound blah blah.
I can predict a pvt matchup right now in hots. Protoss will more than likely always opt for an Stargate opener ( with orcale) and after orcale scouts , if mech get tempest or slam down a robo for mass immortal/colosus, if bio carry on as usual threw the tech tree with robo or templar archives.
Its way to early to just wright off certain units claiming massive imbalance.
Well it's stupid to complain about numbers or balance when the beta is not out, but giving opinions about concepts/designs is totally ok imo.
The warhound, no matter how you tweak it's numbers is stupid. It's a 1a marauder that comes out of factory, it's dumb and uninteresting. I'm not sure why Blizzard is so focused on making tanks not viable :/ The initial warhound (cheaper/smaller replacement to the thor) that we saw at MLG was more interesting than the current design. They changed his role from "mech anti-air" to a dumb amove anti mech/protoss unit.
Actually it seems like blizzard has an approach of "Z and P are too easy to play, T is too hard" (ease of play, not balance, don't jump on me please :<) and are trying to dumb down terran to equalize the ground, when they should be fixing it the other way around (making P/Z more complex).
And once again, this is completely a concept/design problem - something that is stupid regardless of the stats they give to the units, which is why we can discuss it before having the beta available.
On August 21 2012 20:29 Type|NarutO wrote: In my opinion the warhound needs to be changed. I played HOTS a couple of games and its just insanely strong AND cheap. I am a Terran player so I'd love such an imbalanced unit but the way its now it can't be put into the game.
I played against mouzMarine and we agreed that he'll mech while I'll play bio / biomech a 7 warhounds + bio completely stomped an even if not superior army that was fully put in place and sieged up. (I engaged, not him)
Warhounds have 220HP, 1 armor, range 7 and a movement speed that is faster than a stalker or any other Protoss unit that would be on the field early. It deals 23 base damage and has a haywire missile cooldown ability (6 seconds) which deals 30 damage to mechanical units and fires automatically. Thats 53 damage every 6 seconds + the normal damage in between. In addition to that, they cost 150/75 and build very fast (45) seconds with just the factory + techlab.
I think bio+warhounds (could replace viking possibly in the early phase) could pressure Protoss too much in the early game due to its speed and range. Also the warhound alone makes mech viable, which is not a bad thing but since battlehellion is insane vs zealots and warhounds against everything mechanical, mech seems to be insanely strong.
Well I'm looking forward to it, but I cannot believe its staying like it is now.
you know, there is a unit called a void ray, you know there is a unit called the mother ship core, you know there is a unit called the tempest.
For how long has terran been using an inferior army (bio) and going up against mass chargelot/archon/storm/colosus/stalkers and still managed to win by microing their heart out.
Protoss will find a way to win, Old strategys will make a return ( 3 gate void ray all in) , and mech based pushes especially if tried early game lack any sort of Anti air capablitites, which looks like yummy food for Tempests. If you want to get aggressive with tempest, have a recall ready. You say protoss will have hard time early game defending pushes, while you seem to ignore the mother ship core cannon that does 60 damage at 13 range. More like good bye early aggression you mean.
I just hate when people come to conclusions so fast, Like how you are saying Oh ma god, broken warhound blah blah.
I can predict a pvt matchup right now in hots. Protoss will more than likely always opt for an Stargate opener ( with orcale) and after orcale scouts , if mech get tempest or slam down a robo for mass immortal/colosus, if bio carry on as usual threw the tech tree with robo or templar archives.
Its way to early to just wright off certain units claiming massive imbalance.
Well it's stupid to complain about numbers when the beta is not out, but complaining about concepts/designs is totally ok imo.
The warhound, no matter how you tweak it's numbers is stupid. It's a 1a marauder that comes out of factory, it's dumb and uninteresting. I'm not sure why Blizzard is so focused on making tanks not viable :/ The initial warhound (cheaper/smaller replacement to the thor) that we saw at MLG was more interesting than the current design. They changed his role from "mech anti-air" to a dumb amove anti mech/protoss unit.
Actually it seems like blizzard has an approach of "Z and P are too easy to play, T is too hard" (ease of play, not balance, don't jump on me please :<) and are trying to dumb down terran to equalize the ground, when they should be fixing it the other way around (making P/Z more complex).
And once again, this is completely a concept/design problem - something that is stupid regardless of the stats they give to the units, which is why we can discuss it before having the beta available.
all i actually really hear about people saying the warhound is a-move and dumb down game , is basically the same when sc2 just came out and people were saying MBS, Auto-mine, auto surround, better pathing. All these things people were claiming would make the game really noob. We have people like idra during the early days of sc2 saying people will reach the skill cap fast and everybody will be at the same level, yet idra cant fucking win a tournament to save his life, 20% win ratio this year. Such a fucking noob game huh.
Ive heard it all, X situation is going to make Y situation dumb and to eZ. . Yet you have mvp , the most winning-est player of all time , shit all on the faces of people claiming the game will take no skill. If it takes no skill, go compete against mvp in the gsl, Show us Sc2 takes no skill. How many people actually even have what it takes to win 1 gsl?
Im saying all this because before sc2 was released, the same retarded prophecies were pro-claimed. Ez game, Dumb downed blah blah. Yet we only have 2-3 non koreans that can actually compete with the koreans. Every tournament is korean dominance. Such a fucking noob game.
Give HOTS a chance. The worst thing that could happen to hots is blizzard listening to you idiots, and removing everything that should be fun and changing it into a bland boring fucking game that is so called balanced yet not fun, aka Wings of liberty.
With every new unit proposed being rejected , People seem content with playing Wings of liberity till the end of time. I disagree with this, we have gone from standard 100K viewers for tournaments to a mere 50K tops now in the space of less than a year. Without drastic changes in HOTS, I see starcraft 2 just like starcraft 1 within 2 years.It will basically be for an extreme niche of 10,000 or less odd folks, while League of legends and dota 2 or whatever just keep getting bigger.
The game needs to be dumbed down for the casual to enjoy at a noob level, but at the same time, it can also be very deep like a game of chess that is impossible to win against somebody who is good and knows all the moves.
From what i gather, this is how people want HOTS to look like, 3 years for this!
TERRAN
People want the warhound removed. So realistically what people want to see from terran in HOTS is only a single new unit addition ( if it can even be called that) aka the battlehellion. The widow mine will also get removed when it hits shelfs, Either to good or to bad will be the arguement. and terran has already lost the speed boost on the battlecruiser .
So terran in HOTS = 1 new unit
Protoss -People find orcale gimmicky, and to noob friendly because apparently its a single click. they want it removed -People want the a-move carrier to stay in instead of a tempest that actually brings forth a different strategic dynamic never seen before in rts games, We want a-move
Protoss for HOTS = 1 new unit Mothership Core, everything else removed , carrier back in
Zerg -there are claims of the swarm host having no place in sc2, there are claims of viper pull ability destroying the stratgic positioning of enemy units in the game, they are claims Abduct is broken as fuck. = viper to be removed, swarm host to be removed
Zerg for Hots = brand new creep tumor animation with 1 new unit. The hydralisk .
If people got what they wanted, HOTS would be pointless to release.
Cloud is not a whiner. whiners just repeat the whines of others cause they suck.
Cloud is honest and everyone knows that controlling terran units had been alot harder than toss/zerg units. bliz decides to give terran a good a-move army, they should rather make the game for P and Z harder.
now i get quoted as a whiner because i repeat Cloud's statement, but i can live with it :D
On August 21 2012 20:56 NATO wrote: Lol, a toss player complaining about detection? They have the best detection in the game, combined with the best cloaked unit in the game.
I think is was more to the fact that the detection is married to a specific tech tree, making the other tech tree less viable as an opening. The lack of detection has always been the riskist part of stargate openings, which have some of protoss's best harassment options. It is a good thing to ad.
On August 21 2012 20:56 NATO wrote: Lol, a toss player complaining about detection? They have the best detection in the game, combined with the best cloaked unit in the game.
I think is was more to the fact that the detection is married to a specific tech tree, making the other tech tree less viable as an opening. The lack of detection has always been the riskist part of stargate openings, which have some of protoss's best harassment options. It is a good thing to ad.
What I don't get is why they remove the carrier but at the same time make mech the go-to TvP. Carriers are fine against mech already, a few changes and they'd be just as good in HotS I expect.
On August 21 2012 20:03 xrapture wrote: Cloud does bring up good points, though worded quite immaturely. Why not make the game harder? Core units and solid mechanics should be the determining factor of games. Adding all these super low skill cap, press- a- button- and- everything dies- units really makes me sad.
Seems silly for people to complain about 'low skill cap' when they aren't even close to the top of the game. It's how you use the units. If it were as easy as '1A win' then there would be more people at Mvp's level.
Also, how are Widow Mines, Tempests, Oracles, Vipers, or Swarm Hosts '1A'? They aren't. The only units being added that are are Warhounds and Battle Hellions... and T already has plenty of high skill cap stuff.
they are more close than you think, the skill cap of this game isn't reaching automation 2000 level, i think that all the current pro(mvp drg, mkp), are not too far from reaching the sc2 skill cap, they are very close to reaching the HUMAN possibility skill cap
Well, I think the gap between Cloud's and Mvp's skill are wider then we think.:D
Cloud didn't mean skill cap he meant skill floor. skill caps are unreachable and impossible to know. skill floor is low amount of effort going into unit control producing big results.
No race should be able to amove all in one hotkey and then use a couple spells and come out ahead. lower level pvt is like this. hive tech zerg vs no ravens zvt is like this and now blizzard is making terran able to do it in tvp with warhound battle helion and helion thor banshee in tvz will be more amove friendly because helions will do more damage to roaches, make lings absolutely terrible and tank more damage for the thors making tanks being seiged in good position less of a requirement.
Swarm host is a good unit because it requires setting up and tactics. Battle helion is ok but thats probably terran bias. I think with a towned down warhound BH is ok. Warhound should have less dps and fuck an auto cast spell. The missle thing should be like the corruption spell on corrupters has to be clicked onto every unit. Now instead of herp derp 1a warhound destroying toss and tank lines you have to micro the fuckin thing to get full effect.
On August 21 2012 22:18 furo wrote: Cloud is not a whiner. whiners just repeat the whines of others cause they suck.
Cloud is honest and everyone knows that controlling terran units had been alot harder than toss/zerg units. bliz decides to give terran a good a-move army, they should rather make the game for P and Z harder.
now i get quoted as a whiner because i repeat Cloud's statement, but i can live with it :D
well hard micro means you can't be elsewhere on the map, so a move units allow you way more multitasking. Also Protoss and Zerg have fine units that excel with micro as well. So i like the decision of keeping those things in and expanding it on every race, it means the battles will be more spread out and in multiple positions. If we just had bio like units that have to be taken at hand to be good, we would only see action in one place. Protoss vs fungal is probably a good example. Fungal deletes your commands ... so fungaling stalkers means the ai will choose the next target in the priority list, broodlings, you really have to hold the hand of your army while fighting fungal. For me the worst part about fungal is the command break it does, the rest is fine. Of course if you could order a blink or movement for when the fungal duration would end, the spell would become alot weaker. But with you having to be there the moment the fungal ends and everytime a new one is cast, you only have a few seconds to do something or your army will go and fight neverending broodlings. Exception is of course if you have enough units to kill the broodlings, for example mech unsieged tanks and hellions will destroy broodlings to fast, so thors won't get thrown off fighting broodlords. Colossus also work good at removing this ai priority. Funny thing is the biggest issue with mech in WoL was the lack of armor upgrades for a long time and the problem that people sieged their tanks, while in some situations unsieged tanks would be so much stronger. So we wouldn't really need new a move units. Though a cheap tanking unit is something that was really missing.
On August 21 2012 20:29 Type|NarutO wrote: In my opinion the warhound needs to be changed. I played HOTS a couple of games and its just insanely strong AND cheap. I am a Terran player so I'd love such an imbalanced unit but the way its now it can't be put into the game.
I played against mouzMarine and we agreed that he'll mech while I'll play bio / biomech a 7 warhounds + bio completely stomped an even if not superior army that was fully put in place and sieged up. (I engaged, not him)
Warhounds have 220HP, 1 armor, range 7 and a movement speed that is faster than a stalker or any other Protoss unit that would be on the field early. It deals 23 base damage and has a haywire missile cooldown ability (6 seconds) which deals 30 damage to mechanical units and fires automatically. Thats 53 damage every 6 seconds + the normal damage in between. In addition to that, they cost 150/75 and build very fast (45) seconds with just the factory + techlab.
I think bio+warhounds (could replace viking possibly in the early phase) could pressure Protoss too much in the early game due to its speed and range. Also the warhound alone makes mech viable, which is not a bad thing but since battlehellion is insane vs zealots and warhounds against everything mechanical, mech seems to be insanely strong.
Well I'm looking forward to it, but I cannot believe its staying like it is now.
you know, there is a unit called a void ray, you know there is a unit called the mother ship core, you know there is a unit called the tempest.
For how long has terran been using an inferior army (bio) and going up against mass chargelot/archon/storm/colosus/stalkers and still managed to win by microing their heart out.
Protoss will find a way to win, Old strategys will make a return ( 3 gate void ray all in) , and mech based pushes especially if tried early game lack any sort of Anti air capablitites, which looks like yummy food for Tempests. If you want to get aggressive with tempest, have a recall ready. You say protoss will have hard time early game defending pushes, while you seem to ignore the mother ship core cannon that does 60 damage at 13 range. More like good bye early aggression you mean.
I just hate when people come to conclusions so fast, Like how you are saying Oh ma god, broken warhound blah blah.
I can predict a pvt matchup right now in hots based of what i know /having played the HOTS custom map many times with my friends. Protoss will more than likely always opt for an Stargate opener ( with orcale) and after orcale scouts , if mech get tempest or slam down a robo for mass immortal/colosus, if bio carry on as usual threw the tech tree with robo or templar archives. If you want to be cheeky and you know mech is coming for sure, 3 gate void ray bust.
Its way to early to just wright off certain units claiming massive imbalance.
And what level do you play on to judge me being incompetent? I talked to HasuObs, HeRoMarine, I played myself. How can it be a unit being just a bit cheaper than a stalker has more range, more damage is faster and has a ton more HP. Also the Tempest does cost 300/200. Lacking anti air? Try warhound + bio, its insanely strong. If you wish we can play the custom map so I can show you my point. I'm Terran player myself, I don't really mind having such a strong unit, I just made the point that I believe its too strong for its cost.
On August 21 2012 20:56 NATO wrote: Lol, a toss player complaining about detection? They have the best detection in the game, combined with the best cloaked unit in the game.
I think is was more to the fact that the detection is married to a specific tech tree, making the other tech tree less viable as an opening. The lack of detection has always been the riskist part of stargate openings, which have some of protoss's best harassment options. It is a good thing to ad.
That makes a lot of sense.
One of the most important things to be aware of in any protoss build is when you can get detection, specifically against terran and protoss. Because the only form of mobile detection for protoss is married to the robotics facility, it has really limited the power of stargate builds. The cost of three phoenixes in gas is greater than the cost of both the robotics facility and an observer. This means that a really tight stargate build will have a huge gap with no detection.
The same can be said for all three races with different aspects of the game. Terran lack good map presence if they are expanding and do a lot of their scouting through aggression. The widow mine may help with this, since it allows them to “scout” the same way overlords and pylons. It’s not all about DPS and end game units. There are holes in each race that are more passive and would do huge things for the game if they were filled.
On August 21 2012 22:48 SarcasmMonster wrote: This sounds weird but shouldn't Cloud be insulting Browder, not Kim? His complaint is about unit design, but Kim is the balance director.
On August 21 2012 22:48 SarcasmMonster wrote: This sounds weird but shouldn't Cloud be insulting Browder, not Kim? His complaint is about unit design, but Kim is the balance director.
Was wondering about that too.
Honestly though we really need to see Blizzard's implementations of these units/changes (as in not base it off a custom map) over the course of a decent number of games over a decent period of time - Not just the short periods of hands on time we've gotten so far. Then we can start figuring out what actually doesn't work and needs changing. Complaining about it before that point is kind of foolish.
Respecting Cloud for speaking the truth. 99.9% of the SC2 community front-men (players and casters) suck up to Blizzard, even when Blizz is clearly doing a poor job in balancing the game. The hype is already withering and pro-matches are becoming less and less interesting to watch. HOTS will continue in the same state of mind of poor game design.
Day9, Incontrol for example never ever make negative comments about balance and the poor design that is seeping all over SC2. On the contrary, they try to sell and boring, one-sided, broken matchup as if it's a masterpiece of high-level play and player talent. Not all viewers are bronze and silver anymore though.
Too bad, because if I had the power to influence the game for the better I would do it in a split second, even if it meant hurting my viewership and having negative impact on my e-fame. But it would be a real investment for the game's longevity. I guess making a few dollars while the hype is still burning takes priority
Again, props to Cloud for being the only individual in the pro-scene that has some real e-balls.
On August 21 2012 22:48 SarcasmMonster wrote: This sounds weird but shouldn't Cloud be insulting Browder, not Kim? His complaint is about unit design, but Kim is the balance director.
Clouds may have some complaints, but his ability to articulate them is pretty lack luster. Part of me wants to vomit blood every time someone says “skill ceiling”, since is such a vague term and concept. I don’t know how a designer can measure something so abstract as the amount of skill someone could obtain in their game, or plan for it in design. The only option is to create units and then adjust them as more and more people use them, which is what Blizzard is doing. Until they get massive feed back from thousands of players, all of these units are going to be in a prototype state.
That’s why I don’t care about any of the changes at this time. Blizzard is adopting a “hey, lets try this and see how it feels” approach to the beta. People should be more excited about the open process and voice concerns. It is so clear that nothing is set in stone and we will have to dig deep into the beta before we even glimpse the final build.
Also, calling someone stupid isn’t exactly a page out of Chaucer.
so they're going to maybe just revert the BC nerf? Won't it be a bit too strong though...? They're already quite strong, and, especially compared to SC1, they see quite a lot of play for being so high tech, especially for terran, who usually sticks with mostly bio or mech units. Didn't they nerf BCs because of that 1 base BC rush build in TvP? (And seems it would work even better in TvZ and TvT too lol)
I don't understand why some people expect me to articulate my opinion in a short interview when I've been saying the same things over and over for the past 2 years and I've gotten pretty much shit from every clueless SC2 blind fanboy. I can write an insanely long wall of text about all the issues that could have been avoided in SC2 if only the development and balance team was as competent as the Brood War one, but in the end I would just be wasting my time for nothing and more bad rep. If you say anything negative most people will label you as a whiner even if you bring valid points and I don't think feeding this stupidity with time and effort will bring me anywhere. I'm just overall very disappointed but of course I will keep playing the game and having fun.
btw I really think David Kim doesn't have the game knowledge required for his job. There was a meeting of progamers with David Kim at Gamescom and as far as I understand he's pretty much clueless and doesn't have the insight needed to understand what's going on. I was told he seems to think pvz late game is fine while every protoss is basically playing every tournament game trying to kill zergs before they have an unbeatable deathball. They basically look at the stats and try to even them out as much as possible but this doesn't make the game good to watch. I still fail to understand how they could think gateways/warpgates are completely fine as they are when it's completely destroying the potential entertainment in protoss matchups. Watch last GSL final if you want a valid example.
One doesn't have to be a "clueless sc2 blind fanboy" to think that your posts and opinions generally tend to be very negative, childish, arrogant, not constructive and your tone generally quite unpleasant. So yes, very much in-line with what you see on b.net forums.
On August 21 2012 23:16 syllogism wrote: One doesn't have to be a "clueless sc2 blind fanboy" to think that your posts and opinions generally tend to be very negative, childish, arrogant, not constructive and your tone generally quite unpleasant. So yes, very much in-line with what you see on b.net forums.
Perhaps valid points, but I don't see why its not constructive if the guy puts reasons forth for his complaints, he's not sitting around going 'TvZ impossible' or anything retarded like that.
On August 21 2012 23:08 Yoshi Kirishima wrote: so they're going to maybe just revert the BC nerf? Won't it be a bit too strong though...? They're already quite strong, and, especially compared to SC1, they see quite a lot of play for being so high tech, especially for terran, who usually sticks with mostly bio or mech units. Didn't they nerf BCs because of that 1 base BC rush build in TvP? (And seems it would work even better in TvZ and TvT too lol)
The Repairion strategy on maps like Scrap Station. Maps are way larger now, plus repairing SCV attack priority was changed also. Don't fear a renaissance of this strategy, to be honest.
On August 21 2012 23:13 aTnClouD wrote: I don't understand why some people expect me to articulate my opinion in a short interview when I've been saying the same things over and over for the past 2 years and I've gotten pretty much shit from every clueless SC2 blind fanboy. I can write an insanely long wall of text about all the issues that could have been avoided in SC2 if only the development and balance team was as competent as the Brood War one, but in the end I would just be wasting my time for nothing and more bad rep. If you say anything negative most people will label you as a whiner even if you bring valid points and I don't think feeding this stupidity with time and effort will bring me anywhere. I'm just overall very disappointed but of course I will keep playing the game and having fun.
btw I really think David Kim doesn't have the game knowledge required for his job. There was a meeting of progamers with David Kim at Gamescom and as far as I understand he's pretty much clueless and doesn't have the insight needed to understand what's going on. I was told he seems to think pvz late game is fine while every protoss is basically playing every tournament game trying to kill zergs before they have an unbeatable deathball. They basically look at the stats and try to even them out as much as possible but this doesn't make the game good to watch. I still fail to understand how they could think gateways/warpgates are completely fine as they are when it's completely destroying the potential entertainment in protoss matchups. Watch last GSL final if you want a valid example.
I don’t think people have a problem with what you say, but how you say it. From someone who work in law, calling people dumb is generally a poor way to argue anything, ever. People respond better to positive feed back and constructive criticism. When people talk about HotS, the first thing I look for is if they have anything positive to say about the expansion. If everything is negative, I generally assume that the person was predisposed to hate anything Blizzard did. There are people in the world who live to complain, and some of those people play SC2 are and very good at it.
Also, the game is in the proto-type stage and has not been released to the masses to try out. Many of the units are in a very flexible state and have changed several times since we have seen them. Blizzard is just trying things out and seeing how they work in the game and I really feel the community should embrace that. I personally feel the mothership core should have stayed locked to a nexus, but I am willing to see what it does as a slow moving unit. They can always change it back if it doesn’t work. After all, we won’t know until we try, so why not.
On August 21 2012 23:16 syllogism wrote: One doesn't have to be a "clueless sc2 blind fanboy" to think that your posts and opinions generally tend to be very negative, childish, arrogant, not constructive and your tone generally quite unpleasant. So yes, very much in-line with what you see on b.net forums.
I'm ok with people not liking the way I express myself, and it's understandable since I don't care enough about being e-famous to do the best possible PR I can like most other progamers, but this does not make the reasoning behind my logic less valid. I've been playing at a really high non korean level for years in SCBW and SC2 and I know pretty well what I'm talking about. My point of view as progamer is obviously negative since the current gaming trend is to make everything as simple and unchallenging as possible, you just don't see this from anyone else because if you are not always positive the public will think you are extremely uncool. People tend to remember only the bad things you say and I haven't only been shitting on SC2. I think it can be a really fun game to watch and play and I also expressed this several times. What I said in this small interview was just a really honest reaction to the disappointment I am expecting to get from HotS after I've been hoping for a more challenging, overall better game than Wings of Liberty.
The Mothership with ground only Vortex and Stasis field will be removed and replaced by the Wings of Liberty Mothership
really hating this decision. mother ship should have been thrown in the garbage alone time ago tbh. i still have no idea why they decided to keep Mship but remove carrier. its not that hard to figure out a place/buff for the carrier. if they are going to keep the Mship i thought that removing vortex or making it ground only would be a good idea atleast, but keeping it the same as WoL Mship ontop of having the Mship core is facepalm worthy. such a flawed unit design. as it stands now the Mship is just one gigantic arbiter.
i think the main reason the mothership stays in the game and the carrier may not is, that with the introduction of the viper, swarm host and widdow mines, the game is getting more and more bw'ish units. its kims or browders idea to say hey, bw did not had the derp-tempest the herp-momaship and stuff. instead of just adding units that worked and tweak around those wich may not so good. the ego of this developement team is too huge to create something wich must be different than its predecessor.
Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
To all your arm chair game designers, care to give me a list of changes you will make to HOTS to make it better in your eyes? Such as unit stats changes, implementation of new units etc.
On August 21 2012 23:16 syllogism wrote: One doesn't have to be a "clueless sc2 blind fanboy" to think that your posts and opinions generally tend to be very negative, childish, arrogant, not constructive and your tone generally quite unpleasant. So yes, very much in-line with what you see on b.net forums.
I'm ok with people not liking the way I express myself, and it's understandable since I don't care enough about being e-famous to do the best possible PR I can like most other progamers, but this does not make the reasoning behind my logic less valid. I've been playing at a really high non korean level for years in SCBW and SC2 and I know pretty well what I'm talking about. My point of view as progamer is obviously negative since the current gaming trend is to make everything as simple and unchallenging as possible, you just don't see this from anyone else because if you are not always positive the public will think you are extremely uncool. People tend to remember only the bad things you say and I haven't only been shitting on SC2. I think it can be a really fun game to watch and play and I also expressed this several times. What I said in this small interview was just a really honest reaction to the disappointment I am expecting to get from HotS after I've been hoping for a more challenging, overall better game than Wings of Liberty.
In internet discussions, so many things such as sarcasm and subtle expressions are lost, not to mention the political shills and mindless fanboys who engage in red herring and strawman arguments, you gotta say what's on your mind directly. I mean you're not running for office or anything, better to remove all ambiguity or even go to extremes to express displeasure or the meaning just gets lost. I just hate it when I write something really long only for some shill to latch onto one little detail to use in ad hominem attacks.
I think what you said made perfect sense. Keep at it. Now that the rose colored glasses of SC2 has come off, I think people are more receptive to what you say -- as evidenced here in this thread.
On August 21 2012 23:08 Yoshi Kirishima wrote: so they're going to maybe just revert the BC nerf? Won't it be a bit too strong though...? They're already quite strong, and, especially compared to SC1, they see quite a lot of play for being so high tech, especially for terran, who usually sticks with mostly bio or mech units. Didn't they nerf BCs because of that 1 base BC rush build in TvP? (And seems it would work even better in TvZ and TvT too lol)
they used to do damage in burst however, which was clearly stronger in the long run instead of small chunks that get worst as the opponent's units get more armor upgrades. and where do they "see quite a lot of play"? unless you are confusing them with brood lords, i havent seen that much BC play in pro games.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
You haven't listened to Cloud at all.
He didn't imply that it was imbalanced, more that it has things which were poorly designed. When he discussed the mothership core he said "blizzard doesn't want people to lose to early rushes anymore I guess". That's the idea behind the mothership core. Design is the intention behind a unit and how players implement it into their games, balance is whether it's any good. Different things altogether, and easy to confuse.
I personally do not care how "unprofessional" or whatever you want to call ClouD's articulation of his opinion. The truth is a lot of us share that opinion and he voiced it EXACTLY as a lot of us feel it should be voiced; aggressively. Blizzard ISN'T really listening and the skill ceiling is in fact just coming down farther and farther to cater to the masses instead of to the skillful and the dedicated.
Micro-able units that have exponentially scaling benefits to surviving while killing other units should be something they always apply into all races. More 1-button gimmicks and A-move things that only require optimal positioning rather than serious clicking micro are only going to make this game less stable and the pro-scene more of a revolving door rather than a career path.
Violet, "I think Swarm host is pretty Suck." I loled so hard, just how he said it was hilarious. i really am interested to play with all of these units however. Thank you for these interviews this was an awesome watch. I can't wait for HOTS.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
On August 21 2012 23:08 Yoshi Kirishima wrote: so they're going to maybe just revert the BC nerf? Won't it be a bit too strong though...? They're already quite strong, and, especially compared to SC1, they see quite a lot of play for being so high tech, especially for terran, who usually sticks with mostly bio or mech units. Didn't they nerf BCs because of that 1 base BC rush build in TvP? (And seems it would work even better in TvZ and TvT too lol)
Are they strong now? I never use them, I think they are borderline underpowered at the moment. At the very least, they should make the ground and air attack do the same damage. They look exactly the same visually, so it is very confusing that the ground attack is 25% weaker.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
There is a metric fuckton of community feedback out there that is being patently ignored with the direction HoTS looks to be going at this current juncture. It is subject to change yes, but maybe that process can be sped along with feedback?
When the balance team professed recently that they were unaware that the mothership was popular in lategame PvZ, when they claim to watch all the big tournaments your faith in Blizzard takes a knock. They can't claim to be clued into the current trends of pro play, and have a gap in their knowledge that big!
On August 22 2012 00:33 ROOTT1 wrote: wut about tt1, my tt1 alert goes off whenever someone says my name. was i mentioned in a positive or a negative way?
Hey, what's your opinion of HOTS? Be the pro voice of Canadians.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
There is a metric fuckton of community feedback out there that is being patently ignored with the direction HoTS looks to be going at this current juncture. It is subject to change yes, but maybe that process can be sped along with feedback? When the balance team professed recently that they were unaware that the mothership was popular in lategame PvZ, when they claim to watch all the big tournaments your faith in Blizzard takes a knock. They can't claim to be clued into the current trends of pro play, and have a gap in their knowledge that big!
Where did they say that? As far as I'm aware there was some awkward Interview by Kennigit where he asked a weird question about PvZ lategame problems.
However Browder did not say they don't know that the mothership is/was popular in PvZ.
So, can you link to that statement? If not - no comment.
On August 22 2012 00:33 ROOTT1 wrote: wut about tt1, my tt1 alert goes off whenever someone says my name. was i mentioned in a positive or a negative way?
Hey, what's your opinion of HOTS? Be the pro voice of Canadians.
hots = wol for toss, we have the same attacking units FUCK THIS SHIT
On August 22 2012 00:33 ROOTT1 wrote: wut about tt1, my tt1 alert goes off whenever someone says my name. was i mentioned in a positive or a negative way?
Hey, what's your opinion of HOTS? Be the pro voice of Canadians.
hots = wol for toss, we have the same attacking units FUCK THIS SHIT
Jesus TT1 stop sitting on the fence, tell us your real thoughts
On August 22 2012 00:33 ROOTT1 wrote: wut about tt1, my tt1 alert goes off whenever someone says my name. was i mentioned in a positive or a negative way?
Hey, what's your opinion of HOTS? Be the pro voice of Canadians.
hots = wol for toss, we have the same attacking units FUCK THIS SHIT
Yeah exactly Theres not really a reason for me to play hots custom map, everything is the same except i got 2 oracles darting in and out of their base every minute orso.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
There is a metric fuckton of community feedback out there that is being patently ignored with the direction HoTS looks to be going at this current juncture. It is subject to change yes, but maybe that process can be sped along with feedback?
When the balance team professed recently that they were unaware that the mothership was popular in lategame PvZ, when they claim to watch all the big tournaments your faith in Blizzard takes a knock. They can't claim to be clued into the current trends of pro play, and have a gap in their knowledge that big!
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
There is a metric fuckton of community feedback out there that is being patently ignored with the direction HoTS looks to be going at this current juncture. It is subject to change yes, but maybe that process can be sped along with feedback?
When the balance team professed recently that they were unaware that the mothership was popular in lategame PvZ, when they claim to watch all the big tournaments your faith in Blizzard takes a knock. They can't claim to be clued into the current trends of pro play, and have a gap in their knowledge that big!
This was a bad question from the interviewer, asking how DB felt about the problem with neural parasiting the mothership. Which is non-existant. the problem is the coinflippiness of landing the vortex or not. DB of course responded by denying knowledge of such a problem, which is correct.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
There is a metric fuckton of community feedback out there that is being patently ignored with the direction HoTS looks to be going at this current juncture. It is subject to change yes, but maybe that process can be sped along with feedback? When the balance team professed recently that they were unaware that the mothership was popular in lategame PvZ, when they claim to watch all the big tournaments your faith in Blizzard takes a knock. They can't claim to be clued into the current trends of pro play, and have a gap in their knowledge that big!
Where did they say that? As far as I'm aware there was some awkward Interview by Kennigit where he asked a weird question about PvZ lategame problems.
However Browder did not say they don't know that the mothership is/was popular in PvZ.
So, can you link to that statement? If not - no comment.
I don’t think they ever said that either. I also remember the interview where Dustin was caught with a question about the mothership in late game PvZ. I think the question was mostly about how late game PvZ is to focused on the mothership and vortex, but it was framed like several previous balance questions. From my memory, it looked like Dustin misunderstood the question and said he was not aware of a “balance issue” with the mother ship late game, but the question was really focused on a game play and design issue. Still, he said they would look into it and did not ignore the question.
But clearly here are some people who live to be upset and claim that Blizzard is not listening to them.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
There is a metric fuckton of community feedback out there that is being patently ignored with the direction HoTS looks to be going at this current juncture. It is subject to change yes, but maybe that process can be sped along with feedback? When the balance team professed recently that they were unaware that the mothership was popular in lategame PvZ, when they claim to watch all the big tournaments your faith in Blizzard takes a knock. They can't claim to be clued into the current trends of pro play, and have a gap in their knowledge that big!
Where did they say that? As far as I'm aware there was some awkward Interview by Kennigit where he asked a weird question about PvZ lategame problems.
However Browder did not say they don't know that the mothership is/was popular in PvZ.
So, can you link to that statement? If not - no comment.
Ah, fair point. I tend to read transcripts/TL comments as I zone out quite quickly when it comes to big interviews. I've made the mistake of listening to TL posters too much
The interview in question appears to be him saying 'I wasn't aware that was an issue' in response to a question from Kenningit specifically regarding neural parasite, as opposed to general mothership useage. This got misconstrued by many of the viewers as being him saying he wasn't aware motherships were prevalent in lategame PvZ, so apologies to Browder.
EDIT - In my defence he also goes on to say that the vortex/archon toilet vs infestor/BL is good as a spectacle so, I think he's a bit off with the community on that one
Protoss seems pretty good imo, listening to Feast and saying that the mothership core has a 25 mana ability that can be used on the nexus to get full 200/200 energy seems pretty good I wouldn't really mind getting no new gateway units when you can have so much chronoboost.
Kind of agree with cloud aswell though despite him whining about everything too much in the past, if anything the skill ceiling should be raised for other races than adding in the warhound. So that you can easily see who the good players are and will be rewarded with playing so well and the bad players will suffer and stay irrelevant by being bad instead of possibly getting good tournament finishes when they may not deserve it.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
There is a metric fuckton of community feedback out there that is being patently ignored with the direction HoTS looks to be going at this current juncture. It is subject to change yes, but maybe that process can be sped along with feedback?
When the balance team professed recently that they were unaware that the mothership was popular in lategame PvZ, when they claim to watch all the big tournaments your faith in Blizzard takes a knock. They can't claim to be clued into the current trends of pro play, and have a gap in their knowledge that big!
You misread what they said. They were unaware that the Mothership on late game PvZ was a issue. A lot of people say that late game of PvZ is coinflippy because it depends so much on the Vortex and Neural.
And even that is not completely true. You can always split your BL, position better your army, etc.
On August 22 2012 00:56 Jaegeru wrote: Protoss seems pretty good imo, listening to Feast and saying that the mothership core has a 25 mana ability that can be used on the nexus to get full 200/200 energy seems pretty good I wouldn't really mind getting no new gateway units when you can have so much chronoboost.
Kind of agree with cloud aswell though despite him whining about everything too much in the past, if anything the skill ceiling should be raised for other races than adding in the warhound. So that you can easily see who the good players are and will be rewarded with playing so well and the bad players will suffer and stay irrelevant by being bad instead of possibly getting good tournament finishes when they may not deserve it.
All the listed changes are good. Especially the widow-mine looking more and more spider mine by the patch.
And glad that I'm not the only one that thought energizing the nexus meaning unlimited CB was a bit imbalanced. You actually could CB out collossi and double forges non-stop with that ability.
And best of all, the mothership stays. Now if we can only save the carrier too!
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
There is a metric fuckton of community feedback out there that is being patently ignored with the direction HoTS looks to be going at this current juncture. It is subject to change yes, but maybe that process can be sped along with feedback? When the balance team professed recently that they were unaware that the mothership was popular in lategame PvZ, when they claim to watch all the big tournaments your faith in Blizzard takes a knock. They can't claim to be clued into the current trends of pro play, and have a gap in their knowledge that big!
Where did they say that? As far as I'm aware there was some awkward Interview by Kennigit where he asked a weird question about PvZ lategame problems.
However Browder did not say they don't know that the mothership is/was popular in PvZ.
So, can you link to that statement? If not - no comment.
I don’t think they ever said that either. I also remember the interview where Dustin was caught with a question about the mothership in late game PvZ. I think the question was mostly about how late game PvZ is to focused on the mothership and vortex, but it was framed like several previous balance questions. From my memory, it looked like Dustin misunderstood the question and said he was not aware of a “balance issue” with the mother ship late game, but the question was really focused on a game play and design issue. Still, he said they would look into it and did not ignore the question.
But clearly here are some people who live to be upset and claim that Blizzard is not listening to them.
Yeh, it's pretty clear that it should go both ways. If the community demands more clear talk from the developers than we can't have these, momentarily very common, instances where a lot people get mad over something that never got said.
When reading/listening to an interview the community shouldn't try to freak out once there's something that isn't clear at first. Instead it's best to try to understand the meaning, which in most cases shouldn't be too hard unless you really do consider the devs to be complete idiots.
I mean it's already pretty good with the Starcraft community and there's a lot more Dev talk and interview it feels like, still, improvements can be made.
On August 22 2012 00:56 Jaegeru wrote: Protoss seems pretty good imo, listening to Feast and saying that the mothership core has a 25 mana ability that can be used on the nexus to get full 200/200 energy seems pretty good I wouldn't really mind getting no new gateway units when you can have so much chronoboost.
Kind of agree with cloud aswell though despite him whining about everything too much in the past, if anything the skill ceiling should be raised for other races than adding in the warhound. So that you can easily see who the good players are and will be rewarded with playing so well and the bad players will suffer and stay irrelevant by being bad instead of possibly getting good tournament finishes when they may not deserve it.
u cant energize a nexus anymore, only units
Oh I see, hadn't realised that had been changed so would agree and say that protoss probably has got the shorter end of the stick at the moment.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
There is a metric fuckton of community feedback out there that is being patently ignored with the direction HoTS looks to be going at this current juncture. It is subject to change yes, but maybe that process can be sped along with feedback? When the balance team professed recently that they were unaware that the mothership was popular in lategame PvZ, when they claim to watch all the big tournaments your faith in Blizzard takes a knock. They can't claim to be clued into the current trends of pro play, and have a gap in their knowledge that big!
Where did they say that? As far as I'm aware there was some awkward Interview by Kennigit where he asked a weird question about PvZ lategame problems.
However Browder did not say they don't know that the mothership is/was popular in PvZ.
So, can you link to that statement? If not - no comment.
I don’t think they ever said that either. I also remember the interview where Dustin was caught with a question about the mothership in late game PvZ. I think the question was mostly about how late game PvZ is to focused on the mothership and vortex, but it was framed like several previous balance questions. From my memory, it looked like Dustin misunderstood the question and said he was not aware of a “balance issue” with the mother ship late game, but the question was really focused on a game play and design issue. Still, he said they would look into it and did not ignore the question.
But clearly here are some people who live to be upset and claim that Blizzard is not listening to them.
Yeh, it's pretty clear that it should go both ways. If the community demands more clear talk from the developers than we can't have these, momentarily very common, instances where a lot people get mad over something that never got said.
When reading/listening to an interview the community shouldn't try to freak out once there's something that isn't clear at first. Instead it's best to try to understand the meaning, which in most cases shouldn't be too hard unless you really do consider the devs to be complete idiots.
I mean it's already pretty good with the Starcraft community and there's a lot more Dev talk and interview it feels like, still, improvements can be made.
I corrected myself on that point by the way, took a bit longer than I would have wished as there are a bunch of my family demanding I stop being antisocial at the minute!
Starting 1:30 is the line of questioning that lead to this misunderstanding
I do not care for Cloud's attitude, but putting that aside he made a great point amongst all the QQ and abuse. Instead of making Protoss and Zerg units harder to control they are veering towards making Terran more a-move friendly. As much from some lame personal point of view I would like Terran unit comps a bit easier to control, I would prefer other races having harder armies to control to make the game better.
On August 22 2012 01:21 Klipsys wrote: Who really cares what cloud thinks? Has he even won anything ever?
That isn't relevant to the discussion. You can't have a valid opinion without being the best player in the world? Why are you even reading this forum if you don't care about opinions of people that have never won anything, because that's probably close to 99,9 % of the community?
On August 21 2012 20:06 NVRLand wrote: Would someone please be so kind and explain what that "stasis" ability is? I've checked google translate to find out the swedish word for it but can't find anything that actually explains what the mothership ability will do to the units... haven't found any videos of it being demonstrated either :/
Stasis was new ability on the Mothership, it is ability to freeze all air units around the Mothership, including yours too, because Vortex is working only vs. ground units.
lol they added statis? another bw spell
That one in particular really confused me because Vortex is the new Stasis. A lot of the BW spells made it into SC2 under different names and races, though their previous glory is much diminished in their new forms.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Good fucking job. You are from an english speaking country and you can't even understand Cloud's point. What he meant was that blizzard is trying to lower the skill ceiling of terran which, right now, is way way way higher than the other two races. Funnily enough, the fact that he couldn't even qualify for WCS Italy proved Cloud's point. He is Terran and probably he also is the best italian player but still he couldn't qualify. Who knows why, maybe because of the other two races ? But hey, it's ok. You SC2 fanboy are living in a dream world. Can't wait to see your reaction when your bubble will be bursted down =) .
Carlo, I love you. You are one of the few progamer in the scene right now who always tell the truth about the balance in the game. It really sucks that people still talk shit to you, because you don't deserve it. Keep it up.
i have to agree with Violet on the swarm host..and it confuses me how one of the major ideas behind such a unit is to help with zerg's weakness in their ability to end games by attacking when they're ahead.. like vs marine/medivac such a unit is borderline useless.. in their current state spending resources on swarm hosts to try to finish a terran off would be counterproductive. well if I'm correct and this is an issue, I'm sure it'll be resolved after the game's played enough, just surprised still that this idea is the one that survived all the cuts.
Being a pro-gamer doesn't mean you know anything about how to design a game which Cloud proves in fucking spades. All this "a move friendly" BS is just proof of that - the most basic use of units in this game is moving them from a to b in a group conducive to winning an engagement. Every single unit barring casters with no useful attack is capable of being used as an A move unit. This is true of all strategy games - in fact in virtually every single strategy game, THE GUY WITH MORE STUFF THAT DOES MORE DAMAGE FUCKING WINS THE FIGHT. It is remarkable, for example, that both SC2 and SCBW are balanced in such a way that sometimes, this isn't actually true.
Single target A move units (hi Warhound) are crazy easy to balance. It's a game of numbers and since there's no multiplication implicit to a Warhound deathball they scale linearly with the only limits being the quantized number of shots required to destroy a particular unit. If the problem with the Warhound is that it's too easy to A move, is the problem the Warhound itself (ie taking too many shots to kill and thus absorbing fire for higher DPS units) or is it the time of availability? Is it the sheer damage output? Does it fill a niche other units don't fill? Does it have a reason for being there?
It's only when you get into multi-target damage that a unit becomes really hard to balance. When people go on about A moving, they're not talking about A moving. They're talking about units that are strong enough to survive without being microed against unit groups of equal strength with casters that cannot kill them. There are only two real a move deathballs in the game - Archon Colossus Stalker Chargelot and Infestor Corruptor Broodlord. Both of these have direct counters in the Widow Mine and the Tempest - the two units everyone is slagging off left and right. Every other deathball either has positional weaknesses or involves compositions that take forever to build up/regenerate. There's no such weakness for either of these deathballs - Protoss can easily reinforce with Warpgates for 3/4 of their main units as opposed to say a Mech deathball where you have to take up tech lab factory time to produce all but basic units.
The only worry I have for HoTS is with tanks and I think Blizzard will realise that themselves.
No, Cloud. David Kim is not an idiot. David Kim is one of the designers of a multi-million copy selling game and he is responsible for your fucking career. Show some goddamn respect.
On August 22 2012 02:01 Zelniq wrote: i have to agree with Violet on the swarm host..and it confuses me how one of the major ideas behind such a unit is to help with zerg's weakness in their ability to end games by attacking when they're ahead.. like vs marine/medivac such a unit is borderline useless.. in their current state spending resources on swarm hosts to try to finish a terran off would be counterproductive. well if I'm correct and this is an issue, I'm sure it'll be resolved after the game's played enough, just surprised still that this idea is the one that survived all the cuts.
I actually quite like the swarm host, it gives additional free tanking units against siege fire. I can imagine top Zergs syncing their army to attack with the spawning of the units and stuff like that, similarly to how infested Terrans are used against tanks currently.
I see their main potential utility being to siege up Protoss bases though, a way to chip away at the walls without committing all your units to being forcefielded. Actually one of the few units I quite enjoy the concept of
On August 22 2012 01:21 Swift118 wrote: I do not care for Cloud's attitude, but putting that aside he made a great point amongst all the QQ and abuse. Instead of making Protoss and Zerg units harder to control they are veering towards making Terran more a-move friendly. As much from some lame personal point of view I would like Terran unit comps a bit easier to control, I would prefer other races having harder armies to control to make the game better.
I have become so tired of this argument. Both zerg and protoss are getting units that require multi tasking, micro and control. Niether the swarm host or oracle are going to do much good hanging out in a base. These units need to be out on the map, doing things to be effective. The tempest will do a protoss play no good hanging out with the main army. The viper may have a place in the main army for zerg, but is spell caster, which requires micro.
The battle hellion will likely do a lot to solve the terran’s a-move fears. From all reports, these units seem to be best use to intercept or block opposing melee units. They rely mostly on positing and map awareness to incept incoming charges. By simply existing and being able to combat melee units, this will make the game harder for protoss and zerg using those units. If you think of the units as pikemen in an old medieval army, they seem pretty ok. Hopefully this will mean more flanking. But the best part about the battle hellion is that it can just transform in a hellion to harass, making them more micro intensive.
Terran having a thick unit to tank some damage on the front line is not a bad thing. Their lack of a front line fighter has been one of the weaknesses of the race for a while. The fact that it can also become a fast moving harassment unit will mean far more interesting games.
No, Cloud. David Kim is not an idiot. David Kim is one of the designers of a multi-million copy selling game and he is responsible for your fucking career. Show some goddamn respect.
Yeah, Cloud get it right! Its Dustin Browder that needs to be patched, nerfed, and pulled from the game.
On August 22 2012 02:01 Zelniq wrote: i have to agree with Violet on the swarm host..and it confuses me how one of the major ideas behind such a unit is to help with zerg's weakness in their ability to end games by attacking when they're ahead.. like vs marine/medivac such a unit is borderline useless.. in their current state spending resources on swarm hosts to try to finish a terran off would be counterproductive. well if I'm correct and this is an issue, I'm sure it'll be resolved after the game's played enough, just surprised still that this idea is the one that survived all the cuts.
I feel more like the swarm host is a unit to have as support in battles, but can also offer some tools to break someone when crippled. So you won't get one/some to break someone, but you may be able to break someone by having one/some. i think it must be seen as a way to put on extra pressure when turtling is the opponents' most comfortable position.
I actually like it, to be honest. Especially against protoss, i feel like i have to commit heavily, or not attack at all. This is a kind of middle road.
It makes me cringe hearing about those "a move" units that supposedly don't take skill and all that.
Just because a unit is simply by design doesn't mean the unit won't provide enough versatility nor that that there's no skill required in using them.
I mean is anyone going to argue that the Marine, about as simple as a unit as it gets, is for "a move"-noobs? This is a real time strategy game after all, you can do insanely much with even very simple units.
e: Also, it's funny how so many people applaud Cloud for calling him an idiot. It's probably the same folks that would tear their hair out when they would hear one of the Devs call a progamer, e.g. Cloud, an idiot.
And no, just because it's Cloud I do not think it's it's appropriate of him calling David Kim an idiot. If behavior like that would be the norm there were fewer meetings with the Dev team.
On August 21 2012 23:08 Yoshi Kirishima wrote: so they're going to maybe just revert the BC nerf? Won't it be a bit too strong though...? They're already quite strong, and, especially compared to SC1, they see quite a lot of play for being so high tech, especially for terran, who usually sticks with mostly bio or mech units. Didn't they nerf BCs because of that 1 base BC rush build in TvP? (And seems it would work even better in TvZ and TvT too lol)
they used to do damage in burst however, which was clearly stronger in the long run instead of small chunks that get worst as the opponent's units get more armor upgrades. and where do they "see quite a lot of play"? unless you are confusing them with brood lords, i havent seen that much BC play in pro games.
Well I mean, compared to SC1, BCs are easier to incorporate now and synergize better with the new compositions/units.
Ah, you mean like in BW? Well it wouldn't directly affect the damage then, only affecting the scaling. From the interview it sounded like they were going to increase the actual damage and/or rate of fire.
On August 22 2012 02:01 Zelniq wrote: i have to agree with Violet on the swarm host..and it confuses me how one of the major ideas behind such a unit is to help with zerg's weakness in their ability to end games by attacking when they're ahead.. like vs marine/medivac such a unit is borderline useless.. in their current state spending resources on swarm hosts to try to finish a terran off would be counterproductive. well if I'm correct and this is an issue, I'm sure it'll be resolved after the game's played enough, just surprised still that this idea is the one that survived all the cuts.
I feel more like the swarm host is a unit to have as support in battles, but can also offer some tools to break someone when crippled. So you won't get one/some to break someone, but you may be able to break someone by having one/some. i think it must be seen as a way to put on extra pressure when turtling is the opponents' most comfortable position.
I actually like it, to be honest. Especially against protoss, i feel like i have to commit heavily, or not attack at all. This is a kind of middle road.
The swarm host is going to be one of the harder units to figure out. It is a unit that is going to be dependant on the other races agression, map distance and how well defended they are. They are a good concept, but you need to get them with an army to support and protect them, while also knowing where to deploy them.
I don't understand why Cloud lashes out against David Kim. Because Cloud doesn't understand David Kim's methods doesn't mean that David Kim is an idiot.
On August 22 2012 02:17 Na_Dann_Ma_GoGo wrote: @ Evangelist
Well said!
It makes me cringe hearing about those "a move" units that supposedly don't take skill and all that.
Just because a unit is simply by design doesn't mean the unit won't provide enough versatility nor that that there's no skill required in using them.
I mean is anyone going to argue that the Marine, about as simple as a unit as it gets, is for "a move"-noobs? This is a real time strategy game after all, you can do insanely much with even very simple units.
The marine is interesting because it interacts well with formations. You can choose between having a concave, a ball, having them split up, having a few units ahead to snipe. This works because marines are small, cheap and fast. A warhound which is big and hard to control doesn't function like that; area of effect won't kill it, the pathfinding as such will always have it in an optimal position and they're too expensive to risk in any position other than at the back of your army, similar to immortals. Even David Kim admits that the warhound is made to give casual players a chance to win with a mech composition, although not with mech style gameplay.
And there is no point in saying that this is just an alpha build and that everything will be changed. Blizzard has never demonstrated that they particularly care about the opinions of pro gamers. If you listen to any of their explanations for why they introduced certain units or why they scrapped them, it's in almost all cases because casuals had problems with something. When there are complaints about terran being too hard to play compared to protoss and zerg they don't use the opportunity granted by the expansion to fundamentally rework the respective difficulty of the races; rather leave the existing game intact and add a few units to terran to give them easier play styles.
A lot of units from Wings of Liberty never worked out too well. Examples are the roach, colossus and corruptor. It is obvious that if Heart of the Swarm is to be seen as a real step in their commitment to creating the best e-sports game possible, that they would remove or rework a lot of those units. After all, they do have two full years of development time, so don't tell me they can't come up with more than just a few units. I think it's rather the case that they are planning to cash in on whatever popularity Wings still has, that's why they are unwilling to remove any units people might possibly be attached to, even if it doesn't create the most ideal game. (they will find ways to keep the carrier, don't worry)
The game currently is obviously broken, it is too volatile at the top and a lot of the match-ups are not anywhere close to an optimal state. Over time a lot of match-ups seemed to have regressed and become less interesting. I'll admit to enjoying the game a lot still, but my enthusiasm has waned a great deal. I personally don't see how I can follow several more years of e.g. turtle into deathball into win for both zerg and protoss, much less if they decide to give terran similar play styles. I hope that the influx of KeSPA players and the release of Heart of the Swarm will bring some excitement and improve both the viewing and playing experience, but given that Blizzard has constantly demonstrated they favor short-term popularity by appealing to the lowest common denominator over facilitating an optimal e-sports experience, I have great doubts whether it will be successful.
I know I'm being a bit unfair to Blizzard. Browder and Kim obviously genuinely want this game to succeed, Heart of the Swarm will likely improve the scene and it's already a pretty fun game. Nevertheless, it could be so much better which is obvious if you compare SC2 to Brood War or even Warcraft 3. Maybe if Blizzard was not so constrained by being a part of a big corporation that's chasing maximum profits and by being unwilling to take risks by deviating from their winning formula, then things would have been genuinely different. To be honest I'm not sure why no smaller developers have bothered creating an RTS title that is more suited to being an e-sport, but maybe it will happen in the future. After all, a game does not really need cinematics, a 3D engine, a large single player campaign, an ambitious social networking environment to be successful as a game, with a focus on creating interesting compelling gameplay. Brood War would have had roughly the same amount of success if it had none of those things, just the multiplayer experience and all these additions are simply about corporate profits, not about a commitment to e-sports.
On August 22 2012 02:01 Zelniq wrote: i have to agree with Violet on the swarm host..and it confuses me how one of the major ideas behind such a unit is to help with zerg's weakness in their ability to end games by attacking when they're ahead.. like vs marine/medivac such a unit is borderline useless.. in their current state spending resources on swarm hosts to try to finish a terran off would be counterproductive. well if I'm correct and this is an issue, I'm sure it'll be resolved after the game's played enough, just surprised still that this idea is the one that survived all the cuts.
I feel more like the swarm host is a unit to have as support in battles, but can also offer some tools to break someone when crippled. So you won't get one/some to break someone, but you may be able to break someone by having one/some. i think it must be seen as a way to put on extra pressure when turtling is the opponents' most comfortable position.
I actually like it, to be honest. Especially against protoss, i feel like i have to commit heavily, or not attack at all. This is a kind of middle road.
The swarm host is going to be one of the harder units to figure out. It is a unit that is going to be dependant on the other races agression, map distance and how well defended they are. They are a good concept, but you need to get them with an army to support and protect them, while also knowing where to deploy them.
Agreed.
I am especially interested in mid game roach aggression with host support. (dependent on swarm host gas cost).
Protoss and Zerg are mainly "1a" units. While Terran absolutely has to micro almost everything. Giving Terran a few "1a" units and giving Protoss and Zerg micro units only levels the field. Z&P have A while Terran has B. Now Terran as A and P&Z have B. Same AB thing going on. Its not like one race is getting anything more special than another.
On August 22 2012 02:38 MetalPanda wrote: I'm so tired of Archon toilet/Neural Parasite battles in PvZ as a spectator, please remove that!
And Dustin Browder doesn't "like" positional play.
On August 22 2012 02:32 PauseBreak wrote: @ Evengelist
Protoss and Zerg are mainly "1a" units. While Terran absolutely has to micro almost everything. Giving Terran a few "1a" units and giving Protoss and Zerg micro units only levels the field. Z&P have A while Terran has B. Now Terran as A and P&Z have B. Same AB thing going on. Its not like one race is getting anything more special than another.
I find it hard to find a interview with cloud where he wasn't complaining about something about the game. Cloud grow up your opinions do come fort out of your negativity instead of rational thoughts. Already calling the game more noob friendly is just too prematurely, it was the same as Ret said in sc2 you don't need micro before he really understood the game.
On August 22 2012 02:17 Na_Dann_Ma_GoGo wrote: @ Evangelist
Well said!
It makes me cringe hearing about those "a move" units that supposedly don't take skill and all that.
Just because a unit is simply by design doesn't mean the unit won't provide enough versatility nor that that there's no skill required in using them.
I mean is anyone going to argue that the Marine, about as simple as a unit as it gets, is for "a move"-noobs? This is a real time strategy game after all, you can do insanely much with even very simple units.
The marine is interesting because it interacts well with formations. You can choose between having a concave, a ball, having them split up, having a few units ahead to snipe. This works because marines are small, cheap and fast. A warhound which is big and hard to control doesn't function like that; area of effect won't kill it, the pathfinding as such will always have it in an optimal position and they're too expensive to risk in any position other than at the back of your army, similar to immortals. Even David Kim admits that the warhound is made to give casual players a chance to win with a mech composition, although not with mech style gameplay.
And there is no point in saying that this is just an alpha build and that everything will be changed. Blizzard has never demonstrated that they particularly care about the opinions of pro gamers. If you listen to any of their explanations for why they introduced certain units or why they scrapped them, it's in almost all cases because casuals had problems with something. When there are complaints about terran being too hard to play compared to protoss and zerg they don't use the opportunity granted by the expansion to fundamentally rework the respective difficulty of the races; rather leave the existing game intact and add a few units to terran to give them easier play styles.
A lot of units from Wings of Liberty never worked out too well. Examples are the roach, colossus and corruptor. It is obvious that if Heart of the Swarm is to be seen as a real step in their commitment to creating the best e-sports game possible, that they would remove or rework a lot of those units. After all, they do have two full years of development time, so don't tell me they can't come up with more than just a few units. I think it's rather the case that they are planning to cash in on whatever popularity Wings still has, that's why they are unwilling to remove any units people might possibly be attached to, even if it doesn't create the most ideal game. (they will find ways to keep the carrier, don't worry)
The game currently is obviously broken, it is too volatile at the top and a lot of the match-ups are not anywhere close to an optimal state. Over time a lot of match-ups seemed to have regressed and become less interesting. I'll admit to enjoying the game a lot still, but my enthusiasm has waned a great deal. I personally don't see how I can follow several more years of e.g. turtle into deathball into win for both zerg and protoss, much less if they decide to give terran similar play styles. I hope that the influx of KeSPA players and the release of Heart of the Swarm will bring some excitement and improve both the viewing and playing experience, but given that Blizzard has constantly demonstrated they favor short-term popularity by appealing to the lowest common denominator over facilitating an optimal e-sports experience, I have great doubts whether it will be successful.
I know I'm being a bit unfair to Blizzard. Browder and Kim obviously genuinely want this game to succeed, Heart of the Swarm will likely improve the scene and it's already a pretty fun game. Nevertheless, it could be so much better which is obvious if you compare SC2 to Brood War or even Warcraft 3. Maybe if Blizzard was not so constrained by being a part of a big corporation chasing profits and unwilling to take risks by deviating from their winning formula things would have been different. To be honest I'm not sure why no smaller developers have bothered creating a title that is more suited to being an e-sport, but maybe it will happen in the future. After all, a game does not really need cinematics, a 3D engine, a large single player campaign, an ambitious social networking environment to be successful as a game, with a focus on creating interesting compelling gameplay. Brood War would have had roughly the same amount of success if it had none of those things, just the multiplayer experience and all these additions are simply about corporate profits, not about a commitment to e-sports.
Well played sir, excellent post. Don't know why you bothered given that people will not even bother to read it in all likelihood and continue to spout inaccuracies based on their assumptions on why people don't like the direction that HoTS appears to be going.
* The Battle Cruisers speed boost will be removed, Battle Cruisers will have increased damage
good. They were really making the same mistake they they did with void rays. A flying unit that hits air and ground with good combat characteristics is not supposed to be fast or it will be a super mutalisk. Now Battlecruiser is not supposed to fit that role.
On August 22 2012 02:58 Wombat_NI wrote: Well played sir, excellent post. Don't know why you bothered given that people will not even bother to read it in all likelihood and continue to spout inaccuracies based on their assumptions on why people don't like the direction that HoTS appears to be going.
His post isn't particularly good at all. It's all based around the assumption that Wings of Liberty is somehow too volatile and has too much randomness, too little skill. I assume this is because he is a BW elitist who thinks everything was better in BW. People never bother to check stats.
Wanna guess who has a higher total winrate, Taeja or Fantasy (both at the top of TLPD, Korean Sc2/BW respectively)? Taeja. 4 time winners the OSL? None. GSL? 1 in 2 years.
Given SC2 is an INCREDIBLY new game by BW standards, the fact that it's so STABLE is incredible. People just like spouting shit without backing any of it up.
On August 22 2012 02:58 Wombat_NI wrote: Well played sir, excellent post. Don't know why you bothered given that people will not even bother to read it in all likelihood and continue to spout inaccuracies based on their assumptions on why people don't like the direction that HoTS appears to be going.
His post isn't particularly good at all. It's all based around the assumption that Wings of Liberty is somehow too volatile and has too much randomness, too little skill. I assume this is because he is a BW elitist who thinks everything was better in BW. People never bother to check stats.
Wanna guess who has a higher total winrate, Taeja or Fantasy (both at the top of TLPD, Korean Sc2/BW respectively)? Taeja. 4 time winners the OSL? None. GSL? 1 in 2 years.
Given SC2 is an INCREDIBLY new game by BW standards, the fact that it's so STABLE is incredible. People just like spouting shit without backing any of it up.
To take an extreme example, PvP was never an unfair matchup, or imbalanced in the worst days of 4 gating, but was it optimal in a design sense?
Taeja is crazy good, but there's a lot of tournaments where they are no clear favourites, it's 'Here are 15 people who could win if they have a good day' every time. For every Tajea there's 3 Elfis who just shouldn't be beating players who are many levels above them in every aspect of the game.
Terran players are the only ones who I've ever really looked at as being able to turn those incremental mechanical edges into consistently dominant play, we need more of that to stabilise the game. There are upsets in all games, but Brood War and even Warcraft 3 were a lot less volatile for a reason. Terran is the race that is actually well designed, with a lot of variance in potential playstyles and cool versatile units, why not take more notice of why that is, and emulate that approach with the other races. You don't necessarily have to sacrifice the identifying characteristics of the races to do this either
I didn't even play BW much and was unaware of the pro scene until retroactively looking back and checking out games. It just boggles my mind that at least some of what made it such a good E-sport are overlooked, actively by the designers. Browder has said SC2 is a different game from BW, they're both good games but different, if you want BW, play that. That's fine if it was a new franchise or something, it's a sequel to the bloody original game and ignoring part of what made it great as an E-sport is just refusing to swallow your pride.
I have an open mind, and I'm basing my assessment on what I'm seeing. I was actually hopefully with a lot of the interviews from a few months ago, referring to breaking up deathball play and putting more of an emphasis on hard-to-use units. Then now by all accounts the Terran players now have a mech deathball so now all 3 races can have deathball wars? Great stuff! Blizzard in their public utterances appear to acknowledge and be aware of a lot of issue, claim they're designing the game with those in mind, and then when what we're seeing does not correlate with what they said of course people are going to get pissy!
On August 21 2012 20:59 Arpayon wrote: Cloud best whiner, it's sad to be from Italy in these cases
I feel Cloud is mischaracterised as a whiner, he's a bit blunt but he doesn't tend to excuse his own losses by using balance whine or whatever. He just has issues with the direction the game is going in a design sense, and some of his criticisms are pretty legitimate even if you disagree with them
He does. He is known for publicly claiming that bad players can succeed in the game; known for spiting on the work of casters; making up excuses for not being able to qualify in WCS Italy even though he is supposed to be the best player there, and all that while not being at the top of the scene.
It's fine to express critics but being arrogant while doing so is unacceptable when oneself isn't at the top of the pyramid.
Sry I was working, couldn't reply sooner. That is actually what I was thinking. Even in the Italian community, where he shouldn't have language problems at all, I've always seen him as a very bm person. That is of course my opinion, I would be happier if he were a better person, but he isn't at all.
i feel like they should just add some basic ones to even out inadequacies. (seems terran has more units) and thats not by adding dogshit retarded ones.
I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
On August 22 2012 03:25 uNhoLeee wrote: all the new units look fucking stupid.
i feel like they should just add some basic ones to even out inadequacies. (seems terran has more units) and thats not by adding dogshit retarded ones.
I was laughing hard at the Locusts. They look sooooo silly, and the swarm host looks so awkward and bulky as well. Not to hate on the looks of the units, but jesus, they should have just improved upon the lurker or something...
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to [i]why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
On August 22 2012 02:22 Kodak wrote: Whoever posted that the widow mine has been changed to be largely single-unit damage with little splash...
If that's real (source?) I hardly see the point of it at all. So disappointed.
Source is David Kim. There was a fansite meeting with him and Kaéo Miller at gamescom. All the changes I mentioned in the OP were stated by him or other Blizzard employees (Could be all by him. I can't recall atm who said that about the Battle Cruiser. Rest was him, though).
Again, to all those people complaining about the audio: I'm very sorry I couldn't reach your standards. I didn't have an external microphone and it was very hard to find a relatively quiet place at gamescom.
On August 22 2012 02:58 Wombat_NI wrote: Well played sir, excellent post. Don't know why you bothered given that people will not even bother to read it in all likelihood and continue to spout inaccuracies based on their assumptions on why people don't like the direction that HoTS appears to be going.
His post isn't particularly good at all. It's all based around the assumption that Wings of Liberty is somehow too volatile and has too much randomness, too little skill. I assume this is because he is a BW elitist who thinks everything was better in BW. People never bother to check stats.
Wanna guess who has a higher total winrate, Taeja or Fantasy (both at the top of TLPD, Korean Sc2/BW respectively)? Taeja. 4 time winners the OSL? None. GSL? 1 in 2 years.
Given SC2 is an INCREDIBLY new game by BW standards, the fact that it's so STABLE is incredible. People just like spouting shit without backing any of it up.
To take an extreme example, PvP was never an unfair matchup, or imbalanced in the worst days of 4 gating, but was it optimal in a design sense?
Taeja is crazy good, but there's a lot of tournaments where they are no clear favourites, it's 'Here are 15 people who could win if they have a good day' every time. For every Tajea there's 3 Elfis who just shouldn't be beating players who are many levels above them in every aspect of the game.
Terran players are the only ones who I've ever really looked at as being able to turn those incremental mechanical edges into consistently dominant play, we need more of that to stabilise the game. There are upsets in all games, but Brood War and even Warcraft 3 were a lot less volatile for a reason. Terran is the race that is actually well designed, with a lot of variance in potential playstyles and cool versatile units, why not take more notice of why that is, and emulate that approach with the other races. You don't necessarily have to sacrifice the identifying characteristics of the races to do this either
I didn't even play BW much and was unaware of the pro scene until retroactively looking back and checking out games. It just boggles my mind that at least some of what made it such a good E-sport are overlooked, actively by the designers. Browder has said SC2 is a different game from BW, they're both good games but different, if you want BW, play that. That's fine if it was a new franchise or something, it's a sequel to the bloody original game and ignoring part of what made it great as an E-sport is just refusing to swallow your pride.
I have an open mind, and I'm basing my assessment on what I'm seeing. I was actually hopefully with a lot of the interviews from a few months ago, referring to breaking up deathball play and putting more of an emphasis on hard-to-use units. Then now by all accounts the Terran players now have a mech deathball so now all 3 races can have deathball wars? Great stuff! Blizzard in their public utterances appear to acknowledge and be aware of a lot of issue, claim they're designing the game with those in mind, and then when what we're seeing does not correlate with what they said of course people are going to get pissy!
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to [i]why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Pretty much this. It's not even in beta people. FFS calm down. Cloud does make some decent points. Problem is he just sounds like all the players/people he complains about QQ'n all the time...
lol @ Cloud's interview. Standard foreigner terran player, bitter and upset about the direction sc2 has been going and has gone in. Can't say I disagree with him either.
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to [i]why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
Lol how does warpgate cause deathballs? Warpgate, if anything, would be antideathball. Sure it would increase all-ins, but you can't say deathball at all...
On August 22 2012 00:33 ROOTT1 wrote: wut about tt1, my tt1 alert goes off whenever someone says my name. was i mentioned in a positive or a negative way?
Hey, what's your opinion of HOTS? Be the pro voice of Canadians.
hots = wol for toss, we have the same attacking units FUCK THIS SHIT
you would have had a tempest but your brethren want it removed, back to the carrier!
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to [i]why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
Lol how does warpgate cause deathballs? Warpgate, if anything, would be antideathball. Sure it would increase all-ins, but you can't say deathball at all...
Because it's an all or nothing mechanic. It's part of the reason why they're giving protoss players recall much earlier in the game for HoTS.
Always nice to hear progamers opinions, they have way more insight than us. And Cloud, as usual, brings up valid points in the worst possible PR manner
I think that there are basically three problems in the balance situation: the first is the warp-in mechanic, since it completely nullifies the concept of map distance and makes PvP what it is.
The second is the existence of spells who are able to change the flow of a battle despite whatever your opponent does. Forcefields, fungals, the infamous vortex, EMPs... one could argue that somehow your opponent can prevent some of them like the vortex by splitting everywhere, or luring FFs all day long... but personally I think it relies too much on a single player to make a mistake rather than his opponent doing something genius
The third one is Blizzard's tendency to never punish a player who makes bad decisions when building his army since they tend to make the some units as well-rounded as possible.
Pre-nerf ghost is the epitome of this tendecy, since it was NEVER a bad idea to make ghosts. Not that now making a ghost in TvP can be stupid, since they still hurt any kind of army composition the Protoss has, but they are not the only one.
-Infestors are so well rounded that they can answer to absolutely EVERYTHING the opponent makes in all the matchups. -Colossi as well, as long as the opponent doesn't go completely anti-collossi (no... actually it's even better since in the next warp-in cycle the Toss will completely swap the army wherever he wants). -3/3 marines are perfect in every army against every kind of threat. -Broodlors, as long as supported by infestors, are NEVER a bad choice.
And it looks like the Warhound will fit in this category as well.
Generally a player is punished only because of bad decision making in a battle or due to huge errors with scouting, but the game is pretty generous with army compositions errors at every level of play that isn't the real top. It looks like HoTS won't change this aspect, sadly.
That's the current state, I wonder how will it be in a couple of years...
On August 22 2012 02:05 Evangelist wrote: All this "a move friendly" BS is just proof of that - the most basic use of units in this game is moving them from a to b in a group conducive to winning an engagement. Every single unit barring casters with no useful attack is capable of being used as an A move unit. This is true of all strategy games - in fact in virtually every single strategy game, THE GUY WITH MORE STUFF THAT DOES MORE DAMAGE FUCKING WINS THE FIGHT. It is remarkable, for example, that both SC2 and SCBW are balanced in such a way that sometimes, this isn't actually true.
Maybe i got this wrong, but Overlords/shuttles/any kind of transporter are not meant to attack either, so they are no A move units. (or maybe you meant that they can be moved with the a key? :o ) And what you call balance is in fact game design. High grounds that give specific bonuses, abilities like dark swarm in BW........... are to be balanced AFTER the decision was made to put them in. Everything that can influence the actual battles is game design and THEN you balance it.
Also, I thought we are talking about army control here.. Kiting? A lot of battles (like in Diablo 3, Dota...) are about minimizing incoming damage and maxmizing outgoing damage. Nice job there of completely disregarding everything that makes these games so interesting..
Single target A move units (hi Warhound) are crazy easy to balance. It's a game of numbers and since there's no multiplication implicit to a Warhound deathball they scale linearly with the only limits being the quantized number of shots required to destroy a particular unit.
Crazy easy to balance, lol. Compared to what exacty? Shuttles/workers? Again you completely disregard army control and everything that can influence the battle other than dps/hp/range of a unit. Army upkeep (=supply), costs, upgrades..........
No, Cloud. David Kim is not an idiot. David Kim is one of the designers of a multi-million copy selling game and he is responsible for your fucking career. Show some goddamn respect.
lol. Designer of a multi-million copy selling game. So what? If StarCraft2 wasnt named StarCraft2 but BattleGrounds2, the sales figures would probably look a lot different. So has David Kim to thank the guys that made Blizzard so popular in the first place? Also noone is responsible for clouds career other than Cloud, lol how stupid is that?
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to [i]why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
Lol how does warpgate cause deathballs? Warpgate, if anything, would be antideathball. Sure it would increase all-ins, but you can't say deathball at all...
Warpgate has no disadvantages vs gateways, I mean it even produces units faster. I actually don't mind the concept, but it should be slower to produce armies off gateways, giving you a strategic decision to make between pumping fewer units vs reinforcing faster.
The removal of defenders advantage by enabling Protoss to reinforce instantly at the front made gateway all-ins very powerful. Gateway units are thus not as strong unsupported as other tier 1 units, otherwise big gateway attacks would be all you see.
You need collosus/templar AoE to engage headup against a good player, so you have to turtle to get it, and move out. Hey you have a deathball.
Bear in mind I play Protoss, I'm not bitching because of bias or anything in this case
On August 22 2012 02:58 Wombat_NI wrote: Well played sir, excellent post. Don't know why you bothered given that people will not even bother to read it in all likelihood and continue to spout inaccuracies based on their assumptions on why people don't like the direction that HoTS appears to be going.
His post isn't particularly good at all. It's all based around the assumption that Wings of Liberty is somehow too volatile and has too much randomness, too little skill. I assume this is because he is a BW elitist who thinks everything was better in BW. People never bother to check stats.
Wanna guess who has a higher total winrate, Taeja or Fantasy (both at the top of TLPD, Korean Sc2/BW respectively)? Taeja. 4 time winners the OSL? None. GSL? 1 in 2 years.
Given SC2 is an INCREDIBLY new game by BW standards, the fact that it's so STABLE is incredible. People just like spouting shit without backing any of it up.
To take an extreme example, PvP was never an unfair matchup, or imbalanced in the worst days of 4 gating, but was it optimal in a design sense?
Taeja is crazy good, but there's a lot of tournaments where they are no clear favourites, it's 'Here are 15 people who could win if they have a good day' every time. For every Tajea there's 3 Elfis who just shouldn't be beating players who are many levels above them in every aspect of the game.
Terran players are the only ones who I've ever really looked at as being able to turn those incremental mechanical edges into consistently dominant play, we need more of that to stabilise the game. There are upsets in all games, but Brood War and even Warcraft 3 were a lot less volatile for a reason. Terran is the race that is actually well designed, with a lot of variance in potential playstyles and cool versatile units, why not take more notice of why that is, and emulate that approach with the other races. You don't necessarily have to sacrifice the identifying characteristics of the races to do this either
I didn't even play BW much and was unaware of the pro scene until retroactively looking back and checking out games. It just boggles my mind that at least some of what made it such a good E-sport are overlooked, actively by the designers. Browder has said SC2 is a different game from BW, they're both good games but different, if you want BW, play that. That's fine if it was a new franchise or something, it's a sequel to the bloody original game and ignoring part of what made it great as an E-sport is just refusing to swallow your pride.
I have an open mind, and I'm basing my assessment on what I'm seeing. I was actually hopefully with a lot of the interviews from a few months ago, referring to breaking up deathball play and putting more of an emphasis on hard-to-use units. Then now by all accounts the Terran players now have a mech deathball so now all 3 races can have deathball wars? Great stuff! Blizzard in their public utterances appear to acknowledge and be aware of a lot of issue, claim they're designing the game with those in mind, and then when what we're seeing does not correlate with what they said of course people are going to get pissy!
The main thing I think is stupid with Sc2 is the lack of the high ground advantage mechanic. If you don't want something that is random just make it so that units on the low ground deal 75% damage to units on the high ground. Bam, larger defenders advantage and positional play.
Other than that, people just like to pretend the BW isn't a game where anybody could win on any given day. Did you watch Ace beat KT today? "BW and WC3 were less volatile". Back that up. I've shown you examples that show it was not any less volatile, people just like pretending it is. Guess who won the last two OSLs. JangBi. But wait wasn't Flash dominant? JangBi over Fantasy = OSL finals. Flash over Zero MSL finals. How bout the MSL before that? Hydra over Great. Who? Yea that's right, not volatile in the slightest.
All this did was show that the progamers opinions (with a few exceptions - nerchios surprisingly considering the balance whining i've seen in some games he's played in) are just as worthless as your average bronze league bnet forum poster. All any of them want is to say that their race is weak and everything else is OP. So boring.
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade.
What reaper upgrade ? Being able to heal himself out of combat ? Yeah awesome, a unit that can't kill shit, can now stay withouth killing shit longer. Or am i missing something ?
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to [i]why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
Lol how does warpgate cause deathballs? Warpgate, if anything, would be antideathball. Sure it would increase all-ins, but you can't say deathball at all...
because no warpgate = no squishy gateway units = protoss that works without splash = protoss doesnt play deathBALL and actually _CAN_ spread units and give better games
im masters protoss on EU and i dont want warpgate. there.
i agree with everything Cloud said. i think fanboys and below-diamond-players dont see what he's saying, but most of the people i know that play this game non-casually or are from bw background are literally saying his words for a year now.
and the fact that he wants the game to be harder even though he's not the best among foreigners should even give more meaning to his words, but some people obviously think if you're not naniwa or stephano you can't judge a game (genre) that you've been playing for almost a decade now.
Cloud, please do the post you said you could do with all the wrong stuff in sc2 (and explain it really really slowly), and get opinions from other relevant players you communicate with, and put it as a blog. it will get featured, and maybe, just maybe, it will actually start something and people will start to realize the situation.
sc2 as a long-term rts can't sustain itself if HotS is another WoL. it doesn't have that quality. we need to be loud, for blizzard to do something.
I think what ClouD said was really interesting, when he said something along the lines of "Instead of making other races harder to play, you just made Terran easier." I think that that is very true. I'm not excited for this game, I'm going to play it, but it's just does not seem like Blizzard is doing a good job any more.
On August 22 2012 02:58 Wombat_NI wrote: Well played sir, excellent post. Don't know why you bothered given that people will not even bother to read it in all likelihood and continue to spout inaccuracies based on their assumptions on why people don't like the direction that HoTS appears to be going.
His post isn't particularly good at all. It's all based around the assumption that Wings of Liberty is somehow too volatile and has too much randomness, too little skill. I assume this is because he is a BW elitist who thinks everything was better in BW. People never bother to check stats.
Wanna guess who has a higher total winrate, Taeja or Fantasy (both at the top of TLPD, Korean Sc2/BW respectively)? Taeja. 4 time winners the OSL? None. GSL? 1 in 2 years.
Given SC2 is an INCREDIBLY new game by BW standards, the fact that it's so STABLE is incredible. People just like spouting shit without backing any of it up.
To take an extreme example, PvP was never an unfair matchup, or imbalanced in the worst days of 4 gating, but was it optimal in a design sense?
Taeja is crazy good, but there's a lot of tournaments where they are no clear favourites, it's 'Here are 15 people who could win if they have a good day' every time. For every Tajea there's 3 Elfis who just shouldn't be beating players who are many levels above them in every aspect of the game.
Terran players are the only ones who I've ever really looked at as being able to turn those incremental mechanical edges into consistently dominant play, we need more of that to stabilise the game. There are upsets in all games, but Brood War and even Warcraft 3 were a lot less volatile for a reason. Terran is the race that is actually well designed, with a lot of variance in potential playstyles and cool versatile units, why not take more notice of why that is, and emulate that approach with the other races. You don't necessarily have to sacrifice the identifying characteristics of the races to do this either
I didn't even play BW much and was unaware of the pro scene until retroactively looking back and checking out games. It just boggles my mind that at least some of what made it such a good E-sport are overlooked, actively by the designers. Browder has said SC2 is a different game from BW, they're both good games but different, if you want BW, play that. That's fine if it was a new franchise or something, it's a sequel to the bloody original game and ignoring part of what made it great as an E-sport is just refusing to swallow your pride.
I have an open mind, and I'm basing my assessment on what I'm seeing. I was actually hopefully with a lot of the interviews from a few months ago, referring to breaking up deathball play and putting more of an emphasis on hard-to-use units. Then now by all accounts the Terran players now have a mech deathball so now all 3 races can have deathball wars? Great stuff! Blizzard in their public utterances appear to acknowledge and be aware of a lot of issue, claim they're designing the game with those in mind, and then when what we're seeing does not correlate with what they said of course people are going to get pissy!
The main thing I think is stupid with Sc2 is the lack of the high ground advantage mechanic. If you don't want something that is random just make it so that units on the low ground deal 75% damage to units on the high ground. Bam, larger defenders advantage and positional play.
Other than that, people just like to pretend the BW isn't a game where anybody could win on any given day. Did you watch Ace beat KT today? "BW and WC3 were less volatile". Back that up. I've shown you examples that show it was not any less volatile, people just like pretending it is. Guess who won the last two OSLs. JangBi. But wait wasn't Flash dominant? JangBi over Fantasy = OSL finals. Flash over Zero MSL finals. How bout the MSL before that? Hydra over Great. Who? Yea that's right, not volatile in the slightest.
Well the paucity of foreigners winning against Koreans, but then that's also tied in with intangible factors, such as the gaming environments of the Koreans being more conducive to top-level play.
* The Mothership Core's Energize ability will not be able to target Nexuses * The Mothership with ground only Vortex and Stasis field will be removed and replaced by the Wings of Liberty Mothership
Energize on Nexus would make for more intresting macro mechanics.
* The Mothership Core's Energize ability will not be able to target Nexuses * The Mothership with ground only Vortex and Stasis field will be removed and replaced by the Wings of Liberty Mothership
Energize on Nexus would make for more intresting macro mechanics.
If by "intresting" macro mechanics you mean retarded unstoppable timings/all-ins thanks to infinite CBs then you are correct. How about they make all the OC abilities cost 5 energy?
On August 22 2012 03:46 MavivaM wrote: Always nice to hear progamers opinions, they have way more insight than us. And Cloud, as usual, brings up valid points in the worst possible PR manner
I think that there are basically three problems in the balance situation: the first is the warp-in mechanic, since it completely nullifies the concept of map distance and makes PvP what it is.
The second is the existence of spells who are able to change the flow of a battle despite whatever your opponent does. Forcefields, fungals, the infamous vortex, EMPs... one could argue that somehow your opponent can prevent some of them like the vortex by splitting everywhere, or luring FFs all day long... but personally I think it relies too much on a single player to make a mistake rather than his opponent doing something genius
The third one is Blizzard's tendency to never punish a player who makes bad decisions when building his army since they tend to make the some units as well-rounded as possible.
Pre-nerf ghost is the epitome of this tendecy, since it was NEVER a bad idea to make ghosts. Not that now making a ghost in TvP can be stupid, since they still hurt any kind of army composition the Protoss has, but they are not the only one.
-Infestors are so well rounded that they can answer to absolutely EVERYTHING the opponent makes in all the matchups. -Colossi as well, as long as the opponent doesn't go completely anti-collossi (no... actually it's even better since in the next warp-in cycle the Toss will completely swap the army wherever he wants). -3/3 marines are perfect in every army against every kind of threat. -Broodlors, as long as supported by infestors, are NEVER a bad choice.
And it looks like the Warhound will fit in this category as well.
Generally a player is punished only because of bad decision making in a battle or due to huge errors with scouting, but the game is pretty generous with army compositions errors at every level of play that isn't the real top. It looks like HoTS won't change this aspect, sadly.
That's the current state, I wonder how will it be in a couple of years...
Don't agree on the army composition thing, from multiple views. Firstly, if Terran has just 2-4 vikings too many or too little vs Col, it's instantly gg. I think that's quite a severe punishment for something you can't really scout properly. Same is true vs zerg techswitches in any direction. It used to be like that for zergs making corruptors vs P in the old style, before they just started to max on roaches instantly or go 12min broods. I guess this is less true for protoss because the colossus is always good, you just need to tech in the right window.
Secondly, I don't even agree that unit compositions should be punished harder. It directly leads to a rock paper scissor style. The game is much more "skilled' if any composition is useful in its own way, so the better player will always win, even with a build order disadvantage.
I do agree that units like col/infestor/brood are too strong and always good, but that's because the col can't be balanced due to its design, and the infestor is just too powerful. And warpgate is obviously stupid in its current form, I can't believe it's still in the game and probably will remain forever.
On August 22 2012 03:46 MavivaM wrote: Always nice to hear progamers opinions, they have way more insight than us. And Cloud, as usual, brings up valid points in the worst possible PR manner
I think that there are basically three problems in the balance situation: the first is the warp-in mechanic, since it completely nullifies the concept of map distance and makes PvP what it is.
The second is the existence of spells who are able to change the flow of a battle despite whatever your opponent does. Forcefields, fungals, the infamous vortex, EMPs... one could argue that somehow your opponent can prevent some of them like the vortex by splitting everywhere, or luring FFs all day long... but personally I think it relies too much on a single player to make a mistake rather than his opponent doing something genius
The third one is Blizzard's tendency to never punish a player who makes bad decisions when building his army since they tend to make the some units as well-rounded as possible.
Pre-nerf ghost is the epitome of this tendecy, since it was NEVER a bad idea to make ghosts. Not that now making a ghost in TvP can be stupid, since they still hurt any kind of army composition the Protoss has, but they are not the only one.
-Infestors are so well rounded that they can answer to absolutely EVERYTHING the opponent makes in all the matchups. -Colossi as well, as long as the opponent doesn't go completely anti-collossi (no... actually it's even better since in the next warp-in cycle the Toss will completely swap the army wherever he wants). -3/3 marines are perfect in every army against every kind of threat. -Broodlors, as long as supported by infestors, are NEVER a bad choice.
And it looks like the Warhound will fit in this category as well.
Generally a player is punished only because of bad decision making in a battle or due to huge errors with scouting, but the game is pretty generous with army compositions errors at every level of play that isn't the real top. It looks like HoTS won't change this aspect, sadly.
That's the current state, I wonder how will it be in a couple of years... Don't agree on the army composition thing, from multiple views. Firstly, if Terran has just 2-4 vikings too many or too little vs Col, it's instantly gg. I think that's quite a severe punishment for something you can't really scout properly. Same is true vs zerg techswitches in any direction. It used to be like that for zergs making corruptors vs P in the old style, before they just started to max on roaches instantly or go 12min broods. I guess this is less true for protoss because the colossus is always good, you just need to tech in the right window.
Secondly, I don't even agree that unit compositions should be punished harder. It directly leads to a rock paper scissor style. The game is much more "skilled' if any composition is useful in its own way, so the better player will always win, even with a build order disadvantage.
I do agree that units like col/infestor/brood are too strong and always good, but that's because the col can't be balanced due to its design, and the infestor is just too powerful. And warpgate is obviously stupid in its current form, I can't believe it's still in the game and probably will remain forever.
As for the viking example I don't think the same way because I believe that scouting should be vital in every minute of every game. More than a rock-paper-scissor I think of a situation when player1 takes a decision and it's up to player2 to scout properly and come out with an answer. And then it's up to player2 to scout and realise he has to adjust his plan. At the current moment it's like that to some extent, but since there are some too well rounded units a player needs to make less, minor corrections or just attack anyways.
As for your last paragraph, yes. The game has a flaw (or at least that's my 2 cents) in his core design that cannot be completely corrected.
The Mothership Core's Energize ability will not be able to target Nexuses
This makes me sad. I know it would be a lot of work to balance and re-tweak build times so that they work with almost infinite chronoboost, but having more emphasis placed on chronoboost and making it a larger part of protoss macro is a functional and interesting way to make protoss macro more difficult. It's something that would significantly raise the skill gap between good protoss players and great protoss players which is something I would be very interested to see happen. It also raises the skill ceiling immensely. I pretty much stopped playing Starcraft 2 when my macro became good enough to where I was never floating over 600 minerals and didn't get supply blocked. I ran out of room to improve my macro and the games I won/lost came down to foul army positioning and decision making. Unlike working on those two things, I really enjoyed improving my macro. It's the only thing I really enjoyed improving. I would love to be able to have to work harder to macro better. I'm in Master league but I suck at the game, I'm just really good at protoss macro which could be harder imo. This is a good way to do that
Also, having to make the decision between increasing the efficiency of your build and saving enough energy for recall is what makes having recall as a spell interesting to me. It's something with a palpable opportunity cost. It's a choice you make. "should i slow down my build to pressure?" I know it's only alpha, I just really hope that this is direction things go in TLDR: They shouldn't remove this, they should rework protoss macro around this.
On August 22 2012 02:58 Wombat_NI wrote: Well played sir, excellent post. Don't know why you bothered given that people will not even bother to read it in all likelihood and continue to spout inaccuracies based on their assumptions on why people don't like the direction that HoTS appears to be going.
His post isn't particularly good at all. It's all based around the assumption that Wings of Liberty is somehow too volatile and has too much randomness, too little skill. I assume this is because he is a BW elitist who thinks everything was better in BW. People never bother to check stats.
Wanna guess who has a higher total winrate, Taeja or Fantasy (both at the top of TLPD, Korean Sc2/BW respectively)? Taeja. 4 time winners the OSL? None. GSL? 1 in 2 years.
Given SC2 is an INCREDIBLY new game by BW standards, the fact that it's so STABLE is incredible. People just like spouting shit without backing any of it up.
To take an extreme example, PvP was never an unfair matchup, or imbalanced in the worst days of 4 gating, but was it optimal in a design sense?
Taeja is crazy good, but there's a lot of tournaments where they are no clear favourites, it's 'Here are 15 people who could win if they have a good day' every time. For every Tajea there's 3 Elfis who just shouldn't be beating players who are many levels above them in every aspect of the game.
Terran players are the only ones who I've ever really looked at as being able to turn those incremental mechanical edges into consistently dominant play, we need more of that to stabilise the game. There are upsets in all games, but Brood War and even Warcraft 3 were a lot less volatile for a reason. Terran is the race that is actually well designed, with a lot of variance in potential playstyles and cool versatile units, why not take more notice of why that is, and emulate that approach with the other races. You don't necessarily have to sacrifice the identifying characteristics of the races to do this either
I didn't even play BW much and was unaware of the pro scene until retroactively looking back and checking out games. It just boggles my mind that at least some of what made it such a good E-sport are overlooked, actively by the designers. Browder has said SC2 is a different game from BW, they're both good games but different, if you want BW, play that. That's fine if it was a new franchise or something, it's a sequel to the bloody original game and ignoring part of what made it great as an E-sport is just refusing to swallow your pride.
I have an open mind, and I'm basing my assessment on what I'm seeing. I was actually hopefully with a lot of the interviews from a few months ago, referring to breaking up deathball play and putting more of an emphasis on hard-to-use units. Then now by all accounts the Terran players now have a mech deathball so now all 3 races can have deathball wars? Great stuff! Blizzard in their public utterances appear to acknowledge and be aware of a lot of issue, claim they're designing the game with those in mind, and then when what we're seeing does not correlate with what they said of course people are going to get pissy!
The main thing I think is stupid with Sc2 is the lack of the high ground advantage mechanic. If you don't want something that is random just make it so that units on the low ground deal 75% damage to units on the high ground. Bam, larger defenders advantage and positional play.
Other than that, people just like to pretend the BW isn't a game where anybody could win on any given day. Did you watch Ace beat KT today? "BW and WC3 were less volatile". Back that up. I've shown you examples that show it was not any less volatile, people just like pretending it is. Guess who won the last two OSLs. JangBi. But wait wasn't Flash dominant? JangBi over Fantasy = OSL finals. Flash over Zero MSL finals. How bout the MSL before that? Hydra over Great. Who? Yea that's right, not volatile in the slightest.
It's clear that you don't know all that much about BW...why try to use BW in your argument? BW was less volatile, anyone watching it for years could tell you that. Btw, Jangbi is fucken good. So is Hydra. And yes, Flash was fucken dominant, that's why it's a HUGE shock whenever he did lose in those major tournements. He'll be pretty much invincible the whole season and just lose one boX. He was so dominant that if he ever dared to lose twice in his last 30 games, people said he was "slumping." This doesn't take anything away from Fantasy or Jangbi thought, those two are sick good.
Btw, about ace beating KT...KT was always a team that could be beat. Esp. in the past where Flash could only carry in winners-league.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
There is a metric fuckton of community feedback out there that is being patently ignored with the direction HoTS looks to be going at this current juncture. It is subject to change yes, but maybe that process can be sped along with feedback? When the balance team professed recently that they were unaware that the mothership was popular in lategame PvZ, when they claim to watch all the big tournaments your faith in Blizzard takes a knock. They can't claim to be clued into the current trends of pro play, and have a gap in their knowledge that big!
Where did they say that? As far as I'm aware there was some awkward Interview by Kennigit where he asked a weird question about PvZ lategame problems.
However Browder did not say they don't know that the mothership is/was popular in PvZ.
So, can you link to that statement? If not - no comment.
Ah, fair point. I tend to read transcripts/TL comments as I zone out quite quickly when it comes to big interviews. I've made the mistake of listening to TL posters too much
The interview in question appears to be him saying 'I wasn't aware that was an issue' in response to a question from Kenningit specifically regarding neural parasite, as opposed to general mothership useage. This got misconstrued by many of the viewers as being him saying he wasn't aware motherships were prevalent in lategame PvZ, so apologies to Browder.
EDIT - In my defence he also goes on to say that the vortex/archon toilet vs infestor/BL is good as a spectacle so, I think he's a bit off with the community on that one
My take on Dustin's opinion (over the course of a few interviews, etc. that I recall) is that
a. Having to rely on the vortex, on a unit that you can build only one of, was not the perfect design.
b. They realized that if Zerg could reliably get to late game, Protoss was on a timer. While back in the Alpha... around the time of the old extreme air AOE tempest, before it became the long range version....
c. And then they realized pros were good enough or desperate enough to force the vortex role of the mothership to work well enough. This was after a mothership movement buff.
d. In comes the phoenix range upgrade... and maybe internally it was impossible to balance and make fun the AOE tempests... mothership doing "OK". Hmmm... seems time to rearrange things and maybe mothership can stay, but it doesn't have to be the only solution. Long range tempests have a shot of working late game PvZ if Protoss is ahead. If Protoss is even or behind, vortexing has a shot if the Zerg doesn't pay close attention to unit stacking.
So yeah, they are aware of all of the concerns. Their problem is they need to make the game fun, easy to pick up, harder to get decent at, and hard to master. All while being perfectly balanced. Not easy.
I also think it is the job of pros and avid fans like teamliquid posters to give criticisms. Hopefully, after the beta things will be much more balanced. I do understand and also hold fears named in many recent posts on the designs. Like...
-Protoss getting no real attack units. Sucks. -Too much a-move friendly stuff for Terran. -Oracle too annoying to deal with. -Viper potential.
Still, I see potential in widow-mines, self-healing reapers, MotherShip Core, swarm hosts, and the long range tempest. I'm glad the Oracle at least has some other support role abilities now, so it's not one dimensional. Maybe the viper will also work since it can be tweaked for cost or whatnot if it proves to be too strong. HotS is looking pretty good in my eyes... can't wait to sink my teeth into the beta.
On August 22 2012 02:58 Wombat_NI wrote: Well played sir, excellent post. Don't know why you bothered given that people will not even bother to read it in all likelihood and continue to spout inaccuracies based on their assumptions on why people don't like the direction that HoTS appears to be going.
His post isn't particularly good at all. It's all based around the assumption that Wings of Liberty is somehow too volatile and has too much randomness, too little skill. I assume this is because he is a BW elitist who thinks everything was better in BW. People never bother to check stats.
Wanna guess who has a higher total winrate, Taeja or Fantasy (both at the top of TLPD, Korean Sc2/BW respectively)? Taeja. 4 time winners the OSL? None. GSL? 1 in 2 years.
Given SC2 is an INCREDIBLY new game by BW standards, the fact that it's so STABLE is incredible. People just like spouting shit without backing any of it up.
To take an extreme example, PvP was never an unfair matchup, or imbalanced in the worst days of 4 gating, but was it optimal in a design sense?
Taeja is crazy good, but there's a lot of tournaments where they are no clear favourites, it's 'Here are 15 people who could win if they have a good day' every time. For every Tajea there's 3 Elfis who just shouldn't be beating players who are many levels above them in every aspect of the game.
Terran players are the only ones who I've ever really looked at as being able to turn those incremental mechanical edges into consistently dominant play, we need more of that to stabilise the game. There are upsets in all games, but Brood War and even Warcraft 3 were a lot less volatile for a reason. Terran is the race that is actually well designed, with a lot of variance in potential playstyles and cool versatile units, why not take more notice of why that is, and emulate that approach with the other races. You don't necessarily have to sacrifice the identifying characteristics of the races to do this either
I didn't even play BW much and was unaware of the pro scene until retroactively looking back and checking out games. It just boggles my mind that at least some of what made it such a good E-sport are overlooked, actively by the designers. Browder has said SC2 is a different game from BW, they're both good games but different, if you want BW, play that. That's fine if it was a new franchise or something, it's a sequel to the bloody original game and ignoring part of what made it great as an E-sport is just refusing to swallow your pride.
I have an open mind, and I'm basing my assessment on what I'm seeing. I was actually hopefully with a lot of the interviews from a few months ago, referring to breaking up deathball play and putting more of an emphasis on hard-to-use units. Then now by all accounts the Terran players now have a mech deathball so now all 3 races can have deathball wars? Great stuff! Blizzard in their public utterances appear to acknowledge and be aware of a lot of issue, claim they're designing the game with those in mind, and then when what we're seeing does not correlate with what they said of course people are going to get pissy!
The main thing I think is stupid with Sc2 is the lack of the high ground advantage mechanic. If you don't want something that is random just make it so that units on the low ground deal 75% damage to units on the high ground. Bam, larger defenders advantage and positional play.
Other than that, people just like to pretend the BW isn't a game where anybody could win on any given day. Did you watch Ace beat KT today? "BW and WC3 were less volatile". Back that up. I've shown you examples that show it was not any less volatile, people just like pretending it is. Guess who won the last two OSLs. JangBi. But wait wasn't Flash dominant? JangBi over Fantasy = OSL finals. Flash over Zero MSL finals. How bout the MSL before that? Hydra over Great. Who? Yea that's right, not volatile in the slightest.
It's clear that you don't know all that much about BW...why try to use BW in your argument? BW was less volatile, anyone watching it for years could tell you that. Btw, Jangbi is fucken good. So is Hydra. And yes, Flash was fucken dominant, that's why it's a HUGE shock whenever he did lose in those major tournements. He'll be pretty much invincible the whole season and just lose one boX. He was so dominant that if he ever dared to lose twice in his last 30 games, people said he was "slumping." This doesn't take anything away from Fantasy or Jangbi thought, those two are sick good.
Btw, about ace beating KT...KT was always a team that could be beat. Esp. in the past where Flash could only carry in winners-league.
no point arguing with a sc2 fanboy there, anyone who questions brood war's skill ceiling has obviously never been good at it at any point, or know anything about it at all. i dont know if people are deliberately misunderstanding cloud's point because he put it across in a aggressive way, but i dont see how anyone with who wants sc2 to be a great game would disagree that instead of making terran more A move friendly, they should make zerg and protoss less A move friendly(cloud's point). half the people just rage at him instead of addressing the valid points he is actually making.
On August 22 2012 02:01 Zelniq wrote: i have to agree with Violet on the swarm host..and it confuses me how one of the major ideas behind such a unit is to help with zerg's weakness in their ability to end games by attacking when they're ahead.. like vs marine/medivac such a unit is borderline useless.. in their current state spending resources on swarm hosts to try to finish a terran off would be counterproductive. well if I'm correct and this is an issue, I'm sure it'll be resolved after the game's played enough, just surprised still that this idea is the one that survived all the cuts.
Bad vs. Terran, but maybe good vs. P. If P does a 2 base all-in, swarm hosts with proper protection could be good if tweaked correctly. Sort of the old lurker role - worse for killing but better for tying up units so you can produce more lings/etc? If Protoss has to burn forcefields on the swarmlings, and immortals are terrible vs them... yeah. Maybe that could change a lot if people go lair earlier.
I have only slept 2 hours last night so if I'm talking out of my ass just say so.
On August 22 2012 02:58 Wombat_NI wrote: Well played sir, excellent post. Don't know why you bothered given that people will not even bother to read it in all likelihood and continue to spout inaccuracies based on their assumptions on why people don't like the direction that HoTS appears to be going.
His post isn't particularly good at all. It's all based around the assumption that Wings of Liberty is somehow too volatile and has too much randomness, too little skill. I assume this is because he is a BW elitist who thinks everything was better in BW. People never bother to check stats.
Wanna guess who has a higher total winrate, Taeja or Fantasy (both at the top of TLPD, Korean Sc2/BW respectively)? Taeja. 4 time winners the OSL? None. GSL? 1 in 2 years.
Given SC2 is an INCREDIBLY new game by BW standards, the fact that it's so STABLE is incredible. People just like spouting shit without backing any of it up.
To take an extreme example, PvP was never an unfair matchup, or imbalanced in the worst days of 4 gating, but was it optimal in a design sense?
Taeja is crazy good, but there's a lot of tournaments where they are no clear favourites, it's 'Here are 15 people who could win if they have a good day' every time. For every Tajea there's 3 Elfis who just shouldn't be beating players who are many levels above them in every aspect of the game.
Terran players are the only ones who I've ever really looked at as being able to turn those incremental mechanical edges into consistently dominant play, we need more of that to stabilise the game. There are upsets in all games, but Brood War and even Warcraft 3 were a lot less volatile for a reason. Terran is the race that is actually well designed, with a lot of variance in potential playstyles and cool versatile units, why not take more notice of why that is, and emulate that approach with the other races. You don't necessarily have to sacrifice the identifying characteristics of the races to do this either
I didn't even play BW much and was unaware of the pro scene until retroactively looking back and checking out games. It just boggles my mind that at least some of what made it such a good E-sport are overlooked, actively by the designers. Browder has said SC2 is a different game from BW, they're both good games but different, if you want BW, play that. That's fine if it was a new franchise or something, it's a sequel to the bloody original game and ignoring part of what made it great as an E-sport is just refusing to swallow your pride.
I have an open mind, and I'm basing my assessment on what I'm seeing. I was actually hopefully with a lot of the interviews from a few months ago, referring to breaking up deathball play and putting more of an emphasis on hard-to-use units. Then now by all accounts the Terran players now have a mech deathball so now all 3 races can have deathball wars? Great stuff! Blizzard in their public utterances appear to acknowledge and be aware of a lot of issue, claim they're designing the game with those in mind, and then when what we're seeing does not correlate with what they said of course people are going to get pissy!
The main thing I think is stupid with Sc2 is the lack of the high ground advantage mechanic. If you don't want something that is random just make it so that units on the low ground deal 75% damage to units on the high ground. Bam, larger defenders advantage and positional play.
Other than that, people just like to pretend the BW isn't a game where anybody could win on any given day. Did you watch Ace beat KT today? "BW and WC3 were less volatile". Back that up. I've shown you examples that show it was not any less volatile, people just like pretending it is. Guess who won the last two OSLs. JangBi. But wait wasn't Flash dominant? JangBi over Fantasy = OSL finals. Flash over Zero MSL finals. How bout the MSL before that? Hydra over Great. Who? Yea that's right, not volatile in the slightest.
It's clear that you don't know all that much about BW...why try to use BW in your argument? BW was less volatile, anyone watching it for years could tell you that. Btw, Jangbi is fucken good. So is Hydra. And yes, Flash was fucken dominant, that's why it's a HUGE shock whenever he did lose in those major tournements. He'll be pretty much invincible the whole season and just lose one boX. He was so dominant that if he ever dared to lose twice in his last 30 games, people said he was "slumping." This doesn't take anything away from Fantasy or Jangbi thought, those two are sick good.
Btw, about ace beating KT...KT was always a team that could be beat. Esp. in the past where Flash could only carry in winners-league.
I'm just saying how far can you define "dominant" players until it doesn't mean shit? There have been multiple patches during which the same players have managed to dominate in SC2. The very very top is a little more dominated by one person lately in BW, but even that isn't entirely true. There have been 7 different winners since 2009 in the OSL and MSL (15 events). In the 13 total GSLs, there have been.................. 7 different winners!!!! WHOA CRAZY. HOW MUCH MORE VOLATILE CAN YOU GET??????
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to [i]why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
Lol how does warpgate cause deathballs? Warpgate, if anything, would be antideathball. Sure it would increase all-ins, but you can't say deathball at all...
Either do your research on the topic or think for yourself. Warp Gate is THE contributing factor to why Protoss needs to play a deathball style. It's the root cause of all things bad with the race. Let me see if I can make a concise diagram.
Warp Gate -> Gateway units have to be weak due to Warp In's strength -> Gateway units suck -> majority of the Protoss army sucks as lone units -> Protoss units need to mesh very well or Protoss as a race will fail -> Deathball play is born.
On August 22 2012 01:21 Klipsys wrote: Who really cares what cloud thinks? Has he even won anything ever?
That isn't relevant to the discussion. You can't have a valid opinion without being the best player in the world? Why are you even reading this forum if you don't care about opinions of people that have never won anything, because that's probably close to 99,9 % of the community?
Because he's just one pro out of hundreds and who really cares what he thinks about a game in beta that isn't out yet? The fact that he hasn't won anything in WOL means he hasn't even mastered that yet, and he's commenting on a game in beta? I don't think anyone should care what someone says about an unfinished game, even if they are the best player in the world. I care even less when they're not even top 100
On August 22 2012 02:58 Wombat_NI wrote: Well played sir, excellent post. Don't know why you bothered given that people will not even bother to read it in all likelihood and continue to spout inaccuracies based on their assumptions on why people don't like the direction that HoTS appears to be going.
His post isn't particularly good at all. It's all based around the assumption that Wings of Liberty is somehow too volatile and has too much randomness, too little skill. I assume this is because he is a BW elitist who thinks everything was better in BW. People never bother to check stats.
Wanna guess who has a higher total winrate, Taeja or Fantasy (both at the top of TLPD, Korean Sc2/BW respectively)? Taeja. 4 time winners the OSL? None. GSL? 1 in 2 years.
Given SC2 is an INCREDIBLY new game by BW standards, the fact that it's so STABLE is incredible. People just like spouting shit without backing any of it up.
To take an extreme example, PvP was never an unfair matchup, or imbalanced in the worst days of 4 gating, but was it optimal in a design sense?
Taeja is crazy good, but there's a lot of tournaments where they are no clear favourites, it's 'Here are 15 people who could win if they have a good day' every time. For every Tajea there's 3 Elfis who just shouldn't be beating players who are many levels above them in every aspect of the game.
Terran players are the only ones who I've ever really looked at as being able to turn those incremental mechanical edges into consistently dominant play, we need more of that to stabilise the game. There are upsets in all games, but Brood War and even Warcraft 3 were a lot less volatile for a reason. Terran is the race that is actually well designed, with a lot of variance in potential playstyles and cool versatile units, why not take more notice of why that is, and emulate that approach with the other races. You don't necessarily have to sacrifice the identifying characteristics of the races to do this either
I didn't even play BW much and was unaware of the pro scene until retroactively looking back and checking out games. It just boggles my mind that at least some of what made it such a good E-sport are overlooked, actively by the designers. Browder has said SC2 is a different game from BW, they're both good games but different, if you want BW, play that. That's fine if it was a new franchise or something, it's a sequel to the bloody original game and ignoring part of what made it great as an E-sport is just refusing to swallow your pride.
I have an open mind, and I'm basing my assessment on what I'm seeing. I was actually hopefully with a lot of the interviews from a few months ago, referring to breaking up deathball play and putting more of an emphasis on hard-to-use units. Then now by all accounts the Terran players now have a mech deathball so now all 3 races can have deathball wars? Great stuff! Blizzard in their public utterances appear to acknowledge and be aware of a lot of issue, claim they're designing the game with those in mind, and then when what we're seeing does not correlate with what they said of course people are going to get pissy!
The main thing I think is stupid with Sc2 is the lack of the high ground advantage mechanic. If you don't want something that is random just make it so that units on the low ground deal 75% damage to units on the high ground. Bam, larger defenders advantage and positional play.
Other than that, people just like to pretend the BW isn't a game where anybody could win on any given day. Did you watch Ace beat KT today? "BW and WC3 were less volatile". Back that up. I've shown you examples that show it was not any less volatile, people just like pretending it is. Guess who won the last two OSLs. JangBi. But wait wasn't Flash dominant? JangBi over Fantasy = OSL finals. Flash over Zero MSL finals. How bout the MSL before that? Hydra over Great. Who? Yea that's right, not volatile in the slightest.
It's clear that you don't know all that much about BW...why try to use BW in your argument? BW was less volatile, anyone watching it for years could tell you that. Btw, Jangbi is fucken good. So is Hydra. And yes, Flash was fucken dominant, that's why it's a HUGE shock whenever he did lose in those major tournements. He'll be pretty much invincible the whole season and just lose one boX. He was so dominant that if he ever dared to lose twice in his last 30 games, people said he was "slumping." This doesn't take anything away from Fantasy or Jangbi thought, those two are sick good.
Btw, about ace beating KT...KT was always a team that could be beat. Esp. in the past where Flash could only carry in winners-league.
no point arguing with a sc2 fanboy there, anyone who questions brood war's skill ceiling has obviously never been good at it at any point, or know anything about it at all. i dont know if people are deliberately misunderstanding cloud's point because he put it across in a aggressive way, but i dont see how anyone with who wants sc2 to be a great game would disagree that instead of making terran more A move friendly, they should make zerg and protoss less A move friendly(cloud's point). half the people just rage at him instead of addressing the valid points he is actually making.
I'm not questioning BW's skill ceiling. I'm just saying no one has been anywhere near either SC2 or BW's skill ceilings.
On August 22 2012 01:21 Klipsys wrote: Who really cares what cloud thinks? Has he even won anything ever?
That isn't relevant to the discussion. You can't have a valid opinion without being the best player in the world? Why are you even reading this forum if you don't care about opinions of people that have never won anything, because that's probably close to 99,9 % of the community?
Because he's just one pro out of hundreds and who really cares what he thinks about a game in beta that isn't out yet? The fact that he hasn't won anything in WOL means he hasn't even mastered that yet, and he's commenting on a game in beta? I don't think anyone should care what someone says about an unfinished game, even if they are the best player in the world. I care even less when they're not even top 100
Then you're a fool. If criticism was only valid after a game was finished, then bad ideas would hit the scene all the time and we wouldn't see them removed because you can't just remove entire units or fundamentally change units in an e-sport game after it is released. That is what the time before the game is finished is for.
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to [i]why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
Lol how does warpgate cause deathballs? Warpgate, if anything, would be antideathball. Sure it would increase all-ins, but you can't say deathball at all...
Either do your research on the topic or think for yourself. Warp Gate is THE contributing factor to why Protoss needs to play a deathball style. It's the root cause of all things bad with the race. Let me see if I can make a concise diagram.
Warp Gate -> Gateway units have to be weak due to Warp In's strength -> Gateway units suck -> majority of the Protoss army sucks as lone units -> Protoss units need to mesh very well or Protoss as a race will fail -> Deathball play is born.
That's a gross oversimplification. In really low numbers they can beat similar cost terran or zerg armies, either through kiting or sentries. Then in the midgame they get weak till colossi. That's not a case of being weak in small groups. Plus if you've ever watched blink stalkers v. zerg I don't think you can make a general statement that gateway units are weak.
On August 22 2012 01:21 Klipsys wrote: Who really cares what cloud thinks? Has he even won anything ever?
That isn't relevant to the discussion. You can't have a valid opinion without being the best player in the world? Why are you even reading this forum if you don't care about opinions of people that have never won anything, because that's probably close to 99,9 % of the community?
Because he's just one pro out of hundreds and who really cares what he thinks about a game in beta that isn't out yet? The fact that he hasn't won anything in WOL means he hasn't even mastered that yet, and he's commenting on a game in beta? I don't think anyone should care what someone says about an unfinished game, even if they are the best player in the world. I care even less when they're not even top 100
Then you're a fool. If criticism was only valid after a game was finished, then bad ideas would hit the scene all the time and we wouldn't see them removed because you can't just remove entire units or fundamentally change units in an e-sport game after it is released. That is what the time before the game is finished is for.
I never said it wasn't valid, I said I don't care what he thinks about an unfinished game, nor do I understand why anyone cares what he says about an unfinished game. Blizzard may care but why should we? Most people know little to nothing about game design and balance, so any advice/cristim they give is mostly useless anyway since as a player it's going to be inherently bias. He may be right but the game isn't done. He's talking in absolutes which is fucking stupid. He's missing the point that blizzard is making a product for everyone not just for progamers. That's just the way it is. They're not going to make the game harder to play, that's such a broad request anyway. If they made the game harder to play they won't get the casual base they need to sustain it as a business.
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
Lol how does warpgate cause deathballs? Warpgate, if anything, would be antideathball. Sure it would increase all-ins, but you can't say deathball at all...
Either do your research on the topic or think for yourself. Warp Gate is THE contributing factor to why Protoss needs to play a deathball style. It's the root cause of all things bad with the race. Let me see if I can make a concise diagram.
Warp Gate -> Gateway units have to be weak due to Warp In's strength -> Gateway units suck -> majority of the Protoss army sucks as lone units -> Protoss units need to mesh very well or Protoss as a race will fail -> Deathball play is born.
That's a gross oversimplification. In really low numbers they can beat similar cost terran or zerg armies, either through kiting or sentries. Then in the midgame they get weak till colossi. That's not a case of being weak in small groups. Plus if you've ever watched blink stalkers v. zerg I don't think you can make a general statement that gateway units are weak.
It is an oversimplification; I'm pretty sure that's the point of a concise diagram is to not get into the nitty-gritty details.
That said, the point still stands. Gateway units only work in very low numbers and with a lot of positional advantage (defensive positions + Forcefields). Even then, a Bio force with Stim/CS/+1 upgrades can just roll over a Gateway army unless they get [i]very unlucky with Forcefields. Blink Stalkers are also only really good as timing attacks; if the Zerg knows that they're coming or if the attack comes too late, then they get crushed by pure Roach or Roach/Ling or (ideally) Infestor/anything.
I never said it wasn't valid, I said I don't care what he thinks about an unfinished game, nor do I understand why anyone cares what he says about an unfinished game. Blizzard may care but why should we? Most people know little to nothing about game design and balance, so any advice/cristim they give is mostly useless anyway since as a player it's going to be inherently bias. He may be right but the game isn't done. He's talking in absolutes which is fucking stupid. He's missing the point that blizzard is making a product for everyone not just for progamers. That's just the way it is. They're not going to make the game harder to play, that's such a broad request anyway. If they made the game harder to play they won't get the casual base they need to sustain it as a business.
You're missing the point. It's not about making the game harder to play across the board. The game was already made very easy to play by including all of the UI improvements (unlimited units, smart casting, MBS, automine, etc. etc. etc). The point is to make it so that high level success is hard to achieve. Adding a-move units to Terran only lowers the skill ceiling required to play that race at a high level, which isn't a good thing.
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
Lol how does warpgate cause deathballs? Warpgate, if anything, would be antideathball. Sure it would increase all-ins, but you can't say deathball at all...
Either do your research on the topic or think for yourself. Warp Gate is THE contributing factor to why Protoss needs to play a deathball style. It's the root cause of all things bad with the race. Let me see if I can make a concise diagram.
Warp Gate -> Gateway units have to be weak due to Warp In's strength -> Gateway units suck -> majority of the Protoss army sucks as lone units -> Protoss units need to mesh very well or Protoss as a race will fail -> Deathball play is born.
That's a gross oversimplification. In really low numbers they can beat similar cost terran or zerg armies, either through kiting or sentries. Then in the midgame they get weak till colossi. That's not a case of being weak in small groups. Plus if you've ever watched blink stalkers v. zerg I don't think you can make a general statement that gateway units are weak.
It is an oversimplification; I'm pretty sure that's the point of a concise diagram is to not get into the nitty-gritty details.
That said, the point still stands. Gateway units only work in very low numbers and with a lot of positional advantage (defensive positions + Forcefields). Even then, a Bio force with Stim/CS/+1 upgrades can just roll over a Gateway army unless they get [i]very unlucky with Forcefields. Blink Stalkers are also only really good as timing attacks; if the Zerg knows that they're coming or if the attack comes too late, then they get crushed by pure Roach or Roach/Ling or (ideally) Infestor/anything.
Yea but if you ignore the nitty-gritty details sometimes you miss the point. The reason Protoss don't use warpgate to do tiny harass is because they'd get crushed by a stim bio deathball or a roach deathball. If you see hero with a warp prism, small numbers of gateway units can cause major amounts of damage in terran production or by zerg hatches. The problem isn't exactly warpgate. The problem is the exact way warpgate plays in with the other mechanics and races.
The idea that WG tech makes Protoss gateway units weak is falacious and has had currency for the longest time.
The only "weak" Gateway unit is the Stalker, and that is because it is balanced around Blink not WG. Simply put, Blink Dragoons would be OP. Zealots are very strong, and IIRC, kill more lings, for example, than in BW. In PvT, for example, the Zealot/Stalker/Stalker army is quite strong unless the Terran has a bunker, an ability advantage (i.e. concussive shell) or an appreciable unit advantage. DTs remain strong and HTs are as they always were. A good psionic storm is game deciding or game changing. Both these units can also be morphed into Archons who (after the range buff) are beasts in combat (especially against certain unit types).
The perceived weakness of Gateway units is, possibly, in comparison to BW but is more an effect of the "terrible terrible damage" thinking in WOL. Not to mention mechanics like reactored units and the Zerg larvae mechanic that mean significant unit advantages versus Protoss. There are other issues as well, for example, the Stalker is the backbone of the Protoss army in PvZ (but scales badly - due, again, to the power of a well controlled Blink army), while the Zealot is the backbone of the Protoss army in PvT but is a melee unit engaging ranged units with all the problems this implies.
There is nothing wrong with WG. Protoss need the faster production to keep up with Zerg and Terran in WOL.
On August 22 2012 02:58 Wombat_NI wrote: Well played sir, excellent post. Don't know why you bothered given that people will not even bother to read it in all likelihood and continue to spout inaccuracies based on their assumptions on why people don't like the direction that HoTS appears to be going.
His post isn't particularly good at all. It's all based around the assumption that Wings of Liberty is somehow too volatile and has too much randomness, too little skill. I assume this is because he is a BW elitist who thinks everything was better in BW. People never bother to check stats.
Wanna guess who has a higher total winrate, Taeja or Fantasy (both at the top of TLPD, Korean Sc2/BW respectively)? Taeja. 4 time winners the OSL? None. GSL? 1 in 2 years.
Given SC2 is an INCREDIBLY new game by BW standards, the fact that it's so STABLE is incredible. People just like spouting shit without backing any of it up.
To take an extreme example, PvP was never an unfair matchup, or imbalanced in the worst days of 4 gating, but was it optimal in a design sense?
Taeja is crazy good, but there's a lot of tournaments where they are no clear favourites, it's 'Here are 15 people who could win if they have a good day' every time. For every Tajea there's 3 Elfis who just shouldn't be beating players who are many levels above them in every aspect of the game.
Terran players are the only ones who I've ever really looked at as being able to turn those incremental mechanical edges into consistently dominant play, we need more of that to stabilise the game. There are upsets in all games, but Brood War and even Warcraft 3 were a lot less volatile for a reason. Terran is the race that is actually well designed, with a lot of variance in potential playstyles and cool versatile units, why not take more notice of why that is, and emulate that approach with the other races. You don't necessarily have to sacrifice the identifying characteristics of the races to do this either
I didn't even play BW much and was unaware of the pro scene until retroactively looking back and checking out games. It just boggles my mind that at least some of what made it such a good E-sport are overlooked, actively by the designers. Browder has said SC2 is a different game from BW, they're both good games but different, if you want BW, play that. That's fine if it was a new franchise or something, it's a sequel to the bloody original game and ignoring part of what made it great as an E-sport is just refusing to swallow your pride.
I have an open mind, and I'm basing my assessment on what I'm seeing. I was actually hopefully with a lot of the interviews from a few months ago, referring to breaking up deathball play and putting more of an emphasis on hard-to-use units. Then now by all accounts the Terran players now have a mech deathball so now all 3 races can have deathball wars? Great stuff! Blizzard in their public utterances appear to acknowledge and be aware of a lot of issue, claim they're designing the game with those in mind, and then when what we're seeing does not correlate with what they said of course people are going to get pissy!
The main thing I think is stupid with Sc2 is the lack of the high ground advantage mechanic. If you don't want something that is random just make it so that units on the low ground deal 75% damage to units on the high ground. Bam, larger defenders advantage and positional play.
Other than that, people just like to pretend the BW isn't a game where anybody could win on any given day. Did you watch Ace beat KT today? "BW and WC3 were less volatile". Back that up. I've shown you examples that show it was not any less volatile, people just like pretending it is. Guess who won the last two OSLs. JangBi. But wait wasn't Flash dominant? JangBi over Fantasy = OSL finals. Flash over Zero MSL finals. How bout the MSL before that? Hydra over Great. Who? Yea that's right, not volatile in the slightest.
It's clear that you don't know all that much about BW...why try to use BW in your argument? BW was less volatile, anyone watching it for years could tell you that. Btw, Jangbi is fucken good. So is Hydra. And yes, Flash was fucken dominant, that's why it's a HUGE shock whenever he did lose in those major tournements. He'll be pretty much invincible the whole season and just lose one boX. He was so dominant that if he ever dared to lose twice in his last 30 games, people said he was "slumping." This doesn't take anything away from Fantasy or Jangbi thought, those two are sick good.
Btw, about ace beating KT...KT was always a team that could be beat. Esp. in the past where Flash could only carry in winners-league.
I'm just saying how far can you define "dominant" players until it doesn't mean shit? There have been multiple patches during which the same players have managed to dominate in SC2. The very very top is a little more dominated by one person lately in BW, but even that isn't entirely true. There have been 7 different winners since 2009 in the OSL and MSL (15 events). In the 13 total GSLs, there have been.................. + Show Spoiler +
8 different winners!!!!
To add to this, in the last 2 OSLs, out of the round of 16, 8 were the same. The last two GSLs, out of the round of 20, 16 were the same.
Go back an OSL further, and you have 5 the same 16. Go back a GSL further and you have 11 of the same 20. It would seem like the GSL is less volatile than the OSL. Anyone who says SC2 is much more volatile is just looking at it from a skewed perspective that is not based on stats and instead based on "gut feeling". Even if it is (it might be, I haven't done any in depth statistical analysis over a really large sample, this is obviously a very small sample), it's not massively more volatile than BW like some people seem to think.
On August 22 2012 01:21 Klipsys wrote: Who really cares what cloud thinks? Has he even won anything ever?
That isn't relevant to the discussion. You can't have a valid opinion without being the best player in the world? Why are you even reading this forum if you don't care about opinions of people that have never won anything, because that's probably close to 99,9 % of the community?
Because he's just one pro out of hundreds and who really cares what he thinks about a game in beta that isn't out yet? The fact that he hasn't won anything in WOL means he hasn't even mastered that yet, and he's commenting on a game in beta? I don't think anyone should care what someone says about an unfinished game, even if they are the best player in the world. I care even less when they're not even top 100
Then you're a fool. If criticism was only valid after a game was finished, then bad ideas would hit the scene all the time and we wouldn't see them removed because you can't just remove entire units or fundamentally change units in an e-sport game after it is released. That is what the time before the game is finished is for.
I never said it wasn't valid, I said I don't care what he thinks about an unfinished game, nor do I understand why anyone cares what he says about an unfinished game. Blizzard may care but why should we? Most people know little to nothing about game design and balance, so any advice/cristim they give is mostly useless anyway since as a player it's going to be inherently bias. He may be right but the game isn't done. He's talking in absolutes which is fucking stupid. He's missing the point that blizzard is making a product for everyone not just for progamers. That's just the way it is. They're not going to make the game harder to play, that's such a broad request anyway. If they made the game harder to play they won't get the casual base they need to sustain it as a business.
So you don't care about cloud opinion? Should we care about yours then?
don't think so..
I think Nerchio was the guy that gave a better input imo
On August 22 2012 05:37 aZealot wrote: The idea that WG tech makes Protoss gateway units weak is falacious and has had currency for the longest time.
The only "weak" Gateway unit is the Stalker, and that is because it is balanced around Blink not WG. Simply put, Blink Dragoons would be OP. Zealots are very strong, and IIRC, kill more lings, for example, than in BW. In PvT, for example, the Zealot/Stalker/Stalker army is quite strong unless the Terran has a bunker, an ability advantage (i.e. concussive shell) or an appreciable unit advantage. DTs remain strong and HTs are as they always were. A good psionic storm is game deciding or game changing. Both these units can also be morphed into Archons who (after the range buff) are beasts in combat (especially against certain unit types).
The perceived weakness of Gateway units is, possibly, in comparison to BW but is more an effect of the "terrible terrible damage" thinking in WOL. Not to mention mechanics like reactored units and the Zerg larvae mechanic that mean significant unit advantages versus Protoss. There are other issues as well, for example, the Stalker is the backbone of the Protoss army in PvZ (but scales badly - due, again, to the power of a well controlled Blink army), while the Zealot is the backbone of the Protoss army in PvT but is a melee unit engaging ranged units with all the problems this implies.
There is nothing wrong with WG. Protoss need the faster production to keep up with Zerg and Terran in WOL.
Good post and don't forget Chrono that makes the protoss keep up in economy and upgrades also
A few reasons why there have been so many repeat winners in the GSL: In the first year of the game there was obviously a lot of skill to be gained. This allows players to dominate despite the game being more volatile than Brood War. Also, there were only a few really strong Brood War players that switched over, therefore the pool of potential tournament winners was very low. It's easier to become the strongest player in such a small pool. Also, the tournament format of the GSL has been set-up in such a way as to reduce volatility. Also, a lot of GSL tournaments do take place over a very short period of time. This could result in a player with a dominating streak to be able to get several victories in quick succession, creating the illusion the game is not volatile. Also, not all the match-ups are equally volatile at all points in history. There have been periods of less volatility that would allow the superior player to almost always win. Also, just because Brood War had some amount of volatility that does not excuse Starcraft 2. The game is supposed to be somewhat of an improvement over Brood War after all. Also, if match-ups are imbalanced, as they have been in the past, it dilutes the pool of potential tournament champions even more.
I'm sorry there is "keeping it real" as people have said about Cloud lately but then there is also "being an arrogant asshole" which he is in this video. To say that about David Kim alone is genuinely arrogant and ignorant. David Kim is tasked with a much harder job then many can realize especially to someone with a small vocabulary and brain as it appears Cloud has. Not only is David Kim tasked with having to help balance an RTS game that is widely popular around the world (this task alone would break most people mentally) he also has to deal with the nonstop public criticism he receives (this would also break most people mentally).
If you want to be out spoken in real life then please expand your vocabulary and don't go calling people an idiot when their job is far harder then yours is Cloud. Grow up please.
On August 21 2012 20:59 Arpayon wrote: Cloud best whiner, it's sad to be from Italy in these cases
I feel Cloud is mischaracterised as a whiner, he's a bit blunt but he doesn't tend to excuse his own losses by using balance whine or whatever. He just has issues with the direction the game is going in a design sense, and some of his criticisms are pretty legitimate even if you disagree with them
I don't necessarily agree with Cloud's assessment but I believe the balance/imbalance taboo needs to be broken. As in, I understand that actually blaming imbalance for what is actually one's own failure is poor sportsmanship, I don't necessarily agree, however, that pretending that everything is perfectly balanced or otherwise perfectly designed is better sportsmanship than saying it like it is. Here the problem is not even only balance but also broader design (skill caps). Blizzard needs to hear negative feedback when it makes poor decisions, especially if this involves sticking to a controversial policy, sticking with a single person's controversial vision and ignoring other voices etc.
For the record, I agree with Blizzard's assessment that Terran was lacking in 1A power compared to other races. But that's only one aspect of the problem and I think that overall, the Terran problem is not going to be solved by the introduction of HotS changes. In fact, I expect it to exacerbate. This is because every race, including Terran, is getting units which are pretty much dedicated XvT counters (mostly siege line breakers/incapacitators). This means even more ways to make a Terran's life hard, even more worries for Terran, even more punishment for small mistakes. Which is basically the problem of Terran as compared to other races: it feels like you're getting punished all the time for choosing Terran.
I wonder where Blizzard has gone wrong. Perhaps using Terran as the reference race and hence overfocus of attention on Terran and therefore overfocus on counters to Terran units and strategies? Bias against the "default" race of WoL? Bias in favour of non-humans (affirmative policy kind of thing, overcompensation of potential racism)? There seems to be a pattern that Terran players have to find ways and develop appropriate metagame if something's a problem in TvP or TvZ, while other races can expect a nerf if something is a problem in XvT. Blizzard might even be right on the merits of the nerfs vs telling players to l2p, but I think if you're consistently telling one race to l2p while addressing the problems of other races with actual interventions, then you at least owe an explanation.
On August 22 2012 05:37 aZealot wrote: The only "weak" Gateway unit is the Stalker, and that is because it is balanced around Blink not WG. Simply put, Blink Dragoons would be OP. Zealots are very strong, and IIRC, kill more lings, for example, than in BW. In PvT, for example, the Zealot/Stalker/Stalker army is quite strong unless the Terran has a bunker, an ability advantage (i.e. concussive shell) or an appreciable unit advantage. DTs remain strong and HTs are as they always were. A good psionic storm is game deciding or game changing. Both these units can also be morphed into Archons who (after the range buff) are beasts in combat (especially against certain unit types).
On the point about Zealots vs Zerglings, in BW Zerglings had a much higher attack speed relative to marines and zealots, so it was about 3 zerglings to 1 zealot, whereas the weaker Zerglings of SC2 mean that it now takes about 4 zerglings to take down 1 zealot. This doesn't really change your point though as zealots ARE about as strong as BW, it's just that zerglings are relatively weaker.
On August 21 2012 20:29 Type|NarutO wrote: In my opinion the warhound needs to be changed. I played HOTS a couple of games and its just insanely strong AND cheap. I am a Terran player so I'd love such an imbalanced unit but the way its now it can't be put into the game.
I played against mouzMarine and we agreed that he'll mech while I'll play bio / biomech a 7 warhounds + bio completely stomped an even if not superior army that was fully put in place and sieged up. (I engaged, not him)
Warhounds have 220HP, 1 armor, range 7 and a movement speed that is faster than a stalker or any other Protoss unit that would be on the field early. It deals 23 base damage and has a haywire missile cooldown ability (6 seconds) which deals 30 damage to mechanical units and fires automatically. Thats 53 damage every 6 seconds + the normal damage in between. In addition to that, they cost 150/75 and build very fast (45) seconds with just the factory + techlab.
I think bio+warhounds (could replace viking possibly in the early phase) could pressure Protoss too much in the early game due to its speed and range. Also the warhound alone makes mech viable, which is not a bad thing but since battlehellion is insane vs zealots and warhounds against everything mechanical, mech seems to be insanely strong.
Well I'm looking forward to it, but I cannot believe its staying like it is now.
Honestly, we all know David Kim is Terran biased. The Warhound was designed for TvT so that you could a-move Tank lines and still win. They want to make sure it'd get used, so they gave it stupidly good stats. It's not very informative in its current state though, we won't know how useful it is when it's actually balanced. Sadly, this affects PvT too because ground Toss isn't very cost effective to begin with. It seems like ZvT and TvT are their major focus for HoTS. Only now right before beta are they playing catch up with the metagame for the TvP and ZvP matchups, initially axing Mothership like it isn't Protoss' saving race for PvZ at the moment. There should be 3 lead designers, each with their own race bias. It's tough to really want to focus on all the subtlety of all the matchups if you have one race bias.
Blizzards method is to make stuff OP and then nerf them as needed. So it stands to reason that the new stuff will generally be OP just to get us to use it.
On August 22 2012 07:15 Grumbels wrote: Also, a lot of GSL tournaments do take place over a very short period of time. This results in a player with a dominating streak to be able to get several victories in quick succession, creating the illusion the game is not volatile.
Fun fact, you're still using your gut instead of actually checking how things are. Did you know that there have been no back to back GSL champions? To take the most obvious example, MVP won his first and latest over a year apart. Nestea won his first and latest 8 months apart. Plus that still doesn't deal with my latest post: over 2 GSLs (i.e. from season 1 to season 3), 11 of the top 20 stayed the same. If we compare the latest MSL and 2nd to latest OSL (both took 2 months and ended 1 month apart, that's actually less time than over the past three GSLs), there were 5 of the same players in the top 16. People just like pretending BW was less volatile. It was just as volatile if not more.
One of the largest factors in balance is always going to be the layout, size and other factors of the map that you play on. Today we dont have Steppes of War or other maps like that anymore, meaning that maps evolve with the game itself. Similarly, in BW maps that were used in tournaments were even largeley made by non-Blizzard groups, and even a new League from what I understand was made by the community iteslf (iCCup). Why doesnt the community extend this idea even further in SC2 and make its own league with rankings again but separate itself from blizzard balancing.
How you may ask? Im not experienced in this, so Im just throwing out this idea now: use the map editor for each current and future maps, use these in our own league so to say, and make any small changes that have to be made for balancing. Changes should then have to be made ONLY after polls or whatever by the community agrees with it. This could also help the game from becoming too bland, especially if multiple strategies wont instantly get nerfed when they get discovered.
How does this tie in with HotS? Well, it doesnt, but it ties in with the discussion going on here. If pro gamers, as well as a large part of the community and almost every terran player complains about skill requirements to play at a decent level, then there is obviously a balance problem between the races. It's only right that the community also has a way to balance the game that will make it more exciting to watch as well as make it more balanced for everyone, not just Taeja, DRG, MVP, etc.
On August 21 2012 19:48 syllogism wrote: Cloud always has the eloquence of a b.net forum poster
yeah David Kim always comes across as intelligent and level headed, one of the ones who can work with odd ideas and make them work. I wonder more about Dustin Browder who has these BIG IDEAS (that often remind me of command and conquer) that will make things AWESOME, but that would only work in single player or something. The recent (what was it gamescon?) interview with David Kim where they talked about a Terran factory unit that sent a nuke-that-wasn't-a-nuke anywhere on the map to hit the opponents army (but not buildings or workers) seemed pretty similar to a Scud launcher or Scud Storm/Nuke/ from C&C Generals or a V3 from RA2, and sounded suspiciously to me like another Browder notion. . . Range 22 flying units also come to mind....
It's not that they're bad ideas per se, it's just that a lot of these ideas don't. imho, fit into a game that lives off its professional scene like sc2.
Don't think it's really DKim's fault about game design. Sounds more like DB's fault as head designer.
Blizzard shouldn't be trying to put hero units into this game. Like mothership, or mothership core. Please just put in the arbiter, or allow players to build more than one mothership and make them cheaper.
---> Even Violet says that the swarm host is silly.
On August 22 2012 07:15 Grumbels wrote: Also, a lot of GSL tournaments do take place over a very short period of time. This results in a player with a dominating streak to be able to get several victories in quick succession, creating the illusion the game is not volatile.
Fun fact, you're still using your gut instead of actually checking how things are. Did you know that there have been no back to back GSL champions? To take the most obvious example, MVP won his first and latest over a year apart. Nestea won his first and latest 8 months apart. Plus that still doesn't deal with my latest post: over 2 GSLs (i.e. from season 1 to season 3), 11 of the top 20 stayed the same. If we compare the latest MSL and 2nd to latest OSL (both took 2 months and ended 1 month apart, that's actually less time than over the past three GSLs), there were 5 of the same players in the top 16. People just like pretending BW was less volatile. It was just as volatile if not more.
2011 ABC Mart MSL Map Pool: Circuit Breaker • Dante's Peak SE • La Mancha • Monte Cristo
2011 Jin Air OSL Map Pool: New Bloody Ridge • La Mancha • Gladiator • Pathfinder
You can't really compare the two strictly on Top performers across tournaments due to race and playstyle differences on different maps.
A better indicator would be how long a player is considered by many as the bonjwa of each race. But then it becomes subjective so I won't get into that.
On August 22 2012 15:19 westgun wrote: One of the largest factors in balance is always going to be the layout, size and other factors of the map that you play on. Today we dont have Steppes of War or other maps like that anymore, meaning that maps evolve with the game itself. Similarly, in BW maps that were used in tournaments were even largeley made by non-Blizzard groups, and even a new League from what I understand was made by the community iteslf (iCCup). Why doesnt the community extend this idea even further in SC2 and make its own league with rankings again but separate itself from blizzard balancing.
How you may ask? Im not experienced in this, so Im just throwing out this idea now: use the map editor for each current and future maps, use these in our own league so to say, and make any small changes that have to be made for balancing. Changes should then have to be made ONLY after polls or whatever by the community agrees with it. This could also help the game from becoming too bland, especially if multiple strategies wont instantly get nerfed when they get discovered.
How does this tie in with HotS? Well, it doesnt, but it ties in with the discussion going on here. If pro gamers, as well as a large part of the community and almost every terran player complains about skill requirements to play at a decent level, then there is obviously a balance problem between the races. It's only right that the community also has a way to balance the game that will make it more exciting to watch as well as make it more balanced for everyone, not just Taeja, DRG, MVP, etc.
Yup, Blizzard basically balanced everything on 200/200 deathball on bronze league maps. I wish KeSPA map makers would get busy and make better ones so we can see free flowing play we all know and love. Maybe next season.
On August 22 2012 15:19 westgun wrote: One of the largest factors in balance is always going to be the layout, size and other factors of the map that you play on. Today we dont have Steppes of War or other maps like that anymore, meaning that maps evolve with the game itself. Similarly, in BW maps that were used in tournaments were even largeley made by non-Blizzard groups, and even a new League from what I understand was made by the community iteslf (iCCup). Why doesnt the community extend this idea even further in SC2 and make its own league with rankings again but separate itself from blizzard balancing.
How you may ask? Im not experienced in this, so Im just throwing out this idea now: use the map editor for each current and future maps, use these in our own league so to say, and make any small changes that have to be made for balancing. Changes should then have to be made ONLY after polls or whatever by the community agrees with it. This could also help the game from becoming too bland, especially if multiple strategies wont instantly get nerfed when they get discovered.
How does this tie in with HotS? Well, it doesnt, but it ties in with the discussion going on here. If pro gamers, as well as a large part of the community and almost every terran player complains about skill requirements to play at a decent level, then there is obviously a balance problem between the races. It's only right that the community also has a way to balance the game that will make it more exciting to watch as well as make it more balanced for everyone, not just Taeja, DRG, MVP, etc.
Had the same thought already. I'm wondering why the community doesn't try to make the game "better" on its own. There already were games that had mods that rebalanced the game and those were used in online and offline tournaments.
On August 22 2012 07:15 Grumbels wrote: Also, a lot of GSL tournaments do take place over a very short period of time. This results in a player with a dominating streak to be able to get several victories in quick succession, creating the illusion the game is not volatile.
Fun fact, you're still using your gut instead of actually checking how things are. Did you know that there have been no back to back GSL champions? To take the most obvious example, MVP won his first and latest over a year apart. Nestea won his first and latest 8 months apart. Plus that still doesn't deal with my latest post: over 2 GSLs (i.e. from season 1 to season 3), 11 of the top 20 stayed the same. If we compare the latest MSL and 2nd to latest OSL (both took 2 months and ended 1 month apart, that's actually less time than over the past three GSLs), there were 5 of the same players in the top 16. People just like pretending BW was less volatile. It was just as volatile if not more.
2011 ABC Mart MSL Map Pool: Circuit Breaker • Dante's Peak SE • La Mancha • Monte Cristo
2011 Jin Air OSL Map Pool: New Bloody Ridge • La Mancha • Gladiator • Pathfinder
You can't really compare the two strictly on Top performers across tournaments due to race and playstyle differences on different maps.
A better indicator would be how long a player is considered by many as the bonjwa of each race. But then it becomes subjective so I won't get into that.
It's not a better indicator because, as you said, it's subjective. People's emotions are easily swayed into only looking for data that supports their own point. I'm probably guilty of it as well. But at least trying to use data is better than large generalizations. If you can't compare top performers across tournaments then there is literally no way of comparing. And the fact that one person can win everything (or if you'd like, 3, one for each race) is not a good measure of volatility at all. Why would other people's "skill levels" vary so widely that only the top performer is constant?
And if you want to make the qualification about race and playstyle differences then the point is COMPLETELY moot. Then there's no way to ever prove that BW is volatile in the slightest. You've basically defined not volatile as volatile and said it's statistically unable to be studied. MMA tore apart zergs and terrans so when there weren't many good toss he won. When he won his gsl he played only terrans. If you want to explain volatility you can do it for SC2 as well. People just don't like their closely held beliefs challenged.
On August 22 2012 07:26 LimeNade wrote: I'm sorry there is "keeping it real" as people have said about Cloud lately but then there is also "being an arrogant asshole" which he is in this video. To say that about David Kim alone is genuinely arrogant and ignorant. David Kim is tasked with a much harder job then many can realize especially to someone with a small vocabulary and brain as it appears Cloud has. Not only is David Kim tasked with having to help balance an RTS game that is widely popular around the world (this task alone would break most people mentally) he also has to deal with the nonstop public criticism he receives (this would also break most people mentally).
If you want to be out spoken in real life then please expand your vocabulary and don't go calling people an idiot when their job is far harder then yours is Cloud. Grow up please.
You can't have a clue about the game, read/listen to some of the stuff DKim is saying, and conclude that he is a person that should be touching this games' balance. I agree that maybe Cloud was rude, but I guess it was some amount of frustration speaking.
On August 21 2012 20:06 NVRLand wrote: Would someone please be so kind and explain what that "stasis" ability is? I've checked google translate to find out the swedish word for it but can't find anything that actually explains what the mothership ability will do to the units... haven't found any videos of it being demonstrated either :/
Stasis was new ability on the Mothership, it is ability to freeze all air units around the Mothership, including yours too, because Vortex is working only vs. ground units.
lol they added statis? another bw spell
Yea...next thing they'll do is add workers hydras zerglings marines zelots and so on. I mean come on man..what is this world coming to.... hope they won't do it!
On August 22 2012 07:15 Grumbels wrote: Also, a lot of GSL tournaments do take place over a very short period of time. This results in a player with a dominating streak to be able to get several victories in quick succession, creating the illusion the game is not volatile.
Fun fact, you're still using your gut instead of actually checking how things are. Did you know that there have been no back to back GSL champions? To take the most obvious example, MVP won his first and latest over a year apart. Nestea won his first and latest 8 months apart. Plus that still doesn't deal with my latest post: over 2 GSLs (i.e. from season 1 to season 3), 11 of the top 20 stayed the same. If we compare the latest MSL and 2nd to latest OSL (both took 2 months and ended 1 month apart, that's actually less time than over the past three GSLs), there were 5 of the same players in the top 16. People just like pretending BW was less volatile. It was just as volatile if not more.
2011 ABC Mart MSL Map Pool: Circuit Breaker • Dante's Peak SE • La Mancha • Monte Cristo
2011 Jin Air OSL Map Pool: New Bloody Ridge • La Mancha • Gladiator • Pathfinder
You can't really compare the two strictly on Top performers across tournaments due to race and playstyle differences on different maps.
A better indicator would be how long a player is considered by many as the bonjwa of each race. But then it becomes subjective so I won't get into that.
It's not a better indicator because, as you said, it's subjective. People's emotions are easily swayed into only looking for data that supports their own point. I'm probably guilty of it as well. But at least trying to use data is better than large generalizations. If you can't compare top performers across tournaments then there is literally no way of comparing. And the fact that one person can win everything (or if you'd like, 3, one for each race) is not a good measure of volatility at all. Why would other people's "skill levels" vary so widely that only the top performer is constant?
And if you want to make the qualification about race and playstyle differences then the point is COMPLETELY moot. Then there's no way to ever prove that BW is volatile in the slightest. You've basically defined not volatile as volatile and said it's statistically unable to be studied. MMA tore apart zergs and terrans so when there weren't many good toss he won. When he won his gsl he played only terrans. If you want to explain volatility you can do it for SC2 as well. People just don't like their closely held beliefs challenged.
Hey, I gave you tendencies as to why the stats might not be what they appear. I didn't mean to imply all of these would hold at all times, just that they could influence the result. Looking at GSL winners is a ridiculous way to measure volatility in any case. Personally I think it's obvious from the games that 'metagame' imbalance issues plus innate volatility of many match-ups (PvP, ZvZ) lead to situations where it's really hard to decide who will win any given tournament. Yes, if the skill differences are high then it's easy, but don't tell me you can say which one of, say, Seed Creator Squirtle Puzzle Parting Genius San Oz MC is a strong favourite to win a tournament over the other.
I mean, just look at the games: PvZ is heavily dependent on guessing all-ins and vortexes, TvZ on guessing third/fourth CC, mirror match-ups depend a lot on openings as well. TvP has some luck factors with regards to drops and army positioning that's manageable to a degree, but not completely so. A player like Flash can get ridiculous records in proleague against top tier opposition, meanwhile MVP is hardly even a favorite when playing Vortix just because of TvZ being silly.
On August 22 2012 15:19 westgun wrote: One of the largest factors in balance is always going to be the layout, size and other factors of the map that you play on. Today we dont have Steppes of War or other maps like that anymore, meaning that maps evolve with the game itself. Similarly, in BW maps that were used in tournaments were even largeley made by non-Blizzard groups, and even a new League from what I understand was made by the community iteslf (iCCup). Why doesnt the community extend this idea even further in SC2 and make its own league with rankings again but separate itself from blizzard balancing.
How you may ask? Im not experienced in this, so Im just throwing out this idea now: use the map editor for each current and future maps, use these in our own league so to say, and make any small changes that have to be made for balancing. Changes should then have to be made ONLY after polls or whatever by the community agrees with it. This could also help the game from becoming too bland, especially if multiple strategies wont instantly get nerfed when they get discovered.
How does this tie in with HotS? Well, it doesnt, but it ties in with the discussion going on here. If pro gamers, as well as a large part of the community and almost every terran player complains about skill requirements to play at a decent level, then there is obviously a balance problem between the races. It's only right that the community also has a way to balance the game that will make it more exciting to watch as well as make it more balanced for everyone, not just Taeja, DRG, MVP, etc.
Had the same thought already. I'm wondering why the community doesn't try to make the game "better" on its own. There already were games that had mods that rebalanced the game and those were used in online and offline tournaments.
Wish this would come true.
There are BW maps (and yes BW is much more balanced and fun to play), it has its' own rating system (similar to ICCup) but it's not popular at all. The problem is that you can't really make a separate server, but the maps will never be similarly popular, because it's not good enough for tournaments. People who are serious about their game want to have a big Ladder and real game to play, not custom maps
Sometimes when I see changes made by Blizzard I think that they no nothing about SC2.
So basically Blizzard is forcing this idea, which in itself sounds awesome, that Terrans should play mech or mix into bioball at least this transforming hellions - of course we are talking about games vs P. Sounds reasonable. mmm... or not.
When Terrans play vs P they have to kill Toss as soon as possible. Late game is too tricky (I don't want to use the word imbalanced) and Terran is lacking the possibility to produce something that will scare Toss. As a consequence it is rather reasonable to say again that Terran should kill Protoss ASAP. So 111 or bioball. Bioball is so called standard and when playing bioball with which Terran try to kill Protoss ideally before 20, maybe even 17 minute mark, there is no place for Hellions. Why? Coz unlike Protoss Terran has to make upgrades for bio and mech separately. 0/0 Hellions vs 3/3 Protoss army is a suicide. That is why we see almost only bio which is also 3/3. You think I exaggerate? Look what happens when Protoss is having lots of Colossus - Terran makes Vikings - but they are 0/0, sometimes 1/0. And Viking is not like Hellion - an additional unit. It is a unit that is essential and yet Terran cannot afford and do not have time to make upgrades for them.
Also mech vs Protoss is a not even funny joke for few reasons. First, there are too many units in Protoss army that can very easily kill Tanks, making them at some point of the game almost useless (plus look at HotS clips - Tempest vs sieged Tanks... 22 range? lol). Second - Thors. Ever since they have energy, not cooldown, they are too vulnerable to High Templars.
I am not saying that TvP is imbalanced. It is balanced, but also very fragile. It is so easy to ruin it plus Blizzard efforts called "mech vs P" are funny. I fear that in HotS we will have again bio vs everything that Protoss can afford to build with some crazy 111-like builds.
I agree with Cloud, they're dumbing it down and I don't like it. I was a high masters Terran, I worked my way up there through hard work. You give us 1A moves and you're suddenly taking the challenge from the game. What was the point of working my ass off trying to get into GM someday when getting into it suddenly takes so much less skill because you can 1A2A3A to a nice 30 game winstreak against pros?
God if I could still play I probably wouldn't want to, guess I don't have to hate God for not letting me be able to play SC2 now.
On August 21 2012 23:13 aTnClouD wrote: I don't understand why some people expect me to articulate my opinion in a short interview when I've been saying the same things over and over for the past 2 years and I've gotten pretty much shit from every clueless SC2 blind fanboy. I can write an insanely long wall of text about all the issues that could have been avoided in SC2 if only the development and balance team was as competent as the Brood War one, but in the end I would just be wasting my time for nothing and more bad rep. If you say anything negative most people will label you as a whiner even if you bring valid points and I don't think feeding this stupidity with time and effort will bring me anywhere. I'm just overall very disappointed but of course I will keep playing the game and having fun.
btw I really think David Kim doesn't have the game knowledge required for his job. There was a meeting of progamers with David Kim at Gamescom and as far as I understand he's pretty much clueless and doesn't have the insight needed to understand what's going on. I was told he seems to think pvz late game is fine while every protoss is basically playing every tournament game trying to kill zergs before they have an unbeatable deathball. They basically look at the stats and try to even them out as much as possible but this doesn't make the game good to watch. I still fail to understand how they could think gateways/warpgates are completely fine as they are when it's completely destroying the potential entertainment in protoss matchups. Watch last GSL final if you want a valid example.
I still think its a good thing that you came forward to express your opinion. No matter what some people may think, you don't need to be an expert in a certain domain to make an educated opinion, though it helps. And while the beta is still beta and the game is still in development, its easy to recognize bad ideas and concepts when you see them, I wish more pro gamers like you came forward to express these opinions about such ideas.
I also find it highly disturbing that the man behind the design of the game is so disconnected from it and relies so much on statistics and internal data, when watching and playing the game could provide much more insight, and better help with making it more spectacular and better to play, in ways that cold hard numbers really can't convey.
Keep it up, your opinion is valuable.
Edit: And the reason why I agree with ClouD, even though I may not play at a very high level, I can recognize it when I see it, I am smart enough to not comment on balance at my level, and I can understand and differentiate between good units/concepts and bad ones. And what I see in HoTS is a bunch of really weird and broken ideas and concepts, some which don't even blend well with a particular race, some that synergize too well with the race's strengths, but most just make the game more boring and simple. Yes you can change numbers all you want, but some ideas are just not going to work no matter what, or even if you force them in they will always feel forced and awkward.
I agree 100%, that instead of giving terrans easier units, they should be working on incorporating more complexity and difficulty into protoss and zerg. The beauty of BW, wasn't that people could do everything at once, it was that they had to chose what to do and when to do it, smartly allocate their APM and multi-tasking, all of which made games even more spectacular when you saw action happen consistently and fluidly at 3-4 locations at the same time, while macro was also going on in the background.
Units like the BH and Warhound won't change that, what is more spectacular, seeing small groups of BH/WH a-move into other small groups of immortals/stalkers in 3-4 locations, or seeing 3 drops in different locations + a main army of bio, all being microed almost constantly? Granted one is definitely harder to pull of then the other, but also much more rewarding when you see it happen or when performed well.
SC2 often lacks that, and its quite a shame because you can get a real kick out of a game when there is so much back and forth action going on across the map that even the casters + observer are having a hard time keeping up with it (never mid the players).
* The Battle Cruisers speed boost will be removed, Battle Cruisers will have increased damage
Errr I,.. uhhhh well, ... you see... look ..ummmmmm.... well... oh :/ (Literally my reaction reading that line)
BC's don't seem used very much but it seems to me when they come out they fucking stay out, those things are tough as fuck and kick some serious ass, I'm kind of lost here - can someone tell me how they are weak (except build time, cost) ? Very confused right here - I fear the shit out of those fucking things.
On August 22 2012 07:15 Grumbels wrote: Also, a lot of GSL tournaments do take place over a very short period of time. This results in a player with a dominating streak to be able to get several victories in quick succession, creating the illusion the game is not volatile.
Fun fact, you're still using your gut instead of actually checking how things are. Did you know that there have been no back to back GSL champions? To take the most obvious example, MVP won his first and latest over a year apart. Nestea won his first and latest 8 months apart. Plus that still doesn't deal with my latest post: over 2 GSLs (i.e. from season 1 to season 3), 11 of the top 20 stayed the same. If we compare the latest MSL and 2nd to latest OSL (both took 2 months and ended 1 month apart, that's actually less time than over the past three GSLs), there were 5 of the same players in the top 16. People just like pretending BW was less volatile. It was just as volatile if not more.
2011 ABC Mart MSL Map Pool: Circuit Breaker • Dante's Peak SE • La Mancha • Monte Cristo
2011 Jin Air OSL Map Pool: New Bloody Ridge • La Mancha • Gladiator • Pathfinder
You can't really compare the two strictly on Top performers across tournaments due to race and playstyle differences on different maps.
A better indicator would be how long a player is considered by many as the bonjwa of each race. But then it becomes subjective so I won't get into that.
It's not a better indicator because, as you said, it's subjective. People's emotions are easily swayed into only looking for data that supports their own point. I'm probably guilty of it as well. But at least trying to use data is better than large generalizations. If you can't compare top performers across tournaments then there is literally no way of comparing. And the fact that one person can win everything (or if you'd like, 3, one for each race) is not a good measure of volatility at all. Why would other people's "skill levels" vary so widely that only the top performer is constant?
And if you want to make the qualification about race and playstyle differences then the point is COMPLETELY moot. Then there's no way to ever prove that BW is volatile in the slightest. You've basically defined not volatile as volatile and said it's statistically unable to be studied. MMA tore apart zergs and terrans so when there weren't many good toss he won. When he won his gsl he played only terrans. If you want to explain volatility you can do it for SC2 as well. People just don't like their closely held beliefs challenged.
Hey, I gave you tendencies as to why the stats might not be what they appear. I didn't mean to imply all of these would hold at all times, just that they could influence the result. Looking at GSL winners is a ridiculous way to measure volatility in any case. Personally I think it's obvious from the games that 'metagame' imbalance issues plus innate volatility of many match-ups (PvP, ZvZ) lead to situations where it's really hard to decide who will win any given tournament. Yes, if the skill differences are high then it's easy, but don't tell me you can say which one of, say, Seed Creator Squirtle Puzzle Parting Genius San Oz MC is a strong favourite to win a tournament over the other.
I mean, just look at the games: PvZ is heavily dependent on guessing all-ins and vortexes, TvZ on guessing third/fourth CC, mirror match-ups depend a lot on openings as well. TvP has some luck factors with regards to drops and army positioning that's manageable to a degree, but not completely so. A player like Flash can get ridiculous records in proleague against top tier opposition, meanwhile MVP is hardly even a favorite when playing Vortix just because of TvZ being silly.
The GSL winner thing was a first brush at volatility data to all the people who say Flash wins everything. No he doesn't. Different people win tournaments at about the same rate in SC2 and BW. (Edit: This also holds with saying only Bonjwas win things in BW, then there are hell of a lot of bonjwas eh?)
The second one is the one that matters more. I made it slightly harder for SC2 by going over the course of a longer time period (so that you can't say the format of GSL saves people, over even 1 gsl you can drop from Code S to out, but just to make it even more difficult you can use 2 GSLs to make certain of turnover), but from any tournament to the next in BW, there's more volatility than most 2 month periods of the GSL.
As per foreign tournaments, I don't think they count in comparing volatility. Traveling and playing starcraft well in a completely different setting from what you're used to is VERY difficult and the fact that MVP still could win is a testament to just how good he is. It's something BW pros never had to face.
Again if PvZ, PvP, ZvZ were so dependent on guessing, why would there be such little turnover in any 2 GSL period? Good protoss beat bad zerg, good zerg beat bad protoss, etc.
The Flash dominance in Proleague thing is also not entirely fair. You only have to play one match and you're playing on your favorite (or at least maps your race/playstyle is favored) maps. "Aces" in GSTL are expected not just to win the first map they play, but also face sniper after sniper on maps they aren't favored.
Edit: Also looking at MLG championships, 2011 champ -> Winter Champ 6 of same top 16 (in a tournament where you have no preparation) Winter Champ -> Spring Champ, 8 of same top 16. It doesn't seem like there's all too much randomness when the same people do well in tournaments over and over again...
* The Battle Cruisers speed boost will be removed, Battle Cruisers will have increased damage
Errr I,.. uhhhh well, ... you see... look ..ummmmmm.... well... oh :/ (Literally my reaction reading that line)
BC's don't seem used very much but it seems to me when they come out they fucking stay out, those things are tough as fuck and kick some serious ass, I'm kind of lost here - can someone tell me how they are weak (except build time, cost) ? Very confused right here - I fear the shit out of those fucking things.
They changed their damage from 8 to 6 in a patch a while ago, I think primarily because of concerns for team play and free for all. Ever since they have not been used as much, except as a late-game transition where they are weak until critical mass. If Battle Cruisers have serious weaknesses, but are stronger than they are now, a place opens up for more BC rushes, mixing in BCs with your late-game army, and so on. Of course, the danger is that mass BC is impossible to defeat, which is somewhat of an issue with the game in general. (ultimate compositions having so few weaknesses)
On August 21 2012 20:29 Type|NarutO wrote: In my opinion the warhound needs to be changed. I played HOTS a couple of games and its just insanely strong AND cheap. I am a Terran player so I'd love such an imbalanced unit but the way its now it can't be put into the game.
I played against mouzMarine and we agreed that he'll mech while I'll play bio / biomech a 7 warhounds + bio completely stomped an even if not superior army that was fully put in place and sieged up. (I engaged, not him)
Warhounds have 220HP, 1 armor, range 7 and a movement speed that is faster than a stalker or any other Protoss unit that would be on the field early. It deals 23 base damage and has a haywire missile cooldown ability (6 seconds) which deals 30 damage to mechanical units and fires automatically. Thats 53 damage every 6 seconds + the normal damage in between. In addition to that, they cost 150/75 and build very fast (45) seconds with just the factory + techlab.
I think bio+warhounds (could replace viking possibly in the early phase) could pressure Protoss too much in the early game due to its speed and range. Also the warhound alone makes mech viable, which is not a bad thing but since battlehellion is insane vs zealots and warhounds against everything mechanical, mech seems to be insanely strong.
Well I'm looking forward to it, but I cannot believe its staying like it is now.
As multiple people stated in the battlereport thread which came out about a week ago, the problem with the Warhound and the Battle Hellion is that they aren't mech units. They are 'metallic' bio units basically. One is the firebat and the other is a marauder. The movement speed, animation, attack speed just seem off. The way to use the unit is exactly the same as mechnical units. Blizzard have completely misunderstood the intention of mech play with the addition of these units. Especially the auto targeting bullshit.
Also don't take my post as an "op" whine - I'm a scrub at the game, I care more about watching than playing and these units at least appear as if they will be AWFUL for good, watchable, competitive play. They really do, for all intents and purposes appear like 1a bio units in a mech skin. Regardless of the stats for these units, the problem is the type of gameplay they will foster will be kind of ... well boring and shitty.
* The Battle Cruisers speed boost will be removed, Battle Cruisers will have increased damage
Errr I,.. uhhhh well, ... you see... look ..ummmmmm.... well... oh :/ (Literally my reaction reading that line)
BC's don't seem used very much but it seems to me when they come out they fucking stay out, those things are tough as fuck and kick some serious ass, I'm kind of lost here - can someone tell me how they are weak (except build time, cost) ? Very confused right here - I fear the shit out of those fucking things.
They changed their damage from 8 to 6 in a patch a while ago, I think primarily because of concerns for team play and free for all. Ever since they have not been used as much, except as a late-game transition where they are weak until critical mass. If Battle Cruisers have serious weakness, but are stronger than they are now, a place opens up for more BC rushes, mixing in BCs with your late-game army, and so on. Of course, the danger is that mass BC is impossible to defeat, which is somewhat of an issue with the game in general. (ultimate compositions having so few weaknesses)
No. BCs were nerfed because of the 1-base BC all-in was a bit too strong.
On August 21 2012 20:56 NATO wrote: Lol, a toss player complaining about detection? They have the best detection in the game, combined with the best cloaked unit in the game.
Not to go completely op vs op, he said she said but what the flying fuck are you talking about? Detection for Terran = Raven, Missle Turret, Ghost EMP (kinda), Scan (with an incredibly large range and surprisingly long duration) ........... and scan is the most important one there "oh fuck, I forgot to build detection, let me just press this simple oops I forgot button"
No good sir but no, Protoss does not, in any way have the best detection in the game. If a terran forgets, wait for 50 energy, phew. If a Protoss fucks up it can be completely game ending.
* The Battle Cruisers speed boost will be removed, Battle Cruisers will have increased damage
Errr I,.. uhhhh well, ... you see... look ..ummmmmm.... well... oh :/ (Literally my reaction reading that line)
BC's don't seem used very much but it seems to me when they come out they fucking stay out, those things are tough as fuck and kick some serious ass, I'm kind of lost here - can someone tell me how they are weak (except build time, cost) ? Very confused right here - I fear the shit out of those fucking things.
They changed their damage from 8 to 6 in a patch a while ago, I think primarily because of concerns for team play and free for all. Ever since they have not been used as much, except as a late-game transition where they are weak until critical mass. If Battle Cruisers have serious weakness, but are stronger than they are now, a place opens up for more BC rushes, mixing in BCs with your late-game army, and so on. Of course, the danger is that mass BC is impossible to defeat, which is somewhat of an issue with the game in general. (ultimate compositions having so few weaknesses)
That last sentence is my issue exactly. If you are too slow on upgrades as P and don't have enough stalkers / phoenix - a certain amount of BC's can utterly maul you - and my god do they seem hard to actually knock down - such a tough unit. I won't deny it's kind of cool - since the BC is such an iconic looking capital ship but it sucks as a mid skill player. (mind you it seems like pros have similar problems as me with the things if someone manages to sneak more than 3 or 4 out)
Battlecruisers currently lack good counters from the ground and still perform very well against a wide array of unit types. We're aware that it is not easy to get battlecruisers out for the cost, but at the same time, it is possible in both 1v1s and team games to create stalemate situations to bring them out. Overall, we feel that battlecruisers are too strong for their cost, and the terran-forced stalemate situations are causing less interesting gameplay. We will be lowering their damage against ground units from 10 to 8.
From Blizzard's situation report. I guess I mostly remembered it correctly. Also, for some reason I thought that they changed the damage from 8 to 6 instead of 10 to 8. And they have increased the speed of the battlecruiser in patch 1.3, already making it easier to use along the lines of the removed speed boost in HotS.
i like the damage increase, while they are not bad now, i want them to be a better units, however i'm not a fan of their puny multiple laser, BW bc were more intimidating
On August 22 2012 02:05 Evangelist wrote: Single target A move units (hi Warhound) are crazy easy to balance. It's a game of numbers and since there's no multiplication implicit to a Warhound deathball they scale linearly with the only limits being the quantized number of shots required to destroy a particular unit. If the problem with the Warhound is that it's too easy to A move, is the problem the Warhound itself (ie taking too many shots to kill and thus absorbing fire for higher DPS units) or is it the time of availability? Is it the sheer damage output? Does it fill a niche other units don't fill? Does it have a reason for being there?
Congratulations on not getting it *at all* This paragraph you wrote is a perfect example of Blizzard thinking, forget the *design* of the unit and focus on the numbers.
It's how the unit is used, what it's abilities are, how and what it attacks. The Warhound is the very definition of a mindless unit which auto-targets what it's intended to disperse. It requires no thinking, at all - it's only weakness is air units (of which Protoss doesn't have a huge quantity of good air to ground units)
Fiddling with numbers is meaningless when the design is wrong. I never even played more than a few hours of BW and over 2 years of watching pro games, reading this site - it's very easy to understand why some pros are disillusioned with the game. The design needs to be clever - not just even.
* The Battle Cruisers speed boost will be removed, Battle Cruisers will have increased damage
Errr I,.. uhhhh well, ... you see... look ..ummmmmm.... well... oh :/ (Literally my reaction reading that line)
BC's don't seem used very much but it seems to me when they come out they fucking stay out, those things are tough as fuck and kick some serious ass, I'm kind of lost here - can someone tell me how they are weak (except build time, cost) ? Very confused right here - I fear the shit out of those fucking things.
They changed their damage from 8 to 6 in a patch a while ago, I think primarily because of concerns for team play and free for all. Ever since they have not been used as much, except as a late-game transition where they are weak until critical mass. If Battle Cruisers have serious weakness, but are stronger than they are now, a place opens up for more BC rushes, mixing in BCs with your late-game army, and so on. Of course, the danger is that mass BC is impossible to defeat, which is somewhat of an issue with the game in general. (ultimate compositions having so few weaknesses)
That last sentence is my issue exactly. If you are too slow on upgrades as P and don't have enough stalkers / phoenix - a certain amount of BC's can utterly maul you - and my god do they seem hard to actually knock down - such a tough unit. I won't deny it's kind of cool - since the BC is such an iconic looking capital ship but it sucks as a mid skill player. (mind you it seems like pros have similar problems as me with the things if someone manages to sneak more than 3 or 4 out)
What are you talking about? If you didn't scout him at all, you deserve to lose to BCs. If you are slow on upgrades? The Protoss has always been the race that gets all of the upgrades the fastest because of Chronoboost. And Stalkers should be enough to deal with BCs, Phoenixes don't do anything vs. BCs because they don't damage them at all.. One Phoenix does 2x5 damage vs. non-light units, and BC has 2 armor when not upgraded, that is only 6 damage per Phoenix. The things that is really good vs. BCs are HTs and Void Rays, as seen in Mvp vs. Squirtle match.
And I think that mass BCs are far easier to beat than mass Carriers.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
Reading that last bit.
What matters to me most of all is the extent to which Blizzard is willing to change the foundation of the game.
When people say, "stuff will change," how much stuff are we talking about? And to what extent will Blizzard be willing to change the concepts they have designed for HOTS?
See, tweaking the stats or delivery method of a unit concept is not the extent of change that I desire.
If Blizzard was truly willing to design this game as an esports title, then they would be willing to do things like:
1. Remove WG. 2. Nerf macro mechanics (income of mule, spawn larva to + 2 larva, slightly increase chronoboost cost (35)) 3. Remove 1A units (roach, collosi, warhound, battlehellion). 4. Reduce the supply count of higher supply units (siege tanks, hydras, ultras). 5. Remove hero units (mothership, mothership core) and replace them with massable counterparts. 6. Reduce the power of stuns (make fungal slow by 60 percent rather than immobalize, change vortex). 7. Revert to 1 gas format (I believe this would improve several gameplay aspects, including: reducing the amount of workers required for 4 base saturation to 72, allowing for more tactical gas placements, better map design).
If Blizzard was truly willing, then they would try putting widow mines on the hellion, instead of giving the hellion a battle mode. That's my biggest beef. If they were willing, then they would stop trying to make Terran more 1A and increase the skill floor of the game.
And if they were willing, then they would put the lurker in the expansion over the swarm host (ok this is my biggest, PERSONAL beef, which is why I spoilered it.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
Reading that last bit.
What matters to me most of all is the extent to which Blizzard is willing to change the foundation of the game.
When people say, "stuff will change," how much stuff are we talking about? And to what extent will Blizzard be willing to change the concepts they have designed for HOTS?
See, tweaking the stats or delivery method of a unit concept is not the extent of change that I desire.
If Blizzard was truly willing to design this game as an esports title, then they would be willing to do things like:
1. Remove WG. 2. Nerf macro mechanics (income of mule, spawn larva to + 2 larva, slightly increase chronoboost cost (35)) 3. Remove 1A units (roach, collosi, warhound, battlehellion). 4. Reduce the supply count of higher supply units (siege tanks, hydras, ultras). 5. Remove hero units (mothership, mothership core) and replace them with massable counterparts. 6. Reduce the power of stuns (make fungal slow by 60 percent rather than immobalize, change vortex). 7. Revert to 1 gas format (I believe this would improve several gameplay aspects, including: reducing the amount of workers required for 4 base saturation to 72, allowing for more tactical gas placements, better map design).
If Blizzard was truly willing, then they would try putting widow mines on the hellion, instead of giving the hellion a battle mode. That's my biggest beef. If they were willing, then they would stop trying to make Terran more 1A and increase the skill floor of the game.
And if they were willing, then they would put the lurker in the expansion over the swarm host (ok this is my biggest, PERSONAL beef, which is why I spoilered it.
On August 22 2012 03:46 MavivaM wrote: Always nice to hear progamers opinions, they have way more insight than us. And Cloud, as usual, brings up valid points in the worst possible PR manner
I think that there are basically three problems in the balance situation: the first is the warp-in mechanic, since it completely nullifies the concept of map distance and makes PvP what it is.
The second is the existence of spells who are able to change the flow of a battle despite whatever your opponent does. Forcefields, fungals, the infamous vortex, EMPs... one could argue that somehow your opponent can prevent some of them like the vortex by splitting everywhere, or luring FFs all day long... but personally I think it relies too much on a single player to make a mistake rather than his opponent doing something genius
The third one is Blizzard's tendency to never punish a player who makes bad decisions when building his army since they tend to make the some units as well-rounded as possible.
Pre-nerf ghost is the epitome of this tendecy, since it was NEVER a bad idea to make ghosts. Not that now making a ghost in TvP can be stupid, since they still hurt any kind of army composition the Protoss has, but they are not the only one.
-Infestors are so well rounded that they can answer to absolutely EVERYTHING the opponent makes in all the matchups. -Colossi as well, as long as the opponent doesn't go completely anti-collossi (no... actually it's even better since in the next warp-in cycle the Toss will completely swap the army wherever he wants). -3/3 marines are perfect in every army against every kind of threat. -Broodlors, as long as supported by infestors, are NEVER a bad choice.
And it looks like the Warhound will fit in this category as well.
Generally a player is punished only because of bad decision making in a battle or due to huge errors with scouting, but the game is pretty generous with army compositions errors at every level of play that isn't the real top. It looks like HoTS won't change this aspect, sadly.
That's the current state, I wonder how will it be in a couple of years...
Really appreciate your post, seems very insightful to me. I play P but reading what you said does make sense to be honest regarding warpgate. I've never understood the hate but I see how it negates map size.
Perhaps the solution here is to make GW units build times faster than their warp in cooldown - reverse the effect so to speak? The convienience of warpgate is somewhat negated in a tradeoff by a longer cooldown? Sorry to theorycraft, especially as a low skill player but it seems to make some sense to me. (obviously in the early game this could be an issue, solved by perhaps longer build times on the gates themselves?)
As for the comment(s) regarding 'never a bad idea to build x" (example infestors) very much agree with you and great point also. I always thought the colossus was a cool looking unit with an interesting skill (the wall walking) but having watched probably hundreds of hours of progames now and read this site I begin to see why people complain about these kind of units. A single 'smart choice' isn't really a good thing. If a unit has a cool skill like cliff walking, I'd like to see some kind of handicap - I don't think an obscenely long range is a handicap (and the lack of attacking air - while a partial handicap isn't the end of the world) I won't begin to theorycraft the infestor, ghost, colossus or the marine but your point is really striking as someone who watches a lot of games - that kind of insight is smart and what blizzard should be sitting down and thinking about when designing units for HoTS - not as Dustin said many years ago "we just add cool units and balance the numbers around them"
Also on a sidenote, SC2 vs SC1 (non BW) - the quantity of units is much more in SC2 - I feel as if Blizzard penned themselves into a bloody corner with SC2 having so much variety. Just how many units will each side have to choose from, come the Protoss expansion? I know we want value for money in our game but more numbers of units isn't always the best.
On August 22 2012 19:18 Disastorm wrote: awesome didn't know that violet knows english.
Violet: "Swarm host is pretty suck"
You should definately check out the interviews with djWHEAT, SaSe and DRG he did for CSN. They are absolutely great. viOLet is such an awesome guy! I still can't believe I talked to him.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
Reading that last bit.
What matters to me most of all is the extent to which Blizzard is willing to change the foundation of the game.
When people say, "stuff will change," how much stuff are we talking about? And to what extent will Blizzard be willing to change the concepts they have designed for HOTS?
See, tweaking the stats or delivery method of a unit concept is not the extent of change that I desire.
If Blizzard was truly willing to design this game as an esports title, then they would be willing to do things like:
1. Remove WG. 2. Nerf macro mechanics (income of mule, spawn larva to + 2 larva, slightly increase chronoboost cost (35)) 3. Remove 1A units (roach, collosi, warhound, battlehellion). 4. Reduce the supply count of higher supply units (siege tanks, hydras, ultras). 5. Remove hero units (mothership, mothership core) and replace them with massable counterparts. 6. Reduce the power of stuns (make fungal slow by 60 percent rather than immobalize, change vortex). 7. Revert to 1 gas format (I believe this would improve several gameplay aspects, including: reducing the amount of workers required for 4 base saturation to 72, allowing for more tactical gas placements, better map design).
If Blizzard was truly willing, then they would try putting widow mines on the hellion, instead of giving the hellion a battle mode. That's my biggest beef. If they were willing, then they would stop trying to make Terran more 1A and increase the skill floor of the game.
And if they were willing, then they would put the lurker in the expansion over the swarm host (ok this is my biggest, PERSONAL beef, which is why I spoilered it.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
Reading that last bit.
What matters to me most of all is the extent to which Blizzard is willing to change the foundation of the game.
When people say, "stuff will change," how much stuff are we talking about? And to what extent will Blizzard be willing to change the concepts they have designed for HOTS?
See, tweaking the stats or delivery method of a unit concept is not the extent of change that I desire.
If Blizzard was truly willing to design this game as an esports title, then they would be willing to do things like:
1. Remove WG. 2. Nerf macro mechanics (income of mule, spawn larva to + 2 larva, slightly increase chronoboost cost (35)) 3. Remove 1A units (roach, collosi, warhound, battlehellion). 4. Reduce the supply count of higher supply units (siege tanks, hydras, ultras). 5. Remove hero units (mothership, mothership core) and replace them with massable counterparts. 6. Reduce the power of stuns (make fungal slow by 60 percent rather than immobalize, change vortex). 7. Revert to 1 gas format (I believe this would improve several gameplay aspects, including: reducing the amount of workers required for 4 base saturation to 72, allowing for more tactical gas placements, better map design).
If Blizzard was truly willing, then they would try putting widow mines on the hellion, instead of giving the hellion a battle mode. That's my biggest beef. If they were willing, then they would stop trying to make Terran more 1A and increase the skill floor of the game.
And if they were willing, then they would put the lurker in the expansion over the swarm host (ok this is my biggest, PERSONAL beef, which is why I spoilered it.
.
But that would be admitting Dustin "innovation" Browder is wrong. The guy would rather slash the Carrier than admit what a bad design Mothership is. Now he's taking the Defiler and doing a flip (ground --> air, unit consumption --> building) and calling it his own invention.
I agree wholeheartedly with your and Clouds post. I think Blizzard is suffering from the corporate political correctness disease where everyone is too afraid to tell their superiors they suck. Go around smiling and saying everything is great. They really need someone to tell them, in no uncertain terms, how much they suck.
I still say the worst thing that could've happened to the SC franchise is Dustin Browder. What an idiot.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
Reading that last bit.
What matters to me most of all is the extent to which Blizzard is willing to change the foundation of the game.
When people say, "stuff will change," how much stuff are we talking about? And to what extent will Blizzard be willing to change the concepts they have designed for HOTS?
See, tweaking the stats or delivery method of a unit concept is not the extent of change that I desire.
If Blizzard was truly willing to design this game as an esports title, then they would be willing to do things like:
1. Remove WG. 2. Nerf macro mechanics (income of mule, spawn larva to + 2 larva, slightly increase chronoboost cost (35)) 3. Remove 1A units (roach, collosi, warhound, battlehellion). 4. Reduce the supply count of higher supply units (siege tanks, hydras, ultras). 5. Remove hero units (mothership, mothership core) and replace them with massable counterparts. 6. Reduce the power of stuns (make fungal slow by 60 percent rather than immobalize, change vortex). 7. Revert to 1 gas format (I believe this would improve several gameplay aspects, including: reducing the amount of workers required for 4 base saturation to 72, allowing for more tactical gas placements, better map design).
If Blizzard was truly willing, then they would try putting widow mines on the hellion, instead of giving the hellion a battle mode. That's my biggest beef. If they were willing, then they would stop trying to make Terran more 1A and increase the skill floor of the game.
And if they were willing, then they would put the lurker in the expansion over the swarm host (ok this is my biggest, PERSONAL beef, which is why I spoilered it.
.
Yup, With most of those points, particularly the ones about 1A units and units that eliminate micro such as Infestors and forcefields, if all those were eliminated/ the game would be a FAR better viewing product. I'm a Terran player and this expansion will probably benefit me greatly as it'll be easier to play terran with amoving hellions and warhounds, but I love this as a spectator sport more than playing it, and I want to be able to see the pros micro their asses off with all races, but dumbing down terran just doesn't appeal to me at all. ClouD is totally correct, I don't see how this can be argued.. I mean David Kim even freely stated he wanted to give terran a "1 A" option :S Really doesn't make a great spectacle.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
Reading that last bit.
What matters to me most of all is the extent to which Blizzard is willing to change the foundation of the game.
When people say, "stuff will change," how much stuff are we talking about? And to what extent will Blizzard be willing to change the concepts they have designed for HOTS?
See, tweaking the stats or delivery method of a unit concept is not the extent of change that I desire.
If Blizzard was truly willing to design this game as an esports title, then they would be willing to do things like:
1. Remove WG. 2. Nerf macro mechanics (income of mule, spawn larva to + 2 larva, slightly increase chronoboost cost (35)) 3. Remove 1A units (roach, collosi, warhound, battlehellion). 4. Reduce the supply count of higher supply units (siege tanks, hydras, ultras). 5. Remove hero units (mothership, mothership core) and replace them with massable counterparts. 6. Reduce the power of stuns (make fungal slow by 60 percent rather than immobalize, change vortex). 7. Revert to 1 gas format (I believe this would improve several gameplay aspects, including: reducing the amount of workers required for 4 base saturation to 72, allowing for more tactical gas placements, better map design).
If Blizzard was truly willing, then they would try putting widow mines on the hellion, instead of giving the hellion a battle mode. That's my biggest beef. If they were willing, then they would stop trying to make Terran more 1A and increase the skill floor of the game.
And if they were willing, then they would put the lurker in the expansion over the swarm host (ok this is my biggest, PERSONAL beef, which is why I spoilered it.
* The Battle Cruisers speed boost will be removed, Battle Cruisers will have increased damage
Errr I,.. uhhhh well, ... you see... look ..ummmmmm.... well... oh :/ (Literally my reaction reading that line)
BC's don't seem used very much but it seems to me when they come out they fucking stay out, those things are tough as fuck and kick some serious ass, I'm kind of lost here - can someone tell me how they are weak (except build time, cost) ? Very confused right here - I fear the shit out of those fucking things.
Battlecruisers have the weakness that they need good numbers and good upgrades before they can be effective. And even then, it's a bit of a time race against the counter. In lower leagues, few people have the skill/experience/insight to start making vikings (or some other applicable counter) in several different places on the map plus the micro skill to kite efficiently. In higher leagues, I guess it's a given that a player can make vikings in several expos or proxy locations, join up anywhere, kite the vikings into oblivion. I used Skyterran strategies a lot in silver and gold, but for BCs it required pulling some shenanigans like early turtling (need 3 well-defended bases) or mass banshee with double upgrades for an easy BC transition when they already have 2/2 and can be made like 3-5 at a time. Then yamato-ing vikings if the opponent attempts to kite (because plenty of BCs with yamato are actually better than a BC/viking mix). This said, 0/0 BCs are pretty bad (up to downright horrible), while 3/3 BCs are monsters (especially visible vs marines), one 3/3 battlecruiser can beat three 0/0 battlecruisers attacking at the same time. If you get discovered early, you can pretty much forget it. And against a good player, I guess you can't count on much secrecy unless you keep him occupied with some gosu harass and he somehow doesn't scout you successfully.
* The Battle Cruisers speed boost will be removed, Battle Cruisers will have increased damage
Errr I,.. uhhhh well, ... you see... look ..ummmmmm.... well... oh :/ (Literally my reaction reading that line)
BC's don't seem used very much but it seems to me when they come out they fucking stay out, those things are tough as fuck and kick some serious ass, I'm kind of lost here - can someone tell me how they are weak (except build time, cost) ? Very confused right here - I fear the shit out of those fucking things.
They changed their damage from 8 to 6 in a patch a while ago, I think primarily because of concerns for team play and free for all. Ever since they have not been used as much, except as a late-game transition where they are weak until critical mass. If Battle Cruisers have serious weakness, but are stronger than they are now, a place opens up for more BC rushes, mixing in BCs with your late-game army, and so on. Of course, the danger is that mass BC is impossible to defeat, which is somewhat of an issue with the game in general. (ultimate compositions having so few weaknesses)
No. BCs were nerfed because of the 1-base BC all-in was a bit too strong.
On August 22 2012 02:05 Evangelist wrote: Single target A move units (hi Warhound) are crazy easy to balance. It's a game of numbers and since there's no multiplication implicit to a Warhound deathball they scale linearly with the only limits being the quantized number of shots required to destroy a particular unit. If the problem with the Warhound is that it's too easy to A move, is the problem the Warhound itself (ie taking too many shots to kill and thus absorbing fire for higher DPS units) or is it the time of availability? Is it the sheer damage output? Does it fill a niche other units don't fill? Does it have a reason for being there?
Congratulations on not getting it *at all* This paragraph you wrote is a perfect example of Blizzard thinking, forget the *design* of the unit and focus on the numbers.
It's how the unit is used, what it's abilities are, how and what it attacks. The Warhound is the very definition of a mindless unit which auto-targets what it's intended to disperse. It requires no thinking, at all - it's only weakness is air units (of which Protoss doesn't have a huge quantity of good air to ground units)
Fiddling with numbers is meaningless when the design is wrong. I never even played more than a few hours of BW and over 2 years of watching pro games, reading this site - it's very easy to understand why some pros are disillusioned with the game. The design needs to be clever - not just even.
Yeah. Plus, I don't like that whole idea that balance can be determined by looking at race vs race winning statistics or numerical properties of units. That ignores a lot of skill thresholds, synergy, versatility etc. plus a heckload of situational factors.
I just dont understand, removing things maybe can fix an issue, but surely there will be another generated from the removing. Sure, remove warp, and then reinvent from 0 the harass\map control capabilities of protoss, we're all pretty sure the final product will be better. Or not? and if not? mm.. maybe we can try to remove an another thing, maybe from other races..and then what we will remove? With the "remove" logic, this game can become only more poor and issues (different ) will still there. Also, i believe cloud speaks the truth about the skillcap, but you know, the warhound can be a cloacked duck with six spells at the release.
On August 22 2012 22:50 InVerno wrote: I just dont understand, removing things maybe can fix an issue, but surely there will be another generated from the removing. Sure, remove warp, and then reinvent from 0 the harass\map control capabilities of protoss, we're all pretty sure the final product will be better. Or not? and if not? mm.. maybe we can try to remove an another thing, maybe from other races..and then what we will remove? With the "remove" logic, this game can become only more poor and issues (different ) will still there. Also, i believe cloud speaks the truth about the skillcap, but you know, the warhound can be a cloacked duck with six spells at the release.
Frankly, you're correct. HotS is just a bandaid for the poor decisions in WoL. Things like blink, warpgate and forcefield should never be in an RTS. They're too easy to abuse and impossible to balance.
I hate corporate political games, but one I wouldn't mind in this case is to fire Dustin Browder and his minion David Kim. Blame it all on them and do LotV properly. If not, hope the franchise doesn't die a Diablo3 death by the time SC3 comes out.
Ah the internet - finally a place where people can complain about everything, call people who disagree with them names, and come to a group consensus that suggestions like the 1-supply hydralisk would make the game way better (maybe I was the only person who read that part).
Feel free to disregard this post, because after all there are far easier posts here to rage about - but while you're at it, can we go a bit more extreme to make things in this thread a little more entertaining? Like could someone link "easier" video games to brain cancer? Or maybe come up with a leetspeak spelling of "Dustin Browder" that converts to "Joseph Stalin" backwards when you convert it to hexadecimal?
On August 21 2012 19:48 syllogism wrote: Cloud always has the eloquence of a b.net forum poster
Have you ever been to b.net forum? Cloud is telling like it is and you can't disagree with him. It is stupid that they lower the skill cap in HotS and mainly David Kim is in charge of this decision.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
Reading that last bit.
What matters to me most of all is the extent to which Blizzard is willing to change the foundation of the game.
When people say, "stuff will change," how much stuff are we talking about? And to what extent will Blizzard be willing to change the concepts they have designed for HOTS?
See, tweaking the stats or delivery method of a unit concept is not the extent of change that I desire.
If Blizzard was truly willing to design this game as an esports title, then they would be willing to do things like:
1. Remove WG. 2. Nerf macro mechanics (income of mule, spawn larva to + 2 larva, slightly increase chronoboost cost (35)) 3. Remove 1A units (roach, collosi, warhound, battlehellion). 4. Reduce the supply count of higher supply units (siege tanks, hydras, ultras). 5. Remove hero units (mothership, mothership core) and replace them with massable counterparts. 6. Reduce the power of stuns (make fungal slow by 60 percent rather than immobalize, change vortex). 7. Revert to 1 gas format (I believe this would improve several gameplay aspects, including: reducing the amount of workers required for 4 base saturation to 72, allowing for more tactical gas placements, better map design).
If Blizzard was truly willing, then they would try putting widow mines on the hellion, instead of giving the hellion a battle mode. That's my biggest beef. If they were willing, then they would stop trying to make Terran more 1A and increase the skill floor of the game.
And if they were willing, then they would put the lurker in the expansion over the swarm host (ok this is my biggest, PERSONAL beef, which is why I spoilered it.
.
You're missing something. This would probably make the most enjoyable esports game now, but it would work for just a short amount at time.
Making a harder game increases considerably the learning curve and skill ceiling. But it kills the incoming of new players. All this hard stuff just make the game more frustrating for anyone that doesn't have the APM and mechanics to keep up.
It worked with Brood War, but it didn't have a LoL or a Dota 2 to compete. At its time, BW were one of the most acessible games to play.
Just look to the actual Pro scene, just WC3 and SCBW ex-pros are playing SC2 competitvly (probably Babyknight it's the only exception, he came from DotA scene). All new possible new RTS players (all these causal players that you hate so much) are playing LoL and injecting the game with new life.
What i love about Blizz, it's they are still trying to make the ideal esports game even if guys like you just shit on them. A easy to entry, but hard to master, game. It can be impossible, but they're still trying.
There's some cool stuff on carmac's blog and other interviews about these points. After seeing that, you probably will understand why LoL is more near to being a ideal esport than SC2 and even SCBW (even if LoL is so boring to watch).
People that want to play an RTS play RTS. People that want to play a MOBA play Dota 2. People that want to play with friends while putting in minimal effort play LoL (or some MMO).
The groups are not in direct concurrence with each other.
On August 22 2012 23:57 Velr wrote: People that want to play an RTS play RTS. People that want to play a MOBA play Dota 2. People that want to play with friends while putting in minimal effort play LoL (or some MMO).
The groups are not in direct concurrence with each other.
But they're. There's a reason why dota (and the MOBA genre) grew inside fo the Mapmaking scene of WC3. It is because people liked to play with heroes but hated to macro behind it (it is important elemente of RTS, but it cannot be denied that it's a repetitive, tiring, sometimes brainless and very mechanical task).
When SC:BW came out, only RTS was a real option if people wanted to play a "strategy PC game" (actually you can extend to almost anyone that wanted to play a online PC game, bacause there weren't any FPS or MMO at that time). Today, there's a lot of options and they all are more noob friendly than SC2.
In the end, all possible new public that could be interested in play an online RTS game is playing an MOBA today. A commom and straight RTS is just too hard in comparison to LoL or wtv MOBA game out there.
On August 21 2012 23:49 Mauldo wrote: Cloud just proves once again that he belongs on the battle.net forums. Blaming Blizzard for losing a game in an imbalanced HOTS alpha is plain sad. Add that to his long track record of shitting on other people for no reason, and (my personal favorite) constantly claiming that the skill ceiling is too low and anyone can win when the guy can't even qualify for WCS Italy or remain even kinda relevant and I'm starting to get annoyed with him even being there. He's about as bad as TT1 at his worst or avilo at his best. The shot at David Kim was really something special, and proved his maturity.
Of course Terran are being given two a-move units. There race is the hardest to play micro wise. Ever wonder why it's taken Terran as a whole (barring people like Taeja) longer than most would think to find a solution to their problems when they have people like QXC on the case? The race is just plain harder and more intensive. So they gave them a few units to maybe even out the odds while giving Zerg/Protoss more micro-centric/thought-provoking units to use. The Viper and Swarm Host, for example, are perfect examples of a anti-a-move unit. You have to think about how to use them, and they add a level of difficult up toward the Terran level, while Terran will hopefully be bumped down a smidge by the Warhound and Battle Hellion.
My favorite parts of this thread are the people who are still trying to shit on HOTS units before they're even in beta stage, and the people who are seriously taking Cloud as banner carrier to try and proclaim that the max skill level in SC2 is already almost met.
Are you kidding me guys? Seriously. You have to be.
Maybe read the thread and the posts contained within before pre-judging. People are referencing the difference between a skill ceiling which isn't yet reached, but a skill floor where people with mediocre mechanics are still able to compete.
Cloud was not fucking butthurt about losing a game in the alpha build, but is pointing out the direction that HoTS is going after having played the game, played around with the design etc.
Also Cloud plays Terran, and is saying that the 1A mentality of which the warhound is the chief 'offender' is something that he doesn't want, even though it would improve his own race's ease of play. Why might that be? Despite this I'm sure he's just a butthurt balance whiner who wants easy results though......
I don’t think anyone is even attempting to argue that Cloud is upset that he lost a game in a test build of HotS. I personally don’t like that fact that he asserts that Blizzard is designing the game for bad player based off of that single experience. People, as a whole, are responding to the over all negative tone of his interview and his attitude toward the game designers. Calling someone an idiot because you don’t agree with them is pretty unprofessional. Also, its kind of lazy, since there are so many other words that could be used.
But most I think people are getting tired of the complaining, negativity and over all bitchyness toward this expansion and the game. The game is so clearly in alpha and not even fully released in beta. Stuff will change and Blizzard is clearly willing to try things out and people really need to start treating the changes as such.
Reading that last bit.
What matters to me most of all is the extent to which Blizzard is willing to change the foundation of the game.
When people say, "stuff will change," how much stuff are we talking about? And to what extent will Blizzard be willing to change the concepts they have designed for HOTS?
See, tweaking the stats or delivery method of a unit concept is not the extent of change that I desire.
If Blizzard was truly willing to design this game as an esports title, then they would be willing to do things like:
1. Remove WG. 2. Nerf macro mechanics (income of mule, spawn larva to + 2 larva, slightly increase chronoboost cost (35)) 3. Remove 1A units (roach, collosi, warhound, battlehellion). 4. Reduce the supply count of higher supply units (siege tanks, hydras, ultras). 5. Remove hero units (mothership, mothership core) and replace them with massable counterparts. 6. Reduce the power of stuns (make fungal slow by 60 percent rather than immobalize, change vortex). 7. Revert to 1 gas format (I believe this would improve several gameplay aspects, including: reducing the amount of workers required for 4 base saturation to 72, allowing for more tactical gas placements, better map design).
If Blizzard was truly willing, then they would try putting widow mines on the hellion, instead of giving the hellion a battle mode. That's my biggest beef. If they were willing, then they would stop trying to make Terran more 1A and increase the skill floor of the game.
And if they were willing, then they would put the lurker in the expansion over the swarm host (ok this is my biggest, PERSONAL beef, which is why I spoilered it.
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to [i]why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
Lol how does warpgate cause deathballs? Warpgate, if anything, would be antideathball. Sure it would increase all-ins, but you can't say deathball at all...
Either do your research on the topic or think for yourself. Warp Gate is THE contributing factor to why Protoss needs to play a deathball style. It's the root cause of all things bad with the race. Let me see if I can make a concise diagram.
Warp Gate -> Gateway units have to be weak due to Warp In's strength -> Gateway units suck -> majority of the Protoss army sucks as lone units -> Protoss units need to mesh very well or Protoss as a race will fail -> Deathball play is born.
That's a gross oversimplification. In really low numbers they can beat similar cost terran or zerg armies, either through kiting or sentries. Then in the midgame they get weak till colossi. That's not a case of being weak in small groups. Plus if you've ever watched blink stalkers v. zerg I don't think you can make a general statement that gateway units are weak.
In what universe do you see equally upgraded small Protoss armies beating small Terran armies? I'm really not looking forward to HotS as it is now, I play Protoss and would love to see warp gate removed to buff gateway units but it doesn't look like the Blizzard design team shares that philosophy. Cloud is being Cloud. Its hard to really make much of this because its not even in open beta yet but we will see I guess.
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to [i]why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
Lol how does warpgate cause deathballs? Warpgate, if anything, would be antideathball. Sure it would increase all-ins, but you can't say deathball at all...
Either do your research on the topic or think for yourself. Warp Gate is THE contributing factor to why Protoss needs to play a deathball style. It's the root cause of all things bad with the race. Let me see if I can make a concise diagram.
Warp Gate -> Gateway units have to be weak due to Warp In's strength -> Gateway units suck -> majority of the Protoss army sucks as lone units -> Protoss units need to mesh very well or Protoss as a race will fail -> Deathball play is born.
That's a gross oversimplification. In really low numbers they can beat similar cost terran or zerg armies, either through kiting or sentries. Then in the midgame they get weak till colossi. That's not a case of being weak in small groups. Plus if you've ever watched blink stalkers v. zerg I don't think you can make a general statement that gateway units are weak.
In what universe do you see equally upgraded small Protoss armies beating small Terran armies? I'm really not looking forward to HotS as it is now, I play Protoss and would love to see warp gate removed to buff gateway units but it doesn't look like the Blizzard design team shares that philosophy. Cloud is being Cloud. Its hard to really make much of this because its not even in open beta yet but we will see I guess.
In the universe of micro and having some grasp of positioning and unit control?
On August 22 2012 07:26 LimeNade wrote: I'm sorry there is "keeping it real" as people have said about Cloud lately but then there is also "being an arrogant asshole" which he is in this video. To say that about David Kim alone is genuinely arrogant and ignorant. David Kim is tasked with a much harder job then many can realize especially to someone with a small vocabulary and brain as it appears Cloud has. Not only is David Kim tasked with having to help balance an RTS game that is widely popular around the world (this task alone would break most people mentally) he also has to deal with the nonstop public criticism he receives (this would also break most people mentally).
If you want to be out spoken in real life then please expand your vocabulary and don't go calling people an idiot when their job is far harder then yours is Cloud. Grow up please.
You can't have a clue about the game, read/listen to some of the stuff DKim is saying, and conclude that he is a person that should be touching this games' balance. I agree that maybe Cloud was rude, but I guess it was some amount of frustration speaking.
David Kim has had probably more experience in RTS genre games then like 95% if not a higher % of people playing Sc2. Have you ever tried speaking in front of thousands of people before? He's a game balancer not a public speaker I am sure things he has said before may have not been 100% accurate and not to mention things are ever changing with balance. We should be LUCKY that someone with experience in RTS games is actually participating in the balance of the game rather then leaving it up to people who create the game but have no high level experience playing it.
David Kim grew up in korea, he's roughly 28 years old which means he grew up through the SCBW boom. He has expressed before he grew up with a huge love for SCBW while playing it at a high level. He's also far more dedicated to the game then some floundering pro players who aren't even nearly as dedicated in their career as David Kim has been to the blizzard/sc2 franchise. Keep in mind balancing a game is probably one of the biggest headaches that a game presents. Especially a complex RTS as Sc2 with a community who will raise the pitch forks if something doesn't seem balanced to their liking
On August 22 2012 07:26 LimeNade wrote: I'm sorry there is "keeping it real" as people have said about Cloud lately but then there is also "being an arrogant asshole" which he is in this video. To say that about David Kim alone is genuinely arrogant and ignorant. David Kim is tasked with a much harder job then many can realize especially to someone with a small vocabulary and brain as it appears Cloud has. Not only is David Kim tasked with having to help balance an RTS game that is widely popular around the world (this task alone would break most people mentally) he also has to deal with the nonstop public criticism he receives (this would also break most people mentally).
If you want to be out spoken in real life then please expand your vocabulary and don't go calling people an idiot when their job is far harder then yours is Cloud. Grow up please.
You can't have a clue about the game, read/listen to some of the stuff DKim is saying, and conclude that he is a person that should be touching this games' balance. I agree that maybe Cloud was rude, but I guess it was some amount of frustration speaking.
David Kim has had probably more experience in RTS genre games then like 95% if not a higher % of people playing Sc2. Have you ever tried speaking in front of thousands of people before? He's a game balancer not a public speaker I am sure things he has said before may have not been 100% accurate and not to mention things are ever changing with balance. We should be LUCKY that someone with experience in RTS games is actually participating in the balance of the game rather then leaving it up to people who create the game but have no high level experience playing it.
David Kim grew up in korea, he's roughly 28 years old which means he grew up through the SCBW boom. He has expressed before he grew up with a huge love for SCBW while playing it at a high level. He's also far more dedicated to the game then some floundering pro players who aren't even nearly as dedicated in their career as David Kim has been to the blizzard/sc2 franchise. Keep in mind balancing a game is probably one of the biggest headaches that a game presents. Especially a complex RTS as Sc2 with a community who will raise the pitch forks if something doesn't seem balanced to their liking
Given his experience with the RTS genre I am less likely to think that David Kim is at fault here than some of the other designers. Based off the interviews I've seen of him he appears to be the most level headed on the design team.
On August 21 2012 19:19 regiment wrote: * The Battle Cruisers speed boost will be removed, Battle Cruisers will have increased damage
Oh fuck yes!
This is what irks me. They change up the Battlecruiser and buff/nerf it and all that jazz, but they won't even try to buff/change the carrier at all instead they just remove it for a unit that is 10x worse.
On August 22 2012 23:57 Velr wrote: People that want to play an RTS play RTS. People that want to play a MOBA play Dota 2. People that want to play with friends while putting in minimal effort play LoL (or some MMO).
The groups are not in direct concurrence with each other.
But they're. There's a reason why dota (and the MOBA genre) grew inside fo the Mapmaking scene of WC3. It is because people liked to play with heroes but hated to macro behind it (it is important elemente of RTS, but it cannot be denied that it's a repetitive, tiring, sometimes brainless and very mechanical task).
When SC:BW came out, only RTS was a real option if people wanted to play a "strategy PC game" (actually you can extend to almost anyone that wanted to play a online PC game, bacause there weren't any FPS or MMO at that time). Today, there's a lot of options and they all are more noob friendly than SC2.
In the end, all possible new public that could be interested in play an online RTS game is playing an MOBA today. A commom and straight RTS is just too hard in comparison to LoL or wtv MOBA game out there.
That's an interesting point. Perhaps the growth of MOBA games indicates that a lot of people don't really like the idea of macro as a skill.
On August 23 2012 11:12 IdrA wrote: and he still has no idea what hes doing
And that's why Blizzard should hire a progamer game design team.
They consult pro-gamers on their opinions of the game all the time, it's stupid to think they wouldn't.
More like they look at data created by progamers. I think that if they actively consulted pros the game would look much different.
You are incorrect. Multiple professionals, including White-Ra, have reported meeting with David Kim and discussing balance and the upcoming expansion. They are taking input, but professional gamers do not make video games and have none of the skills required to do so.
On August 23 2012 11:12 IdrA wrote: and he still has no idea what hes doing
And that's why Blizzard should hire a progamer game design team.
They consult pro-gamers on their opinions of the game all the time, it's stupid to think they wouldn't.
More like they look at data created by progamers. I think that if they actively consulted pros the game would look much different.
You are incorrect. Multiple professionals, including White-Ra, have reported meeting with David Kim and discussing balance and the upcoming expansion. They are taking input, but professional gamers do not make video games and have none of the skills required to do so.
The reply to IdrA was a joke.
My reply to you is that if they actually cared about making an esport, Blizzard would be much more involved. If they actually cared we wouldn't see the units we are seeing now, we would see a radical redesign and removal of issues that have plagued this game since day 1.
SC2 is lacking compared to other esport platforms. Developer involvement in shaping the game feels disappointing to me. I see a big difference (as in me, my eyes, not the eys of others), moreso - I FEEL - a big difference in developer support between developers such as Riot and Valve and Blizzard, and the fact that the former seem to be focusing on creating a viable platform, while the latter seems not to care, and that is really disappointing to me.
Blizzard takes input. Hmm. More like Blizzard gets craptons of good input thrown in their face but are slow to react and most of the time choose to ignore it. Why do I say this? I used to be a staunch Blizzard supporter. But the more I observe, the more jaded I have become. I'm sure others share my opinion, but my thoughts are genuine and I have come to them through observation. That's all.
lol what is everybody even fighting about? its pretty obs that blizzard does take our input into consideration, seeing as how alot of the things that happened, actually happened.
alls i know is that violets part is the funniest part of all the interviews, he is very funny because his english is bad, but he knows cussing.
hmmm, check it out; if you watch the video, the pro's actually did not complain that much. they only really complained about the oracle being annoying, and warhounds being too strong, maybe. this is very interesting to me because pros "SOME OF THE BEST PLAYERS IN TEH WORLD" think that hots is gonna be fine for the most part,
but all of us here on team liquid are e-shanking each other over its balance. wth?
On August 23 2012 14:22 urbaNo wrote: lol what is everybody even fighting about?
Haven't you heard? Getting community figures together to say that x, y and z are imba and that their race needs buffs (despite having very little experience with the units involved, and having been in situations before where they had strong beliefs and were wrong) is the new way you play this game. I personally think Blizzard needs to make their interface for community feedback more streamlined though.
It would be best for everyone, I think, if following every loss Blizzard could draft a balance complaint which would post globally across reddit, battle.net and TL - something like an autopopulated template like "This game is horrible. I was playing this game against [Enemy_Race] and he just built [Enemy_Unit_List] and a-moved and won basically. It seemed pretty imba. [Player_Race] needs some buffs to deal with this. Otherwise, I guess they just want unskilled [Enemy_Race] to always win. Why does Blizzard hate [Player_Race]?"
For me, this is the most important balance change Blizzard can make. Currently, complaining takes too much skill and the desgin team can just a-move their balance changes right over them. If we could make an a-move-style complaint process, things become much more balanced.
Also, I read on page 13 something about easier games being linked to brain cancer. Why do you guys think Blizzard wants to give all of us brain cancer?
On August 23 2012 14:22 urbaNo wrote: lol what is everybody even fighting about?
Haven't you heard? Getting community figures together to say that x, y and z are imba and that their race needs buffs (despite having very little experience with the units involved, and having been in situations before where they had strong beliefs and were wrong) is the new way you play this game. I personally think Blizzard needs to make their interface for community feedback more streamlined though.
It would be best for everyone, I think, if following every loss Blizzard could draft a balance complaint which would post globally across reddit, battle.net and TL - something like an autopopulated template like "This game is horrible. I was playing this game against [Enemy_Race] and he just built [Enemy_Unit_List] and a-moved and won basically. It seemed pretty imba. [Player_Race] needs some buffs to deal with this. Otherwise, I guess they just want unskilled [Enemy_Race] to always win. Why does Blizzard hate [Player_Race]?"
For me, this is the most important balance change Blizzard can make. Currently, complaining takes too much skill and the desgin team can just a-move their balance changes right over them. If we could make an a-move-style complaint process, things become much more balanced.
Also, I read on page 13 something about easier games being linked to brain cancer. Why do you guys think Blizzard wants to give all of us brain cancer?
LOL dude. this is the best post in the thread.
you pretty much summed up the entire starcraft 2 community. ok i wont say entire i will say about 95 percent of the community. i think your template is awesome, it would pretty much cut the walls of text in about 90 percent of our threads to save space on the servers.
lol and i thin your balance suggestions is awesome, you should email kim himself, he wont listen to you though because he doesnt know anything about balance, and he wont listen to you anyways right?
but in all seriousness, it makes me sad how our entire community is full of nothing but shit talkers and trolls trying to drown each other. i dont get it, nobody gains anything from any of this. lol the fact that somebody brought up brain cancer, just so they could get ahead in an argument is quite hilarious.
that being said i have a feeling that HOTS beta is gonna drop this weekend in conjunction with mlg, just a gut feeling. hopefully so all yall can finally play the game and have some justified arguments about how easy the game is and blizzard is trying to give us brain cancer.
On August 23 2012 14:22 urbaNo wrote: lol what is everybody even fighting about?
Haven't you heard? Getting community figures together to say that x, y and z are imba and that their race needs buffs (despite having very little experience with the units involved, and having been in situations before where they had strong beliefs and were wrong) is the new way you play this game. I personally think Blizzard needs to make their interface for community feedback more streamlined though.
It would be best for everyone, I think, if following every loss Blizzard could draft a balance complaint which would post globally across reddit, battle.net and TL - something like an autopopulated template like "This game is horrible. I was playing this game against [Enemy_Race] and he just built [Enemy_Unit_List] and a-moved and won basically. It seemed pretty imba. [Player_Race] needs some buffs to deal with this. Otherwise, I guess they just want unskilled [Enemy_Race] to always win. Why does Blizzard hate [Player_Race]?"
For me, this is the most important balance change Blizzard can make. Currently, complaining takes too much skill and the desgin team can just a-move their balance changes right over them. If we could make an a-move-style complaint process, things become much more balanced.
Also, I read on page 13 something about easier games being linked to brain cancer. Why do you guys think Blizzard wants to give all of us brain cancer?
LOL dude. this is the best post in the thread.
you pretty much summed up the entire starcraft 2 community. ok i wont say entire i will say about 95 percent of the community. i think your template is awesome, it would pretty much cut the walls of text in about 90 percent of our threads to save space on the servers.
lol and i thin your balance suggestions is awesome, you should email kim himself, he wont listen to you though because he doesnt know anything about balance, and he wont listen to you anyways right?
but in all seriousness, it makes me sad how our entire community is full of nothing but shit talkers and trolls trying to drown each other. i dont get it, nobody gains anything from any of this. lol the fact that somebody brought up brain cancer, just so they could get ahead in an argument is quite hilarious.
that being said i have a feeling that HOTS beta is gonna drop this weekend in conjunction with mlg, just a gut feeling. hopefully so all yall can finally play the game and have some justified arguments about how easy the game is and blizzard is trying to give us brain cancer.
When Blizzard has made the changes the community wants to see in the past, there has been nothing but praise coming from those decisions. When Blizzard makes changes the community wants to see, we are given hope for the future of SC2. I
All you're seeing here are the discontent complaining b/c Blizzard is not willing to take radical steps to change the game into a better esport platform.
These complaints are not new. None of them are. They have existed for the most part since beta. Because they are DESIGN flaws, not stat flaws. And design flaws take balls to change. They take a willingness to reconstruct the foundation of the game knowing that in the long run, it will be much better than before. Sacrificing a bit here and there to ensure the longevity of the modern RTS platform.
On August 22 2012 23:57 Velr wrote: People that want to play an RTS play RTS. People that want to play a MOBA play Dota 2. People that want to play with friends while putting in minimal effort play LoL (or some MMO).
The groups are not in direct concurrence with each other.
But they're. There's a reason why dota (and the MOBA genre) grew inside fo the Mapmaking scene of WC3. It is because people liked to play with heroes but hated to macro behind it (it is important elemente of RTS, but it cannot be denied that it's a repetitive, tiring, sometimes brainless and very mechanical task).
When SC:BW came out, only RTS was a real option if people wanted to play a "strategy PC game" (actually you can extend to almost anyone that wanted to play a online PC game, bacause there weren't any FPS or MMO at that time). Today, there's a lot of options and they all are more noob friendly than SC2.
In the end, all possible new public that could be interested in play an online RTS game is playing an MOBA today. A commom and straight RTS is just too hard in comparison to LoL or wtv MOBA game out there.
That's an interesting point. Perhaps the growth of MOBA games indicates that a lot of people don't really like the idea of macro as a skill.
Yeah + all the hate to LoL is undeserved.
In both games, it's based on combined skill rather than individual skill.
Dota has denying and a few extra mechanics? It hardly makes that game much harder than LoL.
I'd say the difference (in skill needed) between Dota(2) and LoL is much much smaller than the difference between BW and SC2.
On August 22 2012 23:57 Velr wrote: People that want to play an RTS play RTS. People that want to play a MOBA play Dota 2. People that want to play with friends while putting in minimal effort play LoL (or some MMO).
The groups are not in direct concurrence with each other.
But they're. There's a reason why dota (and the MOBA genre) grew inside fo the Mapmaking scene of WC3. It is because people liked to play with heroes but hated to macro behind it (it is important elemente of RTS, but it cannot be denied that it's a repetitive, tiring, sometimes brainless and very mechanical task).
When SC:BW came out, only RTS was a real option if people wanted to play a "strategy PC game" (actually you can extend to almost anyone that wanted to play a online PC game, bacause there weren't any FPS or MMO at that time). Today, there's a lot of options and they all are more noob friendly than SC2.
In the end, all possible new public that could be interested in play an online RTS game is playing an MOBA today. A commom and straight RTS is just too hard in comparison to LoL or wtv MOBA game out there.
That's an interesting point. Perhaps the growth of MOBA games indicates that a lot of people don't really like the idea of macro as a skill.
Or that like all MOBA games are free to play. Believe it or not free to play is huge and if it's a well made game will get a lot more people then a game that costs 60$.
I think even if sc2 was f2p that moba games would still be more popular due to not being as difficult to play as sc2 but I think sc2 would have a lot more players/viewers as well just because there would be a lot more people playing it that can't afford it now for w/e reason.
On August 23 2012 14:22 urbaNo wrote: lol what is everybody even fighting about?
Haven't you heard? Getting community figures together to say that x, y and z are imba and that their race needs buffs (despite having very little experience with the units involved, and having been in situations before where they had strong beliefs and were wrong) is the new way you play this game. I personally think Blizzard needs to make their interface for community feedback more streamlined though.
It would be best for everyone, I think, if following every loss Blizzard could draft a balance complaint which would post globally across reddit, battle.net and TL - something like an autopopulated template like "This game is horrible. I was playing this game against [Enemy_Race] and he just built [Enemy_Unit_List] and a-moved and won basically. It seemed pretty imba. [Player_Race] needs some buffs to deal with this. Otherwise, I guess they just want unskilled [Enemy_Race] to always win. Why does Blizzard hate [Player_Race]?"
For me, this is the most important balance change Blizzard can make. Currently, complaining takes too much skill and the desgin team can just a-move their balance changes right over them. If we could make an a-move-style complaint process, things become much more balanced.
Also, I read on page 13 something about easier games being linked to brain cancer. Why do you guys think Blizzard wants to give all of us brain cancer?
LOL dude. this is the best post in the thread.
you pretty much summed up the entire starcraft 2 community. ok i wont say entire i will say about 95 percent of the community. i think your template is awesome, it would pretty much cut the walls of text in about 90 percent of our threads to save space on the servers.
lol and i thin your balance suggestions is awesome, you should email kim himself, he wont listen to you though because he doesnt know anything about balance, and he wont listen to you anyways right?
but in all seriousness, it makes me sad how our entire community is full of nothing but shit talkers and trolls trying to drown each other. i dont get it, nobody gains anything from any of this. lol the fact that somebody brought up brain cancer, just so they could get ahead in an argument is quite hilarious.
that being said i have a feeling that HOTS beta is gonna drop this weekend in conjunction with mlg, just a gut feeling. hopefully so all yall can finally play the game and have some justified arguments about how easy the game is and blizzard is trying to give us brain cancer.
When Blizzard has made the changes the community wants to see in the past, there has been nothing but praise coming from those decisions. When Blizzard makes changes the community wants to see, we are given hope for the future of SC2. I
All you're seeing here are the discontent complaining b/c Blizzard is not willing to take radical steps to change the game into a better esport platform.
These complaints are not new. None of them are. They have existed for the most part since beta. Because they are DESIGN flaws, not stat flaws. And design flaws take balls to change. They take a willingness to reconstruct the foundation of the game knowing that in the long run, it will be much better than before. Sacrificing a bit here and there to ensure the longevity of the modern RTS platform.
yeah i know these arguments are old, ive read them over and over for the past 2 years, still doesnt change anything.
you can not redesign a game after that has been under developement for over 5 years. i think it is ultra un realisitic and selfish/foolish of anyone to ask blizzard to do that. there is no sacficing "here and there" as you put it, what you are asking would be for blizzard to start the game all over and fix everything that you think is wrong with sc2. if they were to redesign these "fundamental flaws" then once those were fixed people would find other flaws to compain about and it would never end anyway.
what are they gonna do? remove the colossus? and then what, what are they gonna substitute it with? how are they gonna balance the replacement for the colossus without it interferering with the rest of the game?
of course the game has its flaws, but none of them are worth me complaing about it.
from reading these forums, i do not understand why half of the people on here even bothered to make an account on a starcraft forum if they hate the game so much.
i will ask you directly, why are you even here if you think starcraft 2 is garbage and needs a major overhaul. why waste your time?
On August 21 2012 20:03 xrapture wrote: Cloud does bring up good points, though worded quite immaturely. Why not make the game harder? Core units and solid mechanics should be the determining factor of games. Adding all these super low skill cap, press- a- button- and- everything dies- units really makes me sad.
Seems silly for people to complain about 'low skill cap' when they aren't even close to the top of the game. It's how you use the units. If it were as easy as '1A win' then there would be more people at Mvp's level.
Also, how are Widow Mines, Tempests, Oracles, Vipers, or Swarm Hosts '1A'? They aren't. The only units being added that are are Warhounds and Battle Hellions... and T already has plenty of high skill cap stuff.
I think the point is that it is more interesting to compete against others at doing "1a9-284-pahsdpinp832" than doing "1A" It will leave you a larger approach and way to improve also it makes the game more interesting.
I would agree that a game like dota is better suited to mainstream success. If you think about it, starcraft is a really weird game that requires you to spread your attention all over the map and constantly be doing repetitive mechanical tasks. And you still lose most games to something stupid that you just happened to miss. In dota on the other hand, almost every game plays out in a satisfying way as the flow is much more 'managed'. And you have a single hero to give your undivided attention, so it is very rewarding. Even from an e-sports perspective, dota requires skill in having proper strategy and team play, although of course it's easier to play as an individual than a game like starcraft.
Personally I don't like dota as much, I played a few hundred games on it a few years back and to me it seems really boring and repetitive, not as 'cerebral' as strategy games can be. Of course I never really delved into the deeper strategy of hero picks and item builds, because I was always playing for fun in pick-up teams, so maybe I would have enjoyed that aspect of it more, but I doubt it. Honestly, I prefer playing WoW battlegrounds or arenas as far as hero-focused games go and I'm not really intimidated by playing competitive strategy games because of my chess background, but I can see how dota is way more popular. (or LoL, obviously) Maybe if the design of SC2 was truly as captivating as Brood War then I would change my mind, but a lot of these moba games really do have better design than SC2.
David Kim and Dustin Browder might be passionate, but that does not mean they know what they are talking about. I honestly have nothing against Dustin Browder and I often find him very aware and intelligent in his interviews, but the fact remains that Blizzard's business model is hardly suited to creating a perfect e-sports game. They are too concerned with not alienating the casual playerbase and with not disappointing clueless mainstream game reviewers, and so they are not coming from a position of strength, where they design a game that is so fun you can't ignore it. Instead they kind of want the game to be really accessible and kind of want it to be really hard, but not too hard or too complex etc. It's all confused and undoubtedly lead to many silly design decisions that resulted in a game not as good as Brood War.
In a game like dota you need not worry about all such considerations, by the restriction of working within this genre you have a lot more freedom in making the game fun without impacting difficulty or accessibility.
On August 23 2012 14:22 urbaNo wrote: lol what is everybody even fighting about?
Haven't you heard? Getting community figures together to say that x, y and z are imba and that their race needs buffs (despite having very little experience with the units involved, and having been in situations before where they had strong beliefs and were wrong) is the new way you play this game. I personally think Blizzard needs to make their interface for community feedback more streamlined though.
It would be best for everyone, I think, if following every loss Blizzard could draft a balance complaint which would post globally across reddit, battle.net and TL - something like an autopopulated template like "This game is horrible. I was playing this game against [Enemy_Race] and he just built [Enemy_Unit_List] and a-moved and won basically. It seemed pretty imba. [Player_Race] needs some buffs to deal with this. Otherwise, I guess they just want unskilled [Enemy_Race] to always win. Why does Blizzard hate [Player_Race]?"
For me, this is the most important balance change Blizzard can make. Currently, complaining takes too much skill and the desgin team can just a-move their balance changes right over them. If we could make an a-move-style complaint process, things become much more balanced.
Also, I read on page 13 something about easier games being linked to brain cancer. Why do you guys think Blizzard wants to give all of us brain cancer?
LOL dude. this is the best post in the thread.
you pretty much summed up the entire starcraft 2 community. ok i wont say entire i will say about 95 percent of the community. i think your template is awesome, it would pretty much cut the walls of text in about 90 percent of our threads to save space on the servers.
lol and i thin your balance suggestions is awesome, you should email kim himself, he wont listen to you though because he doesnt know anything about balance, and he wont listen to you anyways right?
but in all seriousness, it makes me sad how our entire community is full of nothing but shit talkers and trolls trying to drown each other. i dont get it, nobody gains anything from any of this. lol the fact that somebody brought up brain cancer, just so they could get ahead in an argument is quite hilarious.
that being said i have a feeling that HOTS beta is gonna drop this weekend in conjunction with mlg, just a gut feeling. hopefully so all yall can finally play the game and have some justified arguments about how easy the game is and blizzard is trying to give us brain cancer.
When Blizzard has made the changes the community wants to see in the past, there has been nothing but praise coming from those decisions. When Blizzard makes changes the community wants to see, we are given hope for the future of SC2. I
All you're seeing here are the discontent complaining b/c Blizzard is not willing to take radical steps to change the game into a better esport platform.
These complaints are not new. None of them are. They have existed for the most part since beta. Because they are DESIGN flaws, not stat flaws. And design flaws take balls to change. They take a willingness to reconstruct the foundation of the game knowing that in the long run, it will be much better than before. Sacrificing a bit here and there to ensure the longevity of the modern RTS platform.
yeah i know these arguments are old, ive read them over and over for the past 2 years, still doesnt change anything.
you can not redesign a game after that has been under developement for over 5 years. i think it is ultra un realisitic and selfish/foolish of anyone to ask blizzard to do that. there is no sacficing "here and there" as you put it, what you are asking would be for blizzard to start the game all over and fix everything that you think is wrong with sc2. if they were to redesign these "fundamental flaws" then once those were fixed people would find other flaws to compain about and it would never end anyway.
what are they gonna do? remove the colossus? and then what, what are they gonna substitute it with? how are they gonna balance the replacement for the colossus without it interferering with the rest of the game?
of course the game has its flaws, but none of them are worth me complaing about it.
from reading these forums, i do not understand why half of the people on here even bothered to make an account on a starcraft forum if they hate the game so much.
i will ask you directly, why are you even here if you think starcraft 2 is garbage and needs a major overhaul. why waste your time?
Because this game is the modern RTS platform. Because Blizzard has pushed and pushed and pushed for this to be the big esport game in the market.
Because despite what you think, your viewpoint isn't new or original. You're just one mind on the opposite end of the spectrum.
Is it so selfish to want a company to redesign their self proclaimed esport title to be more like the title esports deserves?
It's not unrealistic. The changes that many want to see can be accomplished, TESTED - as a test realm patch, or as a BETA TEST, within a few days. Many desire Blizzard to fix the fundamental problems with SC2. Yes, that means sacrifices here or there. That means removing some of the units they designed. THAT MEANS SACRIFICE. A whole new meta to learn. A whole new game.
But a better one.
There are always those who will complain despite good changes. Because they do not actually care about the welfare of the game. They care about attention, and they get it from their complaints. I am not one of those.
Then there are those who are faithful to the game despite its many flaws. They are satisfied with it. I am still, for the most part, faithful.
Then there are the fanboys. No matter the complaint, they claim that the game is close to perfect - nope, no flaws! Nothing needs change. Nothing could be better, the game is fine the way it is. Blizzard made all the right choices. All their reasons for said choices are correct. Once, in the beginning, I was a fanboy.
Then there are those who are passionate about the scene and the community. When the game came out, they were satisfied. But as time went on and more and more fundamental problems with current game design were revealed, many as hypothesized, they began to become more and more dissatisfied. Jaded. They looked to Blizzard. They waited.
And they waited.
And they still continue to wait.
I play this game because there's no other widely played RTS game out there with similar qualities.
I'm waiting for change. I'm hoping, wishing, praying to see change.
It all seems much like the situation with Mass Effect 3 ending - the difference between what developers want to create and what users want to play. Of course Blizzard should listen to some extent and of course it takes balls to change the design decisions. Even though some changes just have to be made, there's still a deeper problem - to what extent players should shape the game (no, I'm not convinced that we should leave everything to the developers, but still they have right to stick somewhat to their general idea). Blizzard will still sell tons of HotS copies and still they'll continue making games. We should hope then that bussiness model, presented by Riot or Valve will take over EA or other companies' models and then Blizzard (forced by their shareholders or just by themselves) will adopt it too.
On August 23 2012 14:22 urbaNo wrote: lol what is everybody even fighting about?
Haven't you heard? Getting community figures together to say that x, y and z are imba and that their race needs buffs (despite having very little experience with the units involved, and having been in situations before where they had strong beliefs and were wrong) is the new way you play this game. I personally think Blizzard needs to make their interface for community feedback more streamlined though.
It would be best for everyone, I think, if following every loss Blizzard could draft a balance complaint which would post globally across reddit, battle.net and TL - something like an autopopulated template like "This game is horrible. I was playing this game against [Enemy_Race] and he just built [Enemy_Unit_List] and a-moved and won basically. It seemed pretty imba. [Player_Race] needs some buffs to deal with this. Otherwise, I guess they just want unskilled [Enemy_Race] to always win. Why does Blizzard hate [Player_Race]?"
For me, this is the most important balance change Blizzard can make. Currently, complaining takes too much skill and the desgin team can just a-move their balance changes right over them. If we could make an a-move-style complaint process, things become much more balanced.
Also, I read on page 13 something about easier games being linked to brain cancer. Why do you guys think Blizzard wants to give all of us brain cancer?
LOL dude. this is the best post in the thread.
you pretty much summed up the entire starcraft 2 community. ok i wont say entire i will say about 95 percent of the community. i think your template is awesome, it would pretty much cut the walls of text in about 90 percent of our threads to save space on the servers.
lol and i thin your balance suggestions is awesome, you should email kim himself, he wont listen to you though because he doesnt know anything about balance, and he wont listen to you anyways right?
but in all seriousness, it makes me sad how our entire community is full of nothing but shit talkers and trolls trying to drown each other. i dont get it, nobody gains anything from any of this. lol the fact that somebody brought up brain cancer, just so they could get ahead in an argument is quite hilarious.
that being said i have a feeling that HOTS beta is gonna drop this weekend in conjunction with mlg, just a gut feeling. hopefully so all yall can finally play the game and have some justified arguments about how easy the game is and blizzard is trying to give us brain cancer.
When Blizzard has made the changes the community wants to see in the past, there has been nothing but praise coming from those decisions. When Blizzard makes changes the community wants to see, we are given hope for the future of SC2. I
All you're seeing here are the discontent complaining b/c Blizzard is not willing to take radical steps to change the game into a better esport platform.
These complaints are not new. None of them are. They have existed for the most part since beta. Because they are DESIGN flaws, not stat flaws. And design flaws take balls to change. They take a willingness to reconstruct the foundation of the game knowing that in the long run, it will be much better than before. Sacrificing a bit here and there to ensure the longevity of the modern RTS platform.
yeah i know these arguments are old, ive read them over and over for the past 2 years, still doesnt change anything.
you can not redesign a game after that has been under developement for over 5 years. i think it is ultra un realisitic and selfish/foolish of anyone to ask blizzard to do that. there is no sacficing "here and there" as you put it, what you are asking would be for blizzard to start the game all over and fix everything that you think is wrong with sc2. if they were to redesign these "fundamental flaws" then once those were fixed people would find other flaws to compain about and it would never end anyway.
what are they gonna do? remove the colossus? and then what, what are they gonna substitute it with? how are they gonna balance the replacement for the colossus without it interferering with the rest of the game?
of course the game has its flaws, but none of them are worth me complaing about it.
from reading these forums, i do not understand why half of the people on here even bothered to make an account on a starcraft forum if they hate the game so much.
i will ask you directly, why are you even here if you think starcraft 2 is garbage and needs a major overhaul. why waste your time?
Because this game is the modern RTS platform. Because Blizzard has pushed and pushed and pushed for this to be the big esport game in the market.
Because despite what you think, your viewpoint isn't new or original. You're just one mind on the opposite end of the spectrum.
Is it so selfish to want a company to redesign their self proclaimed esport title to be more like the title esports deserves?
It's not unrealistic. The changes that many want to see can be accomplished, TESTED - as a test realm patch, or as a BETA TEST, within a few days. Many desire Blizzard to fix the fundamental problems with SC2. Yes, that means sacrifices here or there. That means removing some of the units they designed. THAT MEANS SACRIFICE. A whole new meta to learn. A whole new game.
But a better one.
There are always those who will complain despite good changes. Because they do not actually care about the welfare of the game. They care about attention, and they get it from their complaints. I am not one of those.
Then there are those who are faithful to the game despite its many flaws. They are satisfied with it. I am still, for the most part, faithful.
Then there are the fanboys. No matter the complaint, they claim that the game is close to perfect - nope, no flaws! Nothing needs change. Nothing could be better, the game is fine the way it is. Blizzard made all the right choices. All their reasons for said choices are correct. Once, in the beginning, I was a fanboy.
Then there are those who are passionate about the scene and the community. When the game came out, they were satisfied. But as time went on and more and more fundamental problems with current game design were revealed, many as hypothesized, they began to become more and more dissatisfied. Jaded. They looked to Blizzard. They waited.
And they waited.
And they still continue to wait.
I play this game because there's no other widely played RTS game out there with similar qualities.
I'm waiting for change. I'm hoping, wishing, praying to see change.
i dont know man, i think you are holding sc2 on to high of a pedestal, and wanting it to be something it might not ever be. it sc2 might not be destined to be the greatest modern rts of all time, or maybe it will become it, we don't know man,
that being said i admire your passion, i am quick to forget that there are some down ass ppl in this community, because it is mostly filled with idiots.
idk man,
i think you should figure out a way to contact dustin bowder directly and explain to him what you just explained to me, why not?
Whats so great about pro gamer opinnions? Its not like the game is changing or anything. We are just gona get new units. So all they are gona do is talk about the new units and possibly QQ about them.
And no blizzard will never make the game harder. They are aperently to big for that
On August 23 2012 17:44 Grumbels wrote: I would agree that a game like dota is better suited to mainstream success. If you think about it, starcraft is a really weird game that requires you to spread your attention all over the map and constantly be doing repetitive mechanical tasks. And you still lose most games to something stupid that you just happened to miss. In dota on the other hand, almost every game plays out in a satisfying way as the flow is much more 'managed'. And you have a single hero to give your undivided attention, so it is very rewarding. Even from an e-sports perspective, dota requires skill in having proper strategy and team play, although of course it's easier to play as an individual than a game like starcraft.
Personally I don't like dota as much, I played a few hundred games on it a few years back and to me it seems really boring and repetitive, not as 'cerebral' as strategy games can be. Of course I never really delved into the deeper strategy of hero picks and item builds, because I was always playing for fun in pick-up teams, so maybe I would have enjoyed that aspect of it more, but I doubt it. Honestly, I prefer playing WoW battlegrounds or arenas as far as hero-focused games go and I'm not really intimidated by playing competitive strategy games because of my chess background, but I can see how dota is way more popular. (or LoL, obviously) Maybe if the design of SC2 was truly as captivating as Brood War then I would change my mind, but a lot of these moba games really do have better design than SC2.
David Kim and Dustin Browder might be passionate, but that does not mean they know what they are talking about. I honestly have nothing against Dustin Browder and I often find him very aware and intelligent in his interviews, but the fact remains that Blizzard's business model is hardly suited to creating a perfect e-sports game. They are too concerned with not alienating the casual playerbase and with not disappointing clueless mainstream game reviewers, and so they are not coming from a position of strength, where they design a game that is so fun you can't ignore it. Instead they kind of want the game to be really accessible and kind of want it to be really hard, but not too hard or too complex etc. It's all confused and undoubtedly lead to many silly design decisions that resulted in a game not as good as Brood War.
In a game like dota you need not worry about all such considerations, by the restriction of working within this genre you have a lot more freedom in making the game fun without impacting difficulty or accessibility.
I disagree. DOTA is a MOBA so it drags out. Starcraft has a higher skill cap then dota.. While its true that in starcraft some small things can fuck you up, thats actully good. It makes the game less forgiving and makes it better to spectate. In MOBAs its almost impossible to come back after being behind, making matches unexiting. Starcraft 2 has the name "Starcraft" in it.
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to [i]why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
Lol how does warpgate cause deathballs? Warpgate, if anything, would be antideathball. Sure it would increase all-ins, but you can't say deathball at all...
Either do your research on the topic or think for yourself. Warp Gate is THE contributing factor to why Protoss needs to play a deathball style. It's the root cause of all things bad with the race. Let me see if I can make a concise diagram.
Warp Gate -> Gateway units have to be weak due to Warp In's strength -> Gateway units suck -> majority of the Protoss army sucks as lone units -> Protoss units need to mesh very well or Protoss as a race will fail -> Deathball play is born.
That's a gross oversimplification. In really low numbers they can beat similar cost terran or zerg armies, either through kiting or sentries. Then in the midgame they get weak till colossi. That's not a case of being weak in small groups. Plus if you've ever watched blink stalkers v. zerg I don't think you can make a general statement that gateway units are weak.
In what universe do you see equally upgraded small Protoss armies beating small Terran armies?
Who wins 1 chargelot, 2 blinkstalkers or 3 marines 2 marauders with stim? If anything it's a very close battle but I'm almost certain that the toss wins. Or even worse for terran, 1 zealot 1 stalker against 1(.5) marine 1 marauder both completely unupgraded.
I just went through every page on this thread and counted that 80% of the comments that complain about SC2 are listed as United States. What's going on america? you mad bros?
On August 23 2012 14:22 urbaNo wrote: lol what is everybody even fighting about?
Haven't you heard? Getting community figures together to say that x, y and z are imba and that their race needs buffs (despite having very little experience with the units involved, and having been in situations before where they had strong beliefs and were wrong) is the new way you play this game. I personally think Blizzard needs to make their interface for community feedback more streamlined though.
It would be best for everyone, I think, if following every loss Blizzard could draft a balance complaint which would post globally across reddit, battle.net and TL - something like an autopopulated template like "This game is horrible. I was playing this game against [Enemy_Race] and he just built [Enemy_Unit_List] and a-moved and won basically. It seemed pretty imba. [Player_Race] needs some buffs to deal with this. Otherwise, I guess they just want unskilled [Enemy_Race] to always win. Why does Blizzard hate [Player_Race]?"
For me, this is the most important balance change Blizzard can make. Currently, complaining takes too much skill and the desgin team can just a-move their balance changes right over them. If we could make an a-move-style complaint process, things become much more balanced.
Also, I read on page 13 something about easier games being linked to brain cancer. Why do you guys think Blizzard wants to give all of us brain cancer?
LOL dude. this is the best post in the thread.
you pretty much summed up the entire starcraft 2 community. ok i wont say entire i will say about 95 percent of the community. i think your template is awesome, it would pretty much cut the walls of text in about 90 percent of our threads to save space on the servers.
lol and i thin your balance suggestions is awesome, you should email kim himself, he wont listen to you though because he doesnt know anything about balance, and he wont listen to you anyways right?
but in all seriousness, it makes me sad how our entire community is full of nothing but shit talkers and trolls trying to drown each other. i dont get it, nobody gains anything from any of this. lol the fact that somebody brought up brain cancer, just so they could get ahead in an argument is quite hilarious.
that being said i have a feeling that HOTS beta is gonna drop this weekend in conjunction with mlg, just a gut feeling. hopefully so all yall can finally play the game and have some justified arguments about how easy the game is and blizzard is trying to give us brain cancer.
When Blizzard has made the changes the community wants to see in the past, there has been nothing but praise coming from those decisions. When Blizzard makes changes the community wants to see, we are given hope for the future of SC2. I
All you're seeing here are the discontent complaining b/c Blizzard is not willing to take radical steps to change the game into a better esport platform.
These complaints are not new. None of them are. They have existed for the most part since beta. Because they are DESIGN flaws, not stat flaws. And design flaws take balls to change. They take a willingness to reconstruct the foundation of the game knowing that in the long run, it will be much better than before. Sacrificing a bit here and there to ensure the longevity of the modern RTS platform.
The major flaw with this argument is that you assume that listening to the community and its suggestions would make the game into a "better esports platform". Almost all of the suggestions are made by people who are not game designers, programmers or people who have an experience with making any computer products. Most suggestions are vague, with broad, overarching themes like "less a-move units", "make the game harder" and "make [x-race] harder". I don't know how you would program around such vague suggestions and if Blizzard did, they would have a whole new section of the community saying "you did it wrong, here is how you do it." Although listening to the community is a valuable tool, but should be taken with a grain of salt like anything else. Because when it comes down to it, the community is great, but also filled with a lot of people who complaint for the sake of complaining.
On August 23 2012 14:22 urbaNo wrote: lol what is everybody even fighting about?
Haven't you heard? Getting community figures together to say that x, y and z are imba and that their race needs buffs (despite having very little experience with the units involved, and having been in situations before where they had strong beliefs and were wrong) is the new way you play this game. I personally think Blizzard needs to make their interface for community feedback more streamlined though.
It would be best for everyone, I think, if following every loss Blizzard could draft a balance complaint which would post globally across reddit, battle.net and TL - something like an autopopulated template like "This game is horrible. I was playing this game against [Enemy_Race] and he just built [Enemy_Unit_List] and a-moved and won basically. It seemed pretty imba. [Player_Race] needs some buffs to deal with this. Otherwise, I guess they just want unskilled [Enemy_Race] to always win. Why does Blizzard hate [Player_Race]?"
For me, this is the most important balance change Blizzard can make. Currently, complaining takes too much skill and the desgin team can just a-move their balance changes right over them. If we could make an a-move-style complaint process, things become much more balanced.
Also, I read on page 13 something about easier games being linked to brain cancer. Why do you guys think Blizzard wants to give all of us brain cancer?
LOL dude. this is the best post in the thread.
you pretty much summed up the entire starcraft 2 community. ok i wont say entire i will say about 95 percent of the community. i think your template is awesome, it would pretty much cut the walls of text in about 90 percent of our threads to save space on the servers.
lol and i thin your balance suggestions is awesome, you should email kim himself, he wont listen to you though because he doesnt know anything about balance, and he wont listen to you anyways right?
but in all seriousness, it makes me sad how our entire community is full of nothing but shit talkers and trolls trying to drown each other. i dont get it, nobody gains anything from any of this. lol the fact that somebody brought up brain cancer, just so they could get ahead in an argument is quite hilarious.
that being said i have a feeling that HOTS beta is gonna drop this weekend in conjunction with mlg, just a gut feeling. hopefully so all yall can finally play the game and have some justified arguments about how easy the game is and blizzard is trying to give us brain cancer.
When Blizzard has made the changes the community wants to see in the past, there has been nothing but praise coming from those decisions. When Blizzard makes changes the community wants to see, we are given hope for the future of SC2. I
All you're seeing here are the discontent complaining b/c Blizzard is not willing to take radical steps to change the game into a better esport platform.
These complaints are not new. None of them are. They have existed for the most part since beta. Because they are DESIGN flaws, not stat flaws. And design flaws take balls to change. They take a willingness to reconstruct the foundation of the game knowing that in the long run, it will be much better than before. Sacrificing a bit here and there to ensure the longevity of the modern RTS platform.
The major flaw with this argument is that you assume that listening to the community and its suggestions would make the game into a "better esports platform". Almost all of the suggestions are made by people who are not game designers, programmers or people who have an experience with making any computer products. Most suggestions are vague, with broad, overarching themes like "less a-move units", "make the game harder" and "make [x-race] harder". I don't know how you would program around such vague suggestions and if Blizzard did, they would have a whole new section of the community saying "you did it wrong, here is how you do it." Although listening to the community is a valuable tool, but should be taken with a grain of salt like anything else. Because when it comes down to it, the community is great, but also filled with a lot of people who complaint for the sake of complaining.
The issue here is that you assume that somehow just because they are making a computer product (a game) that somehow the role requires a mass of qualifications. It doesn't. It really doesn't. It requires a bunch of people to sit down in a room, dictate what they find COOL (wrong) and put it in the game. And then talk about what works and what doesn't. Which anyone can do. Literally anyone. As to numbers, yes that takes skill. Someone who is good with game design.
Essentially, you are saying the exact opposite of what I am saying. You are ASSUMING that the game designers are competent, simply because they hold the job of game designers, regardless of the qualification or what being a game designer means. Mathematically, yes it requires an education. But as I said above anyone can deduce the various interactions of units on a large scale and how situations might play out.
It has been done time and time again with SC2. The various problems of the game have been figured out long before they actually occurred. And the community is for the most part very consistant about what it wants changed (though this is in itself divisive, or at least appears so due to fanboys).
And what people want to put in the game is made even EASIER by the fact that it HAS ALREADY been done. BW. That's right, what many people want are BW units. They don't want some random, hodge podge idea that some "game designers" came up with in a room. They want tried and true units, proven not only by concept but how they have evolved to function over the last 10 years - essentially proof of their value if imported.
I am not being vague. Many others are not being vague. Many threads have been made stating the flaws with the game. If I appear vague about what I want changed in the game it is only because I do not want the hassle of restating what I want changed in specifics every time I post an argument.
I know exactly what I want changed. I can even give numerical values. Many others could as well. Obviously they would not be perfect. That is what where those with qualifications come in. But ANYONE, can sit down and "make a game," as you say.
---
Now, as to the bolded part. Remove the complainers who do so for attention. Look for consistent themes among the majority. What do they want changed? What is bad design? I can observe many such things.
Yes, the community's desires should be taken with a grain of salt.
But the issue here, so to speak, is that Blizzard is not listening to the community at all. They have a valuable tool, the MOST valuable, filled with smart people who want to see the game prosper (when you remove the complainers and the rediculous), yet they do not utilize it at all. It rusts, and thus, so does the whole foundation.
Oh, they think they are. But they are not being direct, straightforward, or concise about solving problems with the game. Instead, they come up with convoluted solutions that "anyone" can do by sitting down and talking about what's COOL! >>.
That is the feeling I get. Others get. Not good yo.
Did you know that approval for Congress is usually between 10 and 20%? Why because people hate "what Congress is doing". How is this so though when every congressman has a 50-60%+ approval rating? Because everyone thinks that their particular idea is great but everyone's ideas are crap.
You can argue and rationalize all you want but the fact is, it doesn't matter what Blizzard did people would complain in exactly the same way.
On August 23 2012 14:22 urbaNo wrote: lol what is everybody even fighting about?
Haven't you heard? Getting community figures together to say that x, y and z are imba and that their race needs buffs (despite having very little experience with the units involved, and having been in situations before where they had strong beliefs and were wrong) is the new way you play this game. I personally think Blizzard needs to make their interface for community feedback more streamlined though.
It would be best for everyone, I think, if following every loss Blizzard could draft a balance complaint which would post globally across reddit, battle.net and TL - something like an autopopulated template like "This game is horrible. I was playing this game against [Enemy_Race] and he just built [Enemy_Unit_List] and a-moved and won basically. It seemed pretty imba. [Player_Race] needs some buffs to deal with this. Otherwise, I guess they just want unskilled [Enemy_Race] to always win. Why does Blizzard hate [Player_Race]?"
For me, this is the most important balance change Blizzard can make. Currently, complaining takes too much skill and the desgin team can just a-move their balance changes right over them. If we could make an a-move-style complaint process, things become much more balanced.
Also, I read on page 13 something about easier games being linked to brain cancer. Why do you guys think Blizzard wants to give all of us brain cancer?
LOL dude. this is the best post in the thread.
you pretty much summed up the entire starcraft 2 community. ok i wont say entire i will say about 95 percent of the community. i think your template is awesome, it would pretty much cut the walls of text in about 90 percent of our threads to save space on the servers.
lol and i thin your balance suggestions is awesome, you should email kim himself, he wont listen to you though because he doesnt know anything about balance, and he wont listen to you anyways right?
but in all seriousness, it makes me sad how our entire community is full of nothing but shit talkers and trolls trying to drown each other. i dont get it, nobody gains anything from any of this. lol the fact that somebody brought up brain cancer, just so they could get ahead in an argument is quite hilarious.
that being said i have a feeling that HOTS beta is gonna drop this weekend in conjunction with mlg, just a gut feeling. hopefully so all yall can finally play the game and have some justified arguments about how easy the game is and blizzard is trying to give us brain cancer.
When Blizzard has made the changes the community wants to see in the past, there has been nothing but praise coming from those decisions. When Blizzard makes changes the community wants to see, we are given hope for the future of SC2. I
All you're seeing here are the discontent complaining b/c Blizzard is not willing to take radical steps to change the game into a better esport platform.
These complaints are not new. None of them are. They have existed for the most part since beta. Because they are DESIGN flaws, not stat flaws. And design flaws take balls to change. They take a willingness to reconstruct the foundation of the game knowing that in the long run, it will be much better than before. Sacrificing a bit here and there to ensure the longevity of the modern RTS platform.
yeah i know these arguments are old, ive read them over and over for the past 2 years, still doesnt change anything.
you can not redesign a game after that has been under developement for over 5 years. i think it is ultra un realisitic and selfish/foolish of anyone to ask blizzard to do that. there is no sacficing "here and there" as you put it, what you are asking would be for blizzard to start the game all over and fix everything that you think is wrong with sc2. if they were to redesign these "fundamental flaws" then once those were fixed people would find other flaws to compain about and it would never end anyway.
what are they gonna do? remove the colossus? and then what, what are they gonna substitute it with? how are they gonna balance the replacement for the colossus without it interferering with the rest of the game?
of course the game has its flaws, but none of them are worth me complaing about it.
from reading these forums, i do not understand why half of the people on here even bothered to make an account on a starcraft forum if they hate the game so much.
i will ask you directly, why are you even here if you think starcraft 2 is garbage and needs a major overhaul. why waste your time?
Because this game is the modern RTS platform. Because Blizzard has pushed and pushed and pushed for this to be the big esport game in the market.
Because despite what you think, your viewpoint isn't new or original. You're just one mind on the opposite end of the spectrum.
Is it so selfish to want a company to redesign their self proclaimed esport title to be more like the title esports deserves?
It's not unrealistic. The changes that many want to see can be accomplished, TESTED - as a test realm patch, or as a BETA TEST, within a few days. Many desire Blizzard to fix the fundamental problems with SC2. Yes, that means sacrifices here or there. That means removing some of the units they designed. THAT MEANS SACRIFICE. A whole new meta to learn. A whole new game.
But a better one.
There are always those who will complain despite good changes. Because they do not actually care about the welfare of the game. They care about attention, and they get it from their complaints. I am not one of those.
Then there are those who are faithful to the game despite its many flaws. They are satisfied with it. I am still, for the most part, faithful.
Then there are the fanboys. No matter the complaint, they claim that the game is close to perfect - nope, no flaws! Nothing needs change. Nothing could be better, the game is fine the way it is. Blizzard made all the right choices. All their reasons for said choices are correct. Once, in the beginning, I was a fanboy.
Then there are those who are passionate about the scene and the community. When the game came out, they were satisfied. But as time went on and more and more fundamental problems with current game design were revealed, many as hypothesized, they began to become more and more dissatisfied. Jaded. They looked to Blizzard. They waited.
And they waited.
And they still continue to wait.
I play this game because there's no other widely played RTS game out there with similar qualities.
I'm waiting for change. I'm hoping, wishing, praying to see change.
i dont know man, i think you are holding sc2 on to high of a pedestal, and wanting it to be something it might not ever be. it sc2 might not be destined to be the greatest modern rts of all time, or maybe it will become it, we don't know man,
that being said i admire your passion, i am quick to forget that there are some down ass ppl in this community, because it is mostly filled with idiots.
idk man,
i think you should figure out a way to contact dustin bowder directly and explain to him what you just explained to me, why not?
I'd love to, if it weren't so futile. I want to play a great game, and have competent people develop it.
As for the pedestal, you're damn right it's high. It's high because of the power and prestige of its predecessor. And that's not something that will go away.
SC2 might not become the best RTS of all time - but it CAN, with proper support, listening to the community, and active involvement on all accounts. It CAN.
On August 23 2012 19:10 Velr wrote: 1 zealot 1 stalker against 1(.5) marine 1 marauder both ... You do realise that this Protoss army is way more expensive in.. absolutely every aspect?
Seriously, what's up with Blizzard? Do they want to fuck their game the quickest way possible? Because to me it seems the entire team is composed of 10 years old kids who loved big units with super powers. Otherwise, I can't understand why they'd leave the mothership in the game. That unit is entirely against what SC has always been. Nobody likes it, nobody likes what it does (i.e. making for a long boring game where one battle is decided by one or 2 vortexes) and it's a stupid hero unit. They should try to fix late game protoss in other ways imo if they find that they don't have enough chances in late game PvZ (which is the only utility at the moment). I also think the tempest is not a very well designed unit, but I'll give it a chance in the beta.
Also, that mothership core is a flawed concept as well. How bad must you be at designing units that you need to implement that one? To me it has the same flaws as the mothership, but more in the early-mid game.
I know the beta isn't out yet, but I'm not saying these units or OP or UP at the moment; I'm just saying that most the units are badly designed and, unfortunately, this is not something you can fix by tweaking numbers.
On August 23 2012 20:01 PatouPower wrote: Seriously, what's up with Blizzard? Do they want to fuck their game the quickest way possible? Because to me it seems the entire team is composed of 10 years old kids who loved big units with super powers. Otherwise, I can't understand why they'd leave the mothership in the game. That unit is entirely against what SC has always been. Nobody likes it, nobody likes what it does (i.e. making for a long boring game where one battle is decided by one or 2 vortexes) and it's a stupid hero unit. They should try to fix late game protoss in other ways imo if they find that they don't have enough chances in late game PvZ (which is the only utility at the moment). I also think the tempest is not a very well designed unit, but I'll give it a chance in the beta.
Also, that mothership core is a flawed concept as well. How bad must you be at designing units that you need to implement that one? To me it has the same flaws as the mothership, but more in the early-mid game.
I know the beta isn't out yet, but I'm not saying these units or OP or UP at the moment; I'm just saying that most the units are badly designed and, unfortunately, this is not something you can fix by tweaking numbers.
Well said. Well, well said. This is also the core of my argument. It is important to ignore (at the moment) claims of imbalance and instead focus solely on unit/mechanic design. What you've said about vortex can also be said about fungal, but to a lesser extent.
Kim: We actually tried a lot of units. It’s hard to keep count how many we scrapped, but one example of a new unit is - When we came up with new units we tried to make sure that we’re either filling a gap that’s existing in Wings of Liberty or it’s a completely new thing that people aren’t really used to. So one example is, in Wings of Liberty, all the harass units in the game go for the worker line. They never go for your stack, the enemies army. So we wanted to introduce a new unit, that kinda harasses that stack, but doesn’t really function well in combat. So what we had was a type of a missile launcher unit at the factory. So this missile launcher had a weapon and had one ability on a longer cooldown, like a one minute or two minutes cooldown. You can use that ability anywhere on the map. And what it does is, it fires a missile at that location and the enemy has to move away. If not, he takes a lot of damage. So the problem with this obviously was that of course enemies will go for your peon line if you can shoot it anywhere on the map or it’s gonna go for key structures, such as Spires, Pylons powering multiple Gateways and so on. So we excluded those two things and it kinda felt weird because it’s a missile that fires, and it lands, but it does zero damage to workers, which made like no sense. So that was problematic. And the second problem was that it’s pretty much a nuke against that enemy army. So we already had that in the game. But when we were first thinking of the concept of the unit, because it’s like a missile launcher that shoots a missile, it didn’t really relate to the Ghost, but mechanically it kinda did. So those are the reasons why it got cut.
So we just have a bunch of units that we just try and that sound kinda cool on paper, but not really. So it’s really important for us to really test the units that we have in game and all the units that are here in gamescom are actually pretty good for the beta. But of course, if there are problems with those units, then we will take measures to either cut, improve or fine-tune those units during the beta.
They actually thought that was a good I idea? They had to try it to know it sucks? Facepalm.
On August 23 2012 20:01 PatouPower wrote: Seriously, what's up with Blizzard? Do they want to fuck their game the quickest way possible? Because to me it seems the entire team is composed of 10 years old kids who loved big units with super powers. Otherwise, I can't understand why they'd leave the mothership in the game. That unit is entirely against what SC has always been. Nobody likes it, nobody likes what it does (i.e. making for a long boring game where one battle is decided by one or 2 vortexes) and it's a stupid hero unit. They should try to fix late game protoss in other ways imo if they find that they don't have enough chances in late game PvZ (which is the only utility at the moment). I also think the tempest is not a very well designed unit, but I'll give it a chance in the beta.
Also, that mothership core is a flawed concept as well. How bad must you be at designing units that you need to implement that one? To me it has the same flaws as the mothership, but more in the early-mid game.
I know the beta isn't out yet, but I'm not saying these units or OP or UP at the moment; I'm just saying that most the units are badly designed and, unfortunately, this is not something you can fix by tweaking numbers.
Blizzard wants to add recall to the game, the mothership core is a way to balance this. It's a similar type of design as the queen and it gives the developers the design space to add some strategical abilities to protoss. Mothership Core energy will be a sort of resource to the protoss, just like creep spread is to the zerg. It will be something an opponent needs to keep tabs on and try to manipulate, therefore it has the potential to add a lot of decision making skill into the game.
I think it can be good design, but it depends on if Blizzard makes all of its abilities way too powerful or not. :/
Swarm Hosts are better and almost fill the same role as Broodlords, While being cheaper and coming out really damn fast.
Warhounds are super anti stalker anti tank destruction machines that will kill everything in their path.
Widow Mines are great to prevent all Oracle harass/muta/drops while forces their opponent to sit in their base even longer cause you have to move out more slowly.
Tempest is stupid, Slow damage, cost a lot comes out when it can be easily dealt with.
Mothership core now moves and could almost be used offensively when close air position. Also the cannon makes rushes mute and allow Protoss to Fast expand in every game.
Viper is a flying defiler.
Oracle could be cool, want to wait for all the entomb/cloaking field stuff to be balanced out. Feel it will be nerfed to death because Low league players won't be able to to deal with entombing their mineral lines.
Also Cloud has only made good points. I like his input please keep posting your thoughts.
On August 23 2012 19:10 Velr wrote: 1 zealot 1 stalker against 1(.5) marine 1 marauder both ... You do realise that this Protoss army is way more expensive in.. absolutely every aspect?
Blizzard seems very conservative with it's changes from WoL to Hots. Just go an check Warcraft 3 classic to TfT... That was balls to the walls.
agreed, after seeing how much tFT improved upon the already fun wc3 I had higher hopes for overhauls in this expansion. Like they changed the cost of almost everything, added heroes, units and buildings, items, complete overhaul of armour types and attack types, etc. In this expansion we get 0 new buildings and just a few (sorry but mostly boring) new units. a new tileset or two.
On August 23 2012 19:10 Velr wrote: 1 zealot 1 stalker against 1(.5) marine 1 marauder both ... You do realise that this Protoss army is way more expensive in.. absolutely every aspect?
Blizzard seems very conservative with it's changes from WoL to Hots. Just go an check Warcraft 3 classic to TfT... That was balls to the walls.
agreed, after seeing how much tFT improved upon the already fun wc3 I had higher hopes for overhauls in this expansion. Like they changed the cost of almost everything, added heroes, units and buildings, items, complete overhaul of armour types and attack types, etc. In this expansion we get 0 new buildings and just a few (sorry but mostly boring) new units. a new tileset or two.
David Kim said they specifically set out to try and not change anything except for the new units. I don't know why, maybe they felt like the game was already pretty solid. Which sounds like something David Kim would say.
On August 23 2012 19:10 Velr wrote: 1 zealot 1 stalker against 1(.5) marine 1 marauder both ... You do realise that this Protoss army is way more expensive in.. absolutely every aspect?
Blizzard seems very conservative with it's changes from WoL to Hots. Just go an check Warcraft 3 classic to TfT... That was balls to the walls.
agreed, after seeing how much tFT improved upon the already fun wc3 I had higher hopes for overhauls in this expansion. Like they changed the cost of almost everything, added heroes, units and buildings, items, complete overhaul of armour types and attack types, etc. In this expansion we get 0 new buildings and just a few (sorry but mostly boring) new units. a new tileset or two.
Yes, because SC2 seems to follow the steps of SC and not WC3, and I am quite happy with it.
Kim: We actually tried a lot of units. It’s hard to keep count how many we scrapped, but one example of a new unit is - When we came up with new units we tried to make sure that we’re either filling a gap that’s existing in Wings of Liberty or it’s a completely new thing that people aren’t really used to. So one example is, in Wings of Liberty, all the harass units in the game go for the worker line. They never go for your stack, the enemies army. So we wanted to introduce a new unit, that kinda harasses that stack, but doesn’t really function well in combat. So what we had was a type of a missile launcher unit at the factory. So this missile launcher had a weapon and had one ability on a longer cooldown, like a one minute or two minutes cooldown. You can use that ability anywhere on the map. And what it does is, it fires a missile at that location and the enemy has to move away. If not, he takes a lot of damage. So the problem with this obviously was that of course enemies will go for your peon line if you can shoot it anywhere on the map or it’s gonna go for key structures, such as Spires, Pylons powering multiple Gateways and so on. So we excluded those two things and it kinda felt weird because it’s a missile that fires, and it lands, but it does zero damage to workers, which made like no sense. So that was problematic. And the second problem was that it’s pretty much a nuke against that enemy army. So we already had that in the game. But when we were first thinking of the concept of the unit, because it’s like a missile launcher that shoots a missile, it didn’t really relate to the Ghost, but mechanically it kinda did. So those are the reasons why it got cut.
So we just have a bunch of units that we just try and that sound kinda cool on paper, but not really. So it’s really important for us to really test the units that we have in game and all the units that are here in gamescom are actually pretty good for the beta. But of course, if there are problems with those units, then we will take measures to either cut, improve or fine-tune those units during the beta.
They actually thought that was a good I idea? They had to try it to know it sucks? Facepalm.
Sorry to whine with all the whiners but ,... yep - what the fuck? "We have an idea which is kind of shit and doesn't work how we want it, so we'll adjust it and now the shit idea is usable"
I mean the idea is awful, it's just fucking awful. I swear even if I played Terran I'd hate the warhound just because it looks like such a silly unit. Why couldn't they add the spider mine thing to tanks or something? Like you build them out of tanks like interceptors? Or perhaps each tank comes with one after you research the upgrade?
Also I kind of like the new spider mine thing, except for it attacking air. I also DID think the timer was kind of interesting, just a bit of a long timer.
I have such little faith for Blizzard with the HoTS proposed changes, I feel sorry for me as a huge huge spectator and I feel actually even more sorry for the casters and players who need to play this game, it's going to be fucking Supreme Commander soon at this rate.
man when I first heard about hots I was pretty damn excited, but throughout the months and after many announcements regarding changes to the units/game I lost confidence in blizz, as they seemingly are making the game worse and not creative at all. as they already dismissed/removed most of the really interesting stuff and instead implement bullshit like reaper HP regeneration or stuff that resembles BW in some way without being even close to the awesomeness of their respective counterparts (sounds a bit awkward I know lol).
my current conclusion on the actual turn of events is I'm prolly not gonna buy it at all, since Dustin Browder and David Kim crushed my excitement with their poor design
Kim: We actually tried a lot of units. It’s hard to keep count how many we scrapped, but one example of a new unit is - When we came up with new units we tried to make sure that we’re either filling a gap that’s existing in Wings of Liberty or it’s a completely new thing that people aren’t really used to. So one example is, in Wings of Liberty, all the harass units in the game go for the worker line. They never go for your stack, the enemies army. So we wanted to introduce a new unit, that kinda harasses that stack, but doesn’t really function well in combat. So what we had was a type of a missile launcher unit at the factory. So this missile launcher had a weapon and had one ability on a longer cooldown, like a one minute or two minutes cooldown. You can use that ability anywhere on the map. And what it does is, it fires a missile at that location and the enemy has to move away. If not, he takes a lot of damage. So the problem with this obviously was that of course enemies will go for your peon line if you can shoot it anywhere on the map or it’s gonna go for key structures, such as Spires, Pylons powering multiple Gateways and so on. So we excluded those two things and it kinda felt weird because it’s a missile that fires, and it lands, but it does zero damage to workers, which made like no sense. So that was problematic. And the second problem was that it’s pretty much a nuke against that enemy army. So we already had that in the game. But when we were first thinking of the concept of the unit, because it’s like a missile launcher that shoots a missile, it didn’t really relate to the Ghost, but mechanically it kinda did. So those are the reasons why it got cut.
So we just have a bunch of units that we just try and that sound kinda cool on paper, but not really. So it’s really important for us to really test the units that we have in game and all the units that are here in gamescom are actually pretty good for the beta. But of course, if there are problems with those units, then we will take measures to either cut, improve or fine-tune those units during the beta.
They actually thought that was a good I idea? They had to try it to know it sucks? Facepalm.
I would rather Blizzard try stuff and see if it sucks, rather than just assuming that things are a bad idea. With the number of changes we have seen since the battle reports and Gamescon, it is pretty clear they are in a very fluid state of design. Experimenting with units, ideas and ways to play the game is the best way to find new units that work. As a community, we shun theory crafting about specific builds and playstyles and reward people who prove their concepts through practice and experimentation. Blizzard is doing the same thing, trying units out in practice, rather than relying on theory crafting on what would improve the game.
On August 22 2012 03:27 Yoduh wrote: I want to point out how most people making huge complaints and posting all this negativity are only focusing on one or two new units and declaring the whole expansion a dud before the beta is even out. I don't mind complaining, it makes for good feedback, but looking at the bigger picture theres a lot of things being done right with HotS. I haven't seen a single complaint against the viper, hydra speed, ultralist burrow charge or reaper upgrade. A lot of people are cool with the oracle, mothership core, and battle hellion. People are on the fence about tempest, widow mine, and swarm host but only for possibly not being powerful enough. Really the only constant complaints being made are against the warhound and general fears about continued deathball vs. deathball "a-move" gameplay.
Doesn't sound too bad for still being pre-beta! And once beta starts there will probably be a floodgate of changes, and I think a lot of people complaining that Blizzard never listens are gonna get shut up. If you can remember back to SC2:WoL beta Blizzard was making changes all the time. People forget that. Once a game is released it's different, and they become way more hesitant to make big changes, and rightfully so. But beta time is great. I don't know what kind of changes are yet to be made, but in a few months you can bet we won't be looking at the same game we see today. So to nay sayers I simply say continue criticizing and giving feedback, that's good, but the predictions about SC2 and HotS failing are just too premature for this stage of development.
Warpgate is still a stupid mechanic and it's been in the game forever. It's also a contributory factor to [i]why[i/] Protoss games largely consist of allins or deathballing.
Lol how does warpgate cause deathballs? Warpgate, if anything, would be antideathball. Sure it would increase all-ins, but you can't say deathball at all...
Either do your research on the topic or think for yourself. Warp Gate is THE contributing factor to why Protoss needs to play a deathball style. It's the root cause of all things bad with the race. Let me see if I can make a concise diagram.
Warp Gate -> Gateway units have to be weak due to Warp In's strength -> Gateway units suck -> majority of the Protoss army sucks as lone units -> Protoss units need to mesh very well or Protoss as a race will fail -> Deathball play is born.
That's a gross oversimplification. In really low numbers they can beat similar cost terran or zerg armies, either through kiting or sentries. Then in the midgame they get weak till colossi. That's not a case of being weak in small groups. Plus if you've ever watched blink stalkers v. zerg I don't think you can make a general statement that gateway units are weak.
In what universe do you see equally upgraded small Protoss armies beating small Terran armies?
Who wins 1 chargelot, 2 blinkstalkers or 3 marines 2 marauders with stim? If anything it's a very close battle but I'm almost certain that the toss wins. Or even worse for terran, 1 zealot 1 stalker against 1(.5) marine 1 marauder both completely unupgraded.
Um... 2 Marauders and 3 marines all with stim would crush 2 blink stalkers and 1 chargelot in a heartbeat. Hell, I doubt terran even needs stim.
On August 23 2012 11:12 IdrA wrote: and he still has no idea what hes doing
And that's why Blizzard should hire a progamer game design team.
They consult pro-gamers on their opinions of the game all the time, it's stupid to think they wouldn't.
In the light of not simply posting images as responses, I just want to share this small comic strip. It's what came to mind as I read this post (nothing inflammatory obviously).
I just don't think that design teams value professional input highly enough. They're looking for something shiny that's interesting and new. Which is a good thing. But sometimes that just gets in the way of game quality. Well, those are my € 0,02...
Kim: We actually tried a lot of units. It’s hard to keep count how many we scrapped, but one example of a new unit is - When we came up with new units we tried to make sure that we’re either filling a gap that’s existing in Wings of Liberty or it’s a completely new thing that people aren’t really used to. So one example is, in Wings of Liberty, all the harass units in the game go for the worker line. They never go for your stack, the enemies army. So we wanted to introduce a new unit, that kinda harasses that stack, but doesn’t really function well in combat. So what we had was a type of a missile launcher unit at the factory. So this missile launcher had a weapon and had one ability on a longer cooldown, like a one minute or two minutes cooldown. You can use that ability anywhere on the map. And what it does is, it fires a missile at that location and the enemy has to move away. If not, he takes a lot of damage. So the problem with this obviously was that of course enemies will go for your peon line if you can shoot it anywhere on the map or it’s gonna go for key structures, such as Spires, Pylons powering multiple Gateways and so on. So we excluded those two things and it kinda felt weird because it’s a missile that fires, and it lands, but it does zero damage to workers, which made like no sense. So that was problematic. And the second problem was that it’s pretty much a nuke against that enemy army. So we already had that in the game. But when we were first thinking of the concept of the unit, because it’s like a missile launcher that shoots a missile, it didn’t really relate to the Ghost, but mechanically it kinda did. So those are the reasons why it got cut.
So we just have a bunch of units that we just try and that sound kinda cool on paper, but not really. So it’s really important for us to really test the units that we have in game and all the units that are here in gamescom are actually pretty good for the beta. But of course, if there are problems with those units, then we will take measures to either cut, improve or fine-tune those units during the beta.
They actually thought that was a good I idea? They had to try it to know it sucks? Facepalm.
I would rather Blizzard try stuff and see if it sucks, rather than just assuming that things are a bad idea. With the number of changes we have seen since the battle reports and Gamescon, it is pretty clear they are in a very fluid state of design. Experimenting with units, ideas and ways to play the game is the best way to find new units that work. As a community, we shun theory crafting about specific builds and playstyles and reward people who prove their concepts through practice and experimentation. Blizzard is doing the same thing, trying units out in practice, rather than relying on theory crafting on what would improve the game.
Yeah I agree.
A lot of the things people say are gimmicks are whatever - You have to remember that in SCBW became good "accidentally".
(They said they never really intended BW to be some epic eSport game that was balanced and had solid mechanics for all three races. They just added some units and thought they were cool and somehow BW happened.)
(Of course that's what remember reading about, not sure if it was true or not. Regardless though, they made BW good on their first try which was unexpected. Also BW had few balance patches [of course the maps needed work though].)
Though I think what they did was try too hard to "solve" the tank issue in TvT (they said they added the missile launcher specifically because of TvT).
I admit that I do dislike playing TvT the most (mainly because it takes long and I want more ladder points and fast wins to increase my MMR faster >.>) but TBH I don't know if they should go through with this or not.
TvT does already have a lot of alternative ways to play (it really depends on map though, some maps are better suited for mech than others).
When HotS comes out, I can imagine playing TvT will be more fun (for me) since I dislike tank battles (playing them that is, I like watching them).
On August 23 2012 23:37 Dustin_Beaver wrote: If this is indicative of what has become of Blizzard culture, they are waaaaaaaay passed their prime.
For those who don't know about the Diablo 3 "Fuck that loser" story, a funny sendup:
I counter that with this: (Go to 4 hours, 4 minutes, and 43 seconds. Or alternatively, open the link and it will go to that spot automatically.) (Jay Wilson - "I don't know why they let me be on that team that is that good." "Every day I wait for security to show up, escort me out." "And just for them to just go 'aww, you had us fooled for 6 and a half years but we now figured it out" *Cut to scene with security guards taking Jay Wilson away moments later. Yep Jay Wilson said that in the video. Watch it if you can.)
It's sad for Jay Wilson because a lot probably don't know about that (he already explained it but he said it mainly because he really loves his team, not because he wanted to defend himself). (Of course, regardless that was unprofessional, so I acknowledge that.)
Listening to pros input is actually the worse fucking thing there is. Ask how reckful and his crew completely broke rogue and mage (and somewhat shaman too) because it benefits them.
Pro players are not designers; they can't handle statistics and numbers. They don't know whether a unit is more fun or not than your average gamers. They can only judge base on their personal feelings, emotions, and perspectives, all of which is just as bias if not more than your average gamers.
On August 22 2012 02:05 Evangelist wrote: Single target A move units (hi Warhound) are crazy easy to balance. It's a game of numbers and since there's no multiplication implicit to a Warhound deathball they scale linearly with the only limits being the quantized number of shots required to destroy a particular unit. If the problem with the Warhound is that it's too easy to A move, is the problem the Warhound itself (ie taking too many shots to kill and thus absorbing fire for higher DPS units) or is it the time of availability? Is it the sheer damage output? Does it fill a niche other units don't fill? Does it have a reason for being there?
Congratulations on not getting it *at all* This paragraph you wrote is a perfect example of Blizzard thinking, forget the *design* of the unit and focus on the numbers.
It's how the unit is used, what it's abilities are, how and what it attacks. The Warhound is the very definition of a mindless unit which auto-targets what it's intended to disperse. It requires no thinking, at all - it's only weakness is air units (of which Protoss doesn't have a huge quantity of good air to ground units)
Fiddling with numbers is meaningless when the design is wrong. I never even played more than a few hours of BW and over 2 years of watching pro games, reading this site - it's very easy to understand why some pros are disillusioned with the game. The design needs to be clever - not just even.
No offence man, but they don't employ you. They are better at designing games than you are. That's why you don't work for them.
Nearly every unit in the game is designed like I have just said. There are only a handful that aren't and they are rightly called "casters". Is the Warhound an A move unit? Of course it is. Does that mean that you just build it and send it in? Of course not - the point of the numerical adjustment is to ensure that you can't just build one unit and overwhelm an opponent at any point in the game.
Put it this way. Yes, at present the Warhound presents a significant advantage vs a meching player compared to not building them at all. In the same way as does building seige tanks does vs someone not building seige tanks. For example there are people in this thread going on about how the future of TvT will be big balls of MMM with Warhounds. Why, exactly? Did seige tanks suddenly stop vaporising marines all of a sudden. Did marines suddenly become ineffective against enemy units? Did banshees suddenly stop shooting down? Did Thors stop doing 60 damage a shot to enemy units?
The worst part of this forum is that people on this forum, because they are on this forum and ESPECIALLY if they do this for a living, assume that because they can see flaws in present game design, means they can design something that stops that. For example, half of the BW advocates on this forum are ranting about having "much stronger AoE" to punish deathballs without thinking that, hey, wait a second, what effect is that going to have on split units if suddenly all you need to do is blanket storm an area for a guaranteed army kill.
They don't see the endgame of their suggestions. The endgame of making AoE 50-100% stronger is that the entire battle is not decided by positioning or even by the better unit composition, but by who has more fucking casters to blanket more of the area with storms. This is not Brood War. The whole design of the game is faster than Brood War. The only complaint that I admit I share with the BW obsessees is the colossus - the reaver was a much more interesting unit.
The only thing that SC2 ever needs to adhere to is combined arms theory - the idea that two units of different types with different roles must always be stronger than a similar number of given units. This holds completely true in nearly every situation you can think of in Starcraft 2. Stalker Immortal vs Stalker, Marine vs Marine Tank, Zergling Baneling vs Zergling. As long as SC2 doesn't have one unit that simply overwhelms every other unit, then composition remains important and it doesn't matter whether the units are A move or not - there will always be a way to overrun those units with either superior micro or superior composition. After all, how do you explain pro terrans winning against toss deathballs when, in every single way, the toss deathball is stronger?
EPT
Also, I am sorry for the audio quality and my shaky hands. I hope you can still enjoy.
P
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/DoFOr.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_iRE1f7T37Zk/TU_F1kpOPaI/AAAAAAAAAYw/gjxOz5_BOaY/s1600/22.%2BIgnore%2BCommon%2BSense.gif)
