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It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets.
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On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets.
I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me.
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I will analyze and place some perspective into unit pathing very soon. It seems that there is more to look into for SC2 design than I thought.
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On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me.
He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining.
Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars.
But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding.
I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play.
If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used.
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On September 11 2013 13:00 Thieving Magpie wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me. He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining. Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars. But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding. I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play. If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used.
I can't really say anything about pathing, but I believe not having units clump up can make a big, big difference, especially small fights like Reapers vs Zerglings.
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On September 11 2013 13:00 Thieving Magpie wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me. He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining. Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars. But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding. I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play. If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used.
Ok yeah I did want to sound a bit dramatic because I am somewhat frustrated by past discussions on the topic of SC2 pathing. Mostly by people chategorically refusing to understand what you are trying to say and dissmising the idea of not clumpy pathing with simple remarks as "ye make SC2 even easier with no spread micro" or "no more marine vs baneling" etc.
Ofcourse i am not talkin about the effectivness of the pathing in SC2. Its obviusly perfect at making the units do what you tell them to do. I am just saying, design wise however, its absolutelly abysmal (because of entertainment value if you will, but I mainly think of micro here as Rabiator explained previously).
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On September 11 2013 13:46 NapkinBox wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 13:00 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me. He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining. Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars. But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding. I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play. If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used. I can't really say anything about pathing, but I believe not having units clump up can make a big, big difference, especially small fights like Reapers vs Zerglings.
Don't misunderstand me, I don't have anything against forcing units to spread.
But I personally think it is arbitrary. Whether units naturally spread or units naturally clump, we need to have mechanics that interact and play with that axiom.
Forcefield is a great example. Its a spell that can be used offensively, defensively, and creatively. It can be used to block off assaults, stop run-bys, split up armies, etc... the better the player the more effective the forcefield. It's a wonderful spell in a world of clumped units. Forcefield SUCKS in a world of pre-spread units since all it will really do is block off entrances and tighten choke points. That's boring.
The steady AOE of a colossus is TERRIBLE in clumped unit game. AOE needs to be escapable in a game where units naturally clump. Watching players like Polt split his marines against Seige Tanks and Banelings is awesome since there is enough delay in both those units that clumped armies can react to them. There is no "splitting" against colossus because the lasers overlap and don't leave a timing to split against them. This forces terran/zerg/protoss to have to use air units specifically designed to counter the colossus instead of requiring strong micro play to minimize the impact of the colossus.
It doesn't really matter if units come clumped or not, so long as you give players a chance to micro their way out of or into situations. So long as you promote dynamic play. If you're too lazy to design units with clumped armies in mind, declump them. If you're too lazy to design units with pre-split in mind, reclump them then. So long as you pick one or the other.
SC2 has this problem where it pretends that the clumping is separate from the unit design and their main goal is to make the game as unpunishing to bad mechanics as possible.
Lets take for example Kahydrin Amulet.
Warp in Storms is very powerful and would give warp gates an offensive and defensive nature that is unique and interesting. Since units come clumped Protoss had instant warp ins to give them a sense of mobility. So long as pylons were everywhere Protoss could instantly warp in templars and storm as needed. This meant that Protoss tactics would eventually become very positional, all about spreading and protecting pylons spread around the map using warp ins to defend where ever their army was absent. This made it okay that Psi Storm damage was nerfed compared to BW and made it okay that landing storms wasn't as impressive as before since good storm use showed good reflexes and map awareness.
KA was pulled because bad players couldn't deal with it. Protoss mobility disappeared and suddenly Protoss needed to be given the Nexus Cannon and the mothership core to become mobile again. Nexus cannon doesn't really interact with clumped up armies. The mothership core does due to recall and mothership bubble. If instead of pulling away from dynamic play that encourages the use of fast hands, Blizzard simply allowed their game to be a game, we wouldn't have an issue. Instead of nerfing it they could have simply given Terran and Zerg equally broken mechanics to give all three races something fun to play with.
Which goes back to my the whole clumping vs pre-spread thing. Prespread units in BW meant that Psi Storm had to kill in 1-2 ticks otherwise it would only tickle 2-3 units. Because units clump in SC2, Psi Storm had to be nerfed to compensate for the tight armies. Kahydrin Amulet gave psi storm a different identity as flexible and fast aoe meant to hit multiple areas at once and gets better with faster hands and stronger mechanics. So although it didn't hit as hard as BW storms, it hit much more often and from far more angles. With the nerf we instead get a BW style storm with a lot less oompf, the worse of both worlds.
Either be okay with units clumping, or not be okay with units clumping. The wishy washiness of blizzard is just ruining unit design.
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@Thieving Magpie
actually you can split against collossi. it gets easier the fewer units you have. i've seen a few pro games with amazing splits and they were oh so effective in crushing the protoss army. basically you try to force the collossus to shoot single units. it's possible 
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On September 11 2013 14:24 NukeD wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 13:00 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me. He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining. Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars. But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding. I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play. If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used. Ok yeah I did want to sound a bit dramatic because I am somewhat frustrated by past discussions on the topic of SC2 pathing. Mostly by people chategorically refusing to understand what you are trying to say and dissmising the idea of not clumpy pathing with simple remarks as "ye make SC2 even easier with no spread micro" or "no more marine vs baneling" etc. Ofcourse i am not talkin about the effectivness of the pathing in SC2. Its obviusly perfect at making the units do what you tell them to do. I am just saying, design wise however, its absolutelly abysmal (because of entertainment value if you will, but I mainly think of micro here as Rabiator explained previously).
My main grip against the "spread out the units" movement is that its not asking for the Yang to its Ying. If we spread units out, we need to design the units to be fun when fighting spread units. But the same could be said about units being clumped, if we design units to be fun to watch when fighting armies both would lead to the same end result entertainment wise.
Currently in SC2 it seems like half the units would be more entertaining if units were spread out and the other half are only interesting because the units clump. One or the other would be better.
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On September 11 2013 14:49 beg wrote:@Thieving Magpie actually you can split against collossi. it gets easier the fewer units you have. i've seen a few pro games with amazing splits and they were oh so effective in crushing the protoss army. basically you try to force the collossus to shoot single units. it's possible
Yes, I remember MMA doing it in 2011 when he was in his unbeatable streak.
The problem with the "critical mass of colossus" is that their overlapping attack speed staccatos leaving no "safe" time between hits. 1-2 colossus is actually fun as all hell and when I used to go Roach Hydra in Xel naga the fights before they get the third colossus was usually so much fun with splits and what not. But when 3-4 arrive there just isn't time.
The concept I talked about was most prevalent in BW Siege Tank lines. Overkill meant that no matter how "uber" and perfect the line was, having units run in will give the enemy army a cooldown worth of momentum.
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Russian Federation221 Posts
On September 11 2013 14:49 Thieving Magpie wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 14:24 NukeD wrote:On September 11 2013 13:00 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me. He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining. Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars. But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding. I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play. If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used. Ok yeah I did want to sound a bit dramatic because I am somewhat frustrated by past discussions on the topic of SC2 pathing. Mostly by people chategorically refusing to understand what you are trying to say and dissmising the idea of not clumpy pathing with simple remarks as "ye make SC2 even easier with no spread micro" or "no more marine vs baneling" etc. Ofcourse i am not talkin about the effectivness of the pathing in SC2. Its obviusly perfect at making the units do what you tell them to do. I am just saying, design wise however, its absolutelly abysmal (because of entertainment value if you will, but I mainly think of micro here as Rabiator explained previously). My main grip against the "spread out the units" movement is that its not asking for the Yang to its Ying. If we spread units out, we need to design the units to be fun when fighting spread units. But the same could be said about units being clumped, if we design units to be fun to watch when fighting armies both would lead to the same end result entertainment wise. Currently in SC2 it seems like half the units would be more entertaining if units were spread out and the other half are only interesting because the units clump. One or the other would be better.
But visually its better when units are spread out.
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On September 11 2013 15:04 MikeMM wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 14:49 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 14:24 NukeD wrote:On September 11 2013 13:00 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me. He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining. Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars. But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding. I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play. If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used. Ok yeah I did want to sound a bit dramatic because I am somewhat frustrated by past discussions on the topic of SC2 pathing. Mostly by people chategorically refusing to understand what you are trying to say and dissmising the idea of not clumpy pathing with simple remarks as "ye make SC2 even easier with no spread micro" or "no more marine vs baneling" etc. Ofcourse i am not talkin about the effectivness of the pathing in SC2. Its obviusly perfect at making the units do what you tell them to do. I am just saying, design wise however, its absolutelly abysmal (because of entertainment value if you will, but I mainly think of micro here as Rabiator explained previously). My main grip against the "spread out the units" movement is that its not asking for the Yang to its Ying. If we spread units out, we need to design the units to be fun when fighting spread units. But the same could be said about units being clumped, if we design units to be fun to watch when fighting armies both would lead to the same end result entertainment wise. Currently in SC2 it seems like half the units would be more entertaining if units were spread out and the other half are only interesting because the units clump. One or the other would be better. But visually its better when units are spread out.
Marching wise I agree.
For the same reason that non-glitching stalkers is visually better than glitching dragoons. Both had pros and cons visually.
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Russian Federation221 Posts
On September 11 2013 15:07 Thieving Magpie wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 15:04 MikeMM wrote:On September 11 2013 14:49 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 14:24 NukeD wrote:On September 11 2013 13:00 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me. He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining. Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars. But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding. I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play. If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used. Ok yeah I did want to sound a bit dramatic because I am somewhat frustrated by past discussions on the topic of SC2 pathing. Mostly by people chategorically refusing to understand what you are trying to say and dissmising the idea of not clumpy pathing with simple remarks as "ye make SC2 even easier with no spread micro" or "no more marine vs baneling" etc. Ofcourse i am not talkin about the effectivness of the pathing in SC2. Its obviusly perfect at making the units do what you tell them to do. I am just saying, design wise however, its absolutelly abysmal (because of entertainment value if you will, but I mainly think of micro here as Rabiator explained previously). My main grip against the "spread out the units" movement is that its not asking for the Yang to its Ying. If we spread units out, we need to design the units to be fun when fighting spread units. But the same could be said about units being clumped, if we design units to be fun to watch when fighting armies both would lead to the same end result entertainment wise. Currently in SC2 it seems like half the units would be more entertaining if units were spread out and the other half are only interesting because the units clump. One or the other would be better. But visually its better when units are spread out. Marching wise I agree. For the same reason that non-glitching stalkers is visually better than glitching dragoons. Both had pros and cons visually.
On the other hand I really like animation of dragoons shooting, animation of its death, and sound of dragoon dying.
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On September 11 2013 14:49 Thieving Magpie wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 14:24 NukeD wrote:On September 11 2013 13:00 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me. He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining. Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars. But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding. I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play. If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used. Ok yeah I did want to sound a bit dramatic because I am somewhat frustrated by past discussions on the topic of SC2 pathing. Mostly by people chategorically refusing to understand what you are trying to say and dissmising the idea of not clumpy pathing with simple remarks as "ye make SC2 even easier with no spread micro" or "no more marine vs baneling" etc. Ofcourse i am not talkin about the effectivness of the pathing in SC2. Its obviusly perfect at making the units do what you tell them to do. I am just saying, design wise however, its absolutelly abysmal (because of entertainment value if you will, but I mainly think of micro here as Rabiator explained previously). My main grip against the "spread out the units" movement is that its not asking for the Yang to its Ying. If we spread units out, we need to design the units to be fun when fighting spread units. But the same could be said about units being clumped, if we design units to be fun to watch when fighting armies both would lead to the same end result entertainment wise. Currently in SC2 it seems like half the units would be more entertaining if units were spread out and the other half are only interesting because the units clump. One or the other would be better.
Any units are always more fun when things are more spread out, because the lower local dps allows you time for relevant micro decisions. There can be tactics evolving within an engagement, not just a dominos release of two armies meeting.
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On September 11 2013 14:49 Thieving Magpie wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 14:24 NukeD wrote:On September 11 2013 13:00 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me. He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining. Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars. But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding. I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play. If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used. Ok yeah I did want to sound a bit dramatic because I am somewhat frustrated by past discussions on the topic of SC2 pathing. Mostly by people chategorically refusing to understand what you are trying to say and dissmising the idea of not clumpy pathing with simple remarks as "ye make SC2 even easier with no spread micro" or "no more marine vs baneling" etc. Ofcourse i am not talkin about the effectivness of the pathing in SC2. Its obviusly perfect at making the units do what you tell them to do. I am just saying, design wise however, its absolutelly abysmal (because of entertainment value if you will, but I mainly think of micro here as Rabiator explained previously). My main grip against the "spread out the units" movement is that its not asking for the Yang to its Ying. If we spread units out, we need to design the units to be fun when fighting spread units. But the same could be said about units being clumped, if we design units to be fun to watch when fighting armies both would lead to the same end result entertainment wise. Currently in SC2 it seems like half the units would be more entertaining if units were spread out and the other half are only interesting because the units clump. One or the other would be better.
I assumed it is self explanatory that if you have different pathing you are then obliged to redesign most of the units and game mechanics. And contrary to your opinion, I hold the stance that it is impossible to design fun units and mechanics other than marine micro with this pathing. There is simply not enough room to be creative in a time span of 2 seconds (the average time a big battle in sc2 lasts) and designing units to artificially prolong that time span isn't going to make for a fun game.
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On September 11 2013 15:49 NukeD wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 14:49 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 14:24 NukeD wrote:On September 11 2013 13:00 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me. He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining. Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars. But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding. I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play. If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used. Ok yeah I did want to sound a bit dramatic because I am somewhat frustrated by past discussions on the topic of SC2 pathing. Mostly by people chategorically refusing to understand what you are trying to say and dissmising the idea of not clumpy pathing with simple remarks as "ye make SC2 even easier with no spread micro" or "no more marine vs baneling" etc. Ofcourse i am not talkin about the effectivness of the pathing in SC2. Its obviusly perfect at making the units do what you tell them to do. I am just saying, design wise however, its absolutelly abysmal (because of entertainment value if you will, but I mainly think of micro here as Rabiator explained previously). My main grip against the "spread out the units" movement is that its not asking for the Yang to its Ying. If we spread units out, we need to design the units to be fun when fighting spread units. But the same could be said about units being clumped, if we design units to be fun to watch when fighting armies both would lead to the same end result entertainment wise. Currently in SC2 it seems like half the units would be more entertaining if units were spread out and the other half are only interesting because the units clump. One or the other would be better. I assumed it is self explanatory that if you have different pathing you are then obliged to redesign most of the units and game mechanics. And contrary to your opinion, I hold the stance that it is impossible to design fun units and mechanics other than marine micro with this pathing. There is simply not enough room to be creative in a time span of 2 seconds (the average time a big battle in sc2 lasts) and designing units to artificially prolong that time span isn't going to make for a fun game.
most of the micro however is done prior the actual engagement.
viking poking
blink stalkers defending the colossus
marauder stim in for snipe
cloak ghost move forward to emp/snipe while stalkers try to deny
A lot of people are just not understanding/appreciating the micro in SC2.
high clumped unit has their own micro such as what we saw yesterday on WCS EU where starbuck continuously used roach hydra to bait forcefields and then constantly adjusting its flank according to the FFs and protoss firepower focus. That plus other tricks like viper abducting the colossus etc
Or you can see how zerg like JD uses split with his mutas against templar storms.
Or protoss with HT flanks and warp prism storm
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On September 11 2013 14:43 Thieving Magpie wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 13:46 NapkinBox wrote:On September 11 2013 13:00 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me. He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining. Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars. But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding. I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play. If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used. I can't really say anything about pathing, but I believe not having units clump up can make a big, big difference, especially small fights like Reapers vs Zerglings. Which goes back to my the whole clumping vs pre-spread thing. Prespread units in BW meant that Psi Storm had to kill in 1-2 ticks otherwise it would only tickle 2-3 units. Because units clump in SC2, Psi Storm had to be nerfed to compensate for the tight armies. Kahydrin Amulet gave psi storm a different identity as flexible and fast aoe meant to hit multiple areas at once and gets better with faster hands and stronger mechanics. So although it didn't hit as hard as BW storms, it hit much more often and from far more angles. With the nerf we instead get a BW style storm with a lot less oompf, the worse of both worlds. Either be okay with units clumping, or not be okay with units clumping. The wishy washiness of blizzard is just ruining unit design.
Can you really look at PvT and say storm doesn't have enough oompf? To me it isn't exactly lacking in that department.
And you have a romanticized image of KA, where it would be used for amazing multitasking that only bad players had issues with (which somehow did have to play against players with that amazing multitasking?). A more realistic example: Toss deathball fights terran bio army. Instead of warping in 20 zealots late game they warp in 14 zealots and 6 HTs to carpet storm the remaining army without ghosts left to deal with them.
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K-Amulet was cool
Counterattack and harass everywhere, to me energy upgrade is a lot cooler on high templars since it allows a new playstyle.
Instead of energy upgrade on battlecruiser, where it just allows you to get yamato, a little faster and is useless without having yamato researched.
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On September 11 2013 16:49 ETisME wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 15:49 NukeD wrote:On September 11 2013 14:49 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 14:24 NukeD wrote:On September 11 2013 13:00 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me. He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining. Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars. But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding. I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play. If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used. Ok yeah I did want to sound a bit dramatic because I am somewhat frustrated by past discussions on the topic of SC2 pathing. Mostly by people chategorically refusing to understand what you are trying to say and dissmising the idea of not clumpy pathing with simple remarks as "ye make SC2 even easier with no spread micro" or "no more marine vs baneling" etc. Ofcourse i am not talkin about the effectivness of the pathing in SC2. Its obviusly perfect at making the units do what you tell them to do. I am just saying, design wise however, its absolutelly abysmal (because of entertainment value if you will, but I mainly think of micro here as Rabiator explained previously). My main grip against the "spread out the units" movement is that its not asking for the Yang to its Ying. If we spread units out, we need to design the units to be fun when fighting spread units. But the same could be said about units being clumped, if we design units to be fun to watch when fighting armies both would lead to the same end result entertainment wise. Currently in SC2 it seems like half the units would be more entertaining if units were spread out and the other half are only interesting because the units clump. One or the other would be better. I assumed it is self explanatory that if you have different pathing you are then obliged to redesign most of the units and game mechanics. And contrary to your opinion, I hold the stance that it is impossible to design fun units and mechanics other than marine micro with this pathing. There is simply not enough room to be creative in a time span of 2 seconds (the average time a big battle in sc2 lasts) and designing units to artificially prolong that time span isn't going to make for a fun game. most of the micro however is done prior the actual engagement. viking poking blink stalkers defending the colossus marauder stim in for snipe cloak ghost move forward to emp/snipe while stalkers try to deny A lot of people are just not understanding/appreciating the micro in SC2. high clumped unit has their own micro such as what we saw yesterday on WCS EU where starbuck continuously used roach hydra to bait forcefields and then constantly adjusting its flank according to the FFs and protoss firepower focus. That plus other tricks like viper abducting the colossus etc Or you can see how zerg like JD uses split with his mutas against templar storms. Or protoss with HT flanks and warp prism storm
The micro you described is only half of the story, or at least it should be half of the story. By that I mean yeah, what you described is very important and does take a lot of skill to perform, but its still only more or less PRE-engagement micro. It should by all means remain to be there but it should then organically transition to an in-battle micro war where all those things regarding positioning and else come into play, but then you get to control your units more directly and efficiently.
Right now its just all sorts of cool micro tricks period where units dance around trying to outposition each other and gain the upper hand, which happens pre engagement, and then SPLAT, all over in 1 second. Now, obviously there is micro during battles in SC2 (marine micro, focus fire, pulling damaged units behind etc.), Im just saying there should be more of it. A lot more of it. Infact its everything this RTS game should be about and what it was aimed to be about considering it was made as an E-Sport, a game people will enjoy spectating. In my opinion it failed at that goal primarily because of the pathing.
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On September 11 2013 16:49 ETisME wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2013 15:49 NukeD wrote:On September 11 2013 14:49 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 14:24 NukeD wrote:On September 11 2013 13:00 Thieving Magpie wrote:On September 11 2013 09:46 archwaykitten wrote:On September 11 2013 07:38 NukeD wrote:
It was obvious from the WoL beta that unit clumping is the number one issuse SC2 has. I was actually shocked when I realised they have no intentions on changing it. I am convinced the game would instantly be 100% better if you made pathing the way it should have been (sort of like Maverick has made it in his SC2BW mod).
I mean for that reason alone I cant take the design team seriously (and Entomb was just the icing on the cake, but I guess some people could enjoy that), without getting into some other issues that whether they are a problem or not is debatable. Current pathing isnt debatable however. If you think pathing in SC2 is good you are plain wrong. And thats objective as it gets. I dunno man. Unlike in BW, my units actually go where I tell them to in SC2 without getting lost along the way. That seems like pretty good pathing to me. He's not saying it doesn't work, he's saying its not entertaining. Now he thinks his opinion that it isn't entertaining is fact and not simply an opinion--which is the type of snide remark that sparks flame wars. But despite his snark, understand that he's trying to talk about visual appeal and not effectiveness of design or coding. I personally disagree with him that unit pathing is badly implemented in SC2, but I do agree that it has not been the *cause* of entertaining play. If AOE dps was upped so much that seige units became the norm and the game became about massive lines of aoe units not wanting to break the no man's land--then you'd get BW TvT and PvT where barracks units were pretty much never used. Ok yeah I did want to sound a bit dramatic because I am somewhat frustrated by past discussions on the topic of SC2 pathing. Mostly by people chategorically refusing to understand what you are trying to say and dissmising the idea of not clumpy pathing with simple remarks as "ye make SC2 even easier with no spread micro" or "no more marine vs baneling" etc. Ofcourse i am not talkin about the effectivness of the pathing in SC2. Its obviusly perfect at making the units do what you tell them to do. I am just saying, design wise however, its absolutelly abysmal (because of entertainment value if you will, but I mainly think of micro here as Rabiator explained previously). My main grip against the "spread out the units" movement is that its not asking for the Yang to its Ying. If we spread units out, we need to design the units to be fun when fighting spread units. But the same could be said about units being clumped, if we design units to be fun to watch when fighting armies both would lead to the same end result entertainment wise. Currently in SC2 it seems like half the units would be more entertaining if units were spread out and the other half are only interesting because the units clump. One or the other would be better. I assumed it is self explanatory that if you have different pathing you are then obliged to redesign most of the units and game mechanics. And contrary to your opinion, I hold the stance that it is impossible to design fun units and mechanics other than marine micro with this pathing. There is simply not enough room to be creative in a time span of 2 seconds (the average time a big battle in sc2 lasts) and designing units to artificially prolong that time span isn't going to make for a fun game. most of the micro however is done prior the actual engagement. viking poking blink stalkers defending the colossus marauder stim in for snipe cloak ghost move forward to emp/snipe while stalkers try to deny A lot of people are just not understanding/appreciating the micro in SC2. high clumped unit has their own micro such as what we saw yesterday on WCS EU where starbuck continuously used roach hydra to bait forcefields and then constantly adjusting its flank according to the FFs and protoss firepower focus. That plus other tricks like viper abducting the colossus etc Or you can see how zerg like JD uses split with his mutas against templar storms. Or protoss with HT flanks and warp prism storm
Doesn't matter how hard you micro, the guy with better production wins 9/10 times. Micro has very miniscule effect in SC2. Basic micro such as stim/kite, abduct or spreading are important, but they don't deliver WOW moments.
Compare reaver's 10 scv kills to templar's 10 kills. In BW crowd would be applauding, in sc2, nevermind, terran dropped 5 mules and he's back in the game.
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EPT
