EPTDavid Kim's Current Balance Thoughts - Page 36
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geokilla
Canada8218 Posts
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Squat
Sweden7978 Posts
On January 12 2014 05:27 Plansix wrote: Not at all. If someone likes something more that SC2, that's fine. Its all personal opinion. The people who run around claiming it is "objectively better than SC2" just amuse me. That's funny, I have similar feelings towards people who hysterically defend SC2 from every point of criticism and for some reason seem to believe that just because blizzard made the game and not the community, they should just blindly accept every aspect of it regardless of how stupid or broken it is. The sanctimoniousness is pretty bizarre. "Just be happy they made the game at all!" Just lol. Anyway, people were told since WoL to make a mod if they didn't like the game, and here we are. If you truly are serious about being a positive presence, then supporting efforts like this seems rather mandatory. | ||
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Xiphos
Canada7507 Posts
On January 12 2014 06:14 Squat wrote: That's funny, I have similar feelings towards people who hysterically defend SC2 from every point of criticism and for some reason seem to believe that just because blizzard made the game and not the community, they should just blindly accept every aspect of it regardless of how stupid or broken it is. The sanctimoniousness is pretty bizarre. "Just be happy they made the game at all!" Just lol. Anyway, people were told since WoL to make a mod if they didn't like the game, and here we are. If you truly are serious about being a positive presence, then supporting efforts like this seems rather mandatory. Its all the definition of being "better" and the properties of being "better". A video game have mainly 2 aspects: How the game functions, or what is known as the gameplay and the video output of the game, or the graphics. We can also add the audio angle into the equation but audio isn't exactly necessary to define a game. Now if we were to delve deeper into semantics, an online video game adds the community factor into play. It is how well a system is set up in order to maximize the social aspect of the product. So far we got the criteria ready to semantically determine an RTS game's superiority over another in gameplay, graphics, sound, and community system. In criticising the gameplay of RTS games, generally speaking, what separates strategy games are how many more variables that one have to think of to complete the goal of winning. A good example would be Go vs chess in a sense that Go is much more complicated game than chess. In adding the Real-time elements into the mixture is how more efficient one can emulate a strategy. We know that people generally like to be in control of certain circumstances. In order to make a game enjoyable to play is to make one's time in playing the game more satisfying that the result isn't determine by a single factor at play as that creates frustration. SC2 is a game w/ less factors of winning than BW as it takes macroability out of the game, downplays harassement options, and makes comeback scenerios much less likely due to fast paced unit-clumping mechanisms and retreating into a higher advantage location. Another thing of RTS games is that units should have high micro potentials. LaLush explored that pretty well with Depth of Gameplay. Units that have high microability in SC2 are the Stalkers, Marines, Banelings, Medivac drops, Roaches/Infestors, Reapers, Banshees and Vikings. BW had MnMs, Lurkers, Mutalisks, Corsairs, Vultures, Wraith, HTs, Shuttle combos, Defilers, Carriers just much more units potential of microing. We can conclude that in terms of gameplay, BW definitely have an edge over SC2. I've been hearing some horrible stuff on SC2's B.net 2.0 but in my time playing SC2, I wasn't playing for the community aspect of the game but rather just plain lattering so I can't comment on it. | ||
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Shebuha
Canada1335 Posts
On January 12 2014 05:12 SC2Labs wrote: As a Terran player myself I am naturally most interest in this. For a very long time people focus on the TvP matchup and its potential problems. The reality here is that a lot of this approach has been built by the community. I do play a lot versus Protoss and tried a lot ranging from Mech to Sky to simple Bio Timings and I do agree that lots of times it does appear the Protoss player has an advantage. But even this really depends on the map, the mindset and the actual use. I heard very often complains about the Oracle but if you do not scout and found your mineral line destroyed than you simply did not scout well enough. There are a few All-Ins that are difficult to hold but think of the tools we Terran Player have (e.g. Cloak Banshee, Stim, Ghost). All in All I think the situation is not as bad as everyone is saying and there always needs to be the constant reminder that there simply can't be a perfect balance for the game. If you do look at the numbers we are actually doing not bad at all! What a nice guy, jeez. Nice post! | ||
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Big J
Austria16289 Posts
On January 12 2014 03:31 Plansix wrote: I am willing to be it is because it is new. There is stupid bull shit in that game and we just need to find it. It will be a different flavor of bullshit that SC2, but it will be bullshit. I completely agree with you. But Starbow has the advantage of building upon years of experience from SC2. And Kabel is very willing to patch anything that turns out bad. The thing that bothers me is how people use Starbow against SC2. As far as I understand, it's not Kabel's intention to expose SC2's shortcomings, but to build a different SC2 experience. | ||
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WombaT
Northern Ireland23772 Posts
I can understand the reticence to do wholesale changes given the industry that makes a living off the game though. Again I understand why Blizz have locked everything to their own servers, preventing another iccup but it's just silly to me that Blizzard are developing a MobA years after DoTA gained traction. I imagine a fair amount of people bought WC3 solely for DoTA which was a custom game. The company doesn't seem to have the capacity to be truly bold anymore, or keep actively working on their games between expos like they once did. The latter smacks to me of a change in corporate ethos, whether just a natural occurrence or actively lead by the Activison side of things | ||
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Hider
Denmark9342 Posts
On January 12 2014 05:28 Rad wrote: Thanks for posting this. I watched the games and they were amazing. Definitely want to see something more come out of that mod. Maybe if it gets some more recognizable community support (like TB casting ryung and impact, thanks TB!) and raises in popularity, blizz might have some motivation to make some more significant changes to the core design of sc2. He needs to cast a TvP. That matchup has so many unexplored opportunities in Sbow. Awesome potential if koreans would play it. | ||
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aZealot
New Zealand5447 Posts
On January 12 2014 04:38 Squat wrote: And despite those periods of imbalance, brood war become bigger in Korea than SC2 ever could. Hell, brood war is bigger than SC2 is today. Yes, a lot of people played mainly customs, as I already said. They did it because it was fun. Who cares if people play ranked ladder or BGH, as long as they are playing and get a feeling of enjoyment out of it. The lack of competition argument is valid, but is applies just as much to SC2, there is no other RTS than is even remotely likely to be an esport right now, unless you count zombie-wc3. Having a game that many people like to watch even if they don't play is a strength, not a weakness. How many percent of world cup soccer viewers do you think play football regularly? If Starbow becomes a huge thing and more or less cannibalizes SC2 in the process, wouldn't that be a good thing? If we are going to be realistic, SC2 is never going to really change. If anything was to be done, it had to come from the community, or so we were told for years. And now it has. Surely this should be a cause to rejoice, something to promote and support as much as we possibly can. BW was and is bigger than SC2 in Korea. SC2 is bigger globally. But, that is irrelevant and wasn't my point. It is that taking balance totally out of the game in the name of "fun" (a vague word in any case) is not the right way to go about it. If, for example, those balance statistics from 2007 - 2011 had been repeated in SC2 we would likely have lost more of a substantial portion of the player base over the last 4 years and had far less of a serious competitive scene. You only have to note the storm of crying on the forum for Blizzard to do something when just a season passes where a race appears to gain a significant advantage over another. In fact, if the context had been comparable, it may be that we could have had similar arguments for the "poor design" of BW, and they may have been right. But, less people played seriously because the game was harder and match-ups were harder and so there was less complaining and more accepting. Ironically, I think SC2 is probably more like BW than people may care to admit but the environment is different. I think the heart of the matter comes to the fact that SC2, like any good RTS, has rules. Things you can or cannot do with your race against another race at certain points in the game. People bump up against these limits and don't like them. They want to be able to play and do whatever they want. The game does not work like that. If it did, it would be a wreck. You can argue that SC2 has some limits that may be too restrictive. That is fair. BW may have been the same, but the mechanical difficulty and micro allowed for those limits to be negotiated by better skill. But, the limits and rules are still there. They are part of both games. It's the negotiation of those rules that is the fun of both SC2 and BW. Unfortunately, it can also lead to a lot of rage. As to the rest, I'd rather have more people play and watch than just watch. I rarely play custom games, and would not play a game which was either too hard or too unfair on my race when it came to competitive ladder games. That, for me, is not fun. The fact that SC2 better allows players to log on and actually learn and play the core game is a strength. As to Kabel and Starbow, I hope that his feedback serves Blizzard well when they get around to LOTV. SC2 is a good game. HOTS is better than WOL. Hopefully, LOTV continues that and we get an even better game to argue about. | ||
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Squat
Sweden7978 Posts
On January 12 2014 06:57 Wombat_NI wrote: Starbow is only used against SC2 because it has added things that arguably should have been explored in SC2, with some interesting ideas. Not all of it works, but I like the approach and community response. I can understand the reticence to do wholesale changes given the industry that makes a living off the game though. Again I understand why Blizz have locked everything to their own servers, preventing another iccup but it's just silly to me that Blizzard are developing a MobA years after DoTA gained traction. I imagine a fair amount of people bought WC3 solely for DoTA which was a custom game. The company doesn't seem to have the capacity to be truly bold anymore, or keep actively working on their games between expos like they once did. The latter smacks to me of a change in corporate ethos, whether just a natural occurrence or actively lead by the Activison side of things The model of: make game, sell game, make expo, sell expo, done, is just horribly outdated. That's how you made games in 2002. It is a model that gives you no incentive to invest time and money into improving your product a year or so after release, you have already sold 99% of every copy you are likely to sell. I refuse to believe that Blizzard is unaware of the massively negative backlash regarding symmetrical economies, protoss in general, terrible terrible damage etc. I also believe they have at least a vague idea of how to change some, or all of this. I think they looked at the problems, looked at the amount of money and time that would be needed(basically a remake of the gameplay, so quite a bit), and said fuck this. There just isn't a monetary incentive for them to take any huge steps. They have a single 40 dollar expo left to sell in a niche market with a stale demographic and no real potential for growth, and then it's over, they have no more money to make off of SC2. If they had gone F2P and promoted the fuck out of the game in 2010, who knows. Just another huge "what if". Our only realistic recourse are things like Starbow, which why I am so excited. IMO it should be in every SC player and fan's interest to push shit like that as hard as humanly possible. That is the future of the game. It has been amply demonstrated by now that any hope placed in Blizzard is sorely misplaced. Either the community will carry the game, or it will fizzle out in a few years. It would be very interesting to see a study on the average age of viewers and players in the big esports games. I am willing to bet we SC people would be the old men with no real country. Not exactly a picture of a bright future. | ||
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Xiphos
Canada7507 Posts
In order to truly test if an esport can sustain itself, the game developers have to let it go and so it can flourish by itself. Have SC2 been truly tested as an ESPORT? No it hasn't. | ||
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Jenia6109
Russian Federation1607 Posts
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WombaT
Northern Ireland23772 Posts
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Sufinsil
United States760 Posts
On January 12 2014 06:23 Xiphos wrote: Its all the definition of being "better" and the properties of being "better". A video game have mainly 2 aspects: How the game functions, or what is known as the gameplay and the video output of the game, or the graphics. We can also add the audio angle into the equation but audio isn't exactly necessary to define a game. Now if we were to delve deeper into semantics, an online video game adds the community factor into play. It is how well a system is set up in order to maximize the social aspect of the product. So far we got the criteria ready to semantically determine an RTS game's superiority over another in gameplay, graphics, sound, and community system. In criticising the gameplay of RTS games, generally speaking, what separates strategy games are how many more variables that one have to think of to complete the goal of winning. A good example would be Go vs chess in a sense that Go is much more complicated game than chess. In adding the Real-time elements into the mixture is how more efficient one can emulate a strategy. We know that people generally like to be in control of certain circumstances. In order to make a game enjoyable to play is to make one's time in playing the game more satisfying that the result isn't determine by a single factor at play as that creates frustration. SC2 is a game w/ less factors of winning than BW as it takes macroability out of the game, downplays harassement options, and makes comeback scenerios much less likely due to fast paced unit-clumping mechanisms and retreating into a higher advantage location. Another thing of RTS games is that units should have high micro potentials. LaLush explored that pretty well with Depth of Gameplay. Units that have high microability in SC2 are the Stalkers, Marines, Banelings, Medivac drops, Roaches/Infestors, Reapers, Banshees and Vikings. BW had MnMs, Lurkers, Mutalisks, Corsairs, Vultures, Wraith, HTs, Shuttle combos, Defilers, Carriers just much more units potential of microing. We can conclude that in terms of gameplay, BW definitely have an edge over SC2. I've been hearing some horrible stuff on SC2's B.net 2.0 but in my time playing SC2, I wasn't playing for the community aspect of the game but rather just plain lattering so I can't comment on it. Very broad generalization of RTS games. You meant Starcraft2 RTS (Or seems Brood War, since SC2 took out some micro aspects of the game and you are comparing it to BW) games should have units with high micro potential. There are great RTS games not reliant on micro like SC. | ||
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Squat
Sweden7978 Posts
On January 12 2014 08:13 Wombat_NI wrote: Hm, true Squat. That said IMO the model that suits SC best would actually be pay-to-play, one Id be happy to go with Maybe, I just have a hard time seeing that working in a world of F2P competition. WoW is pretty much the last MMO with a sub fee, every other brand has abandoned that model, and from what I heard about Titan, even blizzard won't go that route anymore. It's kind of the same trouble the music industry is having with torrenting and MP3 rips, it's really hard to compete with free stuff. You need a product that is just crushingly superior if you want people to pay in that environment. I think even the staunchest supporters of SC2 would be hard pressed to argue that this is the case here. | ||
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Chaggi
Korea (South)1936 Posts
On January 12 2014 07:24 Squat wrote: The model of: make game, sell game, make expo, sell expo, done, is just horribly outdated. That's how you made games in 2002. It is a model that gives you no incentive to invest time and money into improving your product a year or so after release, you have already sold 99% of every copy you are likely to sell. I refuse to believe that Blizzard is unaware of the massively negative backlash regarding symmetrical economies, protoss in general, terrible terrible damage etc. I also believe they have at least a vague idea of how to change some, or all of this. I think they looked at the problems, looked at the amount of money and time that would be needed(basically a remake of the gameplay, so quite a bit), and said fuck this. There just isn't a monetary incentive for them to take any huge steps. They have a single 40 dollar expo left to sell in a niche market with a stale demographic and no real potential for growth, and then it's over, they have no more money to make off of SC2. If they had gone F2P and promoted the fuck out of the game in 2010, who knows. Just another huge "what if". Out only realistic recourse are things like Starbow, which why I am so excited. IMO it should be in every SC player and fan's interest to push shit like that as hard as humanly possible. That is the future of the game. It has been amply demonstrated by now that any hope placed in Blizzard is sorely misplaced. Either the community will carry the game, or it will fizzle out in a few years. It would be very interesting to see a study on the average age of viewers and players in the big esports games. I am willing to bet we SC people would be the old men with no real country. Not exactly a picture of a bright future. I'd agree but why push WCS as hard as they are? They easily could've held out for 2-3 more years (assuming LoTV is coming next year, late 2014/2015) and let the trend of 2011/2012 keep going. It's not like these problems just popped up recently. People have been complaining about design issues (read: Protoss is awful) for a LONG time. We as a community probably don't help with pitchforking everything, but I honestly believe that if they were more transparent, more willing to say they fucked up and actually get the community to help, something would come of it. We as a community have done, and probably are willing to do a lot in terms of throwing out ideas, testing new ideas, and if given the tools, to implement them ourselves. It's just silly that Blizzard isn't addressing it, rather choosing to tell us how stupid/ignorant we are. | ||
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Chaggi
Korea (South)1936 Posts
On January 12 2014 08:23 Squat wrote: Maybe, I just have a hard time seeing that working in a world of F2P competition. WoW is pretty much the last MMO with a sub fee, every other brand has abandoned that model, and from what I heard about Titan, even blizzard won't go that route anymore. It's kind of the same trouble the music industry is having with torrenting and MP3 rips, it's really hard to compete with free stuff. You need a product that is just crushingly superior if you want people to pay in that environment. I think even the staunchest supporters of SC2 would be hard pressed to argue that this is the case here. Without really knowing how the entire cost structure works at Blizzard in respects to SC2, we really don't know F2P is the best way to go or not. Though, one of the reasons that SC2 is still so successful is that there's really no other RTS games to go to. BW? Killed by Blizzard. WC3? Alive only in China. There's nothing really new that can compete with SC2 and for better or worse, that's probably gonna be the reality of it. RTS 1v1 games by nature aren't really that popular, whereas MOBAs/team types of games are just gonna have more viewers/players. | ||
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TotalBiscuit
United Kingdom5437 Posts
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Grumbels
Netherlands7028 Posts
(I'm not being entirely serious, but still...) | ||
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bo1b
Australia12814 Posts
On January 12 2014 08:28 TotalBiscuit wrote: F2P is not going to work unless they redesign the entire netcode. You think hacking is bad now? Wait until you don't have to pay $60 to get back in after you get banned... holy shit If you had to buy access to units or skins or something, and access to other blizzard games linked on your account was in jeopardy I wonder how much hacking would change, if at all. | ||
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Chaggi
Korea (South)1936 Posts
On January 12 2014 08:34 bo1b wrote: If you had to buy access to units or skins or something, and access to other blizzard games linked on your account was in jeopardy I wonder how much hacking would change, if at all. the assumption is that hackers probably won't buy skins or anything like that imo I would pay money to have access to additional ladders, like $20 per ladder. I'd get 1 for each race + random | ||
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