EPTYeah apologies man should have at least asked permission beforehand
[D] Athleticism for Athleticism's Sake in SC - Page 2
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WombaT
Northern Ireland26244 Posts
Yeah apologies man should have at least asked permission beforehand | ||
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sluggaslamoo
Australia4494 Posts
You could watch a "boring macro game" where two players just produce units and a-move them in BW and it would still be really interesting. This is why SC2 shouldn't have MBS and "good pathing". Flash had made so many units and spent so much time making units from barracks that he couldn't even stimhack them all SC2-style to the base, so they just marched on move command and still won because Flash's macro was just that good. This is also the reason why smaller armies could win in BW more easily, because smaller armies were always more efficient as players would spend less time building units and more time microing and focusing on the battle. | ||
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Ravomat
Germany422 Posts
On April 29 2014 20:55 sluggaslamoo wrote: Well if we are going to compare and make fun of BW over SC2 (even though that horse was beaten to death)... You could watch a "boring macro game" where two players just produce units and a-move them in BW and it would still be really interesting. This is why SC2 shouldn't have MBS and "good pathing". + Show Spoiler + https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXH8eCcvQMI Flash had made so many units and spent so much time making units from barracks that he couldn't even stimhack them all SC2-style to the base, so they just marched on move command and still won because Flash's macro was just that good. This is also the reason why smaller armies could win in BW more easily, because smaller armies were always more efficient as players would spend less time building units and more time microing and focusing on the battle. What is fun or interesting about spending most of your time making units? Wouldn't it be better if you could spend that time actually fighting your battles? I understand the appeal of pristine macro I just don't understand obsessing about it. Wouldn't you prefer actually seeing what a guy does more than the results of it? | ||
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Mahavishnu
Canada396 Posts
Let's pretend (really don't need to) starcraft is music. No musician will play as mechanically adept as when they have "warmed up". Warming up is being comfortable with something that is purely physical, there is a biological portion of the consideration of athleticism in any case! Mechanically adept-itude-ness is a state of mind of the state of our physicality, the feedback of our attitude comes from the vigor that our physical impulses react to. Now, Starcraft is a game. (for pretend ^_-) Strategery, mindhaxgames, decisions-making, improvisation, these have been found to be seemingly at the heart of our brain in terms of natural adept-a-tud-inal respons-ical bits. Anyways warm up, always, even in game, OBVIOUSLY. Mentally and physically at the same time, by s-APMming. | ||
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Gowerly
United Kingdom916 Posts
The SupCom reference was interesting, as SupCom has a higher APM ceiling than any other RTS out there. In SC2, at some point things stop being useful. Sure, you can micro your immortal in a warp prism to dodge Marauder shots, but you don't have many immortals. In SupCom you have potentially 1000 units that you can micro to dodge the simulated shots of 1000 other units. Even 5000 APM wouldn't be enough. I think that pushes the micro requirement too far. When discussing the resources for a game, one of them is, indeed, your ability to "think" for want of a better word. How long it takes you to perform your actions impacts how many actions you can do in a timeframe. You can reduce the time it takes to do those actions by practicing them. It takes me a long time to lay tumours and do injects because - I play random - I'm not very good If I were to practice and practice these until they were second nature, then I wouldn't need to think about them and the impact of doing them on my think bank would be greatly reduced. All of these things, the macro, the micro, the decision making (army composition, choice of attack location, choosing what actions to prioritise over other actions) are what makes up a player. Until we can quantify those (hur hur plugging my own work), it'll be difficult to show what brings people/games out on top and when it's just doing it for the sake of doing it/giving players something to do. | ||
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shin_toss
Philippines2589 Posts
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And G
Germany491 Posts
Theoretically, SC2 has this sort of "interesting" decisions with MULEs, chronoboost and injecting larvae all requiring energy. In practice however, there is no real decision there (outside of specific build orders) since banking up Nexus/Queen/OC energy is pretty much always bad, and it's up to the opponent to prevent a player from using that energy to bolster the economy by forcing scans/transfuses/etc. Automining is good because there is no situation where you would want an SCV to sit idly besides the CC, and when you're sending that SCV to work, you're doing a chore. Being good at doing chores is not something that should be rewarded. Basically, if I were to design a SC-like RTS, for everything a player needs to do that requires atheliticsm I would ask the following question: Does it involve non-trivial decision-making that is directed against your opponent? If no, then it needs to go, or at least the trivial parts need to be automated. I realize that since SC2 has traditionally had a lot of chores, many people have come to enjoy this twitchiness and become uneasy when there's a second or two in the game where they don't actually need to click anything. To equate this twitchiness with RTS is a fallacy, though. RTS are not about fitting as many menial tasks as possible in a limited timeframe, RTS are about making limited-information decisions under time pressure and executing them as best as possible. To say that JaKaTaK misunderstands RTS is ludicrous. Also, if you know anything about sports, you'll know that it requires money, and that this money comes from viewers (whether directly or indirectly via sponsors). This means that the large majority of viewers of the RTS of the future will not actually play that game at a high level. A game that aims to become that RTS of the future therefore requires on-screen action that is impressive (and exciting) to someone who has watched lots of games but doesn't play the game very often. Ling surrounds, tank positioning, burrowed banelings, DTs blocking floating OCs, these are the sort of things SC3 needs. Not players clicking 400 times per minute to do the most trivial menial tasks. | ||
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Ravomat
Germany422 Posts
On April 29 2014 21:27 Gowerly wrote: In SupCom you have potentially 1000 units that you can micro to dodge the simulated shots of 1000 other units. Even 5000 APM wouldn't be enough. I think that pushes the micro requirement too far. Actually the number of units changes nothing about the difficulty of micro. You'd just micro differently. The micro scales from single units to increasingly bigger groups of units. Mitigating damage is also not the only thing to achieve with micro, you can also maximize your own damage output by flanking the opponent. What you said about SC2 is also true here: keeping 1 unit alive when you have 1000 isn't useful. You don't try to keep every unit alive but rather as many as possible. On April 29 2014 21:27 Gowerly wrote: When discussing the resources for a game, one of them is, indeed, your ability to "think" for want of a better word. You should try to clarify because I think this is wrong. You do not ever think in a game. You do whatever you decided to do until you have to react using responses you thought about beforehand. This is your strategy. The only thing to think about ingame is what tactics to employ given the information you have. On April 29 2014 21:36 And G wrote: I realize that since SC2 has traditionally had a lot of chores, many people have come to enjoy this twitchiness and become uneasy when there's a second or two in the game where they don't actually need to click anything. To equate this twitchiness with RTS is a fallacy, though. RTS are not about fitting as many menial tasks as possible in a limited timeframe, RTS are about making limited-information decisions under time pressure and executing them as best as possible. I agree with your post I just want to add something. Sometimes when reading about what makes Brood War the superior game to SC2 it feels to me that Starcraft is the only RTS people know and the mere thought that a good game doesn't need to have a lot of tedious tasks is quite alien to them. Especially when MBS, auto-mine and size of control groups come up. | ||
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Gowerly
United Kingdom916 Posts
On April 29 2014 22:48 Ravomat wrote: Actually the number of units changes nothing about the difficulty of micro. You'd just micro differently. The micro scales from single units to increasingly bigger groups of units. Mitigating damage is also not the only thing to achieve with micro, you can also maximize your own damage output by flanking the opponent. What you said about SC2 is also true here: keeping 1 unit alive when you have 1000 isn't useful. You don't try to keep every unit alive but rather as many as possible. If you can micro to keep one more unit alive than your opponent, then it's a victory, you've made a more cost efficient engagement. I know in SupCom it's less important because resources are infinite. However, it's still true. The fewer units die, the less time it will take to rebuild your army. This scales. If you can micro enough to keep 2 alive it's even better. 3 even more than that, all the way up to 1000. If you can dance your units around so that your units are hitting and your opponent's aren't, then you're going to win. Sure, large army positioning is great, flanking and such, but when it comes down to it in SupCom: You can dodge bullets. As long as that's true, you can micro individual units (all the way to 1000) to win the fights, which will always beat positioning. With AoE units, beam units, etc, this is less true, but outside of Experimentals and maybe strat bombers, most units just have projectile weapons. You should try to clarify because I think this is wrong. You do not ever think in a game. You do whatever you decided to do until you have to react using responses you thought about beforehand. This is your strategy. The only thing to think about ingame is what tactics to employ given the information you have. You won't win games by just blindly going in and doing what you set out to do. You modify your strategy based on what your opponent does. You don't ling/bling vs mech, you modify your game to match your opponent. This is thought. You can optimise thought by making it second nature, but it's still thought. You use thought to: - Position your army - Perform "Automatic" tasks (such as placing tumours, building supply generators, using chronoboost, dropping mules, doing scans) - Building/Composing your army - Using "Micro" to move your army in fights, to use spells How you prioritise where your thought goes and how effeciently you use your thought can determine how well you do in your game. | ||
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Penguinator
United States837 Posts
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TheoMikkelsen
Denmark196 Posts
For instance, I believe you can use new information in the UI tab to really improve the skill level. If you allow players to see their income, their units lost, their total units (and clickable/selectable through hotkeys by individual hotkeying) as well as tabs to show their upgrades, I think most players, also koreans, would see this kind of information as a drastic improvement to strategical gameplay. Of course, with lots of new tabs we need transparency so we still maintain most of our overview of the game. Also, if the "custom hotkeys and cameras" would be improved by increeasing camera location hotkeys to 20 as well as army hotkeys to 20, im sure stuff like "b+1, b+2, b+3, b+4, b+5" would be useful in some way. Personally I think you should be able to bind which unit type you wish to "select all army hotkey", so for each viking, ghost, templar, infestor, stalker, prism etc on the map, you select all of only that unit type. This can be done similarily by allowing alternative hotkey selection instead of only alt and shift. (g+1, g+2, g+3 etc.) Having basically limitless possiblities for hotkeys and custom UI allows players to really outclass other players through handling more information which only helps you if you pay attention,. I also think blizzard should make camera locations save each time you load the map. | ||
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KingAce
United States471 Posts
Game design completely changes when you're designing a game for competition as opposed for entertainment. I believe the reason Blizzard took the steps it took to make the game more CONVENIENT, has a lot less to do with efficiency and more to do with lowering the level of entrance for casual gamers. Any changes that appeal to casual players usually piss off veteran players of most competitive franchises. It's a marketing strategy, and it usually undermines the competitive side of the game. So as an Esport exclusively some of these changes were to me, a negative. The higher the skill ceiling, the more complex the mechanics, the more entertaining the Esport. | ||
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Deleted User 97295
1137 Posts
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Cheerio
Ukraine3178 Posts
On April 29 2014 17:01 sertas wrote: well sc2 replaced moving workers to mine and 12 unit selection with other artificial macro functions like injects. I prefered broodwars more straightforward gameplay. I think the limited unit selection helps make the game strategic, if your units dont clump as much and you can spread out squads of 12 you can place your untis strategically easier. This been talked to death ofc. so if you had a choice of formation (clumped up or spaced via increased collision range) would you be happy? | ||
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Cheerio
Ukraine3178 Posts
On April 29 2014 23:37 Laertes wrote: Someone mentioned Starbow in the thread. I think it's important that we understand what Starbow shows us compared to hots if we want to understand how APM affects esports. Starbow is down to its core, BW and SC2 mixed, the balance is primarily BW because BW proved itself more inherently balanced(Onegoal tried to base their balance on SC2 and failed horribly). Now I'm going to tell you a secret why starbow fails in some ways compared to SC2: The game is too hard. Even with some sc2 units and a clean UI and MBS and an economy that you don't have to babysit,the game is too strategically deep and no one wants to lose to someone light years better than them because no one wants to lose. If innovation faces theredbandit the top ranked player on the Starbow ladder in a Bo7, he will probably 4-0 him, such is the level of skill inherent in Starbow compared to SC2. So if Starbow is too hard for the average gamer and the average gamer won't play Starbow cause they don't like to lose, then I highly doubt any athleticism has place in esports because the easier a game is competitively (hearthstone) the more people will play it, inversely, the harder a game is the less people will play it. I dont think Starbow is strategically deeper, it's just much less figured out. | ||
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Deleted User 97295
1137 Posts
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ClueClueClue
Sweden1203 Posts
I, and many with me, like Starcraft 2 for what it is. An elitist video stating what's already been stated way too many times ain't gonna change my opinion. | ||
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Cheerio
Ukraine3178 Posts
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JaKaTaKSc2
United States2787 Posts
I did specifically explain that it was satire. No one is trying to change your opinion. The video presents a perspective on an idea. From this people have been discussing for and against this perspective and others. It's not about who is right and who is wrong but what the truths are and what conclusions can be drawn from those truths. | ||
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Ravomat
Germany422 Posts
On April 29 2014 23:07 Gowerly wrote: If you can micro to keep one more unit alive than your opponent, then it's a victory, you've made a more cost efficient engagement. I know in SupCom it's less important because resources are infinite. However, it's still true. The fewer units die, the less time it will take to rebuild your army. This scales. If you can micro enough to keep 2 alive it's even better. 3 even more than that, all the way up to 1000. If you can dance your units around so that your units are hitting and your opponent's aren't, then you're going to win. Sure, large army positioning is great, flanking and such, but when it comes down to it in SupCom: You can dodge bullets. As long as that's true, you can micro individual units (all the way to 1000) to win the fights, which will always beat positioning. With AoE units, beam units, etc, this is less true, but outside of Experimentals and maybe strat bombers, most units just have projectile weapons. I may have worded that poorly. Of course it's useful even beyond having a unit more since there is the reclaim mechanic which means additional resources for the one who can secure the position where the unit died. Everything else you said is true, too. You just missed my point. You said having a very high unit count would make micro too difficult but it's not any different to having just a few units. In a 200 vs 200 unit fight you wouldn't micro each unit individually you would always micro groups. On April 29 2014 23:07 Gowerly wrote: You won't win games by just blindly going in and doing what you set out to do. You modify your strategy based on what your opponent does. You don't ling/bling vs mech, you modify your game to match your opponent. This is thought. You can optimise thought by making it second nature, but it's still thought. You use thought to: - Position your army - Perform "Automatic" tasks (such as placing tumours, building supply generators, using chronoboost, dropping mules, doing scans) - Building/Composing your army - Using "Micro" to move your army in fights, to use spells How you prioritise where your thought goes and how effeciently you use your thought can determine how well you do in your game. I didn't say that. Also you're arguing much more game-specific than I am. What you said is more about builds than actual strategy. Generally speaking a strategy does not dictate what units to use but it describes your overall gameplan which can have branches to account for various situations. Figuring out what units to use comes after you decided on your gameplan. In your example the Zerg's strategy might be to get up to 3 bases quickly, make sure he doesn't die, scout for Terran's 3rd. If Terran didn't build a 3rd he builds purely units and defends because the lack of 3rd implies an imminent attack. If Terran did build a 3rd Zerg can either decide to go full units and try to do damage at the 3rd or try to secure 4th base and from then on prevent Terran taking any more bases. See what I did there? A strategy doesn't include specifics. If you get specific it becomes a build which is what you modify if given a reason. Just because Ling/Bling doesn't work against Mech doesn't mean the overall strategy of out-expanding Terran and keeping him contained is flawed. It just means that Ling/Bling is not the way to do it. To the thought part: I'd describe with attention but I agree with your explanation. On April 29 2014 23:26 KingAce wrote: The higher the skill ceiling, the more complex the mechanics, the more entertaining the Esport. This isn't necessarily true. Complexity doesn't imply strategic depth or entertainment factor. This discussion came up in another thread but I can't remember which one. Ideally you want maximum depth for minimal complexity. Prime example: Go. There won't be getting any new people into a sport if they cannot figure out what the hell is going on. The sport might be entertaining for those who know what is happening but it won't become very popular. | ||
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