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On July 08 2014 09:06 pure.Wasted wrote:Show nested quote +On July 08 2014 08:59 neptunusfisk wrote: What does Boxer, Flash, Thorzain, Ganzi, TLO, Taeja, Scarlett and MMA have in common?
Answer: they all developed wrist problems while playing terran. Except Scarlett, she's playing zerg.
Clearly terran players are just the weaker physiques that can't handle a exhausting game like starcraft as well as the zerg and protoss. Maru and TLO (not sure if he was Terran or Zerg at the time) round out the list as far as I know.
TLO switched from terran to zerg when he got the problems iirc
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How the hell is this balance whine thread highlighted ??
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TLO switched from Terran to Zerg because he didn't achieve much anymore with Terran.
In WoL you could do so many more builds and TLO was very innovative and surprised his opponents. But when Terran got nerfed in many patches the builds have been reduced to only a couple of standard builds. Then he changed to Zerg after a trying to play standard with Terran for a while.
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On July 08 2014 18:39 samurai80 wrote: How the hell is this balance whine thread highlighted ??
How the hell do you not understand that this is much more than just balance whining?
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France9034 Posts
Those thinking Terran is in a good spot and such articles are "opiniated nonsense/bullshit" should clearly revise their way of thinking because it is currently flawed.
I wouldn't go as far as saying there's no mistakes/no questionable numbers skewing in this article, but there's sufficient data/replays to shows the blatant catastrophic state in which terran is currently.
On July 08 2014 18:39 samurai80 wrote: How the hell is this balance whine thread highlighted ??
You think this is balance _whine_? Seriously ?
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France9034 Posts
I do think the protosses had a right to complain in the early WoL days (Hi Sad Zealot fanclub). Terran is in a worse state currently.
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On July 08 2014 13:33 Fission wrote:Show nested quote +On July 08 2014 12:57 SirPinky wrote:On July 08 2014 12:49 Fission wrote: P players are better at winning tournaments? You know, it's not really sufficient to just post stats and say "hey, OBVIOUSLY there's an issue here". We need to establish that winning more tournaments actually is a result of imbalance. LOL what? Then why the significantly skewed statistics? That's like saying, "We find a correlation between smokers and lung cancer, but we need people to keep smoking to find an exact mortality rate based on consumption." Maybe the skewed statistics are due to the fact that P players, on a whole, are better than their Z and T counterparts . + Show Spoiler +I don't actually believe this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam's_razor
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An opinionated post, but one backed up by a serious amount of statistics. Good job OP. I think if Blizzard worked closer with Korean pros then the game could have some design/balance tweaks for LotV and make it a more fun game and a game that is easier to have a better feeling of balance. It has to be done with the Korean side of sc2 e-sports though. Not just because they play at the highest level, but becuase the Koreans generally have a more mature attitude towards gaming and quite a lot of them are refreshingly unbiased. Judging by Blizzard in recent years though they seem to want to have complete dominance over their games, which I would not care about, but as RTS is flopping we could do with some changes.
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On July 08 2014 18:47 TurboMaN wrote: TLO switched from Terran to Zerg because he didn't achieve much anymore with Terran.
In WoL you could do so many more builds and TLO was very innovative and surprised his opponents. But when Terran got nerfed in many patches the builds have been reduced to only a couple of standard builds. Then he changed to Zerg after a trying to play standard with Terran for a while.
His race progression was actually something like: Random-->Terran-->Random/Zerg/Terran-->Terran-->Zerg
I think all of his switches away from Terran happened when he got frustrated with how uncreative he had to be with the race. But his random and Zerg weren't better either after those switches. (his roach drop builds vs Terran and mass mutalisk vs Zerg were quite bad compared to what was standard back then in the matchups) He basically started to get good when he made his trainingsplans and (seemed to have) accepted that regardless of the race he played (which was Zerg at that time), he needed to play more orthodox.
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On July 08 2014 21:48 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On July 08 2014 18:47 TurboMaN wrote: TLO switched from Terran to Zerg because he didn't achieve much anymore with Terran.
In WoL you could do so many more builds and TLO was very innovative and surprised his opponents. But when Terran got nerfed in many patches the builds have been reduced to only a couple of standard builds. Then he changed to Zerg after a trying to play standard with Terran for a while. His race progression was actually something like: Random-->Terran-->Zerg-->Terran-->Random-->Zerg I think all of his switches away from Terran happened when he got frustrated with how uncreative he could be with the race. But his random and Zerg weren't better either after those switches. (his roach drop builds vs Terran and mass mutalisk vs Zerg were quite bad compared to what was standard back then in the matchups) He basically started to get good when he made his trainingsplans and (seemed to have) accepted that regardless of the race he played (which was Zerg at that time), he needed to play more orthodox.
I think it was: Random --> Terran --> Zerg --> Random --> Terran --> Zerg
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On July 08 2014 21:51 Hider wrote:Show nested quote +On July 08 2014 21:48 Big J wrote:On July 08 2014 18:47 TurboMaN wrote: TLO switched from Terran to Zerg because he didn't achieve much anymore with Terran.
In WoL you could do so many more builds and TLO was very innovative and surprised his opponents. But when Terran got nerfed in many patches the builds have been reduced to only a couple of standard builds. Then he changed to Zerg after a trying to play standard with Terran for a while. His race progression was actually something like: Random-->Terran-->Zerg-->Terran-->Random-->Zerg I think all of his switches away from Terran happened when he got frustrated with how uncreative he could be with the race. But his random and Zerg weren't better either after those switches. (his roach drop builds vs Terran and mass mutalisk vs Zerg were quite bad compared to what was standard back then in the matchups) He basically started to get good when he made his trainingsplans and (seemed to have) accepted that regardless of the race he played (which was Zerg at that time), he needed to play more orthodox. I think it was: Random --> Terran --> Zerg --> Random --> Terran --> Zerg
Yup, realized I made a mistake.  Not sure how his first switch played out exactly. I think it was like you said, at first to Zerg but then "whatever I'll go full random".
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We should be thinking of APM as a resource. The average APM of a top player is around 300-400 APM. With this many actions they have to command armies, build units, scout, etc. They can't realistically gain more APM. Protoss and Zerg mechanics regarding macro and army control can be completed with fewer APM to yield the greatest result. Terran on the other hand must use the majority of their APM on their army while they neglect counter attacks and macro.
Unit Production: Larva mechanic and warp ins allow unit production to be smooth, requiring little APM to operate (ie you only make units when you need to). Terran have to make units cyclically, meaning they must spend APM on unit production on a regular basis at all times, not just when needed.
Buildings: To a lesser extent, Terran does not have a "build and forget" mechanic like Protoss and Zerg. Zerg uses of the drone, Protoss can drop it and leave. Terran building costs more APM (although not significantly) but it adds strain on an already stressed resource.
Army: Zerg and Protoss have many move and attack units (melee, short ranged, free units, mobile siege) that don't cost much APM to use. In every Terran match up you clearly see the number of groups they must control (ie splitting, kitting) to achieve peak efficiency and this costs massive APM. So much so that they often must neglect other areas that need APM (dropping mules, buildings, unit production, harassment, etc). When there is an engagement Terran cannot take their eyes off it at the risk of losing everything. This is why Lings and Zealots harassment is so strong when the main armies are engaged. Terran cannot afford to look away and the result is as we see often, production or mineral lines are massacred with virtually no reaction (which you will note they often do not react until after the main battle has ended).
Harassment: Send Zealots/Templar or Lings to someplace and you don't have to watch them. Click and forget, its cheap on all resources including APM. Terran harassment is significant more costly on APM and more risky (though more mobile). If you do not specifically command a drop it will do virtually no damage and you will lose everything. Protoss can warp in and Zerg can hatch units and have creep speed, they can answer harassment instantly. Terran has no way to answer harassment, they must prepare for it in advanced (at the cost of army supply) or split a portion of their army when needed (costs APM).
In total, the APM needed to efficiently use Terran is much higher but they realistically can only have 300-400, which is as much as an opponent of equal skill would have. APM is a resource that is spent just like any other resource but Blizzard hasn't accounted for "APM costs" for races as a legitimate resource concern.
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300-400 is amongst the faster players, 250 is still common at a very high level
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On July 08 2014 22:55 Foreverkul wrote: We should be thinking of APM as a resource. The average APM of a top player is around 300-400 APM. With this many actions they have to command armies, build units, scout, etc. They can't realistically gain more APM. Protoss and Zerg mechanics regarding macro and army control can be completed with fewer APM to yield the greatest result. Terran on the other hand must use the majority of their APM on their army while they neglect counter attacks and macro. Bullshit. Zergs seem to have the most APM from the samples we usually see. (also on my current and past ladder levels from high diamond to high masters, gathered from aftermatch statistics as T and Z)
On July 08 2014 22:55 Foreverkul wrote: Unit Production: Larva mechanic and warp ins allow unit production to be smooth, requiring little APM to operate (ie you only make units when you need to). Terran have to make units cyclically, meaning they must spend APM on unit production on a regular basis at all times, not just when needed. Play some zerg. Good luck not constantly producing units, sitting on 6drones, 1overlord and 0buildings.
Buildings: To a lesser extent, Terran does not have a "build and forget" mechanic like Protoss and Zerg. Zerg uses of the drone, Protoss can drop it and leave. Terran building costs more APM (although not significantly) but it adds strain on an already stressed resource. And even on the toplevel we sometime see an idle or two SCV sitting somewhere. So always sending your units back is obviously not on requirement to be in the GSL and the game is being balanced around Terran players that are allowed to forget about it sometimes. Not to mention that, as you say it's tiny. We could also be discussing how easy it is that supply depots don't have to be rallied and repositioned all the time like OLs have to and stupid stuff like that, but somehow you seem to forget everything that is not an argument helping your cause (creepspread, whats-up with that?), while completely insignificant shit gets a whole section.
Army: Zerg and Protoss have many move and attack units (melee, short ranged, free units, mobile siege) that don't cost much APM to use. In every Terran match up you clearly see the number of groups they must control (ie splitting, kitting) to achieve peak efficiency and this costs massive APM. So much so that they often must neglect other areas that need APM (dropping mules, buildings, unit production, harassment, etc). When there is an engagement Terran cannot take their eyes off it at the risk of losing everything. This is why Lings and Zealots harassment is so strong when the main armies are engaged. Terran cannot afford to look away and the result is as we see often, production or mineral lines are massacred with virtually no reaction (which you will note they often do not react until after the main battle has ended).
Zerg in general is being played with mapcontrol. For that you have to constantly be moving around with zerglings, roaches, mutas... Ever wondered why you don't build a 4th base at 10mins against good, but clearly defensively-playing Zerg players? Because they will attack that 4th base at 10mins, because they will be constantly roaming the map.
Harassment: Send Zealots/Templar or Lings to someplace and you don't have to watch them. Click and forget, its cheap on all resources including APM. Terran harassment is significant more costly on APM and more risky (though more mobile). If you do not specifically command a drop it will do virtually no damage and you will lose everything. Protoss can warp in and Zerg can hatch units and have creep speed, they can answer harassment instantly. Terran has no way to answer harassment, they must prepare for it in advanced (at the cost of army supply) or split a portion of their army when needed (costs APM).
Terran: unload your dropship, all your units will stay where they are and all attack. Zergling: running all over the place, attacking buildings instead of workers and getting stuck in every tiny choke point trying to kill a spawning marine instead of the enemy mineral line. (not meant to start some war on what is harder. just saying that what you describe is complete bullshit. afk zerglings without hold position micro or target fire achieve hardly anything, meanwhile marines can kill whole mineral lines without their AI bugging out on something else; pros and cons, pros and cons)
In total, the APM needed to efficiently use Terran is much higher but they realistically can only have 300-400, which is as much as an opponent of equal skill would have. APM is a resource that is spent just like any other resource but Blizzard hasn't accounted for "APM costs" for races as a legitimate resource concern.
yeah, in total. You did describe a total game right now, hence you have a total picture. Totally...
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This isn't about balance but I think it's still true. Terran is the race where the most amount of straight up annoying things can go wrong.
Building a barracks? There's a chance that your opponent's scouting harvester will kill or delay your building SCV, and there's nothing you can do other than pray to the RNG gods.
Terran units tend to have low hp and high dps. This is nice if you make 0% mistakes per game. There is no forgiveness in this race.
Slowest production in game. Not even gonna go into detail for this one it should be obvious.
Every unit *needs* to be microd in order to earn the right to *survive*. Not only that, but buildings *need* to be microd, too (build addon, lift off, switch tech, etc). This is not the race to play if you just came home drunk on a Saturday night.
Terran takes the most time *and* apm to max out to 200/200. (By about one minute. Day9 did a daily on this). Despite mules, Terran has the most difficult macro.
Ugh. I'm not saying that these are balance complaints, but when Terran is UP like it is now, these "small" things make the game fucking impossible to play. You gotta put up with all this annoying bullshit, *then* you lose.
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Northern Ireland24285 Posts
It's just clearly harder, by a distance at the sub-Kr pro level. Even at that level now they're not exactly in a great spot as the OP demonstrates pretty thoroughly
I actually enjoy the mechanical difficulty personally, but it can be maddening sometimes to lose to terrible players. Yeah I can improve in a multitude of areas so it's not pertinent to balance, more to an enjoyment factor.
I don't know how to fix it either, wonder what direction LoTV will take. My ideal would be to make the other races benefit more from good micro and get punished for sloppiness rather than making Terran too user-friendly. Give Terrans more flexibility, especially vP in the early game without taking away the other race's capacity in that sense .
Bar the sheer amount of stuff that is hard to sniff out, I do appreciate that Protoss having a lot of flexibility in the early game in PvT is a good thing.
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On July 09 2014 00:06 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On July 08 2014 22:55 Foreverkul wrote: We should be thinking of APM as a resource. The average APM of a top player is around 300-400 APM. With this many actions they have to command armies, build units, scout, etc. They can't realistically gain more APM. Protoss and Zerg mechanics regarding macro and army control can be completed with fewer APM to yield the greatest result. Terran on the other hand must use the majority of their APM on their army while they neglect counter attacks and macro. Bullshit. Zergs seem to have the most APM from the samples we usually see. (also on my current and past ladder levels from high diamond to high masters, gathered from aftermatch statistics as T and Z) Show nested quote +On July 08 2014 22:55 Foreverkul wrote: Unit Production: Larva mechanic and warp ins allow unit production to be smooth, requiring little APM to operate (ie you only make units when you need to). Terran have to make units cyclically, meaning they must spend APM on unit production on a regular basis at all times, not just when needed. Play some zerg. Good luck not constantly producing units, sitting on 6drones, 1overlord and 0buildings.
Let's say that Zerg macro and Terran micro equalize each other in terms of action requirement.
The difference is that Zerg macro is "rote actions," while Terran micro is "dynamic actions." Yes, it takes a lot of clicks to produce fifty Zerglings, or morph fifty Zerglings into Banelings, but once you make that single strategic decision, the actions themselves do not in any way depend on the context of the game. Terran micro depends completely on the context of the game by necessity - you're not microing in your own base but against what your opponent is doing. Marine splitting, for instance, tests the player's ability to parse the battlefield for necessary information and react appropriately with split-second timing. Macro simply doesn't work like that.
At best, this is a superficial problem because dynamic actions look more impressive than rote ones. Compare how many TvZs make it into top 10 games per year vs. how many PvZs make the cut. Surely the Zerg macro just as hard, so why aren't those games as loved by most viewers? Because rote actions are as far from "no actions at all" as they are from contextual, dynamic actions. At worst? This is a huge skill requirement discrepancy. It might be tough to be AMAZING at Zerg macro, but it's easy enough for a Korean to not fuck it up. Terran micro? No one, not even Maru, is guaranteed not to fuck it up in any game he plays, ever.
Zerg in general is being played with mapcontrol. For that you have to constantly be moving around with zerglings, roaches, mutas... Ever wondered why you don't build a 4th base at 10mins against good, but clearly defensively-playing Zerg players? Because they will attack that 4th base at 10mins, because they will be constantly roaming the map.
Same thing. As good as moving units around is (better than not doing anything), it doesn't hold a candle to having to do it in a pressure cooker situation (Marine splits vs Banelings). Select Zerglings, click on minimap, and it doesn't really matter if they live or die. It doesn't force constant, dynamic interaction from the Zerg player.
Show nested quote + Harassment: Send Zealots/Templar or Lings to someplace and you don't have to watch them. Click and forget, its cheap on all resources including APM. Terran harassment is significant more costly on APM and more risky (though more mobile). If you do not specifically command a drop it will do virtually no damage and you will lose everything. Protoss can warp in and Zerg can hatch units and have creep speed, they can answer harassment instantly. Terran has no way to answer harassment, they must prepare for it in advanced (at the cost of army supply) or split a portion of their army when needed (costs APM).
Terran: unload your dropship, all your units will stay where they are and all attack. Zergling: running all over the place, attacking buildings instead of workers and getting stuck in every tiny choke point trying to kill a spawning marine instead of the enemy mineral line. (not meant to start some war on what is harder. just saying that what you describe is complete bullshit. afk zerglings without hold position micro or target fire achieve hardly anything, meanwhile marines can kill whole mineral lines without their AI bugging out on something else; pros and cons, pros and cons)
Let me paint a picture for you:
2 Medivacs get sent across the map. You're not babysitting them the entire way, so you have to watch the minimap to make sure they don't run into trouble. Suddenly you see red dots on the minimap, so you center screen on them and now have a decision to make. That decision is based on the following: are the dots Mutas, Zerglings, what? Let's say they're Zerglings, you afterburn to get into the expansion ASAP and unload the Marines, Stim them, and start killing Drones. This part's pretty easy. There's a Spore attacking your Medivacs so you have to move them out of the way, but not so far that they won't be useful. The Drones get pulled off the mineral line, so you have to give chase. Again, not that tough. Suddenly, 20 Zerglings and 10 Banes stream into the natural.
Your Medivacs spot them early, so you've got time to maneuver. You stutter step your Marines back to the minerals to create a chokepoint, meanwhile targeting the Banelings because they're 1) expensive and 2) the biggest threat. You get into an advantageous position between the minerals and mow down a dozen Zerglings without much effort, but the Marines are getting low on HP, Queens are coming, so it's time to GTFO. You load up and get out. Suddenly, a small flock of Mutalists appears. You can't afford to lose the Medivacs, so you use the "drop Marines without stopping" trick to get the Marines fighting the Mutas, stimming them in small groups as they come out to maximize damage output. The Zerg isn't paying attention to his Mutas and you have a chance to kill them! You pull back your Medivacs to heal the Marines. The Mutas are dropping!
Suddenly a clump of Banes appears rolling down at your Marines, you stutter as long as you can, and then deciding that the trade will be worth it for you, instead of picking up and leaving you split your Marines as best you can, making the Banes cost-ineffective. Your Marines are all dead and you afterburn those Medivacs back to base.
Not every single Terran drop is that involving for the Terran. But the POTENTIAL is always there. The Terran has to be ON POINT, not only with knowing how to take advantage of these DIFFERENT situations as they come up, but being able to execute that with split second efficiency the second it's called for, and it can be called for at any time because that depends not on himself but on his opponent. (I don't mean to imply that if at the very beginning of that scenario, those had been Mutas instead of Zerglings, and the Terran just lost his Medivacs straight up without accomplishing a thing, he automatically loses 10/10 games. But Marines and Medivacs are core army units and losing them with nothing to show for it is a huge deal. Every second they're in enemy territory is a calculated risk. Zergling and Zealot runbys, on the other hand, are expendable.) Splitting Marines vs stutter stepping Marines vs hot-dropping Marines one-by-one all call for completely different mechanical reactions, and the Terran has to make an on the spot decision as to which one he's going to try.
Are Zergling runbys more involving than A+move? Yes. Sometimes a tiny bit, sometimes a fair bit. Are they ANYWHERE near as involving as Medivac drops? Not even remotely close. The most exciting thing involving a Zergling in recent memory was when Hyun used a single Ling to target a lowered Depot while a huge engagement was going on in Taeja's natural, and by the time the action was moving to Taeja's main, Taeja tried to raise the Depot but realized he couldn't. Hyun was one step ahead of him. It was a fantastic move that cost Taeja the entire game. But even if all Zerg started doing it, that's still not enough because it's not as complex as what Terrans have to do, and it's not a situation that comes up all that often. It's only relevant during all-ins at the nat, and at absolutely no other point in the game. You can both plan and execute that move before the engagement even starts.
Some people say that this is "asymmetric race design," and it might qualify as that, but it's definitely bad race design. We could make a race whose CC built no workers and had the ability "Click here, 50/50 you win the game or lose the game right now." That would be a different race too, but it's a fucking terrible one, because it simply fails to test its players and hold them up to the higher standards of the other races. Even if the 50/50 means it will be the most balanced race in the history of BW and SC2.
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On July 09 2014 00:06 Big J wrote:Show nested quote +On July 08 2014 22:55 Foreverkul wrote: We should be thinking of APM as a resource. The average APM of a top player is around 300-400 APM. With this many actions they have to command armies, build units, scout, etc. They can't realistically gain more APM. Protoss and Zerg mechanics regarding macro and army control can be completed with fewer APM to yield the greatest result. Terran on the other hand must use the majority of their APM on their army while they neglect counter attacks and macro. Bullshit. Zergs seem to have the most APM from the samples we usually see. (also on my current and past ladder levels from high diamond to high masters, gathered from aftermatch statistics as T and Z) Show nested quote +On July 08 2014 22:55 Foreverkul wrote: Unit Production: Larva mechanic and warp ins allow unit production to be smooth, requiring little APM to operate (ie you only make units when you need to). Terran have to make units cyclically, meaning they must spend APM on unit production on a regular basis at all times, not just when needed. Play some zerg. Good luck not constantly producing units, sitting on 6drones, 1overlord and 0buildings.
When I tried teaching my girlfriend Starcraft 2 for awhile, her Zerg APM was about 2x her Terran or Protoss APM simply because of the way production works. She didn't use creep spread / scout with her overlords at all, but clicking 6 f1 v f2 v f3 v then pressing d and holding down z (or whatever hotkey) then ctrl click eggs and add to control group gave her 500+ APM spikes and took her very little time after ~1 week. This used higher APM than the equivalent Terran process, which for my hotkey setup making only marine + mauader / tank / medivac, 6 + y + h X number of times, 7 + u X number of times, 8 + i X number of times, where X = production you have available (could also use tab since all production is hotkeyed to 6 as well to make rally points easier), then move screen to where your rally point is set and add units to correct control groups, remember to click f1 or f2 or f3 to make depots periodically not even worrying about building placement which is a huge deal, remember to be adding production at specific times in places where add-ons can go and wont block units out, when I tried to teach her any build order that included add-on swapping she just stared at me pleadingly.
My Zerg apm might be pretty consistently 30-50% higher than my Terran apm, but I personally feel like Terran production is far, far more demanding mechanically ( edit: ) and requires far more decision making, and takes up far more time.
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