On July 03 2014 05:19 Ajukrejzi wrote: Increasing the boost speed can be really good escaping mutalisks in TvZ, often you see Zerg cathing medivacs (guess its a risk dropping but something you have to do to stress or create a diversion) and zergs got pretty good defending and/or penetrate terran drop timing. What i've heard, some terrans think it's really difficult against ultra/viper compositions.
I mean if they moved at 7 speed it would also help avoid Muta, but the point of the Muta is precisely to stop the drops.
I don't thinik drop ships need to be faster. They're already a fucking pain in the ass. Dropships are not the reason Terrans are losing. Lack of splash vs. banelings and susceptibility to Protoss allins are the reasons they are losing.
What would be interesting to see with the insta-drop Medivac proposal is when a smaller flock of Mutas is chasing a Medivac, the Medivac can unload and stim all 8 Marines at once which can make Zerg pay for trying to pick off the drop.
However, that's the only plus. The negative effect it would have on doomdrops by far outweighs it. And no, Medivacs are fast enough already. Terran needs to have a stronger standing army, not a faster hit-and-run force.
On July 03 2014 05:24 Dingodile wrote: Did they patch any WoL units in HotS? I feel they only change HotS units to avoid to say that HotS (units) is a failure.
Reaper - built in speed damage change regeneration Battlecruiser - damage change Raven - seeker change Tank - comes with siege mode Ghost - comes with energy
Roach - burrow moves faster Hydra - upgrades for it Overseer - moves faster
Carrier - more microable DT - shrine is cheaper Pylon - low ground cant power high ground anymore
I didnt mean the change with sc2 HotS Release but afterward. I see some of your list that happened (Hydra attack speed etc).
That's one of my arguments. The ratio was even at the beginning of HotS, when terran was perceived to be the best race (whether because of imbalance or because others hadn't adapted yet, doesn't matter). If what you're saying was true, there should have been more terrans than the other races. Instead it was just even.
But that's not neccsarily true for two reasons;
1) First of all it takes a while for the overpowered race to start being overrepresented. (at least through Aliguac statistics).
2) Unless a race is considered OP for a significant while,and too a large degree (such as what we see today) you shuold not trust common balance complaints. Imagine this (hypothetical) scenario: Race X is really UP, and almost all of it's players are performing poorly and haven't had any results. For this reason, the players of race X aren't considered very good and thus not considered very good. Race X gets a patch, which makes it's balanced and the players starts performing a lot better. Now suddenly many of these players who previously weren't considered very good starts getting much better results --> Some people (mistakenly) think race X is OP.
In this situation it is a ton more useful to look at broader statistical metrics which you can calculate from Aliguac numbers to see whether a race actually is UP or whether people simply are confusing a chance in balance with absolute balance assymetries.
On July 03 2014 05:24 Dingodile wrote: Did they patch any WoL units in HotS? I feel they only change HotS units to avoid to say that HotS (units) is a failure.
Reaper - built in speed damage change regeneration Battlecruiser - damage change Raven - seeker change Tank - comes with siege mode Ghost - comes with energy
Roach - burrow moves faster Hydra - upgrades for it Overseer - moves faster
Carrier - more microable DT - shrine is cheaper Pylon - low ground cant power high ground anymore
DT speed buff didn't go through. Thank fucking christ it didn't.
That list is also forgetting Thor getting 250mm changed to high/low impact rounds, medivac speed boost and hellions being able to change into hellbats.
Also the hydra and siege tank received 10% increase to their rate of fires
On July 03 2014 03:38 Wombat_NI wrote: Dwf, is PO's potency at a specific timing window the biggest issue in the matchup, is it map sizes (albeit Alterzim is going thank fuck), is it just the difficulty in lategame control or what is the primary issue with TvP, for you?
Pretty much all HotS TvP issues stem from the MSC. The speeding of Protoss development and the huge asymmetry in options by early game all come from there. Protoss can tech too quickly because they have 2 Photon Overcharges (one at 5'30, the other at 8'30) before the Medivac push. As for options, the MSC killed countless Terran openings while expanding Protoss' ones.
TvP 2 rack expand 8.3, even if u go fast robo after 1gate fe, first colossus will be barely out...
A Colossus was never needed to hold a stim timing. Gate units and possibly one Immortal were enough even in WoL.
This is completely untrue. Maybe you could forcefield them out for 15 or 30 seconds, but Gateway units alone have never been able to hold a 1/1 stim bio push so long as the Terran has middle to good control.
Never talked about 1/1.
Does YoDa commit here? Nope; he doesn't because he knows he gets dismantled by Forcefield if he tries to engage. His 3 rax stim timing—and he even has CS here—is refuted without any Colossus needed; and Terran would not have more than 12 Marines 3 Marauders at 7'55 with a post-stim buff timing.
So you're saying that an attack that didn't happen, on a map from a year and a half ago, in a Wings of Liberty game, is evidence that it wouldn't have worked?
Besides, he was still forced into Robo tech - I pretty much guarantee you that, had the Immortal not been there, YoDa attacks, but then again, we'll never know. He had an Immortal out and had to make five sentries, like all Protoss had to at that time, because we had NO OTHER OPTIONS.
Nerf the MSC all you want, but Protoss has to have some way to defend early game without crippling their economy too harshly.
On July 03 2014 03:38 Wombat_NI wrote: Dwf, is PO's potency at a specific timing window the biggest issue in the matchup, is it map sizes (albeit Alterzim is going thank fuck), is it just the difficulty in lategame control or what is the primary issue with TvP, for you?
Pretty much all HotS TvP issues stem from the MSC. The speeding of Protoss development and the huge asymmetry in options by early game all come from there. Protoss can tech too quickly because they have 2 Photon Overcharges (one at 5'30, the other at 8'30) before the Medivac push. As for options, the MSC killed countless Terran openings while expanding Protoss' ones.
On July 03 2014 04:16 Redfish wrote:
On July 03 2014 03:20 TheDwf wrote:
TvP 2 rack expand 8.3, even if u go fast robo after 1gate fe, first colossus will be barely out...
A Colossus was never needed to hold a stim timing. Gate units and possibly one Immortal were enough even in WoL.
This is completely untrue. Maybe you could forcefield them out for 15 or 30 seconds, but Gateway units alone have never been able to hold a 1/1 stim bio push so long as the Terran has middle to good control.
Does YoDa commit here? Nope; he doesn't because he knows he gets dismantled by Forcefield if he tries to engage. His 3 rax stim timing—and he even has CS here—is refuted without any Colossus needed; and Terran would not have more than 12 Marines 3 Marauders at 7'55 with a post-stim buff timing.
So you're saying that an attack that didn't happen, on a map from a year and a half ago, in a Wings of Liberty game, is evidence that it wouldn't have worked?
Besides, he was still forced into Robo tech - I pretty much guarantee you that, had the Immortal not been there, YoDa attacks, but then again, we'll never know. He had an Immortal out and had to make five sentries, like all Protoss had to at that time, because we had NO OTHER OPTIONS.
Nerf the MSC all you want, but Protoss has to have some way to defend early game without crippling their economy too harshly.
I think TheDwf's point here is that the Protoss economy is the opposite of crippled now due to the MSC. I mean, I'm Protoss, but I'm not going to pretend like there's not a problem when Protoss can get +1/+1, colossus, and blink off of one gate and have it be fairly safe. That's just ridiculous. To be honest, I'd LIKE to use more gateway units. I LIKED using gateway units to defend. At this point, it's dumb to have the standard meta be "defend with 1 colossus/2 sentries/MSC against everything before 12:00."
You don't have to agree with everything that people say about Terran having difficulties, but you can't go around pretending that Protoss doesn't have some kind of an edge in PvT.
A Colossus was never needed to hold a stim timing. Gate units and possibly one Immortal were enough even in WoL.
Also, for the YoDa game, I'm not sure why you're arguing that, had these not been the circumstances, you would be right. That's like saying, "If I could fly, I could fly, so therefore you're wrong."
That's one of my arguments. The ratio was even at the beginning of HotS, when terran was perceived to be the best race (whether because of imbalance or because others hadn't adapted yet, doesn't matter). If what you're saying was true, there should have been more terrans than the other races. Instead it was just even.
But that's not neccsarily true for two reasons;
1) First of all it takes a while for the overpowered race to start being overrepresented. (at least through Aliguac statistics).
2) Unless a race is considered OP for a significant while,and too a large degree (such as what we see today) you shuold not trust common balance complaints. Imagine this (hypothetical) scenario: Race X is really UP, and almost all of it's players are performing poorly and haven't had any results. For this reason, the players of race X aren't considered very good and thus not considered very good. Race X gets a patch, which makes it's balanced and the players starts performing a lot better. Now suddenly many of these players who previously weren't considered very good starts getting much better results --> Some people (mistakenly) think race X is OP.
In this situation it is a ton more useful to look at broader statistical metrics which you can calculate from Aliguac numbers to see whether a race actually is UP or whether people simply are confusing a chance in balance with absolute balance assymetries.
Overperforming isn't the same thing as overpowered. If everyone does a build for 2 weeks that no one can stop, and then the build is figured out and no one loses to it anymore, the people who did the build during these 2 weeks still went further in the tournaments they played than the others and were thus able to 'make the list', regardless of whether the build was actually overpowered or not. Following that, I don't think it's important to determine whether terran was OP at the start of HotS or if the others had to adapt. In both cases, the result is the same when it comes to the effect on race distribution. We can go back to Faust's example of that hypothetical guy who lost in Ro8 of Zotac because of imbalance and thus didn't get recognition. If the "imba" strategy that he lost to actually had a counter that he was unaware of, in the grand scheme of things, it doesn't matter: he still lost.
It's hard to say from your post whether you agree with Faust's view that there has to be a correlation between a balanced game and a balanced race distribution, because you seem to be disagreeing with me, but in the same time some of what you say kind of disproves him. Can you confirm or infirm that for me please?
I think TheDwf's point here is that the Protoss economy is the opposite of crippled now due to the MSC. I mean, I'm Protoss, but I'm not going to pretend like there's not a problem when Protoss can get +1/+1, colossus, and blink off of one gate and have it be fairly safe. That's just ridiculous. To be honest, I'd LIKE to use more gateway units. I LIKED using gateway units to defend. At this point, it's dumb to have the standard meta be "defend with 1 colossus/2 sentries/MSC against everything before 12:00."
You don't have to agree with everything that people say about Terran having difficulties, but you can't go around pretending that Protoss doesn't have some kind of an edge in PvT.
A Colossus was never needed to hold a stim timing. Gate units and possibly one Immortal were enough even in WoL.
Also, for the YoDa game, I'm not sure why you're arguing that, had these not been the circumstances, you would be right. That's like saying, "If I could fly, I could fly, so therefore you're wrong."
I'm not disagreeing with him about the MSC. What I'm saying is that if you take it away you go back to the days when you had to tech Robo and build a bunch of Sentries to start every game, and that was awful.
I think you're being a bit hyperbolic here too. Double upgrades, Colossus, and Blink off of one gate? Off of three, maybe, but you see Terran teching up just as fast off of three production facilities.
I'm not arguing the last thing either, that's TheDwf's quote. I think Protoss has an edge now, but I also think that's because we have an insanely stubborn Terran player base that largely sticks with the Bio strategies of WoL, doesn't mix in Starport or Factory units other than Vikings, and then wonders why the things they did two years ago don't work any more today.
It's hard to say from your post whether you agree with Faust's view that there has to be a correlation between a balanced game and a balanced race distribution, because you seem to be disagreeing with me, but in the same time some of what you say kind of disproves him. Can you confirm or infirm that for me please?
Well my personal opinion is that we with almost certainty can conclude that there is a balance issue if these two conditions are met;
1) Over an extended period (3+months) a race is signifciantly lagging behind the other races in Aliguac statistics (where we look at a combo of representation and win/rates)
2) If the results among the best players in the world are poor for the race as well
If the former requirement is met, but the latter isn't, then I would argue that we are seeing some type of skill ceiling issue where race X is balanced at the highest level but a bit too weak/harder to play at lower levels.
On July 03 2014 06:38 Redfish wrote:I'm not arguing the last thing either, that's TheDwf's quote. I think Protoss has an edge now, but I also think that's because we have an insanely stubborn Terran player base that largely sticks with the Bio strategies of WoL, doesn't mix in Starport or Factory units other than Vikings, and then wonders why the things they did two years ago don't work any more today.
It's not like terran players haven't tried other compositions, it's that they are worse than MMM+VG. We have seen some alternations do well in single games (Gumiho going bio-mech, Maru playing mech, ForGG going marauder-hellbat etc), but if it was a stronger strategy than standard play people would keep doing it.
I think most terrans wants to mix in factory and starport units. Siege tanks are so much fun to play with! The problem is that it's not fun to lose, so they don't do it.
On July 03 2014 06:38 Redfish wrote:I'm not arguing the last thing either, that's TheDwf's quote. I think Protoss has an edge now, but I also think that's because we have an insanely stubborn Terran player base that largely sticks with the Bio strategies of WoL, doesn't mix in Starport or Factory units other than Vikings, and then wonders why the things they did two years ago don't work any more today.
like what? Thors and tanks don't do enough, hellions aren't built for large style engagements, hellbats suck now you gotta resesarch preignitor (really the strength of pre nerf hellbats was a mixture of how easy it was to include them with merely a single reactor fac and more so that hellbat drops murdered probes and sentries like absolute motherfuckers) and starport units are beaten by protoss storm + their air force. The only factory unit we know is good is the Widow mine which is pretty fucken good more of those please.
I can assure you that almost every terran has had their moments of "oh fuck this bio lark" and made factory units and realised they're bad. When hots was in beta and early released most of us probably messed about with mech some and realised it has far more disadvantages then advantages. We'll see the mech revolution happen when someone makes it happen but currently no one wants to be that terran (except Supernova, whose mech tvp is flashy and interesting but I don't think it's working out too great for him.)
We stubbornly stick to bio because we know it works. Sure it has a few problems but at least we know that marauder + medivac can get shit done reliably.
I think TheDwf's point here is that the Protoss economy is the opposite of crippled now due to the MSC. I mean, I'm Protoss, but I'm not going to pretend like there's not a problem when Protoss can get +1/+1, colossus, and blink off of one gate and have it be fairly safe. That's just ridiculous. To be honest, I'd LIKE to use more gateway units. I LIKED using gateway units to defend. At this point, it's dumb to have the standard meta be "defend with 1 colossus/2 sentries/MSC against everything before 12:00."
You don't have to agree with everything that people say about Terran having difficulties, but you can't go around pretending that Protoss doesn't have some kind of an edge in PvT.
A Colossus was never needed to hold a stim timing. Gate units and possibly one Immortal were enough even in WoL.
Also, for the YoDa game, I'm not sure why you're arguing that, had these not been the circumstances, you would be right. That's like saying, "If I could fly, I could fly, so therefore you're wrong."
I'm not disagreeing with him about the MSC. What I'm saying is that if you take it away you go back to the days when you had to tech Robo and build a bunch of Sentries to start every game, and that was awful.
I think you're being a bit hyperbolic here too. Double upgrades, Colossus, and Blink off of one gate? Off of three, maybe, but you see Terran teching up just as fast off of three production facilities.
I'm not arguing the last thing either, that's TheDwf's quote. I think Protoss has an edge now, but I also think that's because we have an insanely stubborn Terran player base that largely sticks with the Bio strategies of WoL, doesn't mix in Starport or Factory units other than Vikings, and then wonders why the things they did two years ago don't work any more today.
Sorry for being so stubborn and non innovative, I guess we should use a hellbat/tank/banshee composition rather than the ultra mobile bio army because it's "new"
There's nothing new about the Protoss army, just it comes a shit ton faster and there's alot more because Protoss doesn't have to worry about early pressure.
On July 03 2014 03:46 Faust852 wrote: I'm pretty sure you are not looking back enough when you talk about an imbalanced game because early 2012 was considered the best Starcraft2 ever.
Early 2012 did have the best SC2 ever, but it wasn't balanced, not even close. It was definitely Terran favored. It was fun because there was a lot of back forth between the races, and short action packed games were more common than turtlefests.
Medivac Medivac harass has been getting weaker since the beginning of HotS due to players improving at defending against them. If we increase the strength of Medivacs, we’d not only help out Terran on both matchups, but also help provide even more action-packed games to watch. We wonder if buffing the unload speed or increasing the duration of the speed boost slightly would help in a positive way.
This has got to be the dumbest rationale ever for a balance change. "Players are getting better at something, so let's make it harder!" Really? Isn't it good for gameplay to evolve as players figure the game out? Do we really want the game itself to be changed to keep play-styles static?
I totally agree. It is like they want Medivac drop to do damage no matter how well defended they are.
Yeah we already have the oracle doing that no need for more.
Early 2012 did have the best SC2 ever, but it wasn't balanced, not even close. It was definitely Terran favored. It was fun because there was a lot of back forth between the races, and short action packed games were more common than turtlefests.
Early 2012..
You mean.. when DRG won a GSL in a PvZ finals?
You mean.. when Mvp cheesed a whole bracket of protoss the season after and won against all odds?
This update makes me worried about LotV, unless Rob Pardo shows up to save the day.
Widow mine could be a good change, but the medivac change is ridiculous. Basically forcing other players into losing stuff from drops, no matter how fast they respond. It doesn't fix what people have to complain about when it comes to terran, even a little.
They need to make the terran army, which dies like nothing else, a little easier to use and a bit stronger lategame. Terran already has good dropships. It would also be helpful if terrans weren't full all-in if they do anything but turtle pre-10 minutes.
On July 03 2014 06:38 Redfish wrote:I'm not arguing the last thing either, that's TheDwf's quote. I think Protoss has an edge now, but I also think that's because we have an insanely stubborn Terran player base that largely sticks with the Bio strategies of WoL, doesn't mix in Starport or Factory units other than Vikings, and then wonders why the things they did two years ago don't work any more today.
like what? Thors and tanks don't do enough, hellions aren't built for large style engagements, hellbats suck now you gotta resesarch preignitor (really the strength of pre nerf hellbats was a mixture of how easy it was to include them with merely a single reactor fac and more so that hellbat drops murdered probes and sentries like absolute motherfuckers) and starport units are beaten by protoss storm + their air force. The only factory unit we know is good is the Widow mine which is pretty fucken good more of those please.
I can assure you that almost every terran has had their moments of "oh fuck this bio lark" and made factory units and realised they're bad. When hots was in beta and early released most of us probably messed about with mech some and realised it has far more disadvantages then advantages. We'll see the mech revolution happen when someone makes it happen but currently no one wants to be that terran (except Supernova, whose mech tvp is flashy and interesting but I don't think it's working out too great for him.)
We stubbornly stick to bio because we know it works. Sure it has a few problems but at least we know that marauder + medivac can get shit done reliably.
I give up. Suggestions for creative Mech buffs get shot down, people insist absolutely that Bio is better without devoting the time to practice Mech (because "no one wants to be that terran" apparently) and we get nowhere.
On July 03 2014 06:38 Redfish wrote:I'm not arguing the last thing either, that's TheDwf's quote. I think Protoss has an edge now, but I also think that's because we have an insanely stubborn Terran player base that largely sticks with the Bio strategies of WoL, doesn't mix in Starport or Factory units other than Vikings, and then wonders why the things they did two years ago don't work any more today.
like what? Thors and tanks don't do enough, hellions aren't built for large style engagements, hellbats suck now you gotta resesarch preignitor (really the strength of pre nerf hellbats was a mixture of how easy it was to include them with merely a single reactor fac and more so that hellbat drops murdered probes and sentries like absolute motherfuckers) and starport units are beaten by protoss storm + their air force. The only factory unit we know is good is the Widow mine which is pretty fucken good more of those please.
I can assure you that almost every terran has had their moments of "oh fuck this bio lark" and made factory units and realised they're bad. When hots was in beta and early released most of us probably messed about with mech some and realised it has far more disadvantages then advantages. We'll see the mech revolution happen when someone makes it happen but currently no one wants to be that terran (except Supernova, whose mech tvp is flashy and interesting but I don't think it's working out too great for him.)
We stubbornly stick to bio because we know it works. Sure it has a few problems but at least we know that marauder + medivac can get shit done reliably.
I know you don't speak for "the pros", but since you're there, would you prefer they make the standard terran strategies stronger with their buff, or would you prefer they give terran a more complete tree by making the lesser used units more attractive (the risk is the games becoming more boring, since mech games seem to inspire less people due to their turtly nature)?
EPT
