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Warning for everyone in this thread: I WILL moderate your posts very harshly from now on if you can't have a civil discussion. | ||
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Kingsky
Singapore298 Posts
On April 11 2015 06:39 TheDwf wrote: Why do people hate the Colossus? Because the Colossus is like banksters from Wall Street: “too big to fail”. I am appropriating this line. It is filled with too much win | ||
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Penev
28483 Posts
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Wintex
Norway16838 Posts
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Ketch
Netherlands7285 Posts
On April 11 2015 06:39 TheDwf wrote: Why does Life's ultra micro has to be barely more efficient than the (inexistent) one from a low master? To add relevant micro, Blizzard could use the following as their design strategy: (1) For each race - get one or more top pro for that race - eg. Life / Parting / Maru - get a master level player for that race - rather not internal to avoid bias (2) Let them play in the unit tester with units and compositions of their race vs various compositions for a significant amount of time (3) Record the videos for every battle - and put them side by side, preferably anonymously (4) Observe differences and try to identify the world class player and the decent amateur player (5a) Interesting differences/interactions observed? You have meaningful micro in a unit! (5b) No interesting differences/interactions observed? Redesign and re-do! | ||
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boxerfred
Germany8360 Posts
On April 20 2015 21:46 Ketch wrote: To add relevant micro, Blizzard could use the following as their design strategy: (1) For each race - get one or more top pro for that race - eg. Life / Parting / Maru - get a master level player for that race - rather not internal to avoid bias (2) Let them play in the unit tester with units and compositions of their race vs various compositions for a significant amount of time (3) Record the videos for every battle - and put them side by side, preferably anonymously (4) Observe differences and try to identify the world class player and the decent amateur player (5a) Interesting differences/interactions observed? You have meaningful micro in a unit! (5b) No interesting differences/interactions observed? Redesign and re-do! I saw desrow microing marines vs. banes. That was a really good point where you could see the difference between a top korean sc2 player and a not-so-top foreigner (not implying an insult or anything towards desrow, I like the guy!). But tbh, that among with splitting units vs. mines is the only part of the game where micro is really, really important. Even if it comes down to Blink (which is an awesome spell!), it can be hard to distinguish between masters and super imba korean. I really like your idea! Maybe we should realize this as a community project? I'm looking at you, BTTV! I'm sure TotalBiscuit would let Axiom players fulfill the pro role. | ||
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OtherWorld
France17333 Posts
On April 20 2015 21:52 boxerfred wrote: I saw desrow microing marines vs. banes. That was a really good point where you could see the difference between a top korean sc2 player and a not-so-top foreigner (not implying an insult or anything towards desrow, I like the guy!). But tbh, that among with splitting units vs. mines is the only part of the game where micro is really, really important. Even if it comes down to Blink (which is an awesome spell!), it can be hard to distinguish between masters and super imba korean. I really like your idea! Maybe we should realize this as a community project? I'm looking at you, BTTV! I'm sure TotalBiscuit would let Axiom players fulfill the pro role. Having top (and by top I mean world-class) players test their shit instead of (or in addition to) their "internal testing team" which allowed things such as Daedalus 1.0 on ladder would be indeed a pretty good idea | ||
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boxerfred
Germany8360 Posts
On April 20 2015 22:00 OtherWorld wrote: Having top (and by top I mean world-class) players test their shit instead of (or in addition to) their "internal testing team" which allowed things such as Daedalus 1.0 on ladder would be indeed a pretty good idea Imagine Blizz would pay for that. Boom no more match fixing because every pro is damn rich | ||
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Grumbels
Netherlands7031 Posts
On April 20 2015 15:50 BronzeKnee wrote: I hate when people make game design out to be rocket science... it isn't. There are a lot of complex factors here, but this isn't mission impossible and even you can understand it! Don't make me go back through my old threads to Blizzard which were full of ideas that they ended up implementing six months to a year after I suggested them, and after their ideas failed. And there are simple solutions. The double harvesting solution put forward by TL Strategy team is one of them. The real issue here is the current generation of game designers, like Browder, won't be able to create a next generation RTS because he isn't evolving. He keeps trying to import ideas from past RTS games or even worse, ideas from MOBAs (how many spells do units have now?). That isn't where we should be going. The SC2 team needs to finally clean up the bad ideas they had from WOL and built on during HOTS... like Force Fields, Colossus, Fungal Growth, the Viper, the Widow Mine, Photon Overcharge... ect... Game design mainly seems easy because we've had years to analyze game systems and come up with elegant solutions. But actually implementing those requires a certain creative mindset and can go horribly wrong, and when you're under time pressure to deliver a product it's more challenging as well. I mean, no amount of game design theory will generate a brilliantly designed unit for you, that's always dependent on the imagination of the designer. Just because Blizzard can make bad mistakes and you can criticize them doesn't mean that finding the best solutions is a question of simple common sense. | ||
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Hider
Denmark9395 Posts
There are a lot of complex factors here, but this isn't mission impossible and even you can understand it! Don't make me go back through my old threads to Blizzard which were full of ideas that they ended up implementing six months to a year after I suggested them, and after their ideas failed. This comment actually shows that you do not understand game design. The idea is only 10% of the design-proces. The actual challenge is the implementation-proces (and this is where Blizzard repediately have failed). | ||
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BronzeKnee
United States5217 Posts
On April 20 2015 22:38 Grumbels wrote: Game design mainly seems easy because we've had years to analyze game systems and come up with elegant solutions. But actually implementing those requires a certain creative mindset and can go horribly wrong, and when you're under time pressure to deliver a product it's more challenging as well. I mean, no amount of game design theory will generate a brilliantly designed unit for you, that's always dependent on the imagination of the designer. Just because Blizzard can make bad mistakes and you can criticize them doesn't mean that finding the best solutions is a question of simple common sense. A simple solution doesn't necessarily come from simple common sense, that isn't what I argued. But you are correct in that is always dependent on the imagination of designer. I do believe it goes a little beyond that though. I created a map for WC3 (Coming of the Horde that I am still working on) and years ago I had a contest where people created a set of ability for a hero (Medivh) I was putting into the game, and then people voted on what set they thought was best. Lots of creative ideas came out, but I got a little terrified when the set of abilities people liked, though unique, were pretty gamebreaking and difficult to balance, with all or nothing spells like Abduct (that either landed and were incredibly strong, or the Viper gets feedbacked and they do nothing). They were bad for game play. So I submitted my own, and thankfully, my own set of abilities edged out the next closest by a single vote (255 to 256), though I included one spell from the So creativity alone isn't what drives good game design. You've got to see the big picture and understand that certain things are simply not appropriate. The number of spells and the counter play between the spells in (Feedback and EMP, Force Fields and Corrosive Bile) isn't appropriate for an RTS. It shouldn't be about spells. It should be about strategy and everything that that entails. On April 21 2015 00:20 Hider wrote: This comment actually shows that you do not understand game design. The idea is only 10% of the design-proces. The actual challenge is the implementation-proces (and this is where Blizzard repediately have failed). I think you're wrong. The idea is everything. Actually, to be more precise, I think we are both right, we just have a different understanding of what an idea is. To me, creating an idea is a process where you think of something, decide on how it fits into the game, decide what role it plays, work out the interaction between it and other parts of the game. It requires a massive amount of thought and possibly some diagramming. When I add something to COTH, I don't just throw it in there willy nilly. And that is why Blizzard's ideas are terrible. They aren't well thought out. The Warhound never should have escaped a designers head, never should have made it to implementation. But it did, Blizzard spent a lot of time and money on that. And nothing to show for it. Someone should have been fired. Probably multiple people, that is no way to run a business. Modern software design ensures that everything is diagrammed, written up, and well thought out before you begin actually coding. Implementation and balance is the easy part. It's really easy to add or subtract something from the game, whether it be a unit itself or values to and from a unit. If the idea sucks, then it is going to suck, regardless of how much you play with the balance and implementation (see Vortex). But if the idea is good, it will be good. | ||
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Gfire
United States1699 Posts
I also blame us mapmakers for some of the problems with SC2, but only in the sense that we let Blizzard leave the game alone and made bad maps to help balance the competitive scene because we impatient. If Blizzard's good at anything, it's taking their time at things. It's not easy knowing the perfect solution, though, when your dealing with stuff that hasn't been done before. I think they have a little bit of a problem analyzing their own work, but it's not entirely clear. "It shouldn't be about spells" is entirely subjective, for example. The Warhound was something they designed as an anti-air unit to deal with Mutas, I think, and then they saw people figure out how to deal with Mutas TvZ and tried to change it into something else... So I guess it was in that process that they got lost. I can understand that process as I've gone through it myself with modding games back in the day where I take an existing unit, seeing no use for or disliking the previous implementation, and trying to do something new with it, but not really being inspired. I think the pressure for a minimum number of new units for an expansion got to them, which we see later in the changes to make the Battle Hellion more of its own new unit after the Warhound was cut. I'm sure it was renamed and made biological and such partly so they could market hots as having enough new units for Terran. Coming up with new units for T has always been a challenge, and that shows in LotV, too. The solution to that doesn't seem clear at all. They even did a community contest and I don't think anything too amazing came out of that. | ||
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PostNationalism
35 Posts
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Grumbels
Netherlands7031 Posts
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Byyk
457 Posts
On April 21 2015 03:01 Gfire wrote: Coming up with new units for T has always been a challenge, and that shows in LotV, too. The solution to that doesn't seem clear at all. They even did a community contest and I don't think anything too amazing came out of that. It is super easy and effective to come up with unit that fits T. They have it implemented in campaign. It is called Goliath. Nice clean unit with no special abilities. Some other unit should be removed, off course. You know what I mean :-) | ||
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WGT-Baal
France3389 Posts
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Hider
Denmark9395 Posts
To me, creating an idea is a process where you think of something, decide on how it fits into the game, decide what role it plays, work out the interaction between it and other parts of the game The problem is that interactions aren't created by theoretical exercises. Instead, they are created through careful tweaking of numbers so you make sure that micro is rewarded for both players. Unfortunately this is an aspect Blizzard has ignored for years. Besides the Warhound, generally Blizzard has had solid concepts. Oracle, Widow Mine, Viper were all fine theoretically sound. Even PDD which you could shoot down could have been cool. Unfortunately, there is just a difference between how you imagine it working in theory and how they function in the game with a poor implementation. | ||
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TheDwf
France19747 Posts
On April 20 2015 06:25 boxerfred wrote: TheDwf, I just found that sentence in stuchiu's top* players of all times: Isn't that the perfect example for an unecessary change that takes control away from players for the sake of making games "more interesting to watch"? It doesn't matter much, but stuchiu has the historical order wrong. The Medivac boost was only implemented in the patch #8, while Purify (the ancestor of Photon Overcharge) was there from the get-go. It is a very common mistake because of how things turned out afterwards, but initially Photon Overcharge had nothing to do with Medivac Boost. Nonetheless, they're linked indeed as both of them are pure creatures of the Warpgate folly. (1) Despite the valiant strategic innovation from players, Protoss still had “troubles” expanding in PvP at the end of WoL, i.e. you had to fight for expands. They were not granted. The Blizzsters did not like that, and thus crafted an anti-rush button to weaken/nuke 1b pushes. (2) Besides, there was also the huge issue of Protoss being behind in the hyper-development race against Zerg during, hmm, at least the two thirds of WoL (the old gate expand vs FFE problem); so the MSC, by increasing the strength of gate expands and eventually allowing midgame mobility (Recall), would “solve” 3 problems in one. + Show Spoiler + There was even much more to that, but I simplify the history. (3) Then, they probably realized that the absurd combination of Warpgate + PO would completely kill the already moribund TvP drop pressure; and unsurprisingly, since violence calls for violence, their “solution” was another brutal contraction of time (+70% movespeed!). As for the “unnecessary change” part—ah! There lies the trick. Because systems do have their internal logic, and once you enter the cycle of hyper-development, you're prisoner of the “always more” circle (see here). That's why HotS ended up giving birth to sinister synergies between the various new tools/units; that's why each expansion is a stimmed variant of the precedent one. As long as you don't attack hyper-development at its core, nothing will fundamentally change since the system is self-sustaining. That's also why the Blizzsters, as long as they refuse to abandon their initial direction, are doomed to apply “band-aids” which, inexorably, end up creating other problems, which call for other non-solutions, etc., etc. As for players, the consequences are clear for them. I don't fully agree with the way stuchiu presents things here, but yes, players do lose a lot of control; tons of options are purely and simply erased because they don't stand the trial of the temporal environment. This forces players to adopt rigid, stereotyped approaches: they have to play the game of cubes, which naturally contributes to the aridity of the game. Spaghettification of strategy, spaghettification of skill. | ||
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dcemuser
United States3248 Posts
Little of it is new criticism after the first couple of sections, and there is a lot of fairly tasteless hostility ("Blizzsters"?) for no real reason at all. There have been some excellent spotlight articles in the past with similar content that also suggest solutions and are less juvenile. The first three sections are interesting, but that's all they are. There isn't any research into the topic to back up the author's predictions about the 12 worker change. He could be completely right, and he could be horribly wrong. 12-rax-rax marine "rushes" could be the new meta for all we know, and in that case, "the early game" has merely changed definition. There are a very large number of conclusions drawn throughout the article without any prior support. Obviously, this isn't an academic paper, and I didn't expect cited sources or anything going into it. However, I also didn't expect to have to guess which new assumption the author was basing a paragraph on so frequently. The paragraph on ladder anxiety really sticks out as an obvious sign of this - I am not convinced in any way that ladder anxiety is more prevalent in SC2 than it is in any other RTS game. However, the article seems to take this as a given. Section 6 is particularly awful (by far the worst part of the article) because, outside of the first paragraph, it isn't even about the game. It's about aspects of the development team that the author isn't even close to understanding. For example, both the "holy relevation" and "huge snag" explanations are wrong - it has to do with the development team being heavily restructured for LotV (mainly by coincidence). Blizzard has a single RTS team (Team 2), but now they have two products using the same engine with completely different design goals (StarCraft 2 and Heroes of the Storm). The original SC2 team that worked on WoL and HotS was split between the two games, and a lot of additional personnel were hired. Last I knew (summer 2013), it was still technically "one team", but a very significant number of people within the team were working exclusively on one game or the other. Somebody who was a level designer for Heart of the Swarm could now be a balance dev on Heroes of the Storm. (If anyone knows something more recent about the SC2/Heroes team structure I'd be glad to hear it.) | ||
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TheDwf
France19747 Posts
On April 21 2015 03:01 Gfire wrote: Coming up with new units for T has always been a challenge, and that shows in LotV, too. The solution to that doesn't seem clear at all. They even did a community contest and I don't think anything too amazing came out of that. Among the various things Terran needs, the following two come the closest to “new units”: (1) dividing the Thor by 3; (2) turning the Hellbat into something else than the current 1a melee bio unit. | ||
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TheDwf
France19747 Posts
(1) Acknowledge the grievances, but distort and belittle them; (2) Sow confusion to reap division (“divide and rule”); (3) Concede a candy box to appear nice. The last statement from the SC2 crew is a pure, textbook example of the way sources of power behave. First, the language: as we say in France, pure langue de bois (wooden language). Second, the message. Paragraph by paragraph: §1: Acknowledge the claims. Why are there negative references to “emotion-based only” analysis? Because sources of power never intend to concede more than what circumstances force them to concede. Therefore, if there are grievances, they must all be “reasonable,” read: compatible with the agenda pursued by the source of power. Otherwise, they have to be delegitimized: enter the thought-terminating theme of “whine”. + Show Spoiler + On April 11 2015 06:39 TheDwf wrote: I hope people realize the “blind faith” attitude is no more productive than whatever “negative nancies” they want to see. “Heaven has its foundations, angels cannot lose their wings,” drone the zealots who claim we should not probe the bottom of the tank. There were lots of critics, of course, but always cultists found ways to excuse their divinity. Be content to enjoy a small part of their Eternal Grace. Trust the Holy Name of the Brand. Be patient. Be positive. But since 5 years that the joyous positivity of the gang of Care Bears exists, what did it achieve? How many of the original Care Bears themselves are still there? In the end, didn't they grow weary of reaping disenchantment after sowing expectations for so long? §2: Remind beggars where the source of power lies. Hint: it's not at your door. In order not to be too heavy-handed, I will merely note that this paragraph does not lack flavor, coming from the crew responsible for terrible fiascos such as the Queen patch, the patch 2.0.12, the Warhound, the Swarm host, etc. §3: Working as intended. Back to the basics of negotiation: if you want 100 from 50, ask 150. In the delicate comedy of bargaining, the game of mutual concessions will then shift the celestial body towards its natural orbit. Seen, for instance, in wage negotiations. See also the Widow Mine nerf in patch 2.0.12: initially, the Blizzsters had launched the 1.1 value, which allowed them to appear “reasonable” in conceding only 1.25 (down from 1.75). Everyone witnessed the wisdom of that concession afterwards. §4: Sow confusion so as to reap division. By far the most classic rhetorical technique, the immortal straw man: “We should relax the laws,” says the progressist; “Why do you want crimes to go unpunished??” retort Neanderthals. §5: The source of power states its next intents. Following the “principle of negotiation” seen in §3, a marginal change should do the trick. Instead of 1500/750, you will thus have 1500/900. Naturally, the dual, interlaced root of the issues in the SC2 economy (hyper-development and the {2;2;1} worker triplet) is absolutely untouched by this cosmetic tweak. §6: Give the candy box. Any “no” is always sweetened by sugar. See for instance how parents negotiate with their children. You won't have X; but look, it's still great, you can get Y. §7: The source of power reiterates its program. We said “no,” but we didn't say “no”. So; let us now pay attention to the real—and in fact only—concrete element of the post: “Our current thinking is that some degree of increased pressure is good for the game.” (Emphasis mine.) Razzia des Blizzsters described at length this delicate euphemism: + Show Spoiler + On April 11 2015 06:39 TheDwf wrote: In our domain, you cannot and should not be a “dictatorial designer”. This is another contradictio in adjecto. You're a creator. Your destiny is to be a fool. You craft the cocoon, and then you let the butterfly go. Unfortunately, the Blizzsters were heavy-handed, and the intrusive creationist approach is a huge problem in SC2. This is directly correlated to the original philosophy of the “holy esport mantra”. (…) More control for the player = less control from the designer. (…) I spoke about the “control architecture” within the game, but it also exists around the game. In fact, it is no coincidence if this “omnipotence paradigm” can be felt everywhere. A third trait of “modernity” is that power in a given field tends to become increasingly intrusive because of hyper-rationalization. Blizzard wanted to control everything. (…) But you cannot control everything. The more you try to maintain your grip, the more you need increasing power to seize what inevitably tries to slip out of it. The terminal phase is that you end up choking what you wanted to control. The expansionnist project has to stop somewhere. There should even be retraction. (…) The result of the intrusive creationist approach is a game of cubes. You insert cubes of different shapes into other cubes of different shapes according to the will of the designer. (…) Completeness is the natural consequence of the intrusive creationist design. Players are dispossessed from their own creative potential and only have to apply the instruction manual. (…) Yet what is the motto of the Blizzsters? “Forging ahead regardless”. (…) If the RT part of RTS is violently compressed then the S withers away too by force. For sources of power, discussing with us beggars is always risky. Acknowledging grievances is one thing, but fully entering the cycle of discussion is another one—which is way too compromising. By far the greatest risk would be that beggars would increasingly realize that miscommunication is a typical excuse of “bad faith” from sources of power, which do have their vision and keep applying it regardless of their countless wanderings. + Show Spoiler + As our dear Bilbo puts it: All that is gold does not glitter, Not all those who wander are lost; The old that is strong does not wither, Deep roots are not reached by the frost. In the current case, silence or an evasive “later” answer are the most likely outcomes, especially as the beta and data excuses are ready-made—despite contraction of time being blatant in every single LotV beta game played. | ||
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