On March 09 2016 08:58 ejozl wrote: youtu.be This is one of my favourite Mech games, the moves that ForGG makes with scrappy Mech is beyond cool. I feel like this would be way easier to achieve, with how scarce the economy is and how far you need to stretch your bases in LotV.
And for me its
But, yeah mech = boring. Unlike the same "boring" MMMM compostion every single game, every single matchup. Fun Fun Fun Fun..... Would be great to see diverstity on the terran side, i dont care if it will be Bio/mech splitted or combined, but currently every game is more less the same
Can't wait to see what bbyong gonna pull out in gls today He disappear for so long. I wonder does he practice for sc3 like lilbow or try to make mech work.
In an interview he said that he doesn't feel comfortable with LotV because mech doesn't works at all.
On March 09 2016 08:46 Cyro wrote: Drop hitting so early and in force (before warpgate and extra production is up) is a much bigger deal for PvZ balance than anything to do with Ravagers.
The negative effects from ravagers come largely from the effect they have on the matchup (nobody will even consider relying on photon cannons and forcefields past a certain point, which weakens play against ling, roach etc) but ling drop will just outright kill you or force you to play much safer every game.
It's super easy to change drop - what about gating it behind a research of arbitrary cost and research time on the evo chamber instead of just having an evo chamber requirement? I can't recall this tech ever being used in the super early game vs terran (and especially zerg) so they have created this upgrade timing that makes ZvP earlygame lopsided that's not neccesary. If it came 30 seconds later then it wouldn't be a huge problem and most of the other utilizations for overlord drop would still exist.
Like most things Protoss related...it either works or doesn't do anything at all...
You can gate overlord drop, but then Zerg goes back to having no early game aggressive options against a competent Protoss player who can use photon cannons + overcharge + a few adepts/sentries...It's the only aggressive mechanic Zerg can use in the early game that isn't completely all-in...
Maybe Blizzard should adjust the whole matter of Protoss being able to defend any and all Zerg timings with just a few units first? This stuff doesn't work in degrees...in ZvP aggression has always been all or nothing...
Drop might be a rather cheesy way of circumventing that dynamic, but if it forces just a few more units out of Protoss so that they can't just be greedy as all hell then I'm all for it.
Rather than forcing a completely split tech (and by forcing i meant big changes are necessary, that could be harmful for the gameplay, all for the sake of mech) its better to increase the diversity based on what we have now. If more factory and starport are viable in the mid game we should see more mixed and diverse biomech styles, and maybe, full mech.
I couldn't agree more with the way blizzard is approaching it, compared to WoL and HotS those community feedack updates improved a lot, they keep getting better and better.
The view on the state of zerg sounds about right, if they are to be blamed, its for a slow reaction. I was hoping for a map pool change before any balance adjustment, but the maps never changed and since that was the case they should have adressed the matchup in other way.
Im happy they are testing the bile cooldown and something like tank mode drop, i've been calling for those changes for some time now and its almost as if they read specifically my posts and test it internally (people suggested various stuff and they tested the stuff from my "team" ). If they are dropped sieged and have siege time delay, some visual indicator should be good though.
What if the tank turret sets up despite the sieged "legs"? its not visible when the tank is on the medivac, it does require a new specific animation, but if its done its a clean change.
On March 09 2016 08:46 Cyro wrote: Drop hitting so early and in force (before warpgate and extra production is up) is a much bigger deal for PvZ balance than anything to do with Ravagers.
The negative effects from ravagers come largely from the effect they have on the matchup (nobody will even consider relying on photon cannons and forcefields past a certain point, which weakens play against ling, roach etc) but ling drop will just outright kill you or force you to play much safer every game.
It's super easy to change drop - what about gating it behind a research of arbitrary cost and research time on the evo chamber instead of just having an evo chamber requirement? I can't recall this tech ever being used in the super early game vs terran (and especially zerg) so they have created this upgrade timing that makes ZvP earlygame lopsided that's not neccesary. If it came 30 seconds later then it wouldn't be a huge problem and most of the other utilizations for overlord drop would still exist.
Maybe Blizzard should adjust the whole matter of Protoss being able to defend any and all Zerg timings with just a few units first? This stuff doesn't work in degrees...in ZvP aggression has always been all or nothing...
Drop might be a rather cheesy way of circumventing that dynamic, but if it forces just a few more units out of Protoss so that they can't just be greedy as all hell then I'm all for it.
You don't get it, do you? Protoss can't make fighting units out of their Nexi, they have to invest in gateways and other production buildings first. Getting 20 Zerglings for a drop instead of 10 drones is easily done for the Zerg. Getting enough units to defend depends on the number of gateways Protoss has, and if he makes enough gates to blindly counter the possibility of drops, his expo is so late, that he can GG right away. This whole argument "Protoss should just make units like Zerg does" is utter nonsense.
On March 09 2016 08:46 Cyro wrote: Drop hitting so early and in force (before warpgate and extra production is up) is a much bigger deal for PvZ balance than anything to do with Ravagers.
The negative effects from ravagers come largely from the effect they have on the matchup (nobody will even consider relying on photon cannons and forcefields past a certain point, which weakens play against ling, roach etc) but ling drop will just outright kill you or force you to play much safer every game.
It's super easy to change drop - what about gating it behind a research of arbitrary cost and research time on the evo chamber instead of just having an evo chamber requirement? I can't recall this tech ever being used in the super early game vs terran (and especially zerg) so they have created this upgrade timing that makes ZvP earlygame lopsided that's not neccesary. If it came 30 seconds later then it wouldn't be a huge problem and most of the other utilizations for overlord drop would still exist.
Maybe Blizzard should adjust the whole matter of Protoss being able to defend any and all Zerg timings with just a few units first? This stuff doesn't work in degrees...in ZvP aggression has always been all or nothing...
Drop might be a rather cheesy way of circumventing that dynamic, but if it forces just a few more units out of Protoss so that they can't just be greedy as all hell then I'm all for it.
You don't get it, do you? Protoss can't make fighting units out of their Nexi, they have to invest in gateways and other production buildings first. Getting 20 Zerglings for a drop instead of 10 drones is easily done for the Zerg. Getting enough units to defend depends on the number of gateways Protoss has, and if he makes enough gates to blindly counter the possibility of drops, his expo is so late, that he can GG right away. This whole argument "Protoss should just make units like Zerg does" is utter nonsense.
That mothership core thing can fight and is by far the best early game defense tool in existence
On March 09 2016 08:46 Cyro wrote: Drop hitting so early and in force (before warpgate and extra production is up) is a much bigger deal for PvZ balance than anything to do with Ravagers.
The negative effects from ravagers come largely from the effect they have on the matchup (nobody will even consider relying on photon cannons and forcefields past a certain point, which weakens play against ling, roach etc) but ling drop will just outright kill you or force you to play much safer every game.
It's super easy to change drop - what about gating it behind a research of arbitrary cost and research time on the evo chamber instead of just having an evo chamber requirement? I can't recall this tech ever being used in the super early game vs terran (and especially zerg) so they have created this upgrade timing that makes ZvP earlygame lopsided that's not neccesary. If it came 30 seconds later then it wouldn't be a huge problem and most of the other utilizations for overlord drop would still exist.
Maybe Blizzard should adjust the whole matter of Protoss being able to defend any and all Zerg timings with just a few units first? This stuff doesn't work in degrees...in ZvP aggression has always been all or nothing...
Drop might be a rather cheesy way of circumventing that dynamic, but if it forces just a few more units out of Protoss so that they can't just be greedy as all hell then I'm all for it.
You don't get it, do you? Protoss can't make fighting units out of their Nexi, they have to invest in gateways and other production buildings first. Getting 20 Zerglings for a drop instead of 10 drones is easily done for the Zerg. Getting enough units to defend depends on the number of gateways Protoss has, and if he makes enough gates to blindly counter the possibility of drops, his expo is so late, that he can GG right away. This whole argument "Protoss should just make units like Zerg does" is utter nonsense.
That mothership core thing can fight and is by far the best early game defense tool in existence
I am calling Blizzard on its reason for abandoning Mech play. I think you are too lazy to put in the work required to fix the units produced from the factory so that they can be rolled out onto the map in aggressive play.
You see it as having to balance a fourth race, and its challenging for the balance team. It has nothing to do with action. You argue between developers and game balance team.
Truth hurts but its got to be heard.
You are going to change the cyclone, then the Thor instead, then buff Siege Tank instead. Hard work isn't it to try to make the best RTS?
So per Aligulac stats, protoss have a 35.06% winrate vs zerg in the last week, and a 39.75% winrate over the preceding two weeks, but all Blizzard can come up with is that they might give out some really minor nerfs to things other than lurkers? Please.
To be fair, PvZ probably wouldn't be that imbalanced if they would let us use decent maps, but of course they refuse to even acknowledge that issue.
On March 09 2016 08:46 Cyro wrote: Drop hitting so early and in force (before warpgate and extra production is up) is a much bigger deal for PvZ balance than anything to do with Ravagers.
The negative effects from ravagers come largely from the effect they have on the matchup (nobody will even consider relying on photon cannons and forcefields past a certain point, which weakens play against ling, roach etc) but ling drop will just outright kill you or force you to play much safer every game.
It's super easy to change drop - what about gating it behind a research of arbitrary cost and research time on the evo chamber instead of just having an evo chamber requirement? I can't recall this tech ever being used in the super early game vs terran (and especially zerg) so they have created this upgrade timing that makes ZvP earlygame lopsided that's not neccesary. If it came 30 seconds later then it wouldn't be a huge problem and most of the other utilizations for overlord drop would still exist.
Drop might be a rather cheesy way of circumventing that dynamic, but if it forces just a few more units out of Protoss so that they can't just be greedy as all hell then I'm all for it.
Totally agree, Blizzard should fix zerg not being able to punish greedy protoss play. Right after they fix protoss not being able to punish zerg who go for their 3rd hatch before pool.
Some of the staler, more boring games (to play and watch) have been mech only.
No it's been mass air mainly. Surprised David Kim still hasn't understood the difference. For tank-based mech to be interesting, it is important (a) the siege tank is strong, (b) mech play has viable harass options in the midgame and (c) opponent has tools to armytrade/harass against a turtling mech player. None of those requirements were fulfilled in HOTS w/ the exception of TvT (too an extent).
if they nerf siege pick up and don't buff the siege tank to compensate, terran will be much less interesting to play (and watch).
Instead, we can adjust the firing delay upon being dropped to what feels best after testing, from where it is now to the same time it would take to unsiege.
Double it, and add a visual delay timer.
As suggested, we’ve been playtesting an increased cooldown on the Corrosive Bile ability with no damage tweaks. We feel that this could be a good direction to go, especially to help out PvZ. If we’re good with this change, let’s get it in the balance test map, and we could hopefully turn around the patch soon after.
Better change, but I also suggest to reduce damage vs structures.
Is there a world where the delay betwen corrosive bile is much longer but the actual attack faster? Now it seems like you should never get it by corosive bile if you look at your army and it is more of a zoning spell, I feel like you could speed the attack and it would still be possible to dodge but not as easy. That way you have to think more about your shot but also can get your opponent of guard.
I feel like it could be interesting for zvt since now tanks preaty much never get olhit if there is medivac near, it would also be interresting in zvz, snipping overlord and making RRvRR more easy to engage (if one player shoot to soon and misses you can strike and take a significant lead in the fight before he can shoot again)
Since the damage is not higher (in fact dps would be lower) it make early ravager but a bit easier since protoss defence is mostly pylon at this stage (at may cause trouble with the msc if he can't dodge the bile wich can be a huge problem it would depend on the number). I don't realy know how much it would make protoss army harder to control in the mid game since the bile already seem hard to dodge in big battle with the protoss unit that are less mobile.
On March 09 2016 09:55 Superbanana wrote: Rather than forcing a completely split tech (and by forcing i meant big changes are necessary, that could be harmful for the gameplay, all for the sake of mech) its better to increase the diversity based on what we have now. If more factory and starport are viable in the mid game we should see more mixed and diverse biomech styles, and maybe, full mech.
I couldn't agree more with the way blizzard is approaching it, compared to WoL and HotS those community feedack updates improved a lot, they keep getting better and better.
The view on the state of zerg sounds about right, if they are to be blamed, its for a slow reaction. I was hoping for a map pool change before any balance adjustment, but the maps never changed and since that was the case they should have adressed the matchup in other way.
Im happy they are testing the bile cooldown and something like tank mode drop, i've been calling for those changes for some time now and its almost as if they read specifically my posts and test it internally (people suggested various stuff and they tested the stuff from my "team" ). If they are dropped sieged and have siege time delay, some visual indicator should be good though.
What if the tank turret sets up despite the sieged "legs"? its not visible when the tank is on the medivac, it does require a new specific animation, but if its done its a clean change.
Not sure if your serious about community feedback updates. Are you still under the impression their actually being honest? After seeing enough blatant lies and PR I'm no longer fooled. If you actually follow what the community updates say along with the developers comments on the web... You start to see how much BS it is. At this point it's infuriating every time they pull the same old tricks.
Maps are going to be a huge issue. I don't know what the hell they are thinking on the map front, especially after a few weeks back sharing that image of the "9 different map types". Did they forget absolutely everything they know about RTS design and BW's history???
It's not possible to balance each race on so many various map types. Each race will have inherent advantages or disadvantages based on map choice.
Did they forget the importance of maps? Or the fact that BW was literally balanced off maps alone for years, and those specific map types were chosen to try to offer each race a chance?
They have taken a step backwards in every area of design... And their PR updates just talk about how great the game is, rehash the same things they have said to us before, and use it as an excuse for them continually not doing anything, or instead blame the community by saying the community response was completely different from what the community was actually saying.
I keep following the feedback updates with that little bit of hope that they will actually go to extreme measures to improve the games design... but more than 50% of the updates are are infuriating... Instead they do more and more bandaid fixes, and back themselves in to a corner, then eventually when everything falls apart, their too scared to make any changes because they don't want to upset the precious few that have actually stuck with the game to this point.
I would be willing to bet there are far more players wishing they could enjoy the game, than there actually are enjoying the game right now. It's not like SC is not a series that is beloved by many. It's that SC2 is a game that can not be enjoyed b many of the people who love the series...
But I guess everyone needs to face the fact that they will never do major changes. Their too invested in the game as an eSport that they won't make any huge changes. A design change would require an entire rebalance that would take months of time, and their too worried that it will ruin the games eSport viability.
Ironic, since a well designed SC2 would be able to bring SC2 new players and make it a viable eSport again, rather than becoming more and more of a niche...
PvZ : "it’s quite cool seeing more offensive options from Zerg, including this strategy and the early Ravager options" - and the lingqueen allin, baneling bust, nydus roachqueen allin, 12/12 allin, 2 base mutaling allin etc. The problem is that Zerg has way too many options, while Protoss has non in the early game. Zerg allins got ever stronger (especially lingdrops/ ling and queen drops) with the Photon overcharge nerf and P players basically forced to go Phoenix, Immortal, Chargelot, Archon every single game, with defending in the early game. At least Blizz should heavily nerf the cooldown of the corrosive bile and make droplords a bit more expensive or make it a lairtech, or make queens undroppable at least until lair, because it`s just way too hard to get ready to defend all of these earle pressures and allins. So overall from Protoss perspective it is really disappointing update once again, like you did not see how badly Protoss got dumped on at the IEM event last week.
On March 09 2016 09:55 Superbanana wrote: Rather than forcing a completely split tech (and by forcing i meant big changes are necessary, that could be harmful for the gameplay, all for the sake of mech) its better to increase the diversity based on what we have now. If more factory and starport are viable in the mid game we should see more mixed and diverse biomech styles, and maybe, full mech.
I couldn't agree more with the way blizzard is approaching it, compared to WoL and HotS those community feedack updates improved a lot, they keep getting better and better.
The view on the state of zerg sounds about right, if they are to be blamed, its for a slow reaction. I was hoping for a map pool change before any balance adjustment, but the maps never changed and since that was the case they should have adressed the matchup in other way.
Im happy they are testing the bile cooldown and something like tank mode drop, i've been calling for those changes for some time now and its almost as if they read specifically my posts and test it internally (people suggested various stuff and they tested the stuff from my "team" ). If they are dropped sieged and have siege time delay, some visual indicator should be good though.
What if the tank turret sets up despite the sieged "legs"? its not visible when the tank is on the medivac, it does require a new specific animation, but if its done its a clean change.
Not sure if your serious about community feedback updates. Are you still under the impression their actually being honest? After seeing enough blatant lies and PR I'm no longer fooled. If you actually follow what the community updates say along with the developers comments on the web... You start to see how much BS it is. At this point it's infuriating every time they pull the same old tricks.
Maps are going to be a huge issue. I don't know what the hell they are thinking on the map front, especially after a few weeks back sharing that image of the "9 different map types". Did they forget absolutely everything they know about RTS design and BW's history???
It's not possible to balance each race on so many various map types. Each race will have inherent advantages or disadvantages based on map choice.
Did they forget the importance of maps? Or the fact that BW was literally balanced off maps alone for years, and those specific map types were chosen to try to offer each race a chance?
They have taken a step backwards in every area of design... And their PR updates just talk about how great the game is, rehash the same things they have said to us before, and use it as an excuse for them continually not doing anything, or instead blame the community by saying the community response was completely different from what the community was actually saying.
I keep following the feedback updates with that little bit of hope that they will actually go to extreme measures to improve the games design... but more than 50% of the updates are are infuriating... Instead they do more and more bandaid fixes, and back themselves in to a corner, then eventually when everything falls apart, their too scared to make any changes because they don't want to upset the precious few that have actually stuck with the game to this point.
I would be willing to bet there are far more players wishing they could enjoy the game, than there actually are enjoying the game right now. It's not like SC is not a series that is beloved by many. It's that SC2 is a game that can not be enjoyed b many of the people who love the series...
But I guess everyone needs to face the fact that they will never do major changes. Their too invested in the game as an eSport that they won't make any huge changes. A design change would require an entire rebalance that would take months of time, and their too worried that it will ruin the games eSport viability.
Ironic, since a well designed SC2 would be able to bring SC2 new players and make it a viable eSport again, rather than becoming more and more of a niche...
The community is filled with specialists in game design, lots of people criticize game design which is fair but if you look at the proposed fixes and try to find what the community think is the issue, its really all over the place and makes no sense at all.
I don't think the game needs another big redesign, its better than it ever was imo. All that talk about making SC2 popular yada yada, its extremely unlikely, of course, in theory it could happen, but nobody comes up with a solution. Since that is the case, it sounds like "hey blizzard, make SC2 more fun and extremely popular, but make sure its also competitive and have a higher skill ceilling. Do it somehow, k thx bye."
At this point, when i read, "blizzard should listen the community", i know it means "blizzard should hire me as lead game designer".
It does bother me that they are so slow and insecure about changes, but for once, im completely satified if they just implement all that they proposed already.
edit: btw, i completely agree about the maps. Last time they talked about it was a big let down for me.
Their update is terrible. Honestly pretty frustrated they won't listen to anyone, including myself about how to make mech viable. It's really simple - make thors/cyclones able to kill air units so less supply has to be invested into mass vikings which forces turtling and 20-40 more supply late game can be put into mech units and more factories.
That basically means if thors/cyclones can counter air, you can attack because a few air units coming out won't invalidate your army of tanks/hellions. Right now mech can't do jack shit because every mech unit has been nerfed at some point in the past, including cyclones which suck.
Give mech an anti-air unit that can compete with brood/tempest/carrier/liberators and mech games won't be boring and a mech player can go past 5 factories instead of being forced to turtle and do nothing for 20 more minutes because the other guy made 5 carriers.
It's really fucking simple. It's idiotically simple to make mech viable by doing that but blizzard won't listen. Don't know what to say i think i'm not the only one really disappointed and annoyed right now with blizzard.
I've even offered to get into contact with blizzard, written posts about mech anti-air issues, tried to offer a solution via that mod, etc. But it doesn't work they don't seem to give a fuck about mech or any strategic diversity unless it's bio and a frantic spastic twitch fest of a game with thing zipping around. You can see that by how they're attached to the tankivac, which is basically them just turning the tank into a bio unit which just baffles me.
Dunno what to say, they basically killed mech entirely in LOTV and it's really quite sad and hurts the game in the long run. People will get tired of 100% bio games to be honest. It already is 100% bio games.
On March 09 2016 08:46 Cyro wrote: Drop hitting so early and in force (before warpgate and extra production is up) is a much bigger deal for PvZ balance than anything to do with Ravagers.
The negative effects from ravagers come largely from the effect they have on the matchup (nobody will even consider relying on photon cannons and forcefields past a certain point, which weakens play against ling, roach etc) but ling drop will just outright kill you or force you to play much safer every game.
It's super easy to change drop - what about gating it behind a research of arbitrary cost and research time on the evo chamber instead of just having an evo chamber requirement? I can't recall this tech ever being used in the super early game vs terran (and especially zerg) so they have created this upgrade timing that makes ZvP earlygame lopsided that's not neccesary. If it came 30 seconds later then it wouldn't be a huge problem and most of the other utilizations for overlord drop would still exist.
Like most things Protoss related...it either works or doesn't do anything at all...
You can gate overlord drop, but then Zerg goes back to having no early game aggressive options against a competent Protoss player who can use photon cannons + overcharge + a few adepts/sentries...It's the only aggressive mechanic Zerg can use in the early game that isn't completely all-in...
Maybe Blizzard should adjust the whole matter of Protoss being able to defend any and all Zerg timings with just a few units first? This stuff doesn't work in degrees...in ZvP aggression has always been all or nothing...
Drop might be a rather cheesy way of circumventing that dynamic, but if it forces just a few more units out of Protoss so that they can't just be greedy as all hell then I'm all for it.
It has a big effect on every game at its current timing. 2h drops are very all in but dangerous - it's scoutable and less common so not something to worry about as much.
3h drop is basically unscoutable so you have to play safer than usual every game, and yet still die fairly often to it. It's hard to walk the line between dieing to aggression and dieing to econ play when zerg has that switch at 22-30 drones where they can either make 15 more drones or 30 speedlings and you have to be prepared for both simultaneously.
Walking that line is something that zerg has had to deal with for a while in ZvP historically - but now it applies much more to protoss than to zerg