EPT![[image loading]](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CM809rKWoAAiV0C.jpg)
Hey everyone, we hope you’ve all had a good week and want to thank everyone who helped participate in constructive discussions. After hearing your thoughts we’d like to provide an update to discuss a few topics such as team colors and maps. Let’s dive in.
Specifying Team Colors
This is something that we’ve been exploring internally per our community’s request. The initial solution we were considering was to implement a full-featured UI that allowed each player to set his or her color preference, so that whenever possible we can give the customized color. However, we soon recognized that it would be very difficult to guarantee all color preferences in team games and would feel very random in the cases where color preferences are not met.
The solution we’re currently thinking of instead is to allow customization on the option that has preset colors. Currently, the defaults are: Green for a player, Yellow for the player’s allies, and Red for all enemies. By customizing these 3 categories of colors, players would have a clean and simple solution compared to the more complex options.
So the main discussion we should be having on this front is: is the above proposal the best overall solution we can have in this area? If so, we can start working on this task. If not, let’s get discussions going on the best solution, so that we can work towards implementing it in the future.
Zerg Attack Reticle
We saw a post yesterday by aeJupiter about the Zerg attack reticle being incorrect. This post was exceptionally well-presented, and was also very helpful as the reticle’s appearance is indeed a bug! We’ll be looking to fix the reticle in an upcoming patch, thanks so much for pointing this out.
Map Diversity
We noticed the posts regarding having to only use standard maps due to everyone only liking standard maps. We had two points of discussion after reading through these conclusions. First, out of top maps, the ones voted as the 1st place map, the 3rd place map, and the 4th place map don’t seem like standard maps to us, so the conclusions some people have drawn to say that everyone only likes standard maps seems to be inaccurate. Second, we don’t understand how having 4+ similar maps in the ladder or tournaments can be a good thing. Due to the veto system in both official and automated tournaments, we’ve seen that if we go with only a few maps that are different, in some cases they might be vetoed out in every game except for the BO7 finals matches.
We’ve been at that spot in the past before and have clearly seen how stale the game can become if every tournament game plays identically with the same strategy and same timings available on every map. We’re not saying every single tournament out there should have a diverse map pool, and having a couple tournaments here and there that use more standard maps could be a fun difference.
We’re also very excited to see how the old maps turn out in Proleague season 2, and this is something we have been discussing with Kespa. While the HotS maps may have been “standard” in HotS, they have a big potential to create completely different types of games in LotV due to how much the game has changed. We’re very excited to see what types of games they create in LotV. Obviously, if an older map archetype does turn out to be super exciting, we can include maps like these as well on the ladder.
We really wanted to make this point super clear. Our stance is not that standard maps are bad and every map has to be new and different. We’re more than happy to use map archetypes that have been used in the past as long as each of the 7 maps on the ladder is of a different type. The main reason we explore new map types is to locate potentially cool maps that we haven’t encountered before. For example, Dusk Towers seems to be one of the more favorites out there right now, and this type of not-completely-standard macro map would not have been possible if we just stuck to the same, one formula when making new maps.
With that said though, we clearly hear your feedback on maybe we’re pushing the new map types harder than we should right now. Therefore, we’d like to get discussions going on two fronts here: First is to determine on a case by case basis what balance changes are needed on the new maps. Second is regarding Korhal Carnage Knockout and strategies feeling a bit one sided here. If this turns out to be the case, we would like to rotate this out asap. The main goal here would be to look at the 6 maps currently in the map pool, and choose a map that plays very differently from the 6. We would want to go with a map that is already fully arted and QA tested, so one of the HotS maps that proleague is using could be an option here as well.
Taking a step back from everything - we believe it has been incredibly valuable to integrate the most dedicated, smart, and passionate community members into this game’s design process over the past year or so, and we want to continue doing this. There’s no need to become dejected by a decision and discuss how “every map is so bad + and the game is ruined”. Please remember that even if the SC2 community is discussing a massive change like “removing a map”, the SC2 design team is open to listening. Let’s all work as one team and think constructively so we can continue making calls that are best for the game.
Thanks everyone.
Call to Action: March 31 Balance Testing
We’ve published a new Balance Test Map titled “(4)RuinsofSeras (3.1.4 Balance v1.1)” which contains the following changes that we’d like your feedback on:
- Thor’s anti-air attack has been reworked:
- Now deals single-target damage.
- Deals 50 damage every 2 seconds.
- 1 attack per hit.
- The Thor’s model has been changed to reflect its new attack.
- Now deals single-target damage.
- Banshee’s Hyperflight Rotors has changed:
- Requirement changed from Fusion Core to Armory
- Cost reduced from 200/200 to 100/100
- Requirement changed from Fusion Core to Armory
- Liberator’s Defender Mode radius decreased from 5 to 4.
- Ravager Corrosive Bile cooldown increased from 7 to 10 seconds.
We encourage you to head on into the Balance Test Map to test these changes out! To do so, simply click this link if you have StarCraft II installed. To find it manually instead, enter Multiplayer and navigate to Custom. The Balance Test Map will be at the top of the list under ‘Top Played.’
We’ve also updated the Extension Mod for balance testing, so that you can play around with these changes on a variety of maps. Those of you who are interested in trying out the Extension Mod can do the following to get started:
- Navigate to Browse Maps on the Custom Games menu
- Select a map and click the Create with Mod button in the lower right corner
- Choose to sort by Blizzard Mods from the dropdown list at the top of the screen
- Select the “Balance Test Mod” Extension from the list and then hit Create Game
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/8zJdn2q.jpg)
