We wanted to let you guys know that we're aiming to push the map updates discussed last week to the live game this Thursday.
We also wanted to give an update on the next balance update:
First, we agree with your feedback regarding the cool factor of Overlord drops and so we're going to spend more time considering other solutions.
Second, recent events and feedback are causing us to examine the PvZ matchup very closely. The latest Kespa pro feedback is that Zerg has a very low chance vs. Protoss due to changes in the meta. We also pinged a few non-Korean Protoss players regarding this, and they had a very similar sentiment.
From our perspective, early/mid game issues look as though they're not as problematic as before due to Protoss players learning to react better vs. different Zerg threats. And the Immortal buff in LotV looks like it could have been too much. Last weekend's SSL finals showed Dark using a new strategy and we don't quite know where that would lead PvZ once other players start trying out this playstyle. All of these factors are being weighed by our team right now, and because there is no one source of data or feedback that is 100%, we need to work together to locate the current, exact state of the game.
For the next balance test map update, we would like to look at a refined list of what we have been testing, as well as focus on potentially changing Libertor's AA damage focus to be vs. light, while at the same time changing the Thor's AA role to be high, single target damage instead of splash vs. light. We will have more info on this area later in the week.
Thank you, and let's get discussions going on these fronts.
FYI, we're not saying Zerg has no chance against Protoss. We were just as surprised as you guys were when we got the pro feedback last weekend. The reason we wanted to point it out asap is because in order for us to work together, we wanted you to have the information we got as well. If there is a shift in meta coming at the pro level, we're pretty sure that there will be a shift in meta at the ladder level also. This is a common trend we've seen over the years. Although there are some factors that we are keeping an eye on that we pointed out with this update, please remember our goal is to locate exactly where the state of the game lands. So we need to keep an open mind and gauge the situation without previous bias.
Second, recent events and feedback are causing us to examine the PvZ matchup very closely. The latest Kespa pro feedback is that Zerg has a very low chance vs. Protoss due to changes in the meta. We also pinged a few non-Korean Protoss players regarding this, and they had a very similar sentiment.
Thank god, late game Protoss is a nightmare. I'm glad theyre looking more at it.
Second, recent events and feedback are causing us to examine the PvZ matchup very closely. The latest Kespa pro feedback is that Zerg has a very low chance vs. Protoss due to changes in the meta. We also pinged a few non-Korean Protoss players regarding this, and they had a very similar sentiment.
Thank god, late game Protoss is a nightmare. I'm glad theyre looking more at it.
The meta will probably change again before they end up patching anything.
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
I can understand why you would want to nerf the units you mentioned, but why on earth buff the infestor?
It's only used these days for fungal in combination with ravager bile otherwise it's totally useless, they should bring back upgraded infested terrans since right now infestor is the worst spellcaster in the game.
Players created new, "imbalanced" meta DK talks about issues in the balance in the new "balance report" and "looks into it" Players start adepting DK gives out balance test map Players finally overcome "inbalance" by adepting DK see this, stops talking about the balance changes Players find out that the new meta thanks to adepting seems to need a new answer and thus looks imbalanced DK talks about issues in the balance in the new "balance report" and "looks into it"
I don't understand why PvZ can be drastically Zerg favored for months on end and the attitude is wait and see, but then the very instant it looks like Protoss are turning things around they start preparing the nerf bat. Why the unequal treatment? I have said for months that if the winrates for the matchup were reversed then the community outcry would be so strong that nerfs would have come very quickly, looks like that is true. Protoss just aren't allowed to do well.
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
I can understand why you would want to nerf the units you mentioned, but why on earth buff the infestor?
It's only used these days for fungal in combination with ravager bile otherwise it's totally useless, they should bring back upgraded infested terrans since right now infestor is the worst spellcaster in the game.
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
Nerf carrier? Does anyone seriously make carriers right now?
No they don't but it doesn't change the fact that they are too strong
sOs makes carriers and wins with them.
I would be very wary of IT buff, because do we really want to go back to the days of spawning infinite free 3/3 marines all over every other army in the game....?? The end of one WoL game in particular comes to mind. It was a GSL match between a zerg (I think it was Symbol) vs mass skytoss, heavily upgraded carriers/voidrays. The zerg just sprayed ITs everywhere and the entire protoss air army died to free 3/3 units.
EDIT: I'm sure stuchiu knows what game I'm thinking of, I've seen it posted in random threads around here before. It was on Daybreak if that helps at all... (I know, there were a lot of games on Daybreak.)
On April 12 2016 04:40 Exarl25 wrote: I don't understand why PvZ can be drastically Zerg favored for months on end and the attitude is wait and see, but then the very instant it looks like Protoss are turning things around they start preparing the nerf bat. Why the unequal treatment? I have said for months that if the winrates for the matchup were reversed then the community outcry would be so strong that nerfs would have come very quickly, looks like that is true. Protoss just aren't allowed to do well.
How is it zerg favoured exactly? On TL you guys like stats from Korea and the truth is Zerg did well only in SSL which was played way earlier than GSL. People figured out the game and the result is only 1 zerg in RO8 of GSL. The truth is protoss players abused their race to the fullest before Koreans did but they can't do it so well ofcourse.
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
I can understand why you would want to nerf the units you mentioned, but why on earth buff the infestor?
It's only used these days for fungal in combination with ravager bile otherwise it's totally useless, they should bring back upgraded infested terrans since right now infestor is the worst spellcaster in the game.
On April 12 2016 04:37 SetGuitarsToKill wrote:
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
Nerf carrier? Does anyone seriously make carriers right now?
No they don't but it doesn't change the fact that they are too strong
sOs makes carriers and wins with them.
I would be very wary of IT buff, because do we really want to go back to the days of spawning infinite free 3/3 marines all over every other army in the game....?? The end of one WoL game in particular comes to mind. It was a GSL match between a zerg (I think it was Symbol) vs mass skytoss, heavily upgraded carriers/voidrays. The zerg just sprayed ITs everywhere and the entire protoss air army died to free 3/3 units.
EDIT: I'm sure stuchiu knows what game I'm thinking of, I've seen it posted in random threads around here before. It was on Daybreak if that helps at all... (I know, there were a lot of games on Daybreak.)
You are right, we should add a unit to the game that works like a reaver but has free shots and does 150 damage so it kills half of zerg army in 1 shot
Protoss has the worst record since 2010 both in win-rates [aligulac.com] and a representation in "higher" leagues, and the only thing that is mentioned in regards to PvZ is that Zerg is weak late game? I'm sorry, but I really don't understand this....
On April 12 2016 04:40 Exarl25 wrote: I don't understand why PvZ can be drastically Zerg favored for months on end and the attitude is wait and see, but then the very instant it looks like Protoss are turning things around they start preparing the nerf bat. Why the unequal treatment? I have said for months that if the winrates for the matchup were reversed then the community outcry would be so strong that nerfs would have come very quickly, looks like that is true. Protoss just aren't allowed to do well.
You could still make a strong argument for it being zerg favored. If you play a best of 7 w/ every map in the pool, that just sucks for protoss. Zerg still wins more than twice as often on Prion. Every map ranges from "ok" to "completely terrible" for protoss, while it ranges from "ok" to "amazing" for zerg - the "creative" mapping styles seem to trend towards stuff that's awful for protoss to play on.
The P strong argument comes from small sample sizes of games played on cherry picked maps. The right map design can flip 60/40 to 40/60 either way.
Not playing Z or P, from watching Koreans I feel like ZvP is the most balanced matchup at the moment. Though I don't like the dynamics behind it at all.
On April 12 2016 04:40 Exarl25 wrote: I don't understand why PvZ can be drastically Zerg favored for months on end and the attitude is wait and see, but then the very instant it looks like Protoss are turning things around they start preparing the nerf bat. Why the unequal treatment? I have said for months that if the winrates for the matchup were reversed then the community outcry would be so strong that nerfs would have come very quickly, looks like that is true. Protoss just aren't allowed to do well.
You could still make a strong argument for it being zerg favored. If you play a best of 7 w/ every map in the pool, that just sucks for protoss. Zerg still wins more than twice as often on Prion. Every map ranges from "ok" to "completely terrible" for protoss, while it ranges from "ok" to "amazing" for zerg - the "creative" mapping styles seem to trend towards stuff that's awful for protoss to play on.
The P strong argument comes from small sample sizes of games played on cherry picked maps. The right map design can flip 60/40 to 40/60.
The match-up being Zerg favoured and Protoss late game being too strong aren't mutually exclusive.
On April 12 2016 04:40 Exarl25 wrote: I don't understand why PvZ can be drastically Zerg favored for months on end and the attitude is wait and see, but then the very instant it looks like Protoss are turning things around they start preparing the nerf bat. Why the unequal treatment? I have said for months that if the winrates for the matchup were reversed then the community outcry would be so strong that nerfs would have come very quickly, looks like that is true. Protoss just aren't allowed to do well.
I honestly think protoss players don't cry as much as terran/zerg lol
Similar stuff has happened to terran tho. Remember the nerfs on ghosts and thors just a few days after they were used to great effect in only a few games.
Similar stuff has happened to terran tho. Remember the nerfs on ghosts and thors just a few days after they were used to great effect in only a few games.
The ghost nerfs took a while and quite a few high profile games were played like MVP vs Nestea on blizzcon stage
Similar stuff has happened to terran tho. Remember the nerfs on ghosts and thors just a few days after they were used to great effect in only a few games.
The ghost nerfs took a while and quite a few high profile games were played like MVP vs Nestea on blizzcon stage
Well I don't remember the exact timings but compared to the Blord/infestor era it felt like a weekend lol
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
Nerf medivacs?? no nerf to ultras??
Yeah I disagree with him. I agree with nerfing air armies (broodlords included), but nerfing everything and buffing infestors? Sounds like a boring game then. Fuck infestors they are fine as it is, if Zerg needed a buff it should be elsewhere.
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
Nerf medivacs?? no nerf to ultras??
Yeah I disagree with him. I agree with nerfing air armies (broodlords included), but nerfing everything and buffing infestors? Sounds like a boring game then. Fuck infestors they are fine as it is, if Zerg needed a buff it should be elsewhere.
Sounds like a boring game but then the game would not resolve around armies of death (lurkers / immortals/ liberators/ sky armies etc) and would result in the most exciting starcraft you've seen xD
Similar stuff has happened to terran tho. Remember the nerfs on ghosts and thors just a few days after they were used to great effect in only a few games.
The ghost nerfs took a while and quite a few high profile games were played like MVP vs Nestea on blizzcon stage
Well I don't remember the exact timings but compared to the Blord/infestor era it felt like a weekend lol
Yeah but BL+Infestor had a huge period of time where people felt "hmm.. this is probably a bit too strong, but we'll see" that was not so great in hindsight. Ghost switch came and got community agreement that it was silly and too strong soon after it was figured out
The latest Kespa pro feedback is that Zerg has a very low chance vs. Protoss due to changes in the meta. We also pinged a few non-Korean Protoss players regarding this, and they had a very similar sentiment.
This line is really the confusing part IMO. PvZ success has been limited - limited by players/leagues and limited by maps. This month winrates still have protoss below 50% for the 6'th or 7'th month in a row, not zerg being 40-45%. It seems like way too strong of a statement. Even if that was the case, why is a 3-10% imbalance acceptable for half a year but not for a week when there's a hint of it flipping the other way in certain circumstances?
On April 12 2016 04:40 Exarl25 wrote: I don't understand why PvZ can be drastically Zerg favored for months on end and the attitude is wait and see, but then the very instant it looks like Protoss are turning things around they start preparing the nerf bat. Why the unequal treatment? I have said for months that if the winrates for the matchup were reversed then the community outcry would be so strong that nerfs would have come very quickly, looks like that is true. Protoss just aren't allowed to do well.
Welcome to Blizzard, and balancing.
PvT was literally, 50/50 when they nerfed Khaydarin Amulet and gave Protoss no compensatory buffs. And of course the Protoss winrate tanked.
The latest Kespa pro feedback is that Zerg has a very low chance vs. Protoss due to changes in the meta. We also pinged a few non-Korean Protoss players regarding this, and they had a very similar sentiment.
This line is really the confusing part IMO. PvZ success has been limited - limited by players/leagues and limited by maps. This month winrates are somewhere around 45/55 in pro play - and that's zerg being the 55, not zerg being 40-45%. It seems like way too strong of a statement
It's really not. 45-55 winrates from what? Go4SC2 cups?
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
Nerf medivacs?? no nerf to ultras??
Yeah I disagree with him. I agree with nerfing air armies (broodlords included), but nerfing everything and buffing infestors? Sounds like a boring game then. Fuck infestors they are fine as it is, if Zerg needed a buff it should be elsewhere.
Sounds like a boring game but then the game would not resolve around armies of death (lurkers / immortals/ liberators/ sky armies etc) and would result in the most exciting starcraft you've seen xD
Infestors. Exactly what I think of when people say the word exciting.
I'm glad they seem to have forget about that silly banshee buff.
And I agree that PvZ is impossible to win vs a competent Protoss right now because immortals based composition are too strong. Problem is P players have to play phoenix (for mutas) into double robo immortals (for lurkers) and that since no other style is possible, you can't nerf it too heavily. I wish they would nerf a lot of things (let's say lurkers and maybe ultras / tempests and immortals / liberators to begin with -hey can remove invincible nydus as well) and then reconsider the state of the game.
On April 12 2016 04:40 Exarl25 wrote: I don't understand why PvZ can be drastically Zerg favored for months on end and the attitude is wait and see, but then the very instant it looks like Protoss are turning things around they start preparing the nerf bat. Why the unequal treatment? I have said for months that if the winrates for the matchup were reversed then the community outcry would be so strong that nerfs would have come very quickly, looks like that is true. Protoss just aren't allowed to do well.
Welcome to Blizzard, and balancing.
PvT was literally, 50/50 when they nerfed Khaydarin Amulet and gave Protoss no compensatory buffs.
They gave Zealot Charge the guarantee to hit their target even if not actually reaching it, which was a pretty huge compensation (but obviously not as massive as removing the warp-in storms). Before that kiting bio especially with concussive shells would dodge most zealot attacks.
On April 12 2016 05:03 [PkF] Wire wrote: Problem is P players have to play phoenix (for mutas) into double robo immortals (for lurkers) and that since no other style is possible, you can't nerf it too heavily.
Bingo. Protoss is pigeoned-holed into a unit composition because we don't have choices anymore. Nothing deals with Lurkers but Immortals basically, and Blink Stalker/HT/Archon hasn't worked since WOL due to the Muta regeneration buff.
On April 12 2016 04:40 Exarl25 wrote: I don't understand why PvZ can be drastically Zerg favored for months on end and the attitude is wait and see, but then the very instant it looks like Protoss are turning things around they start preparing the nerf bat. Why the unequal treatment? I have said for months that if the winrates for the matchup were reversed then the community outcry would be so strong that nerfs would have come very quickly, looks like that is true. Protoss just aren't allowed to do well.
Welcome to Blizzard, and balancing.
PvT was literally, 50/50 when they nerfed Khaydarin Amulet and gave Protoss no compensatory buffs.
They gave Zealot Charge the guarantee to hit their target even if not actually reaching it, which was a pretty huge compensation (but obviously not as massive as removing the warp-in storms). Before that kiting bio especially with concussive shells would dodge most zealot attacks.
Are you actually stating that Blizzard thought the Charge bug fix/buff was actually equivalent to the nerf of removing KA?
Because we all know what happened, the Protoss winrate tanked.
So either Blizzard is stupid for thinking that bug fix would balance it out, or Blizzard is stupid because they gave no compensatory buff. It isn't hard to figure out how a scale works.
But Blizzard doesn't try to balance their game, they just make changes.
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
Nerf medivacs?? no nerf to ultras??
Yeah I disagree with him. I agree with nerfing air armies (broodlords included), but nerfing everything and buffing infestors? Sounds like a boring game then. Fuck infestors they are fine as it is, if Zerg needed a buff it should be elsewhere.
Sounds like a boring game but then the game would not resolve around armies of death (lurkers / immortals/ liberators/ sky armies etc) and would result in the most exciting starcraft you've seen xD
no armies of death when P/T air armies get nerfed but Z air armies being kept untouched and infestors buffed...? I'm not so sure about that.
On April 12 2016 05:03 [PkF] Wire wrote: Problem is P players have to play phoenix (for mutas) into double robo immortals (for lurkers) and that since no other style is possible, you can't nerf it too heavily.
Bingo. Protoss is pigeoned-holed into a unit composition because we don't have choices anymore. Nothing deals with Lurkers but Immortals basically, and Blink Stalker/HT/Archon hasn't worked since WOL due to the Muta regeneration buff.
could colossi with restored range (I mean colossi which would outrange lurkers) be a first move towards opening other compositions ? Since their damage nerf colossi are less susceptible to break the game.
I think it is reasonable to postpone/cancel PvZ Zerg nerfs as it is likely that Protoss players may still improve their performance against a variety of Zerg allins, but Protoss would have to do even better than now to justify not changing anything at all I would say. Hopefully Protoss will, especially with the help from maps, be able to consistently fend off Zerg aggression to a point where it would be considered balanced. The new map changes seem to generally favor expanding/macro oriented play, and this will indeniably be an indirect Protoss buff versus Zerg.
Also I think what is being meant with non-korean Protosses sharing a similar sentiment with Kespa is not so much that Zerg has a very low chance per se, but probably that they agree with the increased tendency of handling of Zerg allins plus the strength Protoss has in later stages of the matchup. I would guess they still think it is difficult to play against some of the Zerg aggression.
I would lastly add, however, that if the case is that Zerg has trouble versus Protoss, I think nerfing the Immortal would be dangerous as it is such core, much needed unit in all matchups right now. So while the Zerg perspective would suggest that the Immortal is overperforming, which may/may not be true, I would confidently say that nerfing/changing the Immortal without doing a broad-spectrum of buffs/compensations to Protoss as a result of the massive impact it would have is going to cause some problems.
Instead I think the goal for fixing potential problems for Zerg against Protoss would be to look at the lategame. These have been ideas I have proposed and heard so far, and perhaps only one of them could help Zerg enough:
- Increase +massive damage on corrupters (largely only matters versus Carrier/Tempest)
- Split the immortal attack into 2, like marauder (it has 2 cannons aesthetically, mostly only affects their damage against ultralisk) 20+30 to 10+15 (could slightly buff Immortal as a compensation, perhaps 11+15)
- Increase abduct range (would help vs tempests, but may be too much in other matchups.)
- Redesign/nerf Tempest (my suggestion would be to increase movement speed and decrease range.)
I think the best move to prepare for potential imbalances favoring Protoss once Protoss either learns to defend Zerg aggression consistently or gets a helping hand is to look at the Zerg lategame strength like above to avoid nerfing a fundamental LotV Protoss unit like the Immortal.
On April 12 2016 05:03 [PkF] Wire wrote: Problem is P players have to play phoenix (for mutas) into double robo immortals (for lurkers) and that since no other style is possible, you can't nerf it too heavily.
Bingo. Protoss is pigeoned-holed into a unit composition because we don't have choices anymore. Nothing deals with Lurkers but Immortals basically, and Blink Stalker/HT/Archon hasn't worked since WOL due to the Muta regeneration buff.
could colossi with restored range (I mean colossi which would outrange lurkers) be a first move towards opening other compositions ? Since their damage nerf colossi are less susceptible to break the game.
The damage nerf was massive - over 1.5x with +3 attack. They just cost a ton (in minerals, gas, robo+robosup build time, supply) for the amount that they can give to an army, even with +1 range over lurkers
A Colossus buff is really the first step in my opinion of doing anything, but I don't think it will be enough.
Zerg has so many good options versus Protoss. I'd like to see the Warp in change reverted, that would help Protoss significantly, especially in those positional games where Terran and Zerg setup their Tank, Liberators and Lurkers.
On April 12 2016 05:03 [PkF] Wire wrote: Problem is P players have to play phoenix (for mutas) into double robo immortals (for lurkers) and that since no other style is possible, you can't nerf it too heavily.
Bingo. Protoss is pigeoned-holed into a unit composition because we don't have choices anymore. Nothing deals with Lurkers but Immortals basically, and Blink Stalker/HT/Archon hasn't worked since WOL due to the Muta regeneration buff.
could colossi with restored range (I mean colossi which would outrange lurkers) be a first move towards opening other compositions ? Since their damage nerf colossi are less susceptible to break the game.
It could, but I don't think Blizzard wants colossi to take a particularly large role in the match-up. Nerfing lurkers/ravagers alongside immortals probably does more for the match-up.
On April 12 2016 04:40 Exarl25 wrote: I don't understand why PvZ can be drastically Zerg favored for months on end and the attitude is wait and see, but then the very instant it looks like Protoss are turning things around they start preparing the nerf bat. Why the unequal treatment? I have said for months that if the winrates for the matchup were reversed then the community outcry would be so strong that nerfs would have come very quickly, looks like that is true. Protoss just aren't allowed to do well.
Welcome to Blizzard, and balancing.
PvT was literally, 50/50 when they nerfed Khaydarin Amulet and gave Protoss no compensatory buffs.
They gave Zealot Charge the guarantee to hit their target even if not actually reaching it, which was a pretty huge compensation (but obviously not as massive as removing the warp-in storms). Before that kiting bio especially with concussive shells would dodge most zealot attacks.
Are you actually stating that Blizzard thought that bug fix/buff was actually equivalent to the nerf of removing KA?
Because we all know what happened, the Protoss winrate tanked.
So either Blizzard is stupid for thinking that bug fix would balance it out, or Blizzard is stupid because they gave no compensatory buff.
I'm just saying that you are wrong about blizzard giving "no compensatory buff". Whether it was sufficient or not is a different story, but the buff exists.
My point was about Blizzard and their balance scheme.
The bug fix that happened to buff Zealots did happen. But it did not recompense the Protoss race, by definition, since the win rate tanked. Anyway, that is an argument about semantics due to the multiple definitions of compensation. I should have used another word.
On April 12 2016 05:03 [PkF] Wire wrote: Problem is P players have to play phoenix (for mutas) into double robo immortals (for lurkers) and that since no other style is possible, you can't nerf it too heavily.
Bingo. Protoss is pigeoned-holed into a unit composition because we don't have choices anymore. Nothing deals with Lurkers but Immortals basically, and Blink Stalker/HT/Archon hasn't worked since WOL due to the Muta regeneration buff.
could colossi with restored range (I mean colossi which would outrange lurkers) be a first move towards opening other compositions ? Since their damage nerf colossi are less susceptible to break the game.
They are at 9 range with thermal lance again. So either you reduce lurker range to 8 or you up colossus range to 10. And I'd rather not have the 2nd one happen.
Balance with stronger units & less emphasis on warp in is better than instawarp but needing weak units for 50/50 winrates IMO
The change was intended to reduce the strength of Protoss all-ins. But Protoss players doing an all-in just build a Gateway near the pylon anyway or use a Warp Prism. It did little for that.
The bigger factors are that the sped up economy and changes to chronoboost really hurt Warp Gate timings anyway. Warp Gate takes longer to research in LOTV than WOL or HOTS, and your opponent is much more developed in LOTV when it finishes.
Where the change does hurt is for harrassment purposes. I used to send Probes out on the map to make Pylons so I could harass in the mid-late game. Harrass is significantly hampered by that change, which is key in those positional games. But now I just use a Warp Prism. Again Protoss is pigeonholed into using a few really strong units, and everyone is forced to play the same.
And God Forbid my Pylon barely doesn't touch the Nexus on my expansion, because then I won't be able to warp in defenders basically.
It was a silly change that didn't consider other circumstances and leads to confusion. And with Protoss below 50% in both matchups, it is a slight buff that cleans up the confusion of warp in times and streamlines the game.
We're slowly gravitating towards one viable play style for Protoss. If every time Protoss finds a solution to something Blizzard nerfs it into the ground you're going to have a 2 race game very soon. Game has become dull as all fuck. Haven't played seriously in months.
Lol "From our perspective, early/mid game issues look as though they're not as problematic as before due to Protoss players learning to react better vs. different Zerg threats." This is what I've been saying is going for happen in like forever, protoss defense too strong they will eventually learnt o defend and get ahead. Its sad that they did not foresee this coming -_- Should be obvious
On April 12 2016 05:03 [PkF] Wire wrote: Problem is P players have to play phoenix (for mutas) into double robo immortals (for lurkers) and that since no other style is possible, you can't nerf it too heavily.
Bingo. Protoss is pigeoned-holed into a unit composition because we don't have choices anymore. Nothing deals with Lurkers but Immortals basically, and Blink Stalker/HT/Archon hasn't worked since WOL due to the Muta regeneration buff.
could colossi with restored range (I mean colossi which would outrange lurkers) be a first move towards opening other compositions ? Since their damage nerf colossi are less susceptible to break the game.
It could, but I don't think Blizzard wants colossi to take a particularly large role in the match-up. Nerfing lurkers/ravagers alongside immortals probably does more for the match-up.
Of course the problem there is, TvZ is pretty much 50/50.
I think this problem is best handled by fixing the problem, which is unfortunately a systematic problem with the Protoss race versus Zerg, which I've been arguing for months while everyone said it was just maps that were making PvZ bad.
On April 12 2016 05:03 [PkF] Wire wrote: Problem is P players have to play phoenix (for mutas) into double robo immortals (for lurkers) and that since no other style is possible, you can't nerf it too heavily.
Bingo. Protoss is pigeoned-holed into a unit composition because we don't have choices anymore. Nothing deals with Lurkers but Immortals basically, and Blink Stalker/HT/Archon hasn't worked since WOL due to the Muta regeneration buff.
could colossi with restored range (I mean colossi which would outrange lurkers) be a first move towards opening other compositions ? Since their damage nerf colossi are less susceptible to break the game.
It could, but I don't think Blizzard wants colossi to take a particularly large role in the match-up. Nerfing lurkers/ravagers alongside immortals probably does more for the match-up.
Of course the problem there is, TvZ is pretty much 50/50.
I think this problem is best handled by fixing the problem, which is unfortunately a systematic problem with the Protoss race versus Zerg, which I've been arguing for months while everyone said it was just maps that were making PvZ bad.
On April 12 2016 05:03 [PkF] Wire wrote: Problem is P players have to play phoenix (for mutas) into double robo immortals (for lurkers) and that since no other style is possible, you can't nerf it too heavily.
Bingo. Protoss is pigeoned-holed into a unit composition because we don't have choices anymore. Nothing deals with Lurkers but Immortals basically, and Blink Stalker/HT/Archon hasn't worked since WOL due to the Muta regeneration buff.
could colossi with restored range (I mean colossi which would outrange lurkers) be a first move towards opening other compositions ? Since their damage nerf colossi are less susceptible to break the game.
It could, but I don't think Blizzard wants colossi to take a particularly large role in the match-up. Nerfing lurkers/ravagers alongside immortals probably does more for the match-up.
Of course the problem there is, TvZ is pretty much 50/50.
I think this problem is best handled by fixing the problem, which is unfortunately a systematic problem with the Protoss race versus Zerg, which I've been arguing for months while everyone said it was just maps that were making PvZ bad.
TvZ isn't 50/50 at pro level. Try 60/40.
In what direction? If Zerg is at 40% than a Lurker/Ravager nerf is absolutely not an option. And do you have any stats to show me?
On April 12 2016 05:24 Shuffleblade wrote: Lol "From our perspective, early/mid game issues look as though they're not as problematic as before due to Protoss players learning to react better vs. different Zerg threats." This is what I've been saying is going for happen in like forever, protoss defense too strong they will eventually learnt o defend and get ahead. Its sad that they did not foresee this coming -_- Should be obvious
Predicting that people are getting better is always easy. Predicting that the defender is not going to die as often anymore is easy too. The real question is always how much you have to invest into that and what strategical implications it has. At the moment I don't think Protoss is favored in the matchup, because even if they don't die as much to a specific timing, Zerg can often work with a big enough advantage to still compete with mid- and lategame armies of Protoss. I don't really understand why KespA players would be arguing like DK implies, GSL/SSL/Proleague has felt like T>>Z and P>T in the last weeks with few very ZvP games. In which Zergs performed even slightly better than Protoss.
On April 12 2016 05:03 [PkF] Wire wrote: Problem is P players have to play phoenix (for mutas) into double robo immortals (for lurkers) and that since no other style is possible, you can't nerf it too heavily.
Bingo. Protoss is pigeoned-holed into a unit composition because we don't have choices anymore. Nothing deals with Lurkers but Immortals basically, and Blink Stalker/HT/Archon hasn't worked since WOL due to the Muta regeneration buff.
could colossi with restored range (I mean colossi which would outrange lurkers) be a first move towards opening other compositions ? Since their damage nerf colossi are less susceptible to break the game.
It could, but I don't think Blizzard wants colossi to take a particularly large role in the match-up. Nerfing lurkers/ravagers alongside immortals probably does more for the match-up.
Of course the problem there is, TvZ is pretty much 50/50.
I think this problem is best handled by fixing the problem, which is unfortunately a systematic problem with the Protoss race versus Zerg, which I've been arguing for months while everyone said it was just maps that were making PvZ bad.
TvZ isn't 50/50 at pro level. Try 60/40.
In what direction? If Zerg is at 40% than a Lurker/Ravager nerf is absolutely not an option. And do you have any stats to show me?
On April 12 2016 05:03 [PkF] Wire wrote: Problem is P players have to play phoenix (for mutas) into double robo immortals (for lurkers) and that since no other style is possible, you can't nerf it too heavily.
Bingo. Protoss is pigeoned-holed into a unit composition because we don't have choices anymore. Nothing deals with Lurkers but Immortals basically, and Blink Stalker/HT/Archon hasn't worked since WOL due to the Muta regeneration buff.
could colossi with restored range (I mean colossi which would outrange lurkers) be a first move towards opening other compositions ? Since their damage nerf colossi are less susceptible to break the game.
It could, but I don't think Blizzard wants colossi to take a particularly large role in the match-up. Nerfing lurkers/ravagers alongside immortals probably does more for the match-up.
Of course the problem there is, TvZ is pretty much 50/50.
I think this problem is best handled by fixing the problem, which is unfortunately a systematic problem with the Protoss race versus Zerg, which I've been arguing for months while everyone said it was just maps that were making PvZ bad.
TvZ isn't 50/50 at pro level. Try 60/40.
In what direction? If Zerg is at 40% than a Lurker/Ravager nerf is absolutely not an option. And do you have any stats to show me?
The amount is statistics from those three league is usually so low you can't draw any meaningful conclusions.
Imagine if you and I were the best T and Z players respectively in the world, and are equally skilled. If we play 1800 games, we'll have data on which race is better, ect... let's say the game is balanced so we split those 1800 games.
If the next week we play 5 more games, but I'm just not playing as well so I lose them all, no one is going to say the game balance has suddenly changed based on the results of 5 out of 1805 games.
However, if we play 18 games at first and split them, then play 5 more and I lose them all, people might jump all over that and make all kinds of claims, because the winrate would swing dramatically.
That is the problem with looking at such low sample sizes. One series can wildly swing win-rates, and variables (such as a player having an off day) are much more likely to affect the data.
The Aligulac Balance report is a really great tool because it combines data from lots of high level games. Also, the performance difference chart is very powerful, and shows the difference in player performance after patches. At the moment we see that Terran is -1, which is basically even, while Protoss is a -22 and Zerg +19. That speaks to the near 50/50 winrate in TvZ and TvP, but the problematic winrate in ZvP.
Zerg players are outperforming themselves and Protoss players are underperforming compared to Aligulac predictions.
On April 12 2016 05:53 BretZ wrote: Does this make Dark's Starleague win even more prestigious? (considering win rate/path to win)
Well, the main event win rate in SSL for Zerg versus Protoss was 63% (Zerg favored). But the sample size was tiny, and Dark was the reason that win rate was so good...
So draw whatever conclusion you like. There is too little data to have any significance.
That the non-SSL Korean Leagues has chosen other maps, means that they think they can balance the game better than the Blizzard balance team. Blizzards balance team should focus on balancing around the ladder maps, which I cannot possibly imagine being Protoss favoured in PvZ.
I'd like them to try a slight lurker nerf (-1 range would probably make the most sense) and an immortal nerf to make it less resilient vs hydras/lings. But I'm comfortable with them doing nothing for the time being and seeing if Dark's baneling centric style can give birth to something interesting too -probably because I'm P hahahahaha . That style is actually pretty solid, allows for good harass in the mineral lines and transitions smoothly to broods.
On April 12 2016 06:01 BronzeKnee wrote: Banelings are so much fun to watch.
they are and I think letting that style develop would be a smart move. If P players start to adapt and go for quick storms instead of mass immortals Z players can then switch back to lurker play again, might get interesting and allow for more variations.
On April 12 2016 05:53 BretZ wrote: Does this make Dark's Starleague win even more prestigious? (considering win rate/path to win)
Well, the main event win rate in SSL for Zerg versus Protoss was 63% (Zerg favored). But the sample size was tiny, and Dark was the reason that win rate was so good...
So draw whatever conclusion you like. There is too little data to have any significance.
Sure, but at the same time you probably should balance the game around the highest lvl of play possible by humans, i think? The difference between koreans and other "high lvl" gameplay (which is part of the aligulac stats) is simply too high to not consider. It's really a question of philosophy at this point.
Wait 6 months to take any action on a stupidly Zerg favored PvZ.
A couple of Protoss players figure out how to win the matchup a bit... Talk about P nerfs immediately. Cool.
Blizzard hates Protoss confirmed. And you know what? It's probably because of people writing stupid whiny threats. Or some delusion that people actually like Nerchio (I keep hearing this a lot, in casts and stuff... who actually likes Nerchio?)
I think there's no other explanation. It makes NO sense how fucking quickly they've even hinted at a Protoss nerf when for so long win rates have been low 40s for P and they've done nothing. Does this indicate that they want to move in the direction of Dota and immediately patch every winning strategy out of the game as it comes along?
Meta should evolve out of patches, not patches out of meta. Sure if something is clearly broken over a statistically significant number of games, fix it... but this feels like "oh wait, Protoss came up with a new build that beats Zerg." We've gone through this many times before. Zergs have found answers before (mass gateways, soul train, etc.).
Also, pretty much everything that they've done or want to do makes life for the sub GM Protoss INFINITELY harder and less fun. I really don't get how you can decide to just make life hell for 1/3 of your player base.
If you care about Protoss, tweet at Blizzard using #Protosslivesmatter
I'm not so sure lategame Protoss is that bad against Zerg. Dark showed it was quite doable against Stats to handle lategame Toss. Remax is viable and easier to achieve than ever. If initial Zerg army could handle endstage Toss, then there would never be a contest. Endgame Toss also suffers all the Broodlord weaknesses anchored by the terribly slow HTs.
Thinking about it, I think blizzard is mainly trying to react to the daily whine-thread on reddit with this. They haven't talked about anything specifically how to nerf protoss or anything, it's just them telling reddit that Protoss isn't weak by supporting the other side for a moment in time, after heating up the discussion for a long time the other way around by making it sound as if Protoss needed buffs.
On April 12 2016 06:10 DinoMight wrote: Wait 6 months to take any action on a stupidly Zerg favored PvZ.
A couple of Protoss players figure out how to win the matchup a bit... Talk about P nerfs immediately. Cool.
Blizzard hates Protoss confirmed. And you know what? It's probably because of people writing stupid whiny threats. Or some delusion that people actually like Nerchio (I keep hearing this a lot, in casts and stuff... who actually likes Nerchio?)
I think there's no other explanation. It makes NO sense how fucking quickly they've even hinted at a Protoss nerf when for so long win rates have been low 40s for P and they've done nothing.
Also, pretty much everything that they've done or want to do makes life for the sub GM Protoss INFINITELY harder and less fun. I really don't get how you can decide to just make life hell for 1/3 of your player base.
If you care about Protoss, tweet at Blizzard using #Protosslivesmatter
10+ immortals are really incredibly hard to deal with at any level and I understand why they would talk about it. Though I repeat that I hope they give the players some time because I'm pretty sure Z can figure out solutions before an immortal nerf is needed.
On April 12 2016 06:10 DinoMight wrote: Wait 6 months to take any action on a stupidly Zerg favored PvZ.
A couple of Protoss players figure out how to win the matchup a bit... Talk about P nerfs immediately. Cool.
Blizzard hates Protoss confirmed. And you know what? It's probably because of people writing stupid whiny threats. Or some delusion that people actually like Nerchio (I keep hearing this a lot, in casts and stuff... who actually likes Nerchio?)
I think there's no other explanation. It makes NO sense how fucking quickly they've even hinted at a Protoss nerf when for so long win rates have been low 40s for P and they've done nothing.
Also, pretty much everything that they've done or want to do makes life for the sub GM Protoss INFINITELY harder and less fun. I really don't get how you can decide to just make life hell for 1/3 of your player base.
If you care about Protoss, tweet at Blizzard using #Protosslivesmatter
I like how you came into this topic and started talking about liking me or not like if I was the only reason they do not nerf zerg. People that do not understand this game should not talk about game balance so you can be mad all you want but the truth is that without early game advantage zerg doesn't exist in mid and late game at all.
On April 12 2016 06:10 DinoMight wrote: Wait 6 months to take any action on a stupidly Zerg favored PvZ.
A couple of Protoss players figure out how to win the matchup a bit... Talk about P nerfs immediately. Cool.
Blizzard hates Protoss confirmed. And you know what? It's probably because of people writing stupid whiny threats. Or some delusion that people actually like Nerchio (I keep hearing this a lot, in casts and stuff... who actually likes Nerchio?)
I think there's no other explanation. It makes NO sense how fucking quickly they've even hinted at a Protoss nerf when for so long win rates have been low 40s for P and they've done nothing.
Also, pretty much everything that they've done or want to do makes life for the sub GM Protoss INFINITELY harder and less fun. I really don't get how you can decide to just make life hell for 1/3 of your player base.
If you care about Protoss, tweet at Blizzard using #Protosslivesmatter
I like how you came into this topic and started talking about liking me or not like if I was the only reason they do not nerf zerg. People that do not understand this game should not talk about game balance so you can be mad all you want but the truth is that without early game advantage zerg doesn't exist in mid and late game at all.
if you were to keep it realistic, what kind of move would you like Blizzard to make to improve things in the mu ? For instance, when you say "nerf immortal", what kind of nerf would you want to be tested ?
On April 12 2016 06:14 Big J wrote: Thinking about it, I think blizzard is mainly trying to react to the daily whine-thread on reddit with this. They haven't talked about anything specifically how to nerf protoss or anything, it's just them telling reddit that Protoss isn't weak by supporting the other side for a moment in time, after heating up the discussion for a long time the other way around by making it sound as if Protoss needed buffs.
What i really like about all of this is that we're getting map updates and they don't patch anything else. Which right now is pretty much the best move imo.
On April 12 2016 06:10 DinoMight wrote: Wait 6 months to take any action on a stupidly Zerg favored PvZ.
A couple of Protoss players figure out how to win the matchup a bit... Talk about P nerfs immediately. Cool.
Blizzard hates Protoss confirmed. And you know what? It's probably because of people writing stupid whiny threats. Or some delusion that people actually like Nerchio (I keep hearing this a lot, in casts and stuff... who actually likes Nerchio?)
I think there's no other explanation. It makes NO sense how fucking quickly they've even hinted at a Protoss nerf when for so long win rates have been low 40s for P and they've done nothing.
Also, pretty much everything that they've done or want to do makes life for the sub GM Protoss INFINITELY harder and less fun. I really don't get how you can decide to just make life hell for 1/3 of your player base.
If you care about Protoss, tweet at Blizzard using #Protosslivesmatter
I like how you came into this topic and started talking about liking me or not like if I was the only reason they do not nerf zerg. People that do not understand this game should not talk about game balance so you can be mad all you want but the truth is that without early game advantage zerg doesn't exist in mid and late game at all.
Tho to be honest I keep on seeing you on this thread and no other progamer. So far no one can deny or accept what he said.
On April 12 2016 06:10 DinoMight wrote: Wait 6 months to take any action on a stupidly Zerg favored PvZ.
A couple of Protoss players figure out how to win the matchup a bit... Talk about P nerfs immediately. Cool.
Blizzard hates Protoss confirmed. And you know what? It's probably because of people writing stupid whiny threats. Or some delusion that people actually like Nerchio (I keep hearing this a lot, in casts and stuff... who actually likes Nerchio?)
I think there's no other explanation. It makes NO sense how fucking quickly they've even hinted at a Protoss nerf when for so long win rates have been low 40s for P and they've done nothing.
Also, pretty much everything that they've done or want to do makes life for the sub GM Protoss INFINITELY harder and less fun. I really don't get how you can decide to just make life hell for 1/3 of your player base.
If you care about Protoss, tweet at Blizzard using #Protosslivesmatter
I like how you came into this topic and started talking about liking me or not like if I was the only reason they do not nerf zerg. People that do not understand this game should not talk about game balance so you can be mad all you want but the truth is that without early game advantage zerg doesn't exist in mid and late game at all.
if you were to keep it realistic, what kind of move would you like Blizzard to make to improve things in the mu ? For instance, when you say "nerf immortal", what kind of nerf would you want to be tested ?
I think we are not going to achieve a lot of meta changes with small updates unfortunately. Maybe going back to pre-lotv Immortal or trying shield less cooldown/less shield? But I also understand that if we nerf Immortal we need to nerf Ravagers and Lurkers as well.
On April 12 2016 06:10 DinoMight wrote: Wait 6 months to take any action on a stupidly Zerg favored PvZ.
A couple of Protoss players figure out how to win the matchup a bit... Talk about P nerfs immediately. Cool.
Blizzard hates Protoss confirmed. And you know what? It's probably because of people writing stupid whiny threats. Or some delusion that people actually like Nerchio (I keep hearing this a lot, in casts and stuff... who actually likes Nerchio?)
I think there's no other explanation. It makes NO sense how fucking quickly they've even hinted at a Protoss nerf when for so long win rates have been low 40s for P and they've done nothing.
Also, pretty much everything that they've done or want to do makes life for the sub GM Protoss INFINITELY harder and less fun. I really don't get how you can decide to just make life hell for 1/3 of your player base.
If you care about Protoss, tweet at Blizzard using #Protosslivesmatter
I like how you came into this topic and started talking about liking me or not like if I was the only reason they do not nerf zerg. People that do not understand this game should not talk about game balance so you can be mad all you want but the truth is that without early game advantage zerg doesn't exist in mid and late game at all.
if you were to keep it realistic, what kind of move would you like Blizzard to make to improve things in the mu ? For instance, when you say "nerf immortal", what kind of nerf would you want to be tested ?
I think we are not going to achieve a lot of meta changes with small updates unfortunately. Maybe going back to pre-lotv Immortal or trying shield less cooldown/less shield? But I also understand that if we nerf Immortal we need to nerf Ravagers and Lurkers as well.
I think this is the main problem : phoenix into immortals is really hard to deal with but P can't play anything else. So you would have to at least nerf lurkers for the mu to remain fair.
By the way do you think bane centric styles have any chance of shaking the meta ?
On April 12 2016 06:14 Big J wrote: Thinking about it, I think blizzard is mainly trying to react to the daily whine-thread on reddit with this. They haven't talked about anything specifically how to nerf protoss or anything, it's just them telling reddit that Protoss isn't weak by supporting the other side for a moment in time, after heating up the discussion for a long time the other way around by making it sound as if Protoss needed buffs.
What i really like about all of this is that we're getting map updates and they don't patch anything else. Which right now is pretty much the best move imo.
I guess given that blizzard is not going to go back to the active patch philosophy that made 2010-2011 WoL so amazing and kept it always fresh, this may really be a good thing as you say. At least they are not going to patch something big and then watch for 8 months like that.
Though it doesn't really make me want to play a lot to be honest. Regardless whether it is balanced or not, regardless whether there is still stuff to figure out or not, I'm not in love with many of the basic dynamics like being pylon rushed nearly every TvP, losing TvTs on the basis of dropping my tanks 0.3 seconds after my opponent or the stupidity that is the current superpower bio-midgame vs giving up against an equal supply ultralisk army.
On April 12 2016 06:10 DinoMight wrote: Wait 6 months to take any action on a stupidly Zerg favored PvZ.
A couple of Protoss players figure out how to win the matchup a bit... Talk about P nerfs immediately. Cool.
Blizzard hates Protoss confirmed. And you know what? It's probably because of people writing stupid whiny threats. Or some delusion that people actually like Nerchio (I keep hearing this a lot, in casts and stuff... who actually likes Nerchio?)
I think there's no other explanation. It makes NO sense how fucking quickly they've even hinted at a Protoss nerf when for so long win rates have been low 40s for P and they've done nothing.
Also, pretty much everything that they've done or want to do makes life for the sub GM Protoss INFINITELY harder and less fun. I really don't get how you can decide to just make life hell for 1/3 of your player base.
If you care about Protoss, tweet at Blizzard using #Protosslivesmatter
I like how you came into this topic and started talking about liking me or not like if I was the only reason they do not nerf zerg. People that do not understand this game should not talk about game balance so you can be mad all you want but the truth is that without early game advantage zerg doesn't exist in mid and late game at all.
if you were to keep it realistic, what kind of move would you like Blizzard to make to improve things in the mu ? For instance, when you say "nerf immortal", what kind of nerf would you want to be tested ?
I think we are not going to achieve a lot of meta changes with small updates unfortunately. Maybe going back to pre-lotv Immortal or trying shield less cooldown/less shield? But I also understand that if we nerf Immortal we need to nerf Ravagers and Lurkers as well.
I think this is the main problem : phoenix into immortals is really hard to deal with but P can't play anything else. So you would have to at least nerf lurkers for the mu to remain fair.
By the way do you think bane centric styles have any chance of shaking the meta ?
I am not a fan of those right now because I didn't have enough practice with that but we can see it's working quite well for some Zergs so I believe it's a viable style. On the other hand I feel like you rely on your opponent making a lot of mistakes.
On April 12 2016 06:10 DinoMight wrote: Wait 6 months to take any action on a stupidly Zerg favored PvZ.
A couple of Protoss players figure out how to win the matchup a bit... Talk about P nerfs immediately. Cool.
Blizzard hates Protoss confirmed. And you know what? It's probably because of people writing stupid whiny threats. Or some delusion that people actually like Nerchio (I keep hearing this a lot, in casts and stuff... who actually likes Nerchio?)
I think there's no other explanation. It makes NO sense how fucking quickly they've even hinted at a Protoss nerf when for so long win rates have been low 40s for P and they've done nothing.
Also, pretty much everything that they've done or want to do makes life for the sub GM Protoss INFINITELY harder and less fun. I really don't get how you can decide to just make life hell for 1/3 of your player base.
If you care about Protoss, tweet at Blizzard using #Protosslivesmatter
I like how you came into this topic and started talking about liking me or not like if I was the only reason they do not nerf zerg. People that do not understand this game should not talk about game balance so you can be mad all you want but the truth is that without early game advantage zerg doesn't exist in mid and late game at all.
Right. And as I've said countless times before, the changes to LotV economy and warpgate give Zerg an INCREDIBLE early game advantage with which they're able to bully Protoss all game long and finally tech switch/remax after the big fight.
Like a previous poster said, if a Zerg army could actually engage and fight a Protoss end game army straight up... then the game would be completely broken because of the way that Zerg production inherently works.
Zerg wins with econ and overwhelming numbers. This has always been the case.
EDIT - also, I talked about a lot of things that weren't Nerchio specific that you just chose to ignore.
The best change would be pathing changes. Sc2 always falls back to an army which simply does its damage way too fast because the dps/area is too high for the enemy army to trade reasonably. Change the blob pathing and you will have a better foundation to balance around it.
It would also look a lot better which is imo just as important for enjoyment (both watching and playing the game) than actual balance numbers. Not that this is anything new, but hey blizzard said they are still open for bigger changes... (i think they also said one time that they already tried it internally though)
On April 12 2016 06:10 DinoMight wrote: Wait 6 months to take any action on a stupidly Zerg favored PvZ.
A couple of Protoss players figure out how to win the matchup a bit... Talk about P nerfs immediately. Cool.
Blizzard hates Protoss confirmed. And you know what? It's probably because of people writing stupid whiny threats. Or some delusion that people actually like Nerchio (I keep hearing this a lot, in casts and stuff... who actually likes Nerchio?)
I think there's no other explanation. It makes NO sense how fucking quickly they've even hinted at a Protoss nerf when for so long win rates have been low 40s for P and they've done nothing.
Also, pretty much everything that they've done or want to do makes life for the sub GM Protoss INFINITELY harder and less fun. I really don't get how you can decide to just make life hell for 1/3 of your player base.
If you care about Protoss, tweet at Blizzard using #Protosslivesmatter
I like how you came into this topic and started talking about liking me or not like if I was the only reason they do not nerf zerg. People that do not understand this game should not talk about game balance so you can be mad all you want but the truth is that without early game advantage zerg doesn't exist in mid and late game at all.
Right. And as I've said countless times before, the changes to LotV economy and warpgate give Zerg an INCREDIBLE early game advantage with which they're able to bully Protoss all game long and finally tech switch/remax after the big fight.
Like a previous poster said, if a Zerg army could actually engage and fight a Protoss end game army straight up... then the game would be completely broken because of the way that Zerg production inherently works.
Zerg wins with econ. This has always been the case.
Yeah, I am playing a different game than you so there is no point in talking.
There is a zerg who talk about protoss abusing his race but he abuse his zerg race all the time in lotv with cheap allins.
David Kim speak about different maps and so on, but the only think that do, is force to play only 1 strategy on 1 map like on ulrena adept upgrade too not die vs zerg a click allin or drop or both.
On April 12 2016 05:53 BretZ wrote: Does this make Dark's Starleague win even more prestigious? (considering win rate/path to win)
Well, the main event win rate in SSL for Zerg versus Protoss was 63% (Zerg favored). But the sample size was tiny, and Dark was the reason that win rate was so good...
So draw whatever conclusion you like. There is too little data to have any significance.
Sure, but at the same time you probably should balance the game around the highest lvl of play possible by humans, i think? The difference between koreans and other "high lvl" gameplay (which is part of the aligulac stats) is simply too high to not consider. It's really a question of philosophy at this point.
Korean tournaments like GSL hugely shifted the WR because they get rid off idiotic maps when WCS still uses them. You cannot nerf Protoss when there are idiotic maps like Prion in tournaments. That doesn't make sense...
On April 12 2016 06:27 The_Red_Viper wrote: The best change would be pathing changes. Sc2 always falls back to an army which simply does its damage way too fast because the dps/area is too high for the enemy army to trade reasonably. Change the blob pathing and you will have a better foundation to balance around it.
It would also look a lot better which is imo just as important for enjoyment (both watching and playing the game) than actual balance numbers. Not that this is anything new, but hey blizzard said they are still open for bigger changes... (i think they also said one time that they already tried it internally though)
I'd love to see a test map where unit clumping was lessened, see what would happen to the meta. I don't trust Blizzard too much when they say they're open to big changes though, at least not that big.
Blizzard is open for big changes only if protoss is the race who gets the nerf because then the other 2 races will not cry, thats how it feels and terrans are the best at crying over 5 years, gg wp.
On April 12 2016 06:10 DinoMight wrote: Wait 6 months to take any action on a stupidly Zerg favored PvZ.
A couple of Protoss players figure out how to win the matchup a bit... Talk about P nerfs immediately. Cool.
Blizzard hates Protoss confirmed. And you know what? It's probably because of people writing stupid whiny threats. Or some delusion that people actually like Nerchio (I keep hearing this a lot, in casts and stuff... who actually likes Nerchio?)
I think there's no other explanation. It makes NO sense how fucking quickly they've even hinted at a Protoss nerf when for so long win rates have been low 40s for P and they've done nothing.
Also, pretty much everything that they've done or want to do makes life for the sub GM Protoss INFINITELY harder and less fun. I really don't get how you can decide to just make life hell for 1/3 of your player base.
If you care about Protoss, tweet at Blizzard using #Protosslivesmatter
I like how you came into this topic and started talking about liking me or not like if I was the only reason they do not nerf zerg. People that do not understand this game should not talk about game balance so you can be mad all you want but the truth is that without early game advantage zerg doesn't exist in mid and late game at all.
Right. And as I've said countless times before, the changes to LotV economy and warpgate give Zerg an INCREDIBLE early game advantage with which they're able to bully Protoss all game long and finally tech switch/remax after the big fight.
Like a previous poster said, if a Zerg army could actually engage and fight a Protoss end game army straight up... then the game would be completely broken because of the way that Zerg production inherently works.
Zerg wins with econ. This has always been the case.
Yeah, I am playing a different game than you so there is no point in talking.
So remind me again why you're here? This is a discussion forum.
Immo is strong but is the only thing we currently have as a backbone in our protoss army. Please consider letting the zerg adapt a bit. And change map pool for god !
On April 12 2016 06:27 The_Red_Viper wrote: The best change would be pathing changes. Sc2 always falls back to an army which simply does its damage way too fast because the dps/area is too high for the enemy army to trade reasonably. Change the blob pathing and you will have a better foundation to balance around it.
It would also look a lot better which is imo just as important for enjoyment (both watching and playing the game) than actual balance numbers. Not that this is anything new, but hey blizzard said they are still open for bigger changes... (i think they also said one time that they already tried it internally though)
I'd love to see a test map where unit clumping was lessened, see what would happen to the meta. I don't trust Blizzard too much when they say they're open to big changes though, at least not that big.
With less unit clumping the game would have less cool moments like an army evaporating in 2 seconds to mass AOE. So that probably won't happen
Look, all I'm trying to say is Protoss got hosed for 6 months and nothing happened. Then we figure out a build that can win and IN THE NEXT UPDATE David Kim is already talking about nerfing it.
They haven't even given the build enough time to be validated as a legitimate balance concern.
It's like if the game after Jaedong vs. Has they immediately nerfed Photon Cannons.
On April 12 2016 06:27 The_Red_Viper wrote: The best change would be pathing changes. Sc2 always falls back to an army which simply does its damage way too fast because the dps/area is too high for the enemy army to trade reasonably. Change the blob pathing and you will have a better foundation to balance around it.
It would also look a lot better which is imo just as important for enjoyment (both watching and playing the game) than actual balance numbers. Not that this is anything new, but hey blizzard said they are still open for bigger changes... (i think they also said one time that they already tried it internally though)
I'd love to see a test map where unit clumping was lessened, see what would happen to the meta. I don't trust Blizzard too much when they say they're open to big changes though, at least not that big.
With less unit clumping the game would have less cool moments like an army evaporating in 2 seconds to mass AOE. So that probably won't happen
cool is really another word in the mouth of David Kim ^^
On April 12 2016 06:39 DinoMight wrote: Look, all I'm trying to say is Protoss got hosed for 6 months and nothing happened. Then we figure out a build that can win and IN THE NEXT UPDATE David Kim is already talking about nerfing it.
They haven't even given the build enough time to be validated as a legitimate balance concern.
It's like if the game after Jaedong vs. Has they immediately nerfed Photon Cannons.
More like nerfing pylons, which would actually be a good thing in lotv
On April 12 2016 06:39 DinoMight wrote: Look, all I'm trying to say is Protoss got hosed for 6 months and nothing happened. Then we figure out a build that can win and IN THE NEXT UPDATE David Kim is already talking about nerfing it.
They haven't even given the build enough time to be validated as a legitimate balance concern.
It's like if the game after Jaedong vs. Has they immediately nerfed Photon Cannons.
double robo immortals styles have been said to be pretty hard to deal with for months, and now that P players have learnt to defend the early game shenanigans they're becoming problematic and I understand the update. That being said, I think not making a balance move and waiting for things like Dark's style to emerge would be the wisest idea.
On April 12 2016 06:27 The_Red_Viper wrote: The best change would be pathing changes. Sc2 always falls back to an army which simply does its damage way too fast because the dps/area is too high for the enemy army to trade reasonably. Change the blob pathing and you will have a better foundation to balance around it.
It would also look a lot better which is imo just as important for enjoyment (both watching and playing the game) than actual balance numbers. Not that this is anything new, but hey blizzard said they are still open for bigger changes... (i think they also said one time that they already tried it internally though)
I'd love to see a test map where unit clumping was lessened, see what would happen to the meta. I don't trust Blizzard too much when they say they're open to big changes though, at least not that big.
If they are open to big changes, here are my suggestions: - remove mutalisk regen - remove speed buffs from these units: -- oracle -- mutalisk(i think, not sure) -- banshee's upgrade from LotV -- warp prism(not sure about this, but I think its speed was buffed too) -- DT - remove ferrari mode from medevacs - nerf phoenix a little - give back Amulet for templars which are NOT warped in by wapring tech(building via gateway is warping too, sadly ><) - also remove pick up range for WP, it was added because of Kamikaze ball and this is no longer a kamikaze ball, thus it's not needed - remove mines, give them to hellion and finally admit it is a replacement of vulture(also mines no longer target workers, because helion harass would be insane)
So, now we have slowed the game down and it is time to rework the oracle so it is skill unit more like banshee and less like this shit we have now(meaning micro depends and better player does more damage than worse player consistently).
Now all we have to do is fix the 50 shades of doom and I think the game would be lovely
Also removing some of the "press button" micro abilities and replacing them with actual micro would be nice, but that's probably too much to ask with the heavy load of what I wrote.
yepyep, basically all the stuff that's 'cool to watch' (In David Kim's opinion) needs to be replaced by stuff thats 'fun to play' (and not just for one race while the other bangs its head against the desk and ragequits the game).
On April 12 2016 06:39 DinoMight wrote: Look, all I'm trying to say is Protoss got hosed for 6 months and nothing happened. Then we figure out a build that can win and IN THE NEXT UPDATE David Kim is already talking about nerfing it.
They haven't even given the build enough time to be validated as a legitimate balance concern.
It's like if the game after Jaedong vs. Has they immediately nerfed Photon Cannons.
double robo immortals styles have been said to be pretty hard to deal with for months, and now that P players have learnt to defend the early game shenanigans they're becoming problematic and I understand the update. That being said, I think not making a balance move and waiting for things like Dark's style to emerge would be the wisest idea.
I think it comes down to how often they want to patch the game. Some games do it all the damn time. Dota is almost a new game every time they patch it.
I think it's okay to have a strategy that lasts a couple of months before someone finds an answer to it. But 6 months of a race getting owned in win% in a particular matchup is too much.
They should at least try to even out the times that they're willing to let players adapt. So the balance team at least has some sort of arbitrary way of identifying what is a balance issue and what is simply a new build that players haven't learned to deal with yet.
That way, if a new "unstoppable" build comes out, we can at least judge arbitrarily if it's more or less unstoppable than the last unstoppable build.
On April 12 2016 06:39 DinoMight wrote: Look, all I'm trying to say is Protoss got hosed for 6 months and nothing happened. Then we figure out a build that can win and IN THE NEXT UPDATE David Kim is already talking about nerfing it.
They haven't even given the build enough time to be validated as a legitimate balance concern.
It's like if the game after Jaedong vs. Has they immediately nerfed Photon Cannons.
double robo immortals styles have been said to be pretty hard to deal with for months, and now that P players have learnt to defend the early game shenanigans they're becoming problematic and I understand the update. That being said, I think not making a balance move and waiting for things like Dark's style to emerge would be the wisest idea.
I think it comes down to how often they want to patch the game. Some games do it all the damn time. Dota is almost a new game every time they patch it.
I think it's okay to have a strategy that lasts a couple of months before someone finds an answer to it. But 6 months of a race getting owned in win% in a particular matchup is too much.
They should at least try to even out the times that they're willing to let players adapt. So the balance team at least has some sort of arbitrary way of identifying what is a balance issue and what is simply a new build that players haven't learned to deal with yet.
relax bro. Everyone understands that if immortals were to be adressed then lurkers and ravagers would not be untouched.
On April 12 2016 06:39 DinoMight wrote: Look, all I'm trying to say is Protoss got hosed for 6 months and nothing happened. Then we figure out a build that can win and IN THE NEXT UPDATE David Kim is already talking about nerfing it.
They haven't even given the build enough time to be validated as a legitimate balance concern.
It's like if the game after Jaedong vs. Has they immediately nerfed Photon Cannons.
double robo immortals styles have been said to be pretty hard to deal with for months, and now that P players have learnt to defend the early game shenanigans they're becoming problematic and I understand the update. That being said, I think not making a balance move and waiting for things like Dark's style to emerge would be the wisest idea.
I think it comes down to how often they want to patch the game. Some games do it all the damn time. Dota is almost a new game every time they patch it.
I think it's okay to have a strategy that lasts a couple of months before someone finds an answer to it. But 6 months of a race getting owned in win% in a particular matchup is too much.
They should at least try to even out the times that they're willing to let players adapt. So the balance team at least has some sort of arbitrary way of identifying what is a balance issue and what is simply a new build that players haven't learned to deal with yet.
I definitely understand where you're coming from, I play P myself . But don't forget they're just mentioning the concern has reached them -like the concern about P early game had reached them, they tested a ravager nerf, an overlord drop nerf...- not saying P should be nerfed to the ground.
[QUOTE]On April 12 2016 04:38 Nerchio wrote: [QUOTE]On April 12 2016 04:36 TheLordofAwesome wrote: [QUOTE]On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game[/QUOTE] I can understand why you would want to nerf the units you mentioned, but why on earth buff the infestor?[/QUOTE] It's only used these days for fungal in combination with ravager bile otherwise it's totally useless, they should bring back upgraded infested terrans since right now infestor is the worst spellcaster in the game.
At this point, i think anyone who's been playing this game since 2010 can agree, I would rather them just roll infestor all the way back to before the 2011 buff. You would be getting less dps but longer stun insta fungal for: Faster movement, more health, stronger infested terrans, and a longer range neural parasite. They actually made it worse than it originally was which is kinda silly when you think of why they had to buff it in the first place.
They were already hard to keep alive, but after the speed/health nerf, i have not seen one pro-gamer, even the cream of the crop like Life/Byul etc. be able to keep the bulk of their infestors alive for more than 2 separate engagements.
Second, recent events and feedback are causing us to examine the PvZ matchup very closely. The latest Kespa pro feedback is that Zerg has a very low chance vs. Protoss due to changes in the meta. We also pinged a few non-Korean Protoss players regarding this, and they had a very similar sentiment.
Thank god, late game Protoss is a nightmare. I'm glad theyre looking more at it.
Completely agree, the meta is definitely shifting to an extremely potent late game for Protoss, not like their mid game is weak by any means though. Stargate play into Mass Immortal/Templar/Chargelot is really strong and once Protoss remembers what a Sentry can do, I promise that Dark's most recent style will fall into obscurity. And the early phoenix flock gives amazing map control to complete such a dominating ground vs ground composition, it walks through Lurkers with ease.
Not saying Zerg is underpowered, Ravager timing attacks are still deadly if not prepared for and counter attack heavy styles are very strong on maps with wide open third bases, but Protoss is definitely not as weak vs. Zerg as they were 3 months ago, they were the most radically changed race in the beta so it made sense that they were suffering in at least one match up, the pros had to learn a new meta from scratch, where as with Zerg and Terran, bio is still the go to, Ling/Bling is now prevalent in all 3 match ups.
I still think invincible Nydus is the worst thing since the crust of the bread, it's an ever constant and ever effective threat, it's not like a drop ship, it's like anywhere a sneaky overlord wasn't meticulously cleaned out, uber strong in all match ups, I hate it, it's so damn gimmicky, theres literally any better solution to making Nydus strong then the way it currently is.
Cyclone and Swarm Host are still horrible, might as well be deleted from the game.
Liberator is still ridiculously strong against Mutalisks in the mid game making the most skill based unit in the game perhaps probably the Marine useless after building 6 of them and then Ultralisks make relying on the Ghost which is a shit unit 4 years later. It's a bad dynamic in the best match up in the game, it can be worked on for sure.
Tankivac is still gimmicky and tanks still suck even though good ideas were proposed and then...ignored? This could definitely use some elaboration.
Stalkers could probably use a bit of love, Blink timings are pretty weak with how fast you can crank mass speedlings when you scout Twilight Council, maybe something to make them hit light units a bit harder? Make them slightly less shitty in the game? They are already fucking horrible vs. Bio as we all know, them sucking in everything but PvP probably not too good.
Second, recent events and feedback are causing us to examine the PvZ matchup very closely. The latest Kespa pro feedback is that Zerg has a very low chance vs. Protoss due to changes in the meta. We also pinged a few non-Korean Protoss players regarding this, and they had a very similar sentiment.
Thank god, late game Protoss is a nightmare. I'm glad theyre looking more at it.
and once Protoss remembers what a Sentry can do, I promise that Dark's most recent style will fall into obscurity
I'm going to read the rest of your post, but I don't think this is right : baneling drops will destroy you if you try to deal with the style with sentries. Going for an early storm is probably the best choice.
Neural was 9 range at the height of winfestor WOL and it's 9 range now.
Mid 2011 was not the height of "winfestor".
??
Neural was reduced from 9 to 7 range and fungal damage was reduced by 1.2x in the same patch that made infestors quite a lot worse @mid to late 2011. They were strongest as a midgame and core unit before those nerfs.
Neural was since rebuffed back up to that range, so it already has that buff
The recent PvZ results in Korea aren't toss-favored at all.
Zest beat soO 2-0 in the Code S Ro16, and Dark beat Stats 4-2 in the SSL, which evens out.
Going backwards through the Code S Ro32 results, Z and P basically trade wins until we are back at February 24th. Back then, Myungsik 2-0d Soulkey and Leenock lost 2-1 to both Seed and herO. Hardly recent.
In Proleague R2, PvZ is 0-2 thus far. In the playoffs of R1, P went 3-1 vs Z. Evens out.
In Proleague R1 Round Robin, PvZ was exactly 50%.
So it's perfect balance, expect for a few GSL groups in February. I didn't even mention SSL.
Before the supposed Protoss dominance starts happening, there's no need to even think about nerfing Toss.
Neural was 9 range at the height of winfestor WOL and it's 9 range now.
Mid 2011 was not the height of "winfestor".
??
Neural was reduced from 9 to 7 range and fungal damage was reduced by 1.2x in the same patch that made infestors quite a lot worse @mid to late 2011. They were strongest as a midgame and core unit before those nerfs.
Neural was since rebuffed back up to that range, so it already has that buff
It's a strange case. The timeline is effectively:
Mid 2011: Infestors are considered a joke unit built only by gimmick players like Destiny.
September 20th 2011: Neural Parasite nerf. Infestors effectively lose the one ability that could sometimes do something.
Mid 2012: Infestors are the most overpowered unit in the game.
For the next balance test map update, we would like to look at a refined list of what we have been testing, as well as focus on potentially changing Libertor's AA damage focus to be vs. light, while at the same time changing the Thor's AA role to be high, single target damage instead of splash vs. light. We will have more info on this area later in the week.
Neural was 9 range at the height of winfestor WOL and it's 9 range now.
Mid 2011 was not the height of "winfestor".
??
Neural was reduced from 9 to 7 range and fungal damage was reduced by 1.2x in the same patch that made infestors quite a lot worse @mid to late 2011. They were strongest as a midgame and core unit before those nerfs.
Neural was since rebuffed back up to that range, so it already has that buff
It's a strange case. The timeline is effectively:
Mid 2011: Infestors are considered a joke unit built only by gimmick players like Destiny.
September 20th 2011: Neural Parasite nerf. Infestors effectively lose the one ability that could sometimes do something.
Mid 2012: Infestors are the most overpowered unit in the game.
They were built a lot in those 6 months to justify those nerfs. I played a lot of PvZ at the time and I've had stream VOD's of HuK and other players between patch 1.3 and 1.3.3 saved for years (fast infestor spam). After patch 1.3 and before the nerfs after that, fungal did 47 dmg vs armored. It does 30 now.
Maybe I should make more infestors. Not because they'll help me win, but because 9 range neural is fun. I wonder if I can use that to counter liberators.
Few people do because it's not in fashion to use infestors even in the situations that they're worth the money in. I have seen some Z in pro games use them - against disruptors you can cancel a shot that has just been fired or you can control the disruptor for 0.1 second and shoot at the protoss
Neural was 9 range at the height of winfestor WOL and it's 9 range now.
Mid 2011 was not the height of "winfestor".
??
Neural was reduced from 9 to 7 range and fungal damage was reduced by 1.2x in the same patch that made infestors quite a lot worse @mid to late 2011. They were strongest as a midgame and core unit before those nerfs.
Neural was since rebuffed back up to that range, so it already has that buff
Yeah, but as I said, that's not what anyone called the height of infestor play, which was 2012-13.
Neural was 9 range at the height of winfestor WOL and it's 9 range now.
Mid 2011 was not the height of "winfestor".
??
Neural was reduced from 9 to 7 range and fungal damage was reduced by 1.2x in the same patch that made infestors quite a lot worse @mid to late 2011. They were strongest as a midgame and core unit before those nerfs.
Neural was since rebuffed back up to that range, so it already has that buff
Yeah, but as I said, that's not what anyone called the height of infestor play, which was 2012-13.
why do you include 13 in there. infestors were once again nerfed in january 2013 (upgrades removed from IT which hurts to this day) and march 2013 hots came out.
Neural was 9 range at the height of winfestor WOL and it's 9 range now.
Mid 2011 was not the height of "winfestor".
??
Neural was reduced from 9 to 7 range and fungal damage was reduced by 1.2x in the same patch that made infestors quite a lot worse @mid to late 2011. They were strongest as a midgame and core unit before those nerfs.
Neural was since rebuffed back up to that range, so it already has that buff
Yeah, but as I said, that's not what anyone called the height of infestor play, which was 2012-13.
why do you include 13 in there. infestors were once again nerfed in january 2013 (upgrades removed from IT which hurts to this day) and march 2013 hots came out.
Because tournaments like GSL Season 1 2013 were... well... 2013. And even though the infestor was comparatively nerfed that did not change the metagame at all. If anything, the situation escalated more and more in the last months of WoL, at least in TvZ and ZvZ.
Neural was 9 range at the height of winfestor WOL and it's 9 range now.
Mid 2011 was not the height of "winfestor".
??
Neural was reduced from 9 to 7 range and fungal damage was reduced by 1.2x in the same patch that made infestors quite a lot worse @mid to late 2011. They were strongest as a midgame and core unit before those nerfs.
Neural was since rebuffed back up to that range, so it already has that buff
Yeah, but as I said, that's not what anyone called the height of infestor play, which was 2012-13.
Heart of the swarm released Q1 2013 - infestors were very good end of WOL but they were even better in the midgame before those series of nerfs. People just didn't figure out infestor+BL until later
On April 12 2016 06:54 Beelzebub1 wrote: Blink timings are pretty weak with how fast you can crank mass speedlings when you scout Twilight Council, maybe something to make them hit light units a bit harder? Make them slightly less shitty in the game? They are already fucking horrible vs. Bio as we all know, them sucking in everything but PvP probably not too good.
On April 12 2016 06:54 Beelzebub1 wrote: Blink timings are pretty weak with how fast you can crank mass speedlings when you scout Twilight Council, maybe something to make them hit light units a bit harder? Make them slightly less shitty in the game? They are already fucking horrible vs. Bio as we all know, them sucking in everything but PvP probably not too good.
It is time to revert the warp-in change.
...And that would do what exactly to make Stalkers better in the late game? lol
Why can't Blizzard be open with the ladder balance like they did once, like this: us.battle.net. But they seem to rely on pinging others rather making a proper analysis about the game themselves.
Even though immortals are very very strong in the mid game, I think the true problem is that, the game ends for zerg at the mid game. Therefore the obvious thought is 'Immortals are too strong' but what if the late game was more of an even footing.
If both races could go to the late game (Broodlord/corrupter/viper/infestor/queen vs Tempest/Carrier/Ht/Void/Mothership) then maybe the immortal is fine as it is right now.
I think Parasitic bomb was supposed to adress the inability of Zerg to do anything to Protoss (&Terran) Air armies in the late game, and this seems to have done its job vs terran. Unfortunately, The protoss late game massable air units like tempest and carriers with HT support have over 400/450 health (with shields). so a 60 damage PB is pathetic against that and does almost nothing... that leaves abduct as the only good option, but with the oracle buff to envision that was installed in HotS (because of the endless swarmhost games - and realistically has no place in the current game anymore because it makes tempest ridiculous vs T and Z.) The tempest can use their insane range to take free shots almost constantly to take out vipers and corrupters for free, and on top of that templars shut down any energy unit with a single click so incredibly hard that it creates a completely skewed game in favor of Protoss.
I wonder if the late game problem isn't a bigger problem than the rather isolated strenght of the immortal.
On April 12 2016 04:40 Exarl25 wrote: I don't understand why PvZ can be drastically Zerg favored for months on end and the attitude is wait and see, but then the very instant it looks like Protoss are turning things around they start preparing the nerf bat. Why the unequal treatment? I have said for months that if the winrates for the matchup were reversed then the community outcry would be so strong that nerfs would have come very quickly, looks like that is true. Protoss just aren't allowed to do well.
How is it zerg favoured exactly? On TL you guys like stats from Korea and the truth is Zerg did well only in SSL which was played way earlier than GSL. People figured out the game and the result is only 1 zerg in RO8 of GSL. The truth is protoss players abused their race to the fullest before Koreans did but they can't do it so well ofcourse.
Nice cherry picking dude. You forgot to mention that Korean tournaments (especially GSL) don't use super creative and terribly Zerg favoured ladder maps. So no wonder that Protoss looks strong in Korea, but looks super weak in NA and Europe. And one more thing: if you look at who wrecked Zergs in those Korean tournaments, it was mostly Terrans.
But yeah, let's nerf Protoss some more, even though Zerg is reigning supreme in PvZ...
FYI, we're not saying Zerg has no chance against Protoss. We were just as surprised as you guys were when we got the pro feedback last weekend. The reason we wanted to point it out asap is because in order for us to work together, we wanted you to have the information we got as well. If there is a shift in meta coming at the pro level, we're pretty sure that there will be a shift in meta at the ladder level also. This is a common trend we've seen over the years. Although there are some factors that we are keeping an eye on that we pointed out with this update, please remember our goal is to locate exactly where the state of the game lands. So we need to keep an open mind and gauge the situation without previous bias.
guys... why are you even still writing with Nerchio ? He is a biased little kid. He was already when HasuObs was still playing ("Shit Kid"-HasuObs 2012) is right now and will always be. Yea Nerchio we get it. Zerg is so weak and you know the game so much better then everyone of us. You abused zerg and whined since WoL release so pls go and shit talk pro gamer on twitter and be a shame for your sponsors. But please let the community that is caring for the game alone.
Need someone from sc2replaystats or ggtracker to post some indepth Win/Loss stats on the entire map pool. Breath20, where are you?!? :D Someone go tweet @sc2replaystats. I bet they could post some information fairly quickly.
Zerg abusing 5 different strategies, and dominating protoss since release - we will look into it one day Months later, protoss abuses a midgame unit at one tournament - it seems like we overbuffed protoss, instant nerf.
On April 12 2016 08:55 weikor wrote: Zerg abusing 5 different strategies, and dominating protoss since release - we will look into it one day Months later, protoss abuses a midgame unit at one tournament - it seems like we overbuffed protoss, instant nerf.
So... what race do you think Blizzard Employee's play?
On April 12 2016 08:55 weikor wrote: Zerg abusing 5 different strategies, and dominating protoss since release - we will look into it one day Months later, protoss abuses a midgame unit at one tournament - it seems like we overbuffed protoss, instant nerf.
So... what race do you think Blizzard Employee's play?
Hard to say, but I bet that they are not playing Protoss enough. Otherwise the race would not be in this dire state since release.
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
Nerf carrier? Does anyone seriously make carriers right now?
rarely cuz they take a long time; but they are pretty unbeatable in pvz and pvp once theres more than a few out with support
On April 12 2016 05:56 Silvana wrote: Blizzard, stop asking Nerchio and Scarlett for feedback pls -.-
i dont actually give feedback cause im sure it wouldnt be taken so i just rant on teamliquid pretty sure if koreans posted here you'd see the same thing from them though
Few people do because it's not in fashion to use infestors even in the situations that they're worth the money in. I have seen some Z in pro games use them - against disruptors you can cancel a shot that has just been fired or you can control the disruptor for 0.1 second and shoot at the protoss
it doesnt cancel the shot and protoss still gets to control it (plus if neural ends before the hit explodes it wont affect any disruptors)
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
cuz if theres no aoe like disruptors they're better when clumped (in most situations ofc theres exceptions)
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
I can understand why you would want to nerf the units you mentioned, but why on earth buff the infestor?
It's only used these days for fungal in combination with ravager bile otherwise it's totally useless, they should bring back upgraded infested terrans since right now infestor is the worst spellcaster in the game.
PvZ is such a mess right now. Sure, maybe if Protoss deflects all the possible aggression Zerg can throw at them, then they have an edge in the late game.
But that aggression is so strong that it can often dictate what the late game Protoss army looks like to a good extent.
if there's one lesson to be learned from SC2, it's that designing and balancing the game from a PURE PRO LEVEL, does not make it fun or enjoyable for everyone else.
this game could be balanced based on community feedback too, not just from pro tournies or pro feedback. :\ some of these issues were addressed by the community LONG before they showed them off in these tournies David is citing.
This was the first time in my experience with Blizz games that a designer did not really pay attention to the masses and was very narrow in his thinking and decision making, basing it only on professional gaming.
It is what it is, I think the game is still great and I still play it, but I really hope he will pay closer attention to the community.
Seems to me that if they keep patching the game every month or so the meta will never actually settle and hence prevent any kind of 'balance' from occurring
also I wish they stopped saying 'cool factor', it makes me seriously cringe
Two years since I completely stopped following sc2.
Was hoping to see sc2 turned into something worthy, albeit with a small but very strong community. Guess some things never change. David Kim is still here, and game is still shit.
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
Funny to talk about micro when toss immortal/archon/charge attack is literally a-move and enjoy straight at the centre of zerg concave
On April 12 2016 12:18 ihatevideogames wrote: This is just hillarious. Who even cares about the game anymore, watching DK's trollish shenanigans is more fun than actually playing.
Yeah it is fun.
I also enjoy watching CA release games for the Total War Series. Rome 2 Total War was probably the most unfinished game I've ever seen released, and just about everything CA said about the game was a flat out lie. It was really funny watching them try to explain and defend the garbage they released.
And now with Total War Warhammer being released, we already see them pulling the same stuff, like the Chaos DLC, and watching the community rage and their pathetic response is excellent, just excellent. As fun as watching The Donald run for President.
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
Funny to talk about micro when toss immortal/archon/charge attack is literally a-move and enjoy straight at the centre of zerg concave
What is really funny is when I came back to play LOTV, I found myself with an army composition versus Zerg that consisted of Blink Stalkers, Adepts, Phoenixes, Sentries, Disruptors, a MSC and High Templars. I realized that group of units was totally overwhelming to use compared to my Zerg opponent who was going Roach/Hydra/Lurker/Muta/Ling. I can count the abilities those units have on one hand, with one finger.
So I watched some pro streams to figure out what to do and saw them using Immortals/Archon/Chargelots and I realized that even they couldn't properly control the mess Blizzard created by giving so many Protoss units active abilities that require micro.
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
Funny to talk about micro when toss immortal/archon/charge attack is literally a-move and enjoy straight at the centre of zerg concave
That's because if literally anything else were viable, we'd be using it.
YOU try controlling a Phoenix disruptor mothership core sentry high templar blink stalker ball and tell me how you fare.
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
Funny to talk about micro when toss immortal/archon/charge attack is literally a-move and enjoy straight at the centre of zerg concave
That's because if literally anything else were viable, we'd be using it.
YOU try controlling a Phoenix disruptor mothership core sentry high templar blink stalker ball and tell me how you fare.
The point was that both zvp armies require roughly tge same amount of micro, not that P can make ineffective one that takes more micro
At this point im not sure if youre trying to strawman through every argument or simply are this dense
If Blizzard haven't seen this coming it's their fault and failure. They should look past winrates and look at games. No matter what winrates are, the PvZ matchup has obvious problems.
On April 12 2016 15:11 Tuczniak wrote: If Blizzard haven't seen this coming it's their fault and failure. They should look past winrates and look at games. No matter what winrates are, the PvZ matchup has obvious problems.
Couldn't agree with this more. Study the games.... not the numbers...
On April 12 2016 04:40 Clonester wrote: Never ending circle:
Players created new, "imbalanced" meta DK talks about issues in the balance in the new "balance report" and "looks into it" Players start adepting DK gives out balance test map Players finally overcome "inbalance" by adepting DK see this, stops talking about the balance changes Players find out that the new meta thanks to adepting seems to need a new answer and thus looks imbalanced DK talks about issues in the balance in the new "balance report" and "looks into it"
Proving people complain too much and just need to focus on playing the game instead!
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
For me the biggest problem with lategame ZvP is forcing favorable engagements.
I spread my lurkers, position my banes, put hydras in a concave, put all units where they have to be. Then Protoss comes in, sees it aand... is lile "LOL not engaging that, see ya. Also you got 10 zealots in your base, and now my phoenices are harrassing your 5th. You took units away to defend? Okay now I engage! gg ez"
I cant then just follow him into his base for example, because it completely nullifies any kind of advantage I had before. Going Hivetech turtle is the best option for me, because Broods allow me to force an engagement - but because stargate is out, I cant just get broodlords and be dpne with it. So more turtle with AA, allowing Protoss to get every tech he wants, completely shutting down my lategame army because it sucks vs Protoss.
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
I can understand why you would want to nerf the units you mentioned, but why on earth buff the infestor?
It's only used these days for fungal in combination with ravager bile otherwise it's totally useless, they should bring back upgraded infested terrans since right now infestor is the worst spellcaster in the game.
On April 12 2016 04:37 SetGuitarsToKill wrote:
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
Nerf carrier? Does anyone seriously make carriers right now?
No they don't but it doesn't change the fact that they are too strong
sOs makes carriers and wins with them.
I would be very wary of IT buff, because do we really want to go back to the days of spawning infinite free 3/3 marines all over every other army in the game....?? The end of one WoL game in particular comes to mind. It was a GSL match between a zerg (I think it was Symbol) vs mass skytoss, heavily upgraded carriers/voidrays. The zerg just sprayed ITs everywhere and the entire protoss air army died to free 3/3 units.
EDIT: I'm sure stuchiu knows what game I'm thinking of, I've seen it posted in random threads around here before. It was on Daybreak if that helps at all... (I know, there were a lot of games on Daybreak.)
I think it was a game vs MC or Creator, they were the only crazy dudes that tried to make mass skytoss work back then and I specifically remember some of their games on Daybreak.
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
I can understand why you would want to nerf the units you mentioned, but why on earth buff the infestor?
It's only used these days for fungal in combination with ravager bile otherwise it's totally useless, they should bring back upgraded infested terrans since right now infestor is the worst spellcaster in the game.
On April 12 2016 04:37 SetGuitarsToKill wrote:
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
Nerf carrier? Does anyone seriously make carriers right now?
No they don't but it doesn't change the fact that they are too strong
sOs makes carriers and wins with them.
I would be very wary of IT buff, because do we really want to go back to the days of spawning infinite free 3/3 marines all over every other army in the game....?? The end of one WoL game in particular comes to mind. It was a GSL match between a zerg (I think it was Symbol) vs mass skytoss, heavily upgraded carriers/voidrays. The zerg just sprayed ITs everywhere and the entire protoss air army died to free 3/3 units.
EDIT: I'm sure stuchiu knows what game I'm thinking of, I've seen it posted in random threads around here before. It was on Daybreak if that helps at all... (I know, there were a lot of games on Daybreak.)
I think it was a game vs MC or Creator, they were the only crazy dudes that tried to make mass skytoss work back then and I specifically remember some of their games on Daybreak.
In the end of WoL MC came with a composition that worked vs BL-infestor armies. 4-6 carriers, VR, few Colossi, HT, Mothership. This actually worked and worked pretty well. Though it was bloody hard to get there.
On April 12 2016 04:30 PinoKotsBeer wrote: Not only protoss late game is a nightmare for Zerg but also for terran.
nope, thats a missconception.
terran are unable to ever reach their real lategame army, because transitioning is close to impossible.
as for zerg i agree: very lategame, the zerg army is the worst. the reason being tempest+oracle outranging everything, while still losing the airfight when approaching [corruptors scale badly] (terran has an easier time attacking into it or - if they ever got there, which they can't, dealing with it with mass scans and pdd).
I'm wondering how much of the PvZ kinda-low-winrate (but very depending on the leagues) is due to balance of the idiotic maps protoss had to deals with. Like seriously, maps with two free golds base are almost freewin for zerg, and these maps with extremely small air distance has led to very strong all-in build which took a lot of time for protoss to learn how to play against.
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
I can understand why you would want to nerf the units you mentioned, but why on earth buff the infestor?
It's only used these days for fungal in combination with ravager bile otherwise it's totally useless, they should bring back upgraded infested terrans since right now infestor is the worst spellcaster in the game.
On April 12 2016 04:37 SetGuitarsToKill wrote:
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
Nerf carrier? Does anyone seriously make carriers right now?
No they don't but it doesn't change the fact that they are too strong
sOs makes carriers and wins with them.
I would be very wary of IT buff, because do we really want to go back to the days of spawning infinite free 3/3 marines all over every other army in the game....?? The end of one WoL game in particular comes to mind. It was a GSL match between a zerg (I think it was Symbol) vs mass skytoss, heavily upgraded carriers/voidrays. The zerg just sprayed ITs everywhere and the entire protoss air army died to free 3/3 units.
EDIT: I'm sure stuchiu knows what game I'm thinking of, I've seen it posted in random threads around here before. It was on Daybreak if that helps at all... (I know, there were a lot of games on Daybreak.)
I think it was a game vs MC or Creator, they were the only crazy dudes that tried to make mass skytoss work back then and I specifically remember some of their games on Daybreak.
It was MC on Daybreak. I remember that game, he went VR/Carrier/HT/Mothership and essentially solved Broodlord/Infestor before the nerf. He used Carriers like Tempests and was able to zone the Zerg. I believe it was literally the last pro game before the nerf too.
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
Funny to talk about micro when toss immortal/archon/charge attack is literally a-move and enjoy straight at the centre of zerg concave
That's because if literally anything else were viable, we'd be using it.
YOU try controlling a Phoenix disruptor mothership core sentry high templar blink stalker ball and tell me how you fare.
Actually!
This is hard because you are required hotkeys for each unit or tabbing to use their abilites.
It struck me if you were able to use the abilites of all selected units as long as the abilities were on different hotkey controlling this would be MUCH simplier.
If you have Sentires, High Templar and Phoneix selected and pressed F for Forcefield, it would forcefield. T for storm. L for lift. The design forcing to tab between units feels quite dumb when you think about it. As longs as you have different hotkey for all the abilites.
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
Funny to talk about micro when toss immortal/archon/charge attack is literally a-move and enjoy straight at the centre of zerg concave
That's because if literally anything else were viable, we'd be using it.
YOU try controlling a Phoenix disruptor mothership core sentry high templar blink stalker ball and tell me how you fare.
Actually!
This is hard because you are required hotkeys for each unit or tabbing to use their abilites.
It struck me if you were able to use the abilites of all selected units as long as the abilities were on different hotkey controlling this would be MUCH simplier.
If you have Sentires, High Templar and Phoneix selected and pressed F for Forcefield, it would forcefield. T for storm. L for lift. The design forcing to tab between units feels quite dumb when you think about it. As longs as you have different hotkey for all the abilites.
yeah, but you would have to design the game for it. You would have to racially limit the abilities to one per button space and have racially unique hotkeys. It's what Project Atlas does (I think), but you can obviously not make 15 units per race and give each of them 1-4 abilities.
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
I can understand why you would want to nerf the units you mentioned, but why on earth buff the infestor?
It's only used these days for fungal in combination with ravager bile otherwise it's totally useless, they should bring back upgraded infested terrans since right now infestor is the worst spellcaster in the game.
On April 12 2016 04:37 SetGuitarsToKill wrote:
On April 12 2016 04:35 Nerchio wrote: Nerf medivacs/ immortal/ liberator/ ravager/ tempest/ carrier/ warp prism/lurker
Buff infestor
ggwp perfect game
Nerf carrier? Does anyone seriously make carriers right now?
No they don't but it doesn't change the fact that they are too strong
sOs makes carriers and wins with them.
I would be very wary of IT buff, because do we really want to go back to the days of spawning infinite free 3/3 marines all over every other army in the game....?? The end of one WoL game in particular comes to mind. It was a GSL match between a zerg (I think it was Symbol) vs mass skytoss, heavily upgraded carriers/voidrays. The zerg just sprayed ITs everywhere and the entire protoss air army died to free 3/3 units.
EDIT: I'm sure stuchiu knows what game I'm thinking of, I've seen it posted in random threads around here before. It was on Daybreak if that helps at all... (I know, there were a lot of games on Daybreak.)
I think it was a game vs MC or Creator, they were the only crazy dudes that tried to make mass skytoss work back then and I specifically remember some of their games on Daybreak.
It was MC on Daybreak. I remember that game, he went VR/Carrier/HT/Mothership and essentially solved Broodlord/Infestor before the nerf. He used Carriers like Tempests and was able to zone the Zerg. I believe it was literally the last pro game before the nerf too.
He didn't solve it though, maybe he won 1 game like that but he and Creator lost tons of games trying that and it only really worked on Daybreak because of the architecture of the map.
If they are gonna nerf Liberators AA damage they could go for the range nerf on the AG mode instead of the radius nerf (range nerfs the harassment potential just fine, a radius nerf is kinda huge). Small steps.
I've been thinking about BCs lately. Their base attack (plus Yamato) should not care about the enemy armor if the unit is ever gonna viable in TvZ due to ultras. In general the enemy army is gonna have +3 armor when they come out too.
I've noticed that using Hybrid Settings with effects/terrain on makes the maps brighter. I think they use an illumination effect that is not shown on low settings.
Dusk and Endion are two of the worst examples (Dusk being grey blue and Endion being grey orange), but this also affects most/all of the campaign missions and some other maps.
Please post in that thread or make another and give it some more attention - It's neccesary if improvements are to be made
On April 12 2016 15:11 Tuczniak wrote: If Blizzard haven't seen this coming it's their fault and failure. They should look past winrates and look at games. No matter what winrates are, the PvZ matchup has obvious problems.
These problems are:
1) Zerg have too many viable strategies that can kill Protoss outright and are not even all-in
2) Zerg is equally strong at any stage of the game
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
Funny to talk about micro when toss immortal/archon/charge attack is literally a-move and enjoy straight at the centre of zerg concave
That's because if literally anything else were viable, we'd be using it.
YOU try controlling a Phoenix disruptor mothership core sentry high templar blink stalker ball and tell me how you fare.
Actually!
This is hard because you are required hotkeys for each unit or tabbing to use their abilites.
It struck me if you were able to use the abilites of all selected units as long as the abilities were on different hotkey controlling this would be MUCH simplier.
If you have Sentires, High Templar and Phoneix selected and pressed F for Forcefield, it would forcefield. T for storm. L for lift. The design forcing to tab between units feels quite dumb when you think about it. As longs as you have different hotkey for all the abilites.
yeah, but you would have to design the game for it. You would have to racially limit the abilities to one per button space and have racially unique hotkeys. It's what Project Atlas does (I think), but you can obviously not make 15 units per race and give each of them 1-4 abilities.
This is probably one of the best things they could have done for starcraft. It would allow for much better control and army compositions. sure it might benefit protoss the most, but at the moment - you cant make sentries / Disruptor / blink together and play them effectively, just because the UI is so clunky and bad for it.
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
Funny to talk about micro when toss immortal/archon/charge attack is literally a-move and enjoy straight at the centre of zerg concave
That's because if literally anything else were viable, we'd be using it.
YOU try controlling a Phoenix disruptor mothership core sentry high templar blink stalker ball and tell me how you fare.
Actually!
This is hard because you are required hotkeys for each unit or tabbing to use their abilites.
It struck me if you were able to use the abilites of all selected units as long as the abilities were on different hotkey controlling this would be MUCH simplier.
If you have Sentires, High Templar and Phoneix selected and pressed F for Forcefield, it would forcefield. T for storm. L for lift. The design forcing to tab between units feels quite dumb when you think about it. As longs as you have different hotkey for all the abilites.
yeah, but you would have to design the game for it. You would have to racially limit the abilities to one per button space and have racially unique hotkeys. It's what Project Atlas does (I think), but you can obviously not make 15 units per race and give each of them 1-4 abilities.
This is probably one of the best things they could have done for starcraft. It would allow for much better control and army compositions. sure it might benefit protoss the most, but at the moment - you cant make sentries / Disruptor / blink together and play them effectively, just because the UI is so clunky and bad for it.
yeah, the whole genre has been aching for better control options for years. But so far the game designers didn't want to give up on gameplay options to make it happen. We can see it in tons of other games, like CnC:RA3 having exactly one ability on each unit (with the same hotkey for all of them to make it easy to learn), SupCom with huge automatization options or that dinosaur RTS from years ago with the pretty innovative control group manager. Being able to quickly access units without having to be a mechanical genius is the big challenge of the genre, but has been ignored until MobA's just did it (by limiting their game to what was accessible) and now draw all the players.
I think there's a difference between Zerg as a whole requiring very little micro in ZvP since WoL beta and the only viable Protoss build in the current meta actually being unmicroable.
Regardless,
There cannot be one build that is viable. Sooner or later, they will learn to beat it. And if they don't learn to beat it, then it will be patched. There have to be other viable play styles for Protoss.
Right now the early game advantage for Zerg shuts down so many options for Protoss... Anything that isn't go Stargate, make phoenixes, turtle, build lots of Immortals and try to win quickly before Brood Lords just dies to ZERGLINGS. Or Ravagers, if they're so inclined.
It's the same complaint that Terran had in HotS (why do we only have one viable build).
I think Protoss is only strong for people with good Control a good BO and strong macro. If you can handle 5 CGs its good, because you get perfect forcefields, and barriers along with feedbacks, blinks and disruptarballlz. That was a good change that Legacy brought. Take the F2A out of protoss. You cant play sloppy like Terran ("In case of emergency get liberators") or Zerg "All my Hotkeys are hatcheries".
On April 12 2016 22:55 KT_Elwood wrote: I think Protoss is only strong for people with good Control a good BO and strong macro. If you can handle 5 CGs its good, because you get perfect forcefields, and barriers along with feedbacks, blinks and disruptarballlz. That was a good change that Legacy brought. Take the F2A out of protoss. You cant play sloppy like Terran ("In case of emergency get liberators") or Zerg "All my Hotkeys are hatcheries".
I don't think overgeneralizing like this is really helping the discussion
On April 12 2016 22:35 DinoMight wrote: I think there's a difference between Zerg as a whole requiring very little micro in ZvP since WoL beta and the only viable Protoss build in the current meta actually being unmicroable.
Regardless,
There cannot be one build that is viable. Sooner or later, they will learn to beat it. And if they don't learn to beat it, then it will be patched. There have to be other viable play styles for Protoss.
Right now the early game advantage for Zerg shuts down so many options for Protoss... Anything that isn't go Stargate, make phoenixes, turtle, build lots of Immortals and try to win quickly before Brood Lords just dies to ZERGLINGS. Or Ravagers, if they're so inclined.
It's the same complaint that Terran had in HotS (why do we only have one viable build).
That complaint has been there throughout all matchups at some points. And blizzard rarely adressed them, at least not successfully. Most of the matchups are indeed - and will always be - one-style matchups.
Yeah, I wish they would change that where it is blatantly obvious (most blatantly visible in ZvZ, TvP and TvT imo), but the line of argumentation that Protoss is not playable in the longrun with just one style is not valid (and it really is one style, not just one build. There are multiple builds to get into that style and Protoss also has playable, allinish builds besides that).
I think I was pretty specific. Protoss needs better control now than ever. And IF you can do that, the units are strong. If not, well better make 40 Marines/marauders/Roaches/Hydras, press Stim and A-Move.
BUT 99% of all players are not korean Top Protoss players.
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
Funny to talk about micro when toss immortal/archon/charge attack is literally a-move and enjoy straight at the centre of zerg concave
That's because if literally anything else were viable, we'd be using it.
YOU try controlling a Phoenix disruptor mothership core sentry high templar blink stalker ball and tell me how you fare.
Actually!
This is hard because you are required hotkeys for each unit or tabbing to use their abilites.
It struck me if you were able to use the abilites of all selected units as long as the abilities were on different hotkey controlling this would be MUCH simplier.
I suggested this awhile ago on the Blizzard forums after I ran into the issue, allowing you to press F and cast a forcefield no matter how many different casters you had selected would alleviate the control problem.
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
Funny to talk about micro when toss immortal/archon/charge attack is literally a-move and enjoy straight at the centre of zerg concave
That's because if literally anything else were viable, we'd be using it.
YOU try controlling a Phoenix disruptor mothership core sentry high templar blink stalker ball and tell me how you fare.
Actually!
This is hard because you are required hotkeys for each unit or tabbing to use their abilites.
It struck me if you were able to use the abilites of all selected units as long as the abilities were on different hotkey controlling this would be MUCH simplier.
I suggested this awhile ago on the Blizzard forums after I ran into the issue, allowing you to press F and cast a forcefield no matter how many different casters you had selected would alleviate the control problem.
Per usual when it comes to community ideas, it was ignored.
Excuse me mister community, but you're idea is not that smart.
Why the heck should I be forced to have different hotkeys set for each spell? What if I just like to have mostly the same 2-3 keys for every ability in the game?
What if I want to use rapid fire trick to emp with my ghost without having all the rest of my army derping hardcore?
What about people playing with a grid hotkey settting?
And what about people using the core hotkey setting?
and so on and on and on...
It's perfectly fine as it is really, that tab key is not so hard to hit.
I mean, you could have said that less condescending, but I agree.
You can't have a system with propagating hotkeys without redoing the whole hotkey systems. Considering this is a hotkey system used in every arcade map, starcraft, and heroes. That's never going to happen.
You can always add global hotkey which can be associated with certain abilities if units are in group. It's an option, it wouldn't hurt anything, but not very elegant.
David Kim Loves Zerg. That should help clear some things up. With Lurkers to Handle Ground and Corruptors to handle air, as well as Vipers, and Infestors. im pretty sure Zerg has plenty of tools in it's toolbag, i play both races at masters level and zergs ability to expand and make Inject x Number of Hatcheries = Units of any kind at one time, clearly sets it ahead of any race. Zergs are fine vs protoss quit playing, protoss are just finally playing well.
Basically if you aren't a (Korean) Pro Protoss player, you can get out of SC2 because Blizzard don't care about the casuals.
I don't know who your "pro" sources are, but they're obviously just protecting their profession. I think it's a mistake to ignore the general statistics and just do what the pros want. This game is for everyone
This game needs changes. Not tomorrow or "soon" . NOW. Yesterday would even be better.
You made too many roaches? no problem just turn them into ravagers You made too many Hydra's? no problem just turn them into Lurkers You made too many corruptors? no problem, now they can attack buildings as well. Random buffs to the broodlord, to the ling and the ultralisk recieved a huuuuge buff, but there wasnt a tradeoff f.e. slower attack? nope. Burrowed things? everyone can see the mine, but a lurker, ultralisk etc? nope. Liberator siege mode: big bright circel to warn your enemy.... Warprism pickup range+speed is not fun, its gimmicky. Mech? still horror to play. Mass adept, oh you forgot to wall off even better than vs zerg... now you are fcked....
Just a few of the endless examples.
"the game has been balanced around the top" Sure, but the top isnt selling the game to friends. Casuals do. Its such a shame, many friends do not want to play anymore, they "hate" the game because its frustrating. A difficult game is fine, but LOTV is artificial hard to be a hard game in many situations. They liked hots, even when the kept on losing, because it was fun to play. Regardless the race. "They can still play hots" true, but they have moved on. Time is precious, they dont want to play on empty servers with que times of 3 to 6 minutes. More games and things to do besides LOTV.
dont think ive won a lategame zvp game in over a month (even on ladder); and ive played probably 750+ games in that time
Funny that you would say that. Watching Neeb's, Puck's and State's stream (and a bit of Le Twilight Council --> Lilbow and Drogo) it seems to me that Protoss either dies in the early game or sustains such an absurd amount of damage, that he dies in mid or late game.
When Protoss win with the Chargelot/Immo/Archon/Phoenix push, it mostly feels that Zergs botched their positioning rather than Protoss being strong. What I mean by that is, that after all this time, hardly any Zerg spreads their Lurkers sufficiently. It boggles my mind how little most Zergs do to control their army. Lurkers clumped up, almost on top of each other, so that they can get lifted by Phoenix with minimal losses to the Protoss or focused fired by Immos in a blink of an eye. And instead of working on improving the positioning, we get to hear how imba Immortals are.
You're expecting Zerg to micro? Come on man... you should know better
But it's true. This may be like marine splitting back in the day... Zergs simply need to control their units better. Split the lurkers. With 9 range, spreading them out means that the Protoss units would have to spend more time walking in between fighting lurkers.
It's common sense.
You still see top Korean pros just burrow 7 lurkers right there on top of each other.
Funny to talk about micro when toss immortal/archon/charge attack is literally a-move and enjoy straight at the centre of zerg concave
That's because if literally anything else were viable, we'd be using it.
YOU try controlling a Phoenix disruptor mothership core sentry high templar blink stalker ball and tell me how you fare.
Actually!
This is hard because you are required hotkeys for each unit or tabbing to use their abilites.
It struck me if you were able to use the abilites of all selected units as long as the abilities were on different hotkey controlling this would be MUCH simplier.
I suggested this awhile ago on the Blizzard forums after I ran into the issue, allowing you to press F and cast a forcefield no matter how many different casters you had selected would alleviate the control problem.
Per usual when it comes to community ideas, it was ignored.
Excuse me mister community, but you're idea is not that smart.
Why the heck should I be forced to have different hotkeys set for each spell? What if I just like to have mostly the same 2-3 keys for every ability in the game?
What if I want to use rapid fire trick to emp with my ghost without having all the rest of my army derping hardcore?
What about people playing with a grid hotkey settting?
And what about people using the core hotkey setting?
and so on and on and on...
It's perfectly fine as it is really, that tab key is not so hard to hit.
It could be an option. You can continue to hotkey as is, or you could adopt this new system. I believe in as many options as possible. You must not play Protoss much because you'd realize that tenths of a second matter. Having to tab thru multiple casters to select a Sentry to Forcefield a ramp before the Lings come thru, or a High Templar to Feedback that Viper before it Abducts, these action comes down to sub second micro. Tabbing takes too long. So what do Protoss players do? They limit the number of units with abilities they use, so they can play like the other races where nearly every unit doesn't have a unique ability.
And the tab key might not be so hard to hit, but knowing the difference between you're and your is even simpler but you still can't get it right. Maybe I am smarter than you think...
On April 12 2016 06:27 The_Red_Viper wrote: The best change would be pathing changes. Sc2 always falls back to an army which simply does its damage way too fast because the dps/area is too high for the enemy army to trade reasonably. Change the blob pathing and you will have a better foundation to balance around it.
It would also look a lot better which is imo just as important for enjoyment (both watching and playing the game) than actual balance numbers. Not that this is anything new, but hey blizzard said they are still open for bigger changes... (i think they also said one time that they already tried it internally though)
Unfortunately, they will never let us test this change unless the majority of community or some big gun like Maru, Zest or Soo demands it.
Wait, what?! I never knew Zergs found it impossible to beat Protoss in late game. I thought the current meta swinged towards Zerg always winning with mass lurkers. After colossus range was nerfed (and storm being ranged shorted than lurkers), I thought Zerg were favoured more than Protoss. Especially after how Solar and Dark crushed every Protoss they ever played against.
You know what would be cool, LukerHost. Its a buff to the swarmhost to make people play it again. It now spawns flying lurkers! Balance you ask? Cool factor I say!
Amazing feedback from the pros, Stats losing to Dark ezpz in a matchup where zerg have "a very low chance" is pretty sad. He must be getting bullied pretty hard when the other kespa players wont let him in on this new meta.
PvZ numbers for March where over 46%, time for a swift nerf to the immortal to get that sub 40% asap. After all, we all know zerg players have much more talent.
On April 13 2016 11:21 PinoKotsBeer wrote: "the game has been balanced around the top" Sure, but the top isnt selling the game to friends. Casuals do.
No. People that want a difficult game do [to other players that want the same]. Because that is what StarCraft has been all about.
StarCraft:BW had the whole custom game scene going for it back when F2P games weren't a thing, and it still tanked popularity wise over here. StarCraft II is basically built only around players that want difficult 1v1 RTS and the most successful RTS right now.
It's not right to say casuals fuel StarCraft II, because they don't. Even if you are sitting in Bronze right now, you're anything but casual. You're playing one of the most unforgiving and frustrating games out there - that is anything but casual.
That does not mean that automatically catering to the top is the best thing to do. But going "We need to cater to casuals" will do nothing. Casuals are playing LoL vs Bots, casuals are playing Heroes Of the Storm. Casuals are playing mobile games, facebook games, or custom maps in any kind of game. Thats what casuals do. And even if Blizzard attracted those, they are not making money off of them unless they sell their singleplayer content or 1v1 ranked.
But as it is casuals are neither playing nor interested in competetive StarCraft II. And yes, I just called the ladder competetive.
On April 13 2016 11:21 PinoKotsBeer wrote: "the game has been balanced around the top" Sure, but the top isnt selling the game to friends. Casuals do.
That does not mean that automatically catering to the top is the best thing to do. But going "We need to cater to casuals" will do nothing. Casuals are playing LoL vs Bots, casuals are playing Heroes Of the Storm. Casuals are playing mobile games, facebook games, or custom maps in any kind of game. Thats what casuals do. And even if Blizzard attracted those, they are not making money off of them unless they sell their singleplayer content or 1v1 ranked.
Mostly agree, but it's not that black and white. There was a 'level' of casual audience that was fine with WoL and HotS ladder and now is doubleplusunfine with Legacy. Economy changes and mechanical difficulty as its own reward shooed those people away. Was it worth it?
Generally there seems to be a lack of accountability in the gaming industry and a terrible problem with echo chambers. Wildstar: Hardcore. Launch Diablo III: Fuck that loser. Developers who have more or less lost it and these are triple A titles and not some indy newcomers. In other businesses there is a paygrade above these guys to ideally get them to perform again or at least prevent them from doing irrevocable harm to your product. Which brings us to David K.
If your job is balancing, you look at the last six months of pvz winrates and believe everything is a-okay, you are too dumb or too biased for your job. Dumb. Or biased. There is no fucking third option.
And why? Maybe he spent time on forums. Maybe he read too many 'Protoss bullshit', 'I hate that race' 'got protossed' comments, Maybe he agreed, maybe he just wanted to become their hero by making Protoss both the weakest and the mechanically most demanding race. Maybe the state of the game is exactly what the community wants and deserves.
I thought I wouldn't care enough for another post. But I've spent thousands of hours of my life playing Blizzard RTS. Starcraft imploding as a game and as an e-sport will also mean no Warcraft IV anytime soon. And that will make me sad. At least somewhat.
If your job is balancing, you look at the last six months of pvz winrates and believe everything is a-okay, you are too dumb or too biased for your job. Dumb. Or biased. There is no fucking third option.
On April 13 2016 11:21 PinoKotsBeer wrote: "the game has been balanced around the top" Sure, but the top isnt selling the game to friends. Casuals do.
That does not mean that automatically catering to the top is the best thing to do. But going "We need to cater to casuals" will do nothing. Casuals are playing LoL vs Bots, casuals are playing Heroes Of the Storm. Casuals are playing mobile games, facebook games, or custom maps in any kind of game. Thats what casuals do. And even if Blizzard attracted those, they are not making money off of them unless they sell their singleplayer content or 1v1 ranked.
Mostly agree, but it's not that black and white. There was a 'level' of casual audience that was fine with WoL and HotS ladder and now is doubleplusunfine with Legacy. Economy changes and mechanical difficulty as its own reward shooed those people away. Was it worth it?
Generally there seems to be a lack of accountability in the gaming industry and a terrible problem with echo chambers. Wildstar: Hardcore. Launch Diablo III: Fuck that loser. Developers who have more or less lost it and these are triple A titles and not some indy newcomers. In other businesses there is a paygrade above these guys to ideally get them to perform again or at least prevent them from doing irrevocable harm to your product. Which brings us to David K.
If your job is balancing, you look at the last six months of pvz winrates and believe everything is a-okay, you are too dumb or too biased for your job. Dumb. Or biased. There is no fucking third option.
And why? Maybe he spent time on forums. Maybe he read too many 'Protoss bullshit', 'I hate that race' 'got protossed' comments, Maybe he agreed, maybe he just wanted to become their hero by making Protoss both the weakest and the mechanically most demanding race. Maybe the state of the game is exactly what the community wants and deserves.
I thought I wouldn't care enough for another post. But I've spent thousands of hours of my life playing Blizzard RTS. Starcraft imploding as a game and as an e-sport will also mean no Warcraft IV anytime soon. And that will make me sad. At least somewhat.
OK, so you say this "If your job is balancing, you look at the last six months of pvz winrates and believe everything is a-okay, you are too dumb or too biased for your job. Dumb. Or biased. There is no fucking third option. " could you please elaborate why do you think David Kim's balancing decisions were bad? For me everything he did made perfect sense. If you look at winrates that involved similar level players you saw that zerg was favored so it made sense that zerg needed nerf, and David Kim introduced some nerfs to zerg race. But now, that protoss players figured out how to deal with zerg player strategies better and actually shifted win rates in their favor without patch, sc2 balancing team decided to hold on nerfing zerg and look on the matchup more before doing any decisions. Everything sc2 balancing team did so far made perfect sense to me.
On April 13 2016 08:59 Tresher wrote: Basically if you aren't a (Korean) Pro Protoss player, you can get out of SC2 because Blizzard don't care about the casuals.
I don't know who your "pro" sources are, but they're obviously just protecting their profession. I think it's a mistake to ignore the general statistics and just do what the pros want. This game is for everyone
This game needs changes. Not tomorrow or "soon" . NOW. Yesterday would even be better.
It's really shameless actually. An entire game designed specifically to be an eSport first, and fun second. Some corporate idiot obviously got really carried away by the whole BW Korean scene and took things way too far. Here's the thing about real sports. They are accessible and fun to EVERYONE, even 8 year old kids playing tee ball or playing in some kid's soccer league. If nobody can play and enjoy the game, if you make the barriers so high, no one's going to love the game and no one's going to want to watch your hypothetical eSports money machine.
On April 12 2016 06:27 The_Red_Viper wrote: The best change would be pathing changes. Sc2 always falls back to an army which simply does its damage way too fast because the dps/area is too high for the enemy army to trade reasonably. Change the blob pathing and you will have a better foundation to balance around it.
It would also look a lot better which is imo just as important for enjoyment (both watching and playing the game) than actual balance numbers. Not that this is anything new, but hey blizzard said they are still open for bigger changes... (i think they also said one time that they already tried it internally though)
Unfortunately, they will never let us test this change unless the majority of community or some big gun like Maru, Zest or Soo demands it.
Balance aside, it just looks way better. The enjoyment of watching and playing the game would increase imo with such a change, even if it wouldn't change much about the unit interactions (which it would i think) Blizzard telling us that they tested it and it didn't change the game is such a cop out imo, this should have been in the beta testing 100%. But yeah as i said, i think blizzard (and the community) is greatly neglecting the aesthetics such a change would bring, this is extremely important for a game which just "feels good".
On April 12 2016 04:18 Big J wrote: state of the game
It's a sign. We need to reboot SotG.
I was super bored and just randomly tuned into JP's stream yesterday and he didn't even seem to know who Rifkin is ... I don't think he's too interested in SC2 content lol
I think game is in a pretty good place right now, except for some of the new maps. If you can't win, with any race, it's your problem. Watch the Korean pros and you'll figure it out if you aren't a dummy.
On April 14 2016 06:04 Pugfarmer wrote: I think game is in a pretty good place right now, except for some of the new maps. If you can't win, with any race, it's your problem. Watch the Korean pros and you'll figure it out if you aren't a dummy.
Relevant when korean pros are not playing on the same map pool as the ladder ...
On April 13 2016 15:40 MoonyD wrote: Wait, what?! I never knew Zergs found it impossible to beat Protoss in late game. I thought the current meta swinged towards Zerg always winning with mass lurkers. After colossus range was nerfed (and storm being ranged shorted than lurkers), I thought Zerg were favoured more than Protoss. Especially after how Solar and Dark crushed every Protoss they ever played against.
The problem derives from the strong omnipotent bio. I said this 3 years ago and it is still true. Basically everything what is bad about SC2 derives from terran bio being way stronger than it should on its own or with few complements.
A ball of bio units with stim and the basic upgrades is way too volatile to balance the game around and way too alround considering the damage per second output it does.
Protoss got problems with muta regeneration? Zerg was given it back in the days to be able to deal with bio.
Lurkers too much range? If they had only 6-7 range they would be a-move overrun by marauders without dealing any damage at all before they die.
Mech too weak and unplayable? Sure, if mech was stronger then mech/bio combinations would get out of control.
Ultras got 8 armour? Why? Because bio otherwise could endlessly kite them and zerg in any way then needed 3-3 before being able to go ultras, which is now not the case. etc.
I strongly suggest blizz to try one of the following approaches, I think this can make SC2 a good game in a one year period from now, but it involves reconsidering many major things:
1. Remove the marauder from the game or from early/midgame(t3 unit)! Make terran gameplay evolve around X+Marines instead of mmm+x (marines as min dump just as lings/zealots). Tanks then can be 150/100 with 2 supply costs I am sure and whatever else it needs. Marines still can be dropped with mines, helions etc. in order to put pressure.
2. When introducing or evaluation positions of units try it the other way round. I. e. in the case of lurker your approach was: How do we have to do the lurker so that it fits in the current state of the game? You should do it the other way round: The question to ask is why does a 6-7 range lurker not fit into the current game. What has to be changed so that it does? Do that with all units that are in a critical state in certain scenarios and follow it back to the source. If I do that I get to the point where it all comes down to bio, so back to point 1. Especially the marauder complements bio in a way that it should not be complemented.
The problem can be shown when looking at split army fights. Lets take as an example a terran 1-2 medivac drop on z/p: Z/P always needs more stuff in place to defend that. Now ppl. say terran needs to be able to harrass. That is totally not the point. The point is if Z/P needs more investment to defend it. This factors into the meta and causes multiple follow up problems as can be seen e.g. with nexus cannon, muta regen, and so on.
What makes SC2 a relatively bad and unstrategic game is variance and factor of luck/unluck. It is like paying rock paper scissors in many situations.
In silver league: - protoss recognizes that terran dropped 100% of army into his mainbase while his own army stands at his third to defend potential frontal attacks. Until he moves his units back to his main he lost 60% of his mainbase + nexus and additionally takes a disadvantageous fight upwards his ramp, game lost. - terran recognizes that protoss for what ever reason has major parts of his army in main base and his doom drop unloads anyway and fails, game lost.
On higher levels: - this maximum variance gets reduced the higher the level of play, but it is still there and plays a major role. - it comes down to how many stalkers were left behind in order to snipe dropships and if they do so or not. If too many and terran sees that somehow, he gathers the units in drops quickly with medivac boost with his main army and attacks frontal where protoss cant defend then due to too many stalkers back in base. If not enough defence in place he unloads and deals damage.
The game mechanic of this itself is not what is wrong but the fine mechanics that play into it are. Bio with medivacs can only be engaged with superior forces of defencee in order to have a cost efficient trade. You can't send 5 stalkers vs. 4 marauders and 8 marines + and hope to minimize it until support arrives without accepting to take major losses. It is not the other way round. Inferior bio army can trade cost efficiently against superior forces of defense up to a certain degree, e.g. focussing down 3 stalkers while losing 6 marines and one marauder.
What is given to other races to make up for this is causing the game to be unpleasant for everyone participating (including terrans) because it increases variance again: 15 Mutas got shot down to 10% hp by mines and then escape? Funny, 30 sec later they are full hp and it is like nothing happened. If one more mine landed a shot they were all dead tho and game would likely be over (this is variance, luck). I named several things above but when you go into detail, you recognize that the whole game evolves in major aspects around exactly this.
The major point of concern for me is the marauder because it can be stimmed and healed like marines while it exactly covers the downside of marines, which is fighting armored units and providing tankyness.
In broodwar this role was filled by other units which allowed interesting interactions but didn't add up with both marine damage and mobility at the same time, what the marauders do.
Let me get back to my silver league exampe. The higher the variance the lower the fun to play and the lower the motivations for players to play. This explains why alot of ppl are still following SC2 pro-streams while not playing anymore themselves. In this silver league example, both players are on equal skill but one wins as described and the other one loses. - If protoss for whatever reason has randomly his units back in base and defends the doom drop out of luck, he wins the game. He doesn't win because he was the better player. - If protoss has his units at third when the doom drop is taking place terran wins the game, but not because he was the better player.
Everyone always thinks that the game should only be evaluated for pro level. In order to analyse why SC2 is losing interest of players the opposite is true. It is important to note that on any level this silver league example is happening but in smaller instances and less impactful, but it still is happening in exactly this sense, however it gets more visible on lower levels and therefore is more tangible.
Marauders play a major role when it comes to (design-)balancing the game. They are like marines that can only shoot ground with massive hitpoints. Lurkers reliably forced terran to transition into tanks in broodwar. In SC2, bw lurkers would reliably force terran to build more bio instead.
There were changed several things in terms of bio such has healing dropships and marine-shields. But I think these should not be changed back. The marauder however should be removed because it adds majorly to the fact that a bio army cannot be attacked cost efficiently without superiority or massive splash damage. And this caused blizzard to give the other races tools that they shouldn't have as well, as they further increase variance and factor of luck.
I am pretty sure that reducing instead of increasing stuff is the key to make SC2 less volatile and then more popular amongst players.
I don't see a way to bring SC2 back to interest of players in other ordinary ways that only include smallish tweaks. Blizzard is adding more and more stuff which doesn't help the situation but makes it worse. Therefore you even see ppl talking about how great HOTS TvZ was. HOTS TvZ wasn't great but potentially better than current LOTV TvZ. Broodwar TvZ was great, maybe the best matchup in any RTS ever with fun endgame interactions of scourges vs. vessels vs. defiler.
On April 14 2016 06:04 Pugfarmer wrote: I think game is in a pretty good place right now, except for some of the new maps. If you can't win, with any race, it's your problem. Watch the Korean pros and you'll figure it out if you aren't a dummy.
Relevant when korean pros are not playing on the same map pool as the ladder ...
This!
Also not everyone has the the APM/decisionmaking of Korean Pros.
Seriously stop centering the game around 4% Korean Pros. It´s not healthy for the game. Also not everyone wants to be a Pro or competitive. Some people just want to play some games.
EPT
500 hp and 65 damage for 250/100 is kind of a lot don't you think
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