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I learned the game in blizzard seconds; the blizzard seconds are nice, round and convenient; and the editor is still in blizzard seconds. So I will be using blizzards seconds. but let's see if I can remember the numbers correctly first:
Hatchery:
- produces 1 larva every 15 seconds if there are less than 3 larva at the hatch
this means that each minute, a hatch can naturally produce up to 4 larva
- note that a hatchery cannot hold more than . . . 19 or 23 larva I think is the upper limit? and it will of course produce no larva naturally if it has 3 or more larva already at it.
- to 'bank larva', you must inject to exceed the 3 larva cap. During this time, no larva is produced naturally. 100% of your larva production is from injects if you are banking larva
Inject Larva:
- it is a behaviour applied to hatcheries via targetable spell from a Queen
- it takes 40 seconds to build 25 energy (all units and buildings generate mana at the same rate)
- it takes 40 seconds from the time of casting Inject to spawn extra larva
- chrono boost does cause natural and injected larva to spawn faster if anyone was wondering
- I forget if the Overseer's Contaminate halts the inject behaviour or if it only halts the natural spawning - I believe it halts both
in WoL and HotS:
- if you hit every inject perfectly, you would get 4 larva every 40 seconds that can exceed the 3 limit
- stated differently: on average you would get an additional 6 larva per minute if you had perfect injects
- if you are spending your larva, then perfect injects therefore represents a 150% increase in larva generation per minute (increase from 4 to 10)
- you could not stack injects
in LotV,
- with perfect injects, you get 2 extra larva every 40 seconds. This was part of blizzard's decision to reduce macro boosters in all 3 races during the econ redesign
- stated differently, it is on average 3 extra larva per minute with perfect injects
- if you are spending your larva, then perfect injects represents a 75% increase in larva generation (from 4 to 7)
- stacking injects queues up the behaviour / next spawning cycle but does not compound them or run them concurrently
- in practice, you receive your larva in waves - so hitting or missing your injects is a rather feast or famine mechanic. this burst production had some beneficial interactions with the 3 larva cap mechanic and contributes to zerg's swarm-y identity
- it also takes 40 seconds before a missed inject produces any tangible returns. a missed mule will of course be lost opportunity cost - but in the time frame of the game, it begins to return its first load of big minerals within a few seconds
***
IF the issue at hand is that zerg has to continually bounce back to his/her base every 40 seconds throughout all phases of the game; and that this necessary distraction is disproportionately disruptive to late-game zerg compared to late game protoss or terran, there are a couple of ideas I can throw out for consideration:
1. Hive or infestation pit-level upgrade that changes larva generation behaviours or rates to be close to what perfect queen inject would have done. However, better players could still benefit by also hitting manual queen injects on top of that. For example, if a hatchery could naturally house 9 larva instead of 3 before stopping natural production, hitting injects is less important for banking larva.
2. Change inject from feast or famine. Instead of getting 2 larva 40 seconds later from an inject, give 1 larva every 20 seconds for 40 seconds. Perhaps stacking injects would generate multiple larva every 20 seconds so that banked energy can 'stack' like mules
3. Keep it mostly the same as now, but inject is 50 energy for 2 larva every 40 seconds, but the inject buff lasts 80 seconds. This would mean bouncing back to base half as often but more than an auto-mated inject would have. You would have to have queens spawn with 50 energy however, if you wanted them to be able to inject immediately upon birth. But this would have the side effect of also giving them 2 creep tumours on spawn or a transfuse on spawn. Those things may or may not be bad.
4. A combination of 2 and 3; where inject is 50 mana, lasts for 80 seconds and gives 4 larva (1 every 20 seconds) and is stackable.
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I really like the way this is going but I'm a bit worried about lowering baneling health though. I understand the reason and I'm all for it in ZvZ but it would make banelings without speed even more shit, especially against terran. Marines can slaughter(focus fire) slow banelings even on creep, this would make that easier. Banelings are already totally useless without speed if not for all ins or worker line harass, this change would make T timings or harass even harder to stop if Z doesn't go for roach tech.
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Yes please automated macro boosters like we had once in LotV beta. all 3 races can finally focus more on fights & tactic play and not on that stupid brainless endless circle macro boosters. And remove the stackable injects for that.
I will never understand why we spend the most time with macro boosters than everything else in every game.
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God i hate these Community updates by now, would rather see an in depth discussion focused on 1 topic every other month.
For example he brings up the auto inject, cause zerg apparently requires "many more actions".
He never tells the audience why Koreans bring this up every meeting. What "actions" are we talking about, is this a problem occurring vs a specific race, why do koreans think this is the case. Then he presents the "solution" (again) inject could be automated (tested 1 year ago) ... he did back off the last time.
I really want to know what Dkim as the lead game designer of starcraft thinks here, NOT the community or some pro gamer. (this is all we get every time)
early 2015 + Show Spoiler +Macro mechanics
We’ve recently seen significant amounts of passionate and well-articulated discussions on the topic of macro mechanics. There are numerous people on both sides of our proposed changes, and we’ve read through and listened to many of the arguments as to why people feel the way they do. Having considered our testing internally along with your opinions in the community, we are currently planning to begin testing these changes in the next balance update. This does not mean the changes are permanent, but that we would like to explore their effects on a larger scale. To help prepare for this, we also wanted to briefly discuss some additional gameplay observations that we’ve discovered while testing.
Terran Mules being Removed
Scanner Sweep use is much more common, but because there are so many possible scans available, Calldown: Extra Supplies now has tactical justification. The decision to cast one ability or the other has become rather dynamic, and the constant decisions between these two abilities seem interesting.
The balance on these abilities might not be there yet, and if Mules do in fact get removed, we may need to tune these abilities’ details.
Protoss Chronoboost being Removed
The removal itself seems good, but we’re definitely realizing that there may need to be some timing changes to help Protoss.
We will be decreasing Warp Gate research time, and also speeding up the Disruptor build time, but we believe there’s more to come if this change goes through. Our current thought is that if Chronoboost is removed, we will need to strategically locate the specific units, buildings, upgrade times that would need to be reduced .
Zerg Inject Larva Being Auto-Cast and Reduced to 2 per Inject
We were initially worried that this particular change would take away too much from Zerg macro, but surprisingly, it is feeling like there’s still so much macro to tackle.
With this change, we’re also seeing better creep spread. This is something that we may need to tune eventually. Nevertheless, having a more visible result from players’ macro looks to be a much cooler direction rather than just having the forced/needed clicks found in things like Inject Larva.
Overall, we expect there will need to be a lot of balance tuning required if the macro mechanics changes stick. We are definitely looking forward to hearing your feedback and observing how the changes play out in the beta. Also, please remember to keep an open mind when testing out these changes - it will take time to iron out the balance as we continue testing this area.
Thanks for all of the passionate feedback and discussions these last few weeks. We hope that you will continue to have such rich discussions while we test these rather unique changes as we are certainly eager to hear your thoughts after playing with them.
late 2015 kinda talks about inject + Show Spoiler +Spawn Larvae — This requires too much management; even pro players are unable to manage Spawn Larvae perfectly.
Our stance on this kind of issue is simple: We intentionally make different aspects of the game difficult for the different races. We want each of them to have asymmetric advantages and disadvantages that contribute to very different play styles, but still result in a satisfying, balanced game at the end of the day. Spawn Larvae is more difficult to manage than Chrono Boost or MULEs, but zerg has other advantages — for example, unit production is relatively easy to manage for zerg compared with the other races. Making side-by-side comparisons of isolated elements won’t show you the whole picture because StarCraft II is asymmetrically balanced, meaning that if a race is strong in one way, then it’s probably also weak where another race is strong.
We also like to see this kind of feedback, because making games easy to learn but difficult to master is one of Blizzard’s core game design philosophies. So, we don’t see it as a problem that, even at the pro level, perfect mastery hasn’t been achieved yet.
I really want to know what Dkim as the lead game designer of starcraft thinks here, NOT the community or some pro gamer. (this is all we get every time)
Present us a rundown why blizzard introduced macro mechanics initially, did these mechanics achieve what he was hoping = why do we need them, what do they add, are these meaningful actions, problems these macro mechanics gave him in the past.
What is so cool about chronoboost/mule/inject dkim?
Maybe other concepts he likes, after all this is supposed to be a major redesign.
So stop scratching the surface ...
TLDR:
1.Community brings up problems
2. I want a lengthy and in depth post by game developer presenting his views on an issue (challenging his own views?!)
3. Now we have something to work with, we can support his view, bring in a new angle, rethink our view
(right now, wow cool that you guys brought it up, give us more feedback ... we listen ... we listen more .. ok we change)
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I agree that game feels random. I like to play with an idea that emphasis would transfer from ladder to co-op. Develop it, market it, and make it a new Dota 
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Most of the changes seem reasonable. But while i agree that the game should be balanced on high level especially, auto larva inject would break the game for us scrubby master players 
Also buffing the stalker vs light units (marines, widow mines, SCVs, probes, drones, lings, blings, hydras, zealots, oracles, adepts, sentries, HTs, phoenix, reaper, hellion, raven, banshee) would be a massive overkill although thats not a change they are planning to go through with yet. Its never been tested obiously but thats just my impression.
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I have a good change for protoss
bring back the reaver
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I have an idea about automated inject method. You can choose between automatic and manual injects. You can inject all 29sec (like now) manually or all 32sec automatically. inject stacks are removed.
I think my idea lead to play the first 5min manually and then automatically. Even automatic injects have one disadvantage: Your queen doesnt have energy for creep tumors (even one) if you forget to disable automatic injects.
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On October 01 2016 10:14 Exquisite7 wrote:Show nested quote +On October 01 2016 09:25 BronzeKnee wrote:On October 01 2016 09:21 Exquisite7 wrote:On October 01 2016 09:09 Solar424 wrote:On October 01 2016 09:07 Exquisite7 wrote:On October 01 2016 07:38 BronzeKnee wrote:On October 01 2016 07:27 -NegativeZero- wrote:On October 01 2016 07:14 BronzeKnee wrote:
I never cease to enjoy watching the train wreck that is David Kim trying to balance this game.
Where is the Ultra armor change? Why is Terran still so dependent on the Liberator in the late game?
I've literally been saying for years as we go round, yet again, the harass merry go-round that Blizzard needs to get off it. They buff harass tools so that everyone uses them because they are so strong you'd be stupid not to, then then buff defensive options so you can stop them (see Photon Overcharge) so then Blizzard creates new harass tools that can work around the defenses, because no harassed anymore because the defenses work.
It is ridiculous. The game was much better off when the defender had the tools, but had to scout and makes reads in order to stop the incoming attack. Spore Crawlers without a Evo Chamber is what you get when you don't know what you are doing. the post literally states that they are trying to nerf harass options in the upcoming patch Only four years late. David Kim is clueless. Ya know what game is working well, both for people to play and as an E-Sport? League of Legends. And it isn't insanely difficult to master, yet only a small percentage of people can play at the top level. On October 01 2016 07:23 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
is he balancing the game or is he instigating a giant change/shift during the off season to prepare for another competitive season in 2017? He is doing what he always does, destroying the player base by ignoring the basic tenets of game design. He is the reason we had to suffer through hours long Swarm Host matches, such a poorly designed unit that violated so much of what we know about game design. Thinking he can solve the problems he created is ignorant at this point, look at the track record. Let's all remember how the Tempest was going to be a solution to Mutalisks, then realize how it has become a boring A-move monster of the late game. Oh no poor you! You had to SUFFER! Cry me a river and go play LOL then. Problem solved. It's this type of post that killed this game. Telling people to go play other games instead of actually wanting Blizzard to fix the game's glaring problems. And what do you know, a whole lot of people did leave, and they aren't coming back. HA! Yea right... I'm responsible for pushing away the person who already hates the game. The person who only gets on these forums to bash Blizzard for such a shitty game that ruins their life. Okay fine lets say you're right, my comment makes people not want to play. Good! I'm tired of this SC2 community being filled with entitled pricks who complain at everything Blizzard does! I'd rather be part of a community that responds with rejoice when Blizzard announces that they are doing their best EVERY WEEK to improve the game. Whether they succeed or fail. You're right Exquisite, you didn't push me away from the game, Blizzard did. And Blizzard didn't ruin my life, they just ruined their own game. The problem with your comment though, is that it does ignore the game's glaring problems as Solar pointed out. Giving Blizzard a participation trophy is just repulsive to me, because I believe in accountability, and accountability is what could turn SC2 around. Because regardless of how well you think Blizzard is doing, the game is bleeding viewers and players to games like League. Many problems have been around since WOL and HOTS that haven't been addressed. Simply forgetting about them and praising Blizzard doesn't solve them. At least I am trying to keep them relevant. The game has been going in circles balance and game design wise, while games like League are going clearly forward, But you have 11 posts, so my guess is you'll be here until Blizzard does something you don't like, then you'll disappear. But I love SC2 so much, I'll still be here, still be trying to change the direction. So the river isn't for you, it is for SC2. No its bleeding users because RTS has the highest skill curve of any genre. EVER! People want to play this less and less because it takes an insane amount of focus in each game and it takes weeks if not months just to learn the basics. SC2 is difficult at the casual level. Most gamers in general are casual and want a game that is easy to jump into at any level. And LOL is easy to play as a casual gamer OR as a competitive gamer. And theres nothing wrong with that. What I do have problem with, is people like yourself who say this: "I never cease to enjoy watching the train wreck that is David Kim trying to balance this game." and generally just give a bad name to the community by being negative about everything. As if David Kim and Blizzard aren't trying. They post updates about every other week to stay transparent. You should be grateful that they are always listening and less negative. You come off as entitled. And how my 11 posts allows you to conclude my commitment to ANYTHING is beyond me. I've played Blizz games all my life and theres a reason for that... they make good games, just like SC2. So yes I'll praise them for trying because I know they care and that being negative isn't going to make a difference. And NO I'm not just gonna disappear, I would expect that from the likes of you.
Don't mind BronzeKnee. I have never seen him post on TL without bashing DK and puke all over the game. He's obviously a troll.
I don't understand why people rage over suggestions to the BALANCE TESTING-feature. It's far from finished I believe and we have a long time until that version of SC2 will be the real game. Have all of you played it enough and on a high enough level to rage about the state of it?
For me I can't say shit about it cause everytime I play it I face Terrans. It seems that the mech-terrans are the only ones populating that part of the galaxy. It looks fucking ridiculously strong. But I guess I have to adjust cause I'm just a diamond scrub Zerg. Chill!
Thanks Blizzard for trying your best and enduring this toxic community climate! It's disgusting and bashers should be ashamed.
I love SC2!!
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Just don't make any race easier please. All the races are hard to play, each has it's own difficulties and that is what makes the races unique and made us choose a certain race over the others.
I chose zerg because the macro is challenging. Yes, injecting, spreading creep, balancing your larva between armies and drones etc. is hard, but it is also very rewarding when it all comes together. The micro on the other hand is more simple compared to the other races (ling/bling wars being the exception) since it's more about flanking than small micro manoveurs. That's what I like and it feels good, since the macro is hard enough and you still have to inject during fights. Now if you make the macro easier and for example automate injects, zerg loses a big part of it's indentity and it won't feel as rewarding to crush down on an opponent with a huge army from multiple sides.
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remove macro mechanics and give every race an MSC so the warcrafts can finally play their favorite game with new graphics
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Every new CFU can be put into 2 categories:
1. Talks about changes to the client/bnet/technic
Oh god yes, that sounds good.
2. Talks about the balance and design
PLEASE NO PLEASE NO PLEASE NO.
On October 01 2016 18:36 Ej_ wrote:
remove macro mechanics and give every race an MSC so the warcrafts can finally play their favorite game with new graphics
I am a warcrafter and I dont know any other warcrafter who would like this for SC II.
The game too hard? Come on... is this a joke?
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Yes the game is too hard to CONTROL. Ever watched formula 1 on watery distance? Random as hell and nobody (the drivers, viewers may like to watch it) likes it because you don't have "enough" control to drive like you are used on dry distance. Same you can say about progamers because 90% of all have other RTS games experience.
playing is not hard but controlling is far too hard.
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Why was Schumacher labeled as a rain god, or Senna, Alesi, did you watch Hamilton in silverstone/monaco this year?
F1's Greatest Lap?
www.youtube.com
"I felt my ridiculous race by myselft. Everybody passed me easily right and left, and at the braking and cornering. Since that day, I imposed myself to beat my weakness. Once raining, I took my machine outside and continued to practice and practice for many hours in parking space near my house. Unless I was satisfied with my drive how I ran the kart, I could not help running. The rain soaked my body and paralyzed my hands on the steering wheel. But as long as I was not able to overcome its situation I had to run, run, and run." - Ayrton Senna
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Not to mention that the cars are often named as "far to easy to drive" and the rules of 2017 are specially made to make the driving harder again...
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On October 01 2016 19:32 Clonester wrote:
Not to mention that the cars are often named as "far to easy to drive" and the rules of 2017 are specially made to make the driving harder again...
there is a difference between driving and overtaking. If anything happened, overtaking got harder every year. Is nothing new if you can not overtake someone then you get the feeling that driving is too easy because everyone is "just" only driving.
edit: you need control in order to overtake someone!
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Austria24417 Posts
I'd love to just go back to the old macro mechanics. They were good.
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On October 01 2016 21:03 Olli wrote:
I'd love to just go back to the old macro mechanics. They were good.
MULE definitely feels much healthier now, I think the inject is fine too.
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Austria24417 Posts
On October 01 2016 21:09 Ej_ wrote:Show nested quote +On October 01 2016 21:03 Olli wrote:
I'd love to just go back to the old macro mechanics. They were good. MULE definitely feels much healthier now, I think the inject is fine too.
I never felt that macro mechanics were an issue in the first place. Maybe that's just me though.
Harassment being too strong is the biggest thing. They will eventually need to rework adepts or make them insanely weak. They're dominating every protoss matchup atm.
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EPT
