BlizzCon As in years before, the BlizzCon Global Finals ended extremely well! Players displayed amazing skills, there was a near perfect race-ratio towards the top of the bracket, there were many personal stories created, and the quality of the games was spectacular. . . especially in the finals!
Congratulations to all of the highly-skilled players from around the world who put up such a great performance, as well as our community for working together with us to make sure the balance of the game was as good as it was. The casters/observers/hosts/crowd also did such an amazing job, including my personal favorite, ‘Incontrol’, who is the best ‘Incontrol’ in the world. Finally, congratulations to the Blizzard Esports Team and to our partners around the world who did an especially great job this year building up the awesome stories of these fantastic players!
Balance Update Onto gameplay then, we wanted to let you guys know that we’re aiming for November 22nd for the release of the major gameplay patch. We are aware that JYP’s balance tournament is going on right now, but we thought it would be best to push these changes out ASAP so that we have better data to make additional fixes as needed.
Because we don’t have a lot of time remaining until the release of the patch, we wanted to add these additional changes into Testing today or tomorrow.
Ultralisk Base armor increased by 1, and reducing 2 armor from the upgrade like we’ve talked about before. Nothing complicated here.
Cyclone Reducing the anti-ground +armored damage by 1. This puts the Cyclone at 3 (+2 vs armored) damage per shot.
Hydralisk We’ve seen some issues regarding the speed at which the new more powerful Hydralisk can hit the field (and the enemy). To address this, we would like to try splitting up the range upgrade and the speed upgrade since they are now both much more impactful. In this case, the Hydralisk will start off no different than it does in the live game, but after researching both of the upgrades, the Hydralisk will be brought to the full strength of the current balance testing version. Maps for 2017 Season 1 and Season 2 Our community team has been in discussion with TeamLiquid regarding the first TeamLiquid Map Contest for next year, and it looks like the timing is such that we can begin investigating maps to use for Season 2 in 2017. With that in mind, we’ll get the next TLMC going in the middle of Season 1 so that we can use TeamLiquid map contest maps for Season 2!
However, we also have Season 1 just ahead of us, and many of you offered suggestions about community maps that you felt were worth considering for use in Season 1 of next year. After reviewing these maps, we wanted to get your input as well!
In order to have high-quality maps that provide diverse play potential as a pool, we’re currently thinking about bringing in these 4 community maps:
Abyssal Reef by SidiantheBard • battlenet:://starcraft/map/1/277597 Honor Grounds by SidiantheBard • battlenet:://starcraft/map/1/273507 Paladino Terminal by Namrufus • battlenet:://starcraft/map/1/273841 Proxima Station by LatiAs • battlenet:://starcraft/map/1/273568
We’ve reached out to all of the map makers here to discuss using their maps and have heard back from most already. The remaining three maps are still to be determined, so please let us know your thoughts on these maps because we have to start on the QA/Art passes on our end for next season’s maps very soon.
I'd appreciate if the Abyssal Reef had these fish in the middle of the map removed, but if it went into the ladder eventually it would be done anyway I think
Split Hydra upgrades? So we're back to bw. Cyclone is going to have 30 dps and 50 dps against armored, surprised they still want to keep the lock-on damage unchanged
What is really making me angry about these changes is the fact that the community demanded these for so long and for so long blizzard did not want to do jack shit about these issues but now all of a sudden they are like "yeah, we totally see that this needs to be done guys"... Where was this determination before? At least they are doing the right thing in the end...
Also, not mentioned in the update but still an update nonetheless, but more Carbot portraits, decals, and emoticons are going to be available in patch 3.8 as microtransactions.
Another map (or two!) on ladder is a dream come true. Supporting sc2 is what I love to do and I will continue to map make because it scratches that creative itch I get.
The fact that Blizzard is a lot more proactive with community maps is encouraging. They seem to be aiming for a nice combination of aggressive and macro maps too. I wonder how they chose them--Proxima Station isn't a map that was on my radar.
On November 11 2016 06:29 ZigguratOfUr wrote: The fact that Blizzard is a lot more proactive with community maps is encouraging. They seem to be aiming for a nice combination of aggressive and macro maps too. I wonder how they chose the--Proxima Station isn't a map that was on my radar.
I totally agree. I'm willing to believe in a future when the future involves rewarding the communities efforts.
On the other hand I don't know what splitting hydras upgrades are supposed to accomplish. They were fine in ZvZ and ZvP. They were build order losses in ZvT. Adding a second time expensive upgrade isn't going to help anything.
I guess the core issue is it isn't a hydralisk problem. The unit is fine in other matchups.
Looks like it might be a pretty fun macro map. Not sure how you could get any damage onto a two-base opponent other than air, though.
Paladino Terminal
Walling the natural might be difficult (can't really tell from the picture alone), but if not, this looks fantastic as well.
Abyssal Reef
Tanks behind the natural mineral line seem like they could be a real problem. Other than that, I like this map too.
Honorgrounds
I'm not sure how you ever take a third as Protoss / Terran. Seems like a pretty major issue.
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I'd love to see more work to Protoss for the upcoming update. Short end of the stick seems to be the kindest way to look at it.
I'm thinking as Zerg - OK I take my third. And my fourth, and fifth. And I even have a watchtower.
I'm not enthusiastic about Honorgrounds design. I am liking the idea of having a map like apotheosis but with rocks over the gold so its not a big balance issue or perceived as one by players.
On November 11 2016 06:29 ZigguratOfUr wrote: The fact that Blizzard is a lot more proactive with community maps is encouraging. They seem to be aiming for a nice combination of aggressive and macro maps too. I wonder how they chose the--Proxima Station isn't a map that was on my radar.
I totally agree. I'm willing to believe in a future when the future involves rewarding the communities efforts.
On the other hand I don't know what splitting hydras upgrades are supposed to accomplish. They were fine in ZvZ and ZvP. They were build order losses in ZvT. Adding a second time expensive upgrade isn't going to help anything.
I guess the core issue is it isn't a hydralisk problem. The unit is fine in other matchups.
Looks like it might be a pretty fun macro map. Not sure how you could get any damage onto a two-base opponent other than air, though.
Paladino Terminal
Walling the natural might be difficult (can't really tell from the picture alone), but if not, this looks fantastic as well.
Abyssal Reef
Tanks behind the natural mineral line seem like they could be a real problem. Other than that, I like this map too.
Honorgrounds
I'm not sure how you ever take a third as Protoss / Terran. Seems like a pretty major issue.
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I'd love to see more work to Protoss for the upcoming update. Short end of the stick seems to be the kindest way to look at it.
I'm thinking as Zerg - OK I take my third. And my fourth, and fifth. And I even have a watchtower.
I'm not enthusiastic about Honorgrounds design. I am liking the idea of having a map like apotheosis but with rocks over the gold so its not a big balance issue or perceived as one by players.
The only hope I see is two-base all-ins (or 1-base all-ins) to keep the game as low-eco as possible for as long as possible.
Maybe if we force tons and tons of fights until the bases are basically mined out (main / nat), then we'll be able to have barely gotten the tech to hold a third (but really only having 1 mining base -- that one). Seems dismal at best, though. Esp given the ease of defending such an open area for zerg in the early game.
Honestly Edowyth the more I look at honorgrounds the more unpredictable it looks. If you have the watchtower and your opponent doesn't have vision you can get shit done despite being behind if your opponent does not very carefully micro against the map. That's OK but with the combination of a buncha bases, I'm not a fan yet.
After looking at each in turn, Abyssal Reef looks like the most standard of the bunch even if it's quite different from the current pool.
On November 11 2016 06:17 RoomOfMush wrote: What is really making me angry about these changes is the fact that the community demanded these for so long and for so long blizzard did not want to do jack shit about these issues but now all of a sudden they are like "yeah, we totally see that this needs to be done guys"... Where was this determination before? At least they are doing the right thing in the end...
maybe because its the off-season and Blizzard is willing to try all kinds of stuff including stuff they think might not work.
On November 11 2016 06:17 RoomOfMush wrote: What is really making me angry about these changes is the fact that the community demanded these for so long and for so long blizzard did not want to do jack shit about these issues but now all of a sudden they are like "yeah, we totally see that this needs to be done guys"... Where was this determination before? At least they are doing the right thing in the end...
maybe because its the off-season and Blizzard is willing to try all kinds of stuff including stuff they think might not work.
It helps that players are leaving and you can't really bullshit it. I mean it hurts. But they know and aren't going to deny it or hedge and say another expansion will save us.
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