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First, congratulations to Zest for winning the beta tournament! Of course, this is just one result, but seeing all 3 races represented well towards the later stages of the tournament was still cool to see. Seeing how much we saw the games develop throughout this tournament in just a few days, we’re excited to see more players figuring out more new cool stuff soon.
Major Patch
The patch goes live starting early next week! We wanted to thank everyone in the community that helped out with the major patch because we know it takes honest intent to play with potential changes compared to the live game. We look forward to the number of constructive players out there increasing as we go forward. We also wanted to give a shoutout to JYP for helping with the pro matches during the beta testing, and we hope to see some more pro-level matches with the new changes during Homestory Cup this weekend!
Regarding the major patch, there were a few things that we wanted to tweak before the patch goes live next week:
Siege Tank health increased from 160 to 175
The loss of Medivac pick-up seems to have hurt the Siege Tank a bit more than we expected. Because Siege Tanks should be a core part of the Terran Mech army, we’d like to try increasing their survivability a little bit so that they perform better in head on engagements vs. various ground threats.
DT blink research cost reduction from 150/150 to 100/100
The time and tech-level barrier seems to be big enough that this could use a slight buff.
Cyclone range reduction + range upgrade
The Cyclone looks to be extremely flexible since its seeing wide usage regardless of whether a Terran is going for Bio or Mech play. Also, the early all-in using Cyclones looks to be quite strong. In order to push the Cyclone more in the direction of being a core unit for Mech specifically, and also to tone down the-all in a little bit, Cyclone attack range will be reduced by 2 and a cheap upgrade will be added bring back their range.
There are also some other topics that we are discussing based on community and pro feedback.
From the community, discussions regarding early game mass Reapers was happening a lot this week. We expect more people are using and discussing this strategy due to how well ByuN used it in the WCS finals, and how good his micro was. As with other tactics that have become rapidly popular, finding the right defense against them often takes more time than learning to simply use them (such as boosted Medivacs or Stephano’s mass Roaches). Still, we will definitely keep a close eye on how both the tournament and ladder meta evolves around this strategy, and make adjustments to either the Reapers or the Reaper grenades accordingly.
From the pro side, while it’s pretty clear that players aren’t close to figuring out the details of the changes yet, there is some feedback regarding the Tempest’s new ability. One suggestion that we felt could be solid is removing the ability, increasing the anti-ground weapon range to 10, and upping the base damage of the anti-ground weapon slightly. For this one, we would like to have the new Tempest go to the live game as is, test it fully in the live game, and we can keep this type of a suggestion in our back pockets in case the ability doesn’t turn out to be a great add.
Overall, we wanted to stress once more that we really need to use the remaining time this year to focus on balance tuning since many of the changes going in are massive. Let’s continue working together to make sure we locate and fix problems that most likely will come up after the patch goes live.
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If they really want to play around with tank health they should at least put it above 180 so it survives 3 corrosive biles. Or tone down bile damage to 55 or something.
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It's not that I think this patch is bad per say, I just think it's still business as usual, making everything hit faster, harder, more research upgrades, not gonna lie I'm amazed to see a durability buff instead of just making the tanks move faster as Mr. Kim's balance philosophy.
The DT changes seem ridiculous though, out of all the things that could be last minute tweaked for Protoss, Warp Prism pick up (would have been a way better nerf then the HP) Oracle changes, more meaningful Adept changes (yea the vision thing makes them slightly worse but it's a sloppy, inelegant change, surprise surprise) or some type of Disruptor redesign/buff.
I'll hold more severe judgements until I play it myself when it goes live and when the pros flush it out, but it looks like Siege Tank and Raven mech are going to be ludicrously powerful and I'm going to have DT's blinking in and out of my base. Not to sound noob, but literally the last thing this game (and especially Protoss) needed was gimmick abilities to compensate for a unit just being bad.
Adepts - bad except for their ability
Immortals - ability based even if it's passive
Void Rays - completely reliant on ability to not suck
Disruptor - This things attack pretty much is an ability
Dark Templar - Sucks outside of cheese but now has gimmick ability
Stalker - terrible without their ability
Oracle - ...3 abilities....
MSC - Crap designed hero unit that has meaningless attack but 3 gimmick abilities
Phoenix - Ability based
high Templar - Great unit but still ability based
I don't get it, did they say, "there is no way to buff the Dark Templars outside of giving them an ability" or something? I don't even play Protoss but the amount of activated abilities in this game is just crazy, it's made the game so....hectic and sloppy...
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So the change in the Tempest would be not to change it at all? LOL rip mech as usual
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People have been complaining about reapers being broken in TvZ since at least June. And zergs haven't really found a solution aside from hoping the terran messes up and gets their reapers surrounded. Well, at least it's on Blizzard's radar now.
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I think early mass reaper is terrible for TvT, I REALLY dislike the matchup since they've become even more popular recently.
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I kind of laugh at their comment on mass reapers, but mass reapers has literally been a thing since release (I think even in beta) and has only gotten more popular as time went on, even before Byun did it. I am surprised they are just now really acknowledging how dumb it is (I am not saying it's overpowered, but I am saying it's stupid).
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On November 18 2016 04:12 blade55555 wrote:
I kind of laugh at their comment on mass reapers, but mass reapers has literally been a thing since release (I think even in beta) and has only gotten more popular as time went on, even before Byun did it. I am surprised they are just now really acknowledging how dumb it is (I am not saying it's overpowered, but I am saying it's stupid).
That is EXACTLY what I am thinking after reading that.
They're talking about this like it's a new thing. Like people haven't been bitching for months and this hasn't been a lightning rod for everyone to say "HEY LOOK AT HOW STUPID THIS IS".
Goddamnit Blizzard.
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On November 18 2016 04:12 blade55555 wrote:
I kind of laugh at their comment on mass reapers, but mass reapers has literally been a thing since release (I think even in beta) and has only gotten more popular as time went on, even before Byun did it. I am surprised they are just now really acknowledging how dumb it is (I am not saying it's overpowered, but I am saying it's stupid).
IIRC the first time the build was ever shown (ByuN was the first who did it in a casted game I think) was back in November like a week after the game came out. It's been around ever since then, it had like 1 or 2 good maps in every map pool since release.
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masters 1 terran eu comment
pls make void ray speed buff an upgrade, all ins vs terran feel too strong
perhaps give cyclone a bit more anti air damage when you get this +2 range, as banshees, oracles, warp prism very strong versus terran
also perhaps give the seige tank jump ability like in nova campaign to dodge biles and blinding cloud as those seem very strong versus mech
i feel you are going in the right direction but still not there yet keep it up!!!!
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UHHM why was there no info about the beta patch tournament on TL...?
Where can I find the VODs..?
Also thanks for spoiling David Kim!
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It's just a joke that terran got a cheese that doesn't put them behind in the game even when they deal no damage, and it's been 1 year. If koreans haven't figured it out by now, it's because there's no counter.
And this adding to a matchup where zerg's only chance is getting hive, just totaly broken.
For 6 years protoss players have been allowed to cannon rush to masters, and now terran is just as retarded, guess this is the apex of Blizzard's vision of balance.
The fact that the best zerg in the world opens pool first says everything about this game.
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On November 18 2016 04:59 xTJx wrote:
It's just a joke that terran got a cheese that doesn't put them behind in the game even when they deal no damage, and it's been 1 year. If koreans haven't figured it out by now, it's because there's no counter.
And this adding to a matchup where zerg's only chance is getting hive, just totaly broken.
For 6 years protoss players have been allowed to cannon rush to masters, and now terran is just as retarded, guess this is the apex of Blizzard's vision of balance.
The fact that the best zerg in the world opens pool first says everything about this game.
Agree with this 100%, at this point it's obvious that David Kim's vision for the game is questionable to say the least.
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On November 18 2016 04:18 Probe1 wrote:Show nested quote +On November 18 2016 04:12 blade55555 wrote:
I kind of laugh at their comment on mass reapers, but mass reapers has literally been a thing since release (I think even in beta) and has only gotten more popular as time went on, even before Byun did it. I am surprised they are just now really acknowledging how dumb it is (I am not saying it's overpowered, but I am saying it's stupid). That is EXACTLY what I am thinking after reading that. They're talking about this like it's a new thing. Like people haven't been bitching for months and this hasn't been a lightning rod for everyone to say "HEY LOOK AT HOW STUPID THIS IS". Goddamnit Blizzard.
got to just +++++ this, its insane for them to act like this is a new thing its one of the reason i have stopped playing its the dumbest thing in tvt and unplayable for shitty zerg players like me. they act like they are listing to the community but saying things like this makes me thing other wise.
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On November 18 2016 05:18 starslayer wrote:Show nested quote +On November 18 2016 04:18 Probe1 wrote:On November 18 2016 04:12 blade55555 wrote:
I kind of laugh at their comment on mass reapers, but mass reapers has literally been a thing since release (I think even in beta) and has only gotten more popular as time went on, even before Byun did it. I am surprised they are just now really acknowledging how dumb it is (I am not saying it's overpowered, but I am saying it's stupid). That is EXACTLY what I am thinking after reading that. They're talking about this like it's a new thing. Like people haven't been bitching for months and this hasn't been a lightning rod for everyone to say "HEY LOOK AT HOW STUPID THIS IS". Goddamnit Blizzard. got to just +++++ this, its insane for them to act like this is a new thing its one of the reason i have stopped playing its the dumbest thing in tvt and unplayable for shitty zerg players like me(prolly good zergs too not worth learning zvt). they act like they are listing to the community but saying things like this makes me thing other wise.
OoPS idk what happened here ouote edit?
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Very glad to see more changes, even if they are minor.
I say remove Combat healing from Reapers, up their HP and give them a late game upgrade which makes the Grenades do extra damage vs Structures, so we can finally have qxc Reapers again.
As for the Tempest, I see potential in the Stun ability, so I quite like it, instead of just being the good'ol boring Tempest.
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I agree with all the changes.
I still think mech will be weak but this is a step in the right direction.
Cheaper blink is good idea since Protoss needs a bit of help against Zerg.
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Austria24417 Posts
Changes sound solid across the board. I really wanted the previous Tempest ability to go through though, even if massively tweaked. Skytoss will always suck vs Terran until there's some sort of AoE against Marines. It lacks the power to take straight up fights until supported by storm, and then we're talking about an army that's very late in the game.
Especially with a much reduced anti-ground attack range, Tempests need something to compensate. I think a static AoE damage spell would be good. It would be difficult to use correctly, but that's fine. It'd make Skytoss harder to control, which it really has never been, and it would give some much needed stability vs Hydras in PvZ and Marines in PvT (both midgame issues).
Also Voidrays probably need their speed buff to be an upgrade, but you could make them even faster with a lategame upgrade I think.
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EPT![[image loading]](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CM809rKWoAAiV0C.jpg)
