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Thanks to everyone who provided feedback. We appreciate all the thoughts and discussions around the proposed map changes. After reading over the feedback, we are prepared to implement the following changes:
Blood Boil
- Gold minerals were changed to blue minerals at the expansions located near the center of the map.
- A Reaper path was removed near the natural expansion.
Also, we noticed an issue where players were unable to cast the Oracle’s Stasis Ward through the fog of war without having vision beforehand. Along with the map changes, this Oracle issue will be fixed as well.
Thanks again for your continued feedback!
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The change is fine (though I'm not convinced Blood Boil is salvage). Would've been nice if they commented more about their reasoning, and other stuff the community brought up such as why they don't like rich geysers.
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Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this?
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On June 27 2017 04:27 avilo wrote:
Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this?
gsl final won by mech not enough for you? 
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On June 27 2017 04:27 avilo wrote:
Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this?
Lest see, which races won the big tournaments since the big change after Blizzcon:
A Terran in Gyeonggi,
A Terran in Katowice.
A Protoss in GSL 1,
A Protoss in both WCS events (one of which was on the current map pool, which is claimed to be Zerg favored),
A Terran in SSL1,
A mech Terran in GSL 2.
Did a Zerg player won something serious... no! (some second places, but nothing more than that) So is there any reason for Zerg nerfs... doesn't seem so. Maybe some buffs.
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On June 27 2017 04:30 Scarlett` wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 04:27 avilo wrote:
Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this? gsl final won by mech not enough for you?
to be fair, soO didn't use any swarm hosts. obviously this is because they were too good and he didn't want to make it unfair, right?
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On June 27 2017 04:50 SetGuitarsToKill wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 04:30 Scarlett` wrote:On June 27 2017 04:27 avilo wrote:
Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this? gsl final won by mech not enough for you? to be fair, soO didn't use any swarm hosts. obviously this is because they were too good and he didn't want to make it unfair, right?
no it's because the best korean zerg doesn't know how to play vs mech obviously
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¿wHeRe iS tHe BaLaNcE pAtCh FoR sWaRm HoStS?
Ah, mmm, yes. The big question to end all big questions same question about a topic that has been talked to death and beyond the afterlife over several months. When, when will it be answered? Golly, if only we could know.
User was warned for this post
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On June 27 2017 04:30 Scarlett` wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 04:27 avilo wrote:
Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this? gsl final won by mech not enough for you?
Of course not. Didn't you see the balance test mod he put out?
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On June 27 2017 05:13 Jj_82 wrote:
War chests, anyone?
THIS is a good question. People are interested in it, it's meant to do something positive for the game and its community, and we don't have a lot of information about it. I like this question and I also want to know more.
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On June 27 2017 05:18 geokilla wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 04:30 Scarlett` wrote:On June 27 2017 04:27 avilo wrote:
Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this? gsl final won by mech not enough for you? Of course not. Didn't you see the balance test mod he put out?
it was hilarious, basically Swarm hosts 1k/1k, cost 25 supply and self-immolate when casting locusts.
More on topic: I like this info, I'm not expecting, nor do I want, drastic balance changes that completely upend the meta in one moment. I like this (continuation) of a balanced & careful approach.
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ok. the less changes the better. They started with balance changes every week, now they tune in to "fix" map issues once in a month. im completely fine with this aproach. I wish they just got lost for a couple of years for meta to settle in the game for the first fucking time in the game's history.
p.s. overgrowth next season please
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yes, overgrowth, a map we havent played enough for billion of months...... LOL
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I think overall game ballance is in an ok spot right now except for pvz. Bane hydra allins are just to strong in this map pool. Even the best Protoss pros can't deal well with it and generally have to rely on gimikey 2 base builds to stop it. (See classic vs Soo in recent gsl for an example) I just want to encounter Protoss in high-mid masters on ladder agian. Right now the game on NA server feels like it's zvt and tvt craft.
The blood boil change is a good start since having a gold base that easy to take will usualy make a map highly Zerg favored in pvz, but more changes will be needed, mabey it would be better to somehow nerf hydra name or buff Protoss against it so that we don't have to have such a restriction on map design, this map pool is prity interesting and fun some of the maps, especially abyssal have interesting and novel terrain use. It would suck to see all these maps go because of bane hydra.
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On June 27 2017 05:49 PinoKotsBeer wrote:
yes, overgrowth, a map we havent played enough for billion of months...... LOL
Agreed sometimes old maps can be interesting in the pool but in this case I'm fine letting it die finally.
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To be fair at this point no balance should be made for now.... let the meta settle and players figure it out themselves... something that I feel like we were missing for some time.. though I believe many may disagree
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To be honest I just don't think they will. Protoss have been trying for months now to figure out a defense for bane hydra or 2 base strats to stop Zerg from getting there, they haven't. On many maps it's just to hard for Protoss to secure a third, it was already hard before the adept nerf now it's ridiculous. I am not a Protoss player, I often whine about Protoss Since it's such a gimiky race, but even I can see that this needs to get fixed.
Mabey a solution would be to buff sentry starting energy. In hots Protoss could hold these kind of attacks because they could build up a lot of energy on sentries, the faster pace of lotv makes this not work out as well. I think stronger sentries would be a good balance fix and creates less problems than rebuffing adepts, buffing collosi, or nerfing Zerg.
Alternatively we could change the map pool,revert the hydra hp buff or split hydra speed and range upgrades agian. But I don't think any of these changes are as effective as just letting defensive Protoss players use sentries to stop the bane part of bane hydra.
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On June 27 2017 04:30 Scarlett` wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 04:27 avilo wrote:
Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this? gsl final won by mech not enough for you?
To be honest I wanted to answer that ever since soo won, because I knew the question would come...
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Poll: Did the gold base affect WCS CircuitYes (13) 24% No (6) 11% Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked. (35) 65% 54 total votes Your vote: Did the gold base affect WCS Circuit (Vote): Yes
(Vote): No
(Vote): Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked.
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On June 27 2017 06:17 washikie wrote:
I think overall game ballance is in an ok spot right now except for pvz. Bane hydra allins are just to strong in this map pool. Even the best Protoss pros can't deal well with it and generally have to rely on gimikey 2 base builds to stop it. (See classic vs Soo in recent gsl for an example) I just want to encounter Protoss in high-mid masters on ladder agian. Right now the game on NA server feels like it's zvt and tvt craft.
The blood boil change is a good start since having a gold base that easy to take will usualy make a map highly Zerg favored in pvz, but more changes will be needed, mabey it would be better to somehow nerf hydra name or buff Protoss against it so that we don't have to have such a restriction on map design, this map pool is prity interesting and fun some of the maps, especially abyssal have interesting and novel terrain use. It would suck to see all these maps go because of bane hydra.
My God...Just go and watch Serral vs Neeb WCS Finals. And Serral is concidered the best foreign Zerg nowadays. If anything I would say this matchup is P favored. If Zerg is second late with hydra/bane attack- it's GG. Hydra/bane timing attacks or some crazy ling allin with double droplords is like the only way to win vs Protoss. If u don't believe me just go and play some Zerg.
To be honest i would gladly seee some Immortal nerf. That would fix some issues in PvZ and could make mech more viable vs Protoss.
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On June 27 2017 07:19 hiroshOne wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 06:17 washikie wrote:
I think overall game ballance is in an ok spot right now except for pvz. Bane hydra allins are just to strong in this map pool. Even the best Protoss pros can't deal well with it and generally have to rely on gimikey 2 base builds to stop it. (See classic vs Soo in recent gsl for an example) I just want to encounter Protoss in high-mid masters on ladder agian. Right now the game on NA server feels like it's zvt and tvt craft.
The blood boil change is a good start since having a gold base that easy to take will usualy make a map highly Zerg favored in pvz, but more changes will be needed, mabey it would be better to somehow nerf hydra name or buff Protoss against it so that we don't have to have such a restriction on map design, this map pool is prity interesting and fun some of the maps, especially abyssal have interesting and novel terrain use. It would suck to see all these maps go because of bane hydra. My God...Just go and watch Serral vs Neeb WCS Finals. And Serral is concidered the best foreign Zerg nowadays. If anything I would say this matchup is P favored. If Zerg is second late with hydra/bane attack- it's GG. Hydra/bane timing attacks or some crazy ling allin with double droplords is like the only way to win vs Protoss. If u don't believe me just go and play some Zerg. To be honest i would gladly seee some Immortal nerf. That would fix some issues in PvZ and could make mech more viable vs Protoss.
Isn't that how a timing attack is supposed to work the higher level you go? If you're late in a timing attack, then it will fail. You can see this effect in a similar fashion in your own games on the ladder. If you miss a timing window, your attack will fail.
As for the 2 timings being the only way to win (personally I think they're all in, and not just "only a timing"), I think there are other ways to beat a Protoss, its just that the 2 best ways right now are based on the two aforementioned very strong timings. When Protosses figure out how to reliably hold off those timings, Zergs will probably find another way to beat it.
I can say from 1st hand experience though, that damn hydra/bane timing is VERY hard to deal with as a toss player.
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Wtf are you saying hiroshOne o_O. The immortal was the biggest nerf of mech history. Do you remember how many tank shots were needed to kill, and those that are now? (you can even forget that siege tank damage was 50).
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this granular map change will have no impact on the low level players i play with. we're happy any how.
On June 27 2017 04:27 avilo wrote:
Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this?
the game is great. S2 is one of the best GSL seasons i've seen. Lots of Terrans in S1 and S2 of the GSL so its not like the game is totally imbalanced against Terran. Its not like playing Terran is a lost cause the way you characterize it.
Swarmhosts are only a problem when i'm overwhelmed midgame and can NOT multitask well enough to be active out on the map and i must resort to turtley passive play. I view that as my problem and not a problem with the game.
I'm a happy camper. The 8 players in my clan that range from Silver to Diamond are happy with the game.
Great work Blizzard.
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the game is great. S2 is one of the best GSL seasons i've seen. Lots of Terrans in S1 and S2 of the GSL so its not like the game is totally imbalanced against Terran. Its not like playing Terran is a lost cause the way you characterize it.
Indeed, its quite the opposite. The game is balanced in favor of Terran for the last 12 months. Only the balance team knows why. Perhaps it is because there are few good foreign Terrans? Its some political issue, as this imbalance is fairly obvious. In every tournament they have to make terrans eliminate each other so its less obvious.
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On June 27 2017 08:16 Kafka777 wrote:Show nested quote +the game is great. S2 is one of the best GSL seasons i've seen. Lots of Terrans in S1 and S2 of the GSL so its not like the game is totally imbalanced against Terran. Its not like playing Terran is a lost cause the way you characterize it. Indeed, its quite the opposite. The game is balanced in favor of Terran for the last 12 months. Only the balance team knows why. Perhaps it is because there are few good foreign Terrans? Its some political issue, as this imbalance is fairly obvious. In every tournament they have to make terrans eliminate each other so its less obvious.
This sounds like a conspiracy theory like they give Serral a worse computer to animate the NA scene or something
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On June 27 2017 04:30 Scarlett` wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 04:27 avilo wrote:
Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this? gsl final won by mech not enough for you?
This guy was saying in his stream that SoO, the best Zerg in the world, 6th time GSL finalist SUCKS to play against mech and that he was blatantly RAPED by Gumiho. The guy apparently didn't note the aggresive mech of Gumiho, where he didnt wait 15 minutes into he game to attack. But well, I'm just a nobody, I suppose that someone who cannot even qualify for WCS can easily teach me... or you, or SoO...
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On June 27 2017 08:51 Corvuuss wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 08:16 Kafka777 wrote:the game is great. S2 is one of the best GSL seasons i've seen. Lots of Terrans in S1 and S2 of the GSL so its not like the game is totally imbalanced against Terran. Its not like playing Terran is a lost cause the way you characterize it. Indeed, its quite the opposite. The game is balanced in favor of Terran for the last 12 months. Only the balance team knows why. Perhaps it is because there are few good foreign Terrans? Its some political issue, as this imbalance is fairly obvious. In every tournament they have to make terrans eliminate each other so its less obvious. This sounds like a conspiracy theory like they give Serral a worse computer to animate the NA scene or something
Sounds like it because it basically is. The idea that the balance team is somehow conspiring to keep Terran OP is close to avilo levels of delusional (except opposite in viewpoint).
Whether it be avilo perennially whining that a perfectly viable style is somehow UP, or people like this who imagine a shadowy cabal that plots around the clock to ruin specifically their race and their race alone (for teh evulz, cuz why not) just showcases that there's lunatics wherever you go.
Balance is fine. Not perfect or anywhere close to perfect, but fine nonetheless. ZvP with hydra/ling/bane is the biggest issue atm, and presumably the reason for the maps being adjusted. If hydra/ling/bane continues to be a problem, further adjustments will be made accordingly.
Whiners will whine, it's what they do. In the meantime, sane players will enjoy playing.
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On June 27 2017 10:06 pvsnp wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 08:51 Corvuuss wrote:On June 27 2017 08:16 Kafka777 wrote:the game is great. S2 is one of the best GSL seasons i've seen. Lots of Terrans in S1 and S2 of the GSL so its not like the game is totally imbalanced against Terran. Its not like playing Terran is a lost cause the way you characterize it. Indeed, its quite the opposite. The game is balanced in favor of Terran for the last 12 months. Only the balance team knows why. Perhaps it is because there are few good foreign Terrans? Its some political issue, as this imbalance is fairly obvious. In every tournament they have to make terrans eliminate each other so its less obvious. This sounds like a conspiracy theory like they give Serral a worse computer to animate the NA scene or something Sounds like it because it basically is. The idea that the balance team is somehow conspiring to keep Terran OP is close to avilo levels of delusional (except opposite in viewpoint). Whether it be avilo perennially whining that a perfectly viable style is somehow UP, or people like this who imagine a shadowy cabal that plots around the clock to ruin specifically their race and their race alone (for teh evulz, cuz why not) just showcases that there's lunatics wherever you go. Balance is fine. Not perfect or anywhere close to perfect, but fine nonetheless. ZvP with hydra/ling/bane is the biggest issue atm, and presumably the reason for the maps being adjusted. If hydra/ling/bane continues to be a problem, further adjustments will be made accordingly. Whiners will whine, it's what they do. In the meantime, sane players will enjoy playing.
But this doesn't have to be about balance. It can be just about "design"/"fun" or whatever you wanna call it. Just because something is balanced doesn't mean it is fine. Nobody would want to play starcraft if it was only tvt and the only two units you could build were scvs and marines. That game would quite obviously suck, even if it was 100% balanced.
The same can be applied to the current (or any) state of the game. Arguing from a balance pov is simply irrelevant as long as the balance is "good enough" (obviously you have to define that part)
What the conversation should be about is design and what it means for the gameplay (unit interactions, strategic diversity, things like that)
At the end of the day this is subjective ofc, but there are patterns and design philosophies which "work better" than others.
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On June 27 2017 10:27 The_Red_Viper wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 10:06 pvsnp wrote:On June 27 2017 08:51 Corvuuss wrote:On June 27 2017 08:16 Kafka777 wrote:the game is great. S2 is one of the best GSL seasons i've seen. Lots of Terrans in S1 and S2 of the GSL so its not like the game is totally imbalanced against Terran. Its not like playing Terran is a lost cause the way you characterize it. Indeed, its quite the opposite. The game is balanced in favor of Terran for the last 12 months. Only the balance team knows why. Perhaps it is because there are few good foreign Terrans? Its some political issue, as this imbalance is fairly obvious. In every tournament they have to make terrans eliminate each other so its less obvious. This sounds like a conspiracy theory like they give Serral a worse computer to animate the NA scene or something Sounds like it because it basically is. The idea that the balance team is somehow conspiring to keep Terran OP is close to avilo levels of delusional (except opposite in viewpoint). Whether it be avilo perennially whining that a perfectly viable style is somehow UP, or people like this who imagine a shadowy cabal that plots around the clock to ruin specifically their race and their race alone (for teh evulz, cuz why not) just showcases that there's lunatics wherever you go. Balance is fine. Not perfect or anywhere close to perfect, but fine nonetheless. ZvP with hydra/ling/bane is the biggest issue atm, and presumably the reason for the maps being adjusted. If hydra/ling/bane continues to be a problem, further adjustments will be made accordingly. Whiners will whine, it's what they do. In the meantime, sane players will enjoy playing. But this doesn't have to be about balance. It can be just about "design"/"fun" or whatever you wanna call it. Just because something is balanced doesn't mean it is fine. Nobody would want to play starcraft if it was only tvt and the only two units you could build were scvs and marines. That game would quite obviously suck, even if it was 100% balanced. The same can be applied to the current (or any) state of the game. Arguing from a balance pov is simply irrelevant as long as the balance is "good enough" (obviously you have to define that part) What the conversation should be about is design and what it means for the gameplay (unit interactions, strategic diversity, things like that) At the end of the day this is subjective ofc, but there are patterns and design philosophies which "work better" than others.
The problem with arguing design and enjoyability is that, for a great many people, enjoying a game is in large part connected to victory. Enjoying is also in large part connected to the idea that a victory was justly deserved, as a direct result of superior effort or skill on behalf of the victor (this is ofc why people hate cheese, WMs, amove units, etc).
Balance is a (mostly) objective issue, defined by winrates and hard numbers, and thus inherently easier (though far from easy) to address and improve than a completely subjective and often polarized (winner vs loser) experience that is enjoyment.
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On June 27 2017 07:19 hiroshOne wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 06:17 washikie wrote:
I think overall game ballance is in an ok spot right now except for pvz. Bane hydra allins are just to strong in this map pool. Even the best Protoss pros can't deal well with it and generally have to rely on gimikey 2 base builds to stop it. (See classic vs Soo in recent gsl for an example) I just want to encounter Protoss in high-mid masters on ladder agian. Right now the game on NA server feels like it's zvt and tvt craft.
The blood boil change is a good start since having a gold base that easy to take will usualy make a map highly Zerg favored in pvz, but more changes will be needed, mabey it would be better to somehow nerf hydra name or buff Protoss against it so that we don't have to have such a restriction on map design, this map pool is prity interesting and fun some of the maps, especially abyssal have interesting and novel terrain use. It would suck to see all these maps go because of bane hydra. My God...Just go and watch Serral vs Neeb WCS Finals. And Serral is concidered the best foreign Zerg nowadays. If anything I would say this matchup is P favored. If Zerg is second late with hydra/bane attack- it's GG. Hydra/bane timing attacks or some crazy ling allin with double droplords is like the only way to win vs Protoss. If u don't believe me just go and play some Zerg. To be honest i would gladly seee some Immortal nerf. That would fix some issues in PvZ and could make mech more viable vs Protoss.
And Neeb isn't the best foreign Protoss?
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On June 27 2017 10:38 pvsnp wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 10:27 The_Red_Viper wrote:On June 27 2017 10:06 pvsnp wrote:On June 27 2017 08:51 Corvuuss wrote:On June 27 2017 08:16 Kafka777 wrote:the game is great. S2 is one of the best GSL seasons i've seen. Lots of Terrans in S1 and S2 of the GSL so its not like the game is totally imbalanced against Terran. Its not like playing Terran is a lost cause the way you characterize it. Indeed, its quite the opposite. The game is balanced in favor of Terran for the last 12 months. Only the balance team knows why. Perhaps it is because there are few good foreign Terrans? Its some political issue, as this imbalance is fairly obvious. In every tournament they have to make terrans eliminate each other so its less obvious. This sounds like a conspiracy theory like they give Serral a worse computer to animate the NA scene or something Sounds like it because it basically is. The idea that the balance team is somehow conspiring to keep Terran OP is close to avilo levels of delusional (except opposite in viewpoint). Whether it be avilo perennially whining that a perfectly viable style is somehow UP, or people like this who imagine a shadowy cabal that plots around the clock to ruin specifically their race and their race alone (for teh evulz, cuz why not) just showcases that there's lunatics wherever you go. Balance is fine. Not perfect or anywhere close to perfect, but fine nonetheless. ZvP with hydra/ling/bane is the biggest issue atm, and presumably the reason for the maps being adjusted. If hydra/ling/bane continues to be a problem, further adjustments will be made accordingly. Whiners will whine, it's what they do. In the meantime, sane players will enjoy playing. But this doesn't have to be about balance. It can be just about "design"/"fun" or whatever you wanna call it. Just because something is balanced doesn't mean it is fine. Nobody would want to play starcraft if it was only tvt and the only two units you could build were scvs and marines. That game would quite obviously suck, even if it was 100% balanced. The same can be applied to the current (or any) state of the game. Arguing from a balance pov is simply irrelevant as long as the balance is "good enough" (obviously you have to define that part) What the conversation should be about is design and what it means for the gameplay (unit interactions, strategic diversity, things like that) At the end of the day this is subjective ofc, but there are patterns and design philosophies which "work better" than others. The problem with arguing design and enjoyability is that, for a great many people, enjoying a game is in large part connected to victory. Enjoying is also in large part connected to the idea that a victory was justly deserved, as a direct result of superior effort or skill on behalf of the victor (this is ofc why people hate cheese, WMs, amove units, etc). Balance is a (mostly) objective issue, defined by winrates and hard numbers, and thus inherently easier (though far from easy) to address and improve than a completely subjective and often polarized (winner vs loser) experience that is enjoyment.
Sure, but we play games to have this experience, not because we know it is balanced. I would even say that the actual balance doesn't matter at all, the perceived one is what matters and that is oftentimes just a design question.
Games are "art" and it is subjective, sure. But as i said, there absolutely are certain patterns and philosophies we can apply to get a "better" product.
Enjoying is also in large part connected to the idea that a victory was justly deserved, as a direct result of superior effort or skill on behalf of the victor (this is ofc why people hate cheese, WMs, amove units, etc).
Oh yeah absolutely! Which is why the game should be designed in a way which doesn't interfere too much with this aspect. So we basically want to create a game which follows certain goals and find solutions to get there which don't interfere with any of the goals, or realistically the least amount possible.
So really, i think the balance question is pretty uninteresting. Ofc it has to be good enough but realistically most people won't lose because of balance. Though people will lose interest because of design decisions. That's what the debate should be about.
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Seriously?
Still no nerfs to reaper grenade or 80dmg siege tanks or ravens or BC jump?
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I think some people will disagree with this opinion but I think burrowed infestors being able to cast fungal is too strong haha. If you don't got ravens (Which unless you went for skymech, its useless, it'll die to corruptors) you're kind of screwed.. its hard to notice even with the changes and its just too strong.. I feel like a good way to change it would be to take away burrow cast, or to make the travel speed slower. I am not a pro though so my solution isn't the best suggestion out there 
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still not happy with the strength of ravens/BC in all matchups.
still not happy with the map pool in zerg's favor.
I slightly blame TL for doing their map making contest and having a category like "rush maps". can we never do that again and let people make only great maps?
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I guess the "mech not viable" guys will chill for a week or two after Gumiho won GSL. Their supreme leader is the only one mad enough to still complain right now.
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On June 27 2017 12:35 xTJx wrote:
I guess the "mech not viable" guys will chill for a week or two after Gumiho won GSL. Their supreme leader is the only one mad enough to still complain right now.
Hopefully. I am a Terran, and I like Mech. But I would not like the kind of mech that Avilo plays, turtling in your base to the ultimate army and then still losing. He wants to be able to beat better players simply by choosing to go mech, not to have to earn it like Gumigod. The gulf in play between a top level player and Avilo is amazing.
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On June 27 2017 11:01 The_Red_Viper wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 10:38 pvsnp wrote:On June 27 2017 10:27 The_Red_Viper wrote:On June 27 2017 10:06 pvsnp wrote:On June 27 2017 08:51 Corvuuss wrote:On June 27 2017 08:16 Kafka777 wrote:the game is great. S2 is one of the best GSL seasons i've seen. Lots of Terrans in S1 and S2 of the GSL so its not like the game is totally imbalanced against Terran. Its not like playing Terran is a lost cause the way you characterize it. Indeed, its quite the opposite. The game is balanced in favor of Terran for the last 12 months. Only the balance team knows why. Perhaps it is because there are few good foreign Terrans? Its some political issue, as this imbalance is fairly obvious. In every tournament they have to make terrans eliminate each other so its less obvious. This sounds like a conspiracy theory like they give Serral a worse computer to animate the NA scene or something Sounds like it because it basically is. The idea that the balance team is somehow conspiring to keep Terran OP is close to avilo levels of delusional (except opposite in viewpoint). Whether it be avilo perennially whining that a perfectly viable style is somehow UP, or people like this who imagine a shadowy cabal that plots around the clock to ruin specifically their race and their race alone (for teh evulz, cuz why not) just showcases that there's lunatics wherever you go. Balance is fine. Not perfect or anywhere close to perfect, but fine nonetheless. ZvP with hydra/ling/bane is the biggest issue atm, and presumably the reason for the maps being adjusted. If hydra/ling/bane continues to be a problem, further adjustments will be made accordingly. Whiners will whine, it's what they do. In the meantime, sane players will enjoy playing. But this doesn't have to be about balance. It can be just about "design"/"fun" or whatever you wanna call it. Just because something is balanced doesn't mean it is fine. Nobody would want to play starcraft if it was only tvt and the only two units you could build were scvs and marines. That game would quite obviously suck, even if it was 100% balanced. The same can be applied to the current (or any) state of the game. Arguing from a balance pov is simply irrelevant as long as the balance is "good enough" (obviously you have to define that part) What the conversation should be about is design and what it means for the gameplay (unit interactions, strategic diversity, things like that) At the end of the day this is subjective ofc, but there are patterns and design philosophies which "work better" than others. The problem with arguing design and enjoyability is that, for a great many people, enjoying a game is in large part connected to victory. Enjoying is also in large part connected to the idea that a victory was justly deserved, as a direct result of superior effort or skill on behalf of the victor (this is ofc why people hate cheese, WMs, amove units, etc). Balance is a (mostly) objective issue, defined by winrates and hard numbers, and thus inherently easier (though far from easy) to address and improve than a completely subjective and often polarized (winner vs loser) experience that is enjoyment. Sure, but we play games to have this experience, not because we know it is balanced. I would even say that the actual balance doesn't matter at all, the perceived one is what matters and that is oftentimes just a design question. Games are "art" and it is subjective, sure. But as i said, there absolutely are certain patterns and philosophies we can apply to get a "better" product.
In general for a fun game with no competition involving money percieved balance is way better, but if there is money involved (which in sc2 there is) real balance is the only tollerable way to go.
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On June 27 2017 04:30 Scarlett` wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 04:27 avilo wrote:
Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this? gsl final won by mech not enough for you?
What do you expect from Terran? OP race but since they can't win it all, balance whine is their extra skill they practice on the side as well.
User was warned for this post
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On June 27 2017 14:23 AshC wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 04:30 Scarlett` wrote:On June 27 2017 04:27 avilo wrote:
Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this? gsl final won by mech not enough for you? What do you expect from Terran? OP race but since they can't win it all, balance whine is their extra skill they practice on the side as well.
No matter how much you dislike terran players, it's unfair to associate them with Avilo.
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On June 27 2017 12:28 youngjiddle wrote:
still not happy with the map pool in zerg's favor.
I slightly blame TL for doing their map making contest and having a category like "rush maps". can we never do that again and let people make only great maps?
TLMC having a Rush Map category isn't what leads to a map pool that favors Zerg, that's not really how that works. There are some flaws with TLMC that were talked about a bit after the last one, but I don't think any of those issues lead to the current map pool favoring Zerg.
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On June 27 2017 16:23 Vanadiel wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 14:23 AshC wrote:On June 27 2017 04:30 Scarlett` wrote:On June 27 2017 04:27 avilo wrote:
Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this? gsl final won by mech not enough for you? What do you expect from Terran? OP race but since they can't win it all, balance whine is their extra skill they practice on the side as well. No matter how much you dislike terran players, it's unfair to associate them with Avilo.
Exactly, that's really a bit harsh. Also please consider that there are two different breeds of Terran players, us mere mortals aka Foreigners, who can't win shit at tourneys whatsoever (even welfare didn't really help with that) and those gods in Korea who show us how the game is played properly.
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On June 27 2017 12:28 youngjiddle wrote:
I slightly blame TL for doing their map making contest and having a category like "rush maps". can we never do that again and let people make only great maps?
This is not TL's fault, Blizzard made the categories.
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Austria24417 Posts
A bit disappointing not to see anything at least. PvZ could probably use some looking at, even if it isn't horrible by any means.
And of course at some point changes are nice just to shake things up, see Dota.
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That´s good. Little changes more often. No a huge amount of work for you and this things help a lot. Keep on it.
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On June 27 2017 17:15 Olli wrote:
A bit disappointing not to see anything at least. PvZ could probably use some looking at, even if it isn't horrible by any means.
And of course at some point changes are nice just to shake things up, see Dota.
No changes at all can also be good, see BroodWar. ^^
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On June 27 2017 17:15 Olli wrote:
A bit disappointing not to see anything at least. PvZ could probably use some looking at, even if it isn't horrible by any means.
And of course at some point changes are nice just to shake things up, see Dota.
Or lack of changes is nice, see SC:BW.
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Austria24417 Posts
On June 27 2017 17:30 Ej_ wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 17:15 Olli wrote:
A bit disappointing not to see anything at least. PvZ could probably use some looking at, even if it isn't horrible by any means.
And of course at some point changes are nice just to shake things up, see Dota.
Or lack of changes is nice, see SC:BW.
BW was a much different game, one where maps created diversity. That can't really be said for SC2, maps usually create more problems than anything else ;(
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On June 27 2017 17:37 Olli wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 17:30 Ej_ wrote:On June 27 2017 17:15 Olli wrote:
A bit disappointing not to see anything at least. PvZ could probably use some looking at, even if it isn't horrible by any means.
And of course at some point changes are nice just to shake things up, see Dota.
Or lack of changes is nice, see SC:BW. BW was a much different game, one where maps created diversity. That can't really be said for SC2, maps usually create more problems than anything else ;(
SC2 is already more diverse than BW in every matchup :o. Don't need game changes for new strategies to emerge, just let players figure things out.
And it's not like it hasn't happened in SC2 before, WoL and HotS didn't see nearly as many changes as LotV and the game was evolving even during long patchless periods (and often just by rotating in and out maps)
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This entire LOTV thing started out with P being (called) OP. Instead of making P reasonable, Zerg was buffed into entirely new spheres, while pushing T further and further into the gimmickiest of gameplays imagineable. To round things off, we get the current map pool.
As far as I am concerned, I (finally) managed to adapt to all these proceedings and my mmr is higher than ever before, which gives me a more relaxed view on the game. Still, I don't like it. Concidering everything I remember that Blizz said about design goals for SC2, they actually reached those. To summarize it: The game is supposed to be over in a heartbeat, as soon as a player mined enough gas to have 16 3/3/3 carriers out on the map. The reasoning is: the game is taking too long. It is not supposed to go back and forth. It's supposed to be over quickly, so that more games can be played and tournaments may stick to schedules more reliably. If WoL and HotS were like chess, they added a rule for LotV that check is immediately mate, without the chance for the other player to react.
Before, in "normal" games, hardly anything would happen before 7-8 minutes into the game. Today, we have "normal" games that are de facto over after 7-8 minutes into the game. While many people may call this more dynamic and thus desireable, others don't (hello viewing figures and active players count).
This is nothing that is reflected in win rates. When people talk about balance here, they often talk about being able to react to something, in order to keep going and still have a chance at winning the particular match. This is not how SC2 works anymore. You are supposed to lose quickly, but win the next match just as quickly, in order to have a balanced win rate and go into an exciting decider coin flip^W^W match, in your BO3 series.
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On June 27 2017 17:50 QuinnTheEskimo wrote:
This entire LOTV thing started out with P being (called) OP. Instead of making P reasonable, Zerg was buffed into entirely new spheres, while pushing T further and further into the gimmickiest of gameplays imagineable. To round things off, we get the current map pool.
As far as I am concerned, I (finally) managed to adapt to all these proceedings and my mmr is higher than ever before, which gives me a more relaxed view on the game. Still, I don't like it. Concidering everything I remember that Blizz said about design goals for SC2, they actually reached those. To summarize it: The game is supposed to be over in a heartbeat, as soon as a player mined enough gas to have 16 3/3/3 carriers out on the map. The reasoning is: the game is taking too long. It is not supposed to go back and forth. It's supposed to be over quickly, so that more games can be played and tournaments may stick to schedules more reliably. If WoL and HotS were like chess, they added a rule for LotV that check is immediately mate, without the chance for the other player to react.
Before, in "normal" games, hardly anything would happen before 7-8 minutes into the game. Today, we have "normal" games that are de facto over after 7-8 minutes into the game. While many people may call this more dynamic and thus desireable, others don't (hello viewing figures and active players count).
This is nothing that is reflected in win rates. When people talk about balance here, they often talk about being able to react to something, in order to keep going and still have a chance at winning the particular match. This is not how SC2 works anymore. You are supposed to lose quickly, but win the next match just as quickly, in order to have a balanced win rate and go into an exciting decider coin flip^W^W match, in your BO3 series.
I agree with this post, games are over too fast. Personally, the game is not as fun to play as it was in WoL (from the pacing, not the OP compositions that needed to get nerfed)
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No balance changes since 8 months, some map tweaks nobody cares about. Funny thing is that some people here are actually happy with blizzard doing no changes to gameplay LOL
Eeeeezzzz money for game balance team
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On June 27 2017 18:26 Vipermagi wrote:
Funny thing is that some people here are actually happy with blizzard doing no changes to gameplay LOL
The Funny thing is that no matter what Blizzard does, the majority of people in this forum is actually happy with Blizzard and hates on people who are not.
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On June 27 2017 18:26 Vipermagi wrote:
No balance changes since 8 months, some map tweaks nobody cares about. Funny thing is that some people here are actually happy with blizzard doing no changes to gameplay LOL
Eeeeezzzz money for game balance team
The approach of doing no additional/minimal changes after a good balance is established as a concept and people being fine with the current state of LOTV are very different things.
While I generally prefer the philosophy of leaving the game alone I am not happy with quite a few things in the game currently, but these are more of a core design nature like 12 worker start and fewer minerals per base, which for me personally lead to an unpleasant playing experience compared to the previous iterations of SC2.
Since we're pretty far down the road with the latest expansion everyone who still plays the game has adopted, thus any more fundamental game changes are pretty much out of question IMO, Blizzard seems to care way more about squeezing some more bucks out of the player base and it seems to work out for them.
Latest Community Updates are sadly implying the only things left to look at are some map adjustments, which further nurtures my impression that after David Kim left the rest of the SC2 team is in lowest-effort-maintenance mode.
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On June 27 2017 18:45 QuinnTheEskimo wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 18:26 Vipermagi wrote:
Funny thing is that some people here are actually happy with blizzard doing no changes to gameplay LOL
The Funny thing is that no matter what Blizzard does, the majority of people in this forum is actually happy with Blizzard and hates on people who are not.
Yeh 8 months and literally no changes.... like NONE
23 May 2017
3.14.0
Terran
Thor
Thor armor increased from 1 to 2.
Thor morph times reduced from 2.5 to 1.79.
Raven
Auto-Turret damage reduced from 24 to 18.
Auto-Turret duration increased from 7.14 to 10.
Protoss
Tempest
Kinetic Overload damage increased from 30 (+14 massive) to 30 (+22 massive).
Void Ray
Prismatic Alignment slows the Void Ray by 40% while active.
Zealot
Charge upgrade cost lowered from 200/200 to 100/100.
Zerg
Roach
Undetected burrow move visual effects are now more visible.
Infestor
Undetected burrow move visual effects are now be more visible.
28 March 2017
3.12.0
Protoss
Adept
Maximum Health reduced from 80 to 70.
7 March 2017
3.11.0
Terran
Reaper
KD8 Charge cooldown increased from 7 seconds to 14 seconds.
Widow Mine
Splash damage +shield bonus reduced from +40 to +25
Zerg
Hydralisk
Health increased from 80 to 90
Corruptor
Movement speed changed from 4.1343 to 4.725
Acceleration speed changed from 3.675 to 4.2
Parasite Spore weapon damage point changed from .1193 to .0446
31 January 2017
3.10.1
Terran
Liberator Concord Cannon damage changed from 85 to 75.
20 December 2016
3.9.1
Zerg
Baneling
"Evolve Centrifugal Hooks" will now grant +5 health instead of +10.
Protoss
Carrier
Interceptors cost increased from 5 to 10 minerals.
November 3.8.0 Patch
Oh wait... it's actually full of things that the community has been whining about for ages.. things like air toss nerfs, raven nerfs, adept nerfs, reaper nerfs... which was all preceded by things that everyone wanted like the siege tank buff...
Not everyone is completely happy with every direction or change blizzard makes but you could at least open your eyes to reality
the majority of people in this forum is actually happy with Blizzard and hates on people who are not.
And you say that but...how is it then that 90% of these threads is people just whining about how blizzard hasn't nerfed their personally most hated unit yet.
I think maybe if the majority of the community had a longer than 2 second memory they would be able enjoy this game more.
On June 27 2017 17:15 Olli wrote:
BW was a much different game, one where maps created diversity. That can't really be said for SC2, maps usually create more problems than anything else ;(
Yeh all that diversity.... like Fighting Spirit and.. uhh Circuit Breaker? Oh wait right.. Broodwar maps are even more restricted by balance......
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On June 27 2017 12:21 Ryu3600 wrote:I think some people will disagree with this opinion but I think burrowed infestors being able to cast fungal is too strong haha. If you don't got ravens (Which unless you went for skymech, its useless, it'll die to corruptors) you're kind of screwed.. its hard to notice even with the changes and its just too strong.. I feel like a good way to change it would be to take away burrow cast, or to make the travel speed slower. I am not a pro though so my solution isn't the best suggestion out there
It is strong but I'm not sure it needs a nerf, I think overall zvt is in a good state of ballance right now. Terran can just play around burrow fungal as well. If you know it's coming you can split up your army before you walk across the map. The only time it's really a problem is if Zerg can catch you off guard with it, but usualy you will have some sense that he at least could of have made some burrowed investors and you need to watch for them.
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On June 27 2017 19:20 Beliskner wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 18:45 QuinnTheEskimo wrote:On June 27 2017 18:26 Vipermagi wrote:
Funny thing is that some people here are actually happy with blizzard doing no changes to gameplay LOL
The Funny thing is that no matter what Blizzard does, the majority of people in this forum is actually happy with Blizzard and hates on people who are not. Show nested quote +the majority of people in this forum is actually happy with Blizzard and hates on people who are not. And you say that but...how is it then that 90% of these threads is people just whining about how blizzard hasn't nerfed their personally most hated unit yet. I think maybe if the majority of the community had a longer than 2 second memory they would be able enjoy this game more...
I think those people who are okay with what blizzard are doing are not saying anything in those threads because they don't have to. I for one am okay with how it is and the only things I comment on is unreasonable behavior and interesting points that have not so much to do with balance.
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On June 27 2017 17:15 Olli wrote:
A bit disappointing not to see anything at least. PvZ could probably use some looking at, even if it isn't horrible by any means.
And of course at some point changes are nice just to shake things up, see Dota.
I feel like the thing that makes mobas able to deal with drastic changes is the very system. If they come in and make someone hilariously OP, everyone just vetos that character, and balance is restored.
In sc2, you don't have that option. You can vote against maps, but even then it doesn't give a 100% chance of not playing there.
If they make enormous changes and make a race OP, then everyone else just has a miserable time until it's fixed
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Beliskner wrote:
Oh wait... it's actually full of things that the community has been whining about for ages.. things like air toss nerfs, raven nerfs, adept nerfs, reaper nerfs... which was all preceded by things that everyone wanted like the siege tank buff...
Talking about adept nerf? lolz -10hp nerf and still every toss composition have like 90% adepts in it
Air toss nerfs? skytoss is still considered braindead comp with no good counter play
Reaper nerf? Increased cd on grenades changed nothing at all, this unit still ruin early tvt games
Siege tank buff? where is it? cant see it in your post (even though siege tanks are trash anyways outside tvt)
Adding +1 armor to thor or increasing cooldown on reaper grenades are indeed sick gameplay changes.
And it took "only" 8 months to make change which is another sick example.
Blizzard dont care abut zerg being easier to play and dominating foreign ladders / tournaments, in post u made I can only see terran / protoss nerfs and zerg buffs wtf is this !?
These are not balance changes community wants
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On June 27 2017 19:20 Beliskner wrote:Not everyone is completely happy with every direction or change blizzard makes but you could at least open your eyes to reality Show nested quote +the majority of people in this forum is actually happy with Blizzard and hates on people who are not. And you say that but...how is it then that 90% of these threads is people just whining about how blizzard hasn't nerfed their personally most hated unit yet.
Well, first off, thank you for making my point. Secondly, I already presented my view on why 90% of all threads are balance whine: It is because people actually liked how WoL and HotS worked, and are yet to comprehend that LotV is subtly essentially different. The game is to end quickly. This means there are supposed to be many things that are accessible early in the game and (always) have a high chance of tilting a match decisively one way or the other. However, as a player with a WoL/HotS backgorund, one perceives such things as OP. People are looking to solve problems: Player A does X so player B hast to do Y to keep the game going. LotV is not about keeping the game going. It's about the game ending quickly. When Player A actually does X the game is over. The time windows where you can actually react to something you see are stupidly small in LotV, compared to WoL and HotS.
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On June 27 2017 17:50 QuinnTheEskimo wrote:
This entire LOTV thing started out with P being (called) OP. Instead of making P reasonable, Zerg was buffed into entirely new spheres, while pushing T further and further into the gimmickiest of gameplays imagineable. To round things off, we get the current map pool.
As far as I am concerned, I (finally) managed to adapt to all these proceedings and my mmr is higher than ever before, which gives me a more relaxed view on the game. Still, I don't like it. Concidering everything I remember that Blizz said about design goals for SC2, they actually reached those. To summarize it: The game is supposed to be over in a heartbeat, as soon as a player mined enough gas to have 16 3/3/3 carriers out on the map. The reasoning is: the game is taking too long. It is not supposed to go back and forth. It's supposed to be over quickly, so that more games can be played and tournaments may stick to schedules more reliably. If WoL and HotS were like chess, they added a rule for LotV that check is immediately mate, without the chance for the other player to react.
Before, in "normal" games, hardly anything would happen before 7-8 minutes into the game. Today, we have "normal" games that are de facto over after 7-8 minutes into the game. While many people may call this more dynamic and thus desireable, others don't (hello viewing figures and active players count).
This is nothing that is reflected in win rates. When people talk about balance here, they often talk about being able to react to something, in order to keep going and still have a chance at winning the particular match. This is not how SC2 works anymore. You are supposed to lose quickly, but win the next match just as quickly, in order to have a balanced win rate and go into an exciting decider coin flip^W^W match, in your BO3 series.
You summarize perfectly the main reasons I stopped playing this game, thank you so much :D
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On June 27 2017 13:23 Corvuuss wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 11:01 The_Red_Viper wrote:On June 27 2017 10:38 pvsnp wrote:On June 27 2017 10:27 The_Red_Viper wrote:On June 27 2017 10:06 pvsnp wrote:On June 27 2017 08:51 Corvuuss wrote:On June 27 2017 08:16 Kafka777 wrote:the game is great. S2 is one of the best GSL seasons i've seen. Lots of Terrans in S1 and S2 of the GSL so its not like the game is totally imbalanced against Terran. Its not like playing Terran is a lost cause the way you characterize it. Indeed, its quite the opposite. The game is balanced in favor of Terran for the last 12 months. Only the balance team knows why. Perhaps it is because there are few good foreign Terrans? Its some political issue, as this imbalance is fairly obvious. In every tournament they have to make terrans eliminate each other so its less obvious. This sounds like a conspiracy theory like they give Serral a worse computer to animate the NA scene or something Sounds like it because it basically is. The idea that the balance team is somehow conspiring to keep Terran OP is close to avilo levels of delusional (except opposite in viewpoint). Whether it be avilo perennially whining that a perfectly viable style is somehow UP, or people like this who imagine a shadowy cabal that plots around the clock to ruin specifically their race and their race alone (for teh evulz, cuz why not) just showcases that there's lunatics wherever you go. Balance is fine. Not perfect or anywhere close to perfect, but fine nonetheless. ZvP with hydra/ling/bane is the biggest issue atm, and presumably the reason for the maps being adjusted. If hydra/ling/bane continues to be a problem, further adjustments will be made accordingly. Whiners will whine, it's what they do. In the meantime, sane players will enjoy playing. But this doesn't have to be about balance. It can be just about "design"/"fun" or whatever you wanna call it. Just because something is balanced doesn't mean it is fine. Nobody would want to play starcraft if it was only tvt and the only two units you could build were scvs and marines. That game would quite obviously suck, even if it was 100% balanced. The same can be applied to the current (or any) state of the game. Arguing from a balance pov is simply irrelevant as long as the balance is "good enough" (obviously you have to define that part) What the conversation should be about is design and what it means for the gameplay (unit interactions, strategic diversity, things like that) At the end of the day this is subjective ofc, but there are patterns and design philosophies which "work better" than others. The problem with arguing design and enjoyability is that, for a great many people, enjoying a game is in large part connected to victory. Enjoying is also in large part connected to the idea that a victory was justly deserved, as a direct result of superior effort or skill on behalf of the victor (this is ofc why people hate cheese, WMs, amove units, etc). Balance is a (mostly) objective issue, defined by winrates and hard numbers, and thus inherently easier (though far from easy) to address and improve than a completely subjective and often polarized (winner vs loser) experience that is enjoyment. Sure, but we play games to have this experience, not because we know it is balanced. I would even say that the actual balance doesn't matter at all, the perceived one is what matters and that is oftentimes just a design question. Games are "art" and it is subjective, sure. But as i said, there absolutely are certain patterns and philosophies we can apply to get a "better" product. In general for a fun game with no competition involving money percieved balance is way better, but if there is money involved (which in sc2 there is) real balance is the only tollerable way to go.
Well i want the game to be "balanced enough", and i think it most of the time is just that. I think getting to that state is doable no matter what the actual design of the game dictates though. So i am not too concerned to talk about balance every community update, i think that discussion is not interesting at all. What happens here is simply that some strategies/unit compositions are strong and blizzard has to decide if other races/players will likely find a startegy against it or not.
I think the more interesting question is if playing the game with these strategies is fun/enjoyable to watch/play.
An example i often used in the past: Forcefields were maybe balanced, but it was absolutely horrible to play against (arguably also to play) and to watch. I am sure we will find some guy who disagrees with this, but i also think it isn't that out there to state that forcefields are "bad for the game" in general. I won't reiterate all the reasons for this, this was done over and over again in the past.
So yeah, i think arguing about the game mechanics, unit interactions, general pace of the game, etc is way more important than yelling "mech op/up" in every thread. We should first talk about what mech really means, why we want it, how it should work, etc. Just imagine the warhound would be in the game right now and it was balanced. It still wouldn't be "mech play" people actually want to see. That's where the disussion has to take place (i simply used mech as an example here, this is applicable for anything really)
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Mech means "mmh i want to sleep but i also want to play" this is the best compromise
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On June 27 2017 20:25 QuinnTheEskimo wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 19:20 Beliskner wrote:Not everyone is completely happy with every direction or change blizzard makes but you could at least open your eyes to reality the majority of people in this forum is actually happy with Blizzard and hates on people who are not. And you say that but...how is it then that 90% of these threads is people just whining about how blizzard hasn't nerfed their personally most hated unit yet. Well, first off, thank you for making my point. Secondly, I already presented my view on why 90% of all threads are balance whine: It is because people actually liked how WoL and HotS worked, and are yet to comprehend that LotV is subtly essentially different. The game is to end quickly. This means there are supposed to be many things that are accessible early in the game and (always) have a high chance of tilting a match decisively one way or the other. However, as a player with a WoL/HotS backgorund, one perceives such things as OP. People are looking to solve problems: Player A does X so player B hast to do Y to keep the game going. LotV is not about keeping the game going. It's about the game ending quickly. When Player A actually does X the game is over. The time windows where you can actually react to something you see are stupidly small in LotV, compared to WoL and HotS.
i've said this before, its like LotV is more like a C&C game than a Starcraft game when it comes to pace. i like it. but i can see why people who played Brood War, WoL, and HotS for 10+ years might not like it.
Blizzard went through that big process of speeding up everything before LotV was released during a very critical beta period. Blizz sorta made up their mind and during the "big reset" after BlizzCon 2016 decided to stick with that economy, pacing etc.
So Blizz has been taking in LotV feedback for 2+ years has never gone back down the "slow the game down" roadway. They seem 100% set on it in the fact of changing many other things in the game.
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I don't get the point of changing Blood Boil. Any Zerg or Protoss is vetoing the map in a tournament 100% lol
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On June 27 2017 23:28 RPR_Tempest wrote:
I don't get the point of changing Blood Boil. Any Zerg or Protoss is vetoing the map in a tournament 100% lol
Balance for bo7.
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On June 27 2017 17:50 QuinnTheEskimo wrote:
This entire LOTV thing started out with P being (called) OP. Instead of making P reasonable, Zerg was buffed into entirely new spheres, while pushing T further and further into the gimmickiest of gameplays imagineable. To round things off, we get the current map pool.
As far as I am concerned, I (finally) managed to adapt to all these proceedings and my mmr is higher than ever before, which gives me a more relaxed view on the game. Still, I don't like it. Concidering everything I remember that Blizz said about design goals for SC2, they actually reached those. To summarize it: The game is supposed to be over in a heartbeat, as soon as a player mined enough gas to have 16 3/3/3 carriers out on the map. The reasoning is: the game is taking too long. It is not supposed to go back and forth. It's supposed to be over quickly, so that more games can be played and tournaments may stick to schedules more reliably. If WoL and HotS were like chess, they added a rule for LotV that check is immediately mate, without the chance for the other player to react.
Before, in "normal" games, hardly anything would happen before 7-8 minutes into the game. Today, we have "normal" games that are de facto over after 7-8 minutes into the game. While many people may call this more dynamic and thus desireable, others don't (hello viewing figures and active players count).
This is nothing that is reflected in win rates. When people talk about balance here, they often talk about being able to react to something, in order to keep going and still have a chance at winning the particular match. This is not how SC2 works anymore. You are supposed to lose quickly, but win the next match just as quickly, in order to have a balanced win rate and go into an exciting decider coin flip^W^W match, in your BO3 series.
no no no, it's all happenin because RTS games are dying, I swear! LOTV is perfect, just listen to those casters and streamers! :^)
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It's right too, dont be silly
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On June 28 2017 00:26 ihatevideogames wrote:
no no no, it's all happenin because RTS games are dying, I swear! LOTV is perfect, just listen to those casters and streamers! :^)
RTS games are growing by huge amounts. C&C4 came out at teh same time as SC2 in 2010 an its bigger than Dota2 and Overwatch combined. i'm prolly switching to C&C4 because EA supports the #1 RTS franchise of all time ( C&C ) way better than Blizzard supports SC2 and the Starcraft franchise.
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This is nothing that is reflected in win rates. When people talk about balance here, they often talk about being able to react to something, in order to keep going and still have a chance at winning the particular match. This is not how SC2 works anymore. You are supposed to lose quickly, but win the next match just as quickly, in order to have a balanced win rate and go into an exciting decider coin flip^W^W match, in your BO3 series.
The problem is all race aren't equal :
T is ahead of P or Z, he just cross the map and crush the other.
Z is behind : he is dead, totally can't recover.
T can tradebase, get a good drop/liberator and come back while he was behind, his army is cheap, gas light, but still really powerful, and mule give him good boost even if he has lost a lot of SCV, he can turtle at home with liberator/tanks, and while the P/Z try to attack, a sngle can kill an entire base...
Your ahead as Zerg, well you can't just cross the map right now, you need to get a tech that counters the other, and do a good timing attack (that can fail, and you finally lose the game).
Also the build are kind of win-win vs T :
You get rax reapers, you don't kill zerg, are you behind ? not at all, you can deny creep, get map control, your eco is about the same of Zerg (watch Soo vs gumiho).
Same oracle, unscouted, you kill tons of drones, and even with spores, oracle has great utility, can still kill drones and regenerate its shield.
Of course, if you play perfectly the race is really strong, but still, perfectly played terran is better, but no one play perfectly even the pro, but T can do mistakes and correct them eventually, Zerg can't, and that's why i don't see them winning other tournament in the future.
Actually the best Zerg, Life wasn't the player that never make mistakes, but the one who just make bet everygame, and is so good at mind game, and he wins more than he loses, and i think it's the only competitive way to play zerg now : don't try to play perfectly, just surprise the other or fail trying.
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i was very skeptical that Blizzard could find unique roles for all the units in LotV because so many new units got added from WoL. However, 1+ years into LotV. i think they've done a really nice job.
these fucking blizzard guys are geniuses.
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I still think that ZvP lategame is too P favored and that the Lurker is not a useful unit in most situations because the Tempest has such long range.
Any chance we can indirectly buff the lurker by making it so the tempest cannot attack burrowed units?
Maybe reduce neural range to compensate?
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On June 28 2017 02:52 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
i was very skeptical that Blizzard could find unique roles for all the units in LotV because so many new units got added from WoL. However, 1+ years into LotV. i think they've done a really nice job.
these fucking blizzard guys are geniuses.
Liberator unique? Nope, overlaps with Thors and Siege Tanks, just does a better job than the latter. Lurker unique? Nope, just added that unit after years of community outcry for having that iconic unit in SC2, as well. Adept kinda is unique with it's ability, but still merely replaced Zealots, so... Yeah, damn, they're total geniuses.
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When legacy came out, the balance update video talks about the benefits of "microing" the units like that hilarious image of 3 marines killing a lurker or that 3 inmortals alone pushing on 5 tanks alone.
Finally, zerg meta is all about 1-a compos like bane + hit and push/run hydras , or terran, ven more funny: Plant tank liberator mine with the scan giving full knowledge of the army, and bait, you even dont need to 1a. Unsiege - siege...
That is why many protosses left playing: it seems that your race needs massive scout, be aware of drops and one hundred timmings and must use 20 spells to stop an army going 1-a without any warranty that it will work. The fact is that all Pvz must end on Carriers or you will die.
And of course the community: Remember David Kim talking about the 3.8 patch on DH Montreal ?
Yeah i know, BattleCruisers. Didn`t noticed.
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On June 28 2017 02:25 JimmyJRaynor wrote:Show nested quote +On June 28 2017 00:26 ihatevideogames wrote:
no no no, it's all happenin because RTS games are dying, I swear! LOTV is perfect, just listen to those casters and streamers! :^) RTS games are growing by huge amounts. C&C4 came out at teh same time as SC2 in 2010 an its bigger than Dota2 and Overwatch combined. i'm prolly switching to C&C4 because EA supports the #1 RTS franchise of all time ( C&C ) way better than Blizzard supports SC2 and the Starcraft franchise.
What world are you living in where Command and Conquer is doing better than Dota 2 and Overwatch?
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On June 28 2017 02:25 JimmyJRaynor wrote:Show nested quote +On June 28 2017 00:26 ihatevideogames wrote:
no no no, it's all happenin because RTS games are dying, I swear! LOTV is perfect, just listen to those casters and streamers! :^) RTS games are growing by huge amounts. C&C4 came out at teh same time as SC2 in 2010 an its bigger than Dota2 and Overwatch combined. i'm prolly switching to C&C4 because EA supports the #1 RTS franchise of all time ( C&C ) way better than Blizzard supports SC2 and the Starcraft franchise.
C&C4 is obviously the most popular game, let alone RTS.
On a more serious note, they should slow Swarm Hosts down before they ruin an entire season of WCS/GSL/etc, their move speed is ridiculous.
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On June 28 2017 00:06 leublix wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 23:28 RPR_Tempest wrote:
I don't get the point of changing Blood Boil. Any Zerg or Protoss is vetoing the map in a tournament 100% lol Balance for bo7.
Exactly Pig made a Video about the map pool, but essentially having a 16 mineral patch gold that's fairly straight forward for Zerg to hold makes it so that they can do some crushing 3 base timings against Protoss.
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On June 28 2017 03:14 Creager wrote:Show nested quote +On June 28 2017 02:52 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
i was very skeptical that Blizzard could find unique roles for all the units in LotV because so many new units got added from WoL. However, 1+ years into LotV. i think they've done a really nice job.
these fucking blizzard guys are geniuses. Liberator unique? Nope, overlaps with Thors and Siege Tanks, just does a better job than the latter. Lurker unique? Nope, just added that unit after years of community outcry for having that iconic unit in SC2, as well. Adept kinda is unique with it's ability, but still merely replaced Zealots, so... Yeah, damn, they're total geniuses.
Except not realy, liberator and tank both control space but liberator is a unit you want against smaller numbers of powerfull units like ultras or adepts where as the tank is better against large numbers of weeker units like lings and roaches.further liberator can be used as a harasment unit and can reposition much faster. It's like comparing the maurador and the marine and saying meh same unit both shoot when actually mauraders and marines have fairly diffrent and important roles in the bio composition. Both units see play but in diffrent situations enough so that they clearly have diffrent strengths and weaknesses.
Liberator used to overlap with Thor but with the nerfs to lib anti air the Thor now realy outshine the lib when it comes to air splash dmg, I admit it used to not be this way till bliz fixed it. Also thors are super tank ground units that can soak banelings in fights, I don't know about you but I've yet to see lib tank banelings hits for my bio.
The lurker is a Zerg space control siege unit, it overlaps with the tank but Zerg can't build tanks so I don't really see your point (if it's viable is another question) I guess you could argue so is the swarm host but the swarmhosts can't lock down a position like the lurker.
as for the zealot I think it's less about overlap with the adept and more that the adept Is just a better unit than the zelot in many situations. Since it's ranged, does similar dps vs light units, and has a powerfull ability without any research attached, mabey with charge cost change the zelot will someday find a spot in the Protoss kit.
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On June 28 2017 04:49 washikie wrote:Show nested quote +On June 28 2017 03:14 Creager wrote:On June 28 2017 02:52 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
i was very skeptical that Blizzard could find unique roles for all the units in LotV because so many new units got added from WoL. However, 1+ years into LotV. i think they've done a really nice job.
these fucking blizzard guys are geniuses. Liberator unique? Nope, overlaps with Thors and Siege Tanks, just does a better job than the latter. Lurker unique? Nope, just added that unit after years of community outcry for having that iconic unit in SC2, as well. Adept kinda is unique with it's ability, but still merely replaced Zealots, so... Yeah, damn, they're total geniuses. Except not realy, liberator and tank both control space but liberator is a unit you want against smaller numbers of powerfull units like ultras or adepts where as the tank is better against large numbers of weeker units like lings and roaches.further liberator can be used as a harasment unit and can reposition much faster. It's like comparing the maurador and the marine and saying meh same unit both shoot when actually mauraders and marines have fairly diffrent and important roles in the bio composition. The lurker is a Zerg space control siege unit, it overlaps with the tank but Zerg can't build tanks so I don't really see your point (if it's viable is another question) I guess you could argue so is the swarm host but the swarmhosts can't lock down a position like the lurker. as for the zealot I think it's less about overlap with the adept and more that the adept Is just a better unit than the zelot in many situations. Since it's ranged, does similar dps vs light units, and has a powerfull ability without any research attached, mabey with charge cost change the zelot will someday find a spot in the Protoss kit.
You apparently didn't understand my post, I was referring to his point which implies that all new units in LotV have unique roles they fit into, which, to a certain extend, is not the case, since they at some point all overlap(ped) with already existing units, merely replacing them since they work out better instead of being a true and unique addition to the arsenal.
What you say about Siege Tanks and Liberators is certainly right, they do fulfill different purposes, but in reality players build MMM and one additional unit for siege or splash damage, namely Tanks, Widow Mines or Liberators, they don't build all of those constantly, because they just back up the core army. In WoL it was Bio/Tank, in HotS Tank got replaced by the Widow Mine and in LotV it's Liberators.
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On June 28 2017 05:33 Creager wrote:Show nested quote +On June 28 2017 04:49 washikie wrote:On June 28 2017 03:14 Creager wrote:On June 28 2017 02:52 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
i was very skeptical that Blizzard could find unique roles for all the units in LotV because so many new units got added from WoL. However, 1+ years into LotV. i think they've done a really nice job.
these fucking blizzard guys are geniuses. Liberator unique? Nope, overlaps with Thors and Siege Tanks, just does a better job than the latter. Lurker unique? Nope, just added that unit after years of community outcry for having that iconic unit in SC2, as well. Adept kinda is unique with it's ability, but still merely replaced Zealots, so... Yeah, damn, they're total geniuses. Except not realy, liberator and tank both control space but liberator is a unit you want against smaller numbers of powerfull units like ultras or adepts where as the tank is better against large numbers of weeker units like lings and roaches.further liberator can be used as a harasment unit and can reposition much faster. It's like comparing the maurador and the marine and saying meh same unit both shoot when actually mauraders and marines have fairly diffrent and important roles in the bio composition. The lurker is a Zerg space control siege unit, it overlaps with the tank but Zerg can't build tanks so I don't really see your point (if it's viable is another question) I guess you could argue so is the swarm host but the swarmhosts can't lock down a position like the lurker. as for the zealot I think it's less about overlap with the adept and more that the adept Is just a better unit than the zelot in many situations. Since it's ranged, does similar dps vs light units, and has a powerfull ability without any research attached, mabey with charge cost change the zelot will someday find a spot in the Protoss kit. You apparently didn't understand my post, I was referring to his point which implies that all new units in LotV have unique roles they fit into, which, to a certain extend, is not the case, since they at some point all overlap(ped) with already existing units, merely replacing them since they work out better instead of being a true and unique addition to the arsenal. What you say about Siege Tanks and Liberators is certainly right, they do fulfill different purposes, but in reality players build MMM and one additional unit for siege or splash damage, namely Tanks, Widow Mines or Liberators, they don't build all of those constantly, because they just back up the core army. In WoL it was Bio/Tank, in HotS Tank got replaced by the Widow Mine and in LotV it's Liberators.
Except that all three of these support units get used because they are needed vs diffrent comps. Mines are great vs linng muta bane and adept phenix but suck vs roaches and collosi based toss, tanks are very helpful vs roach ravager and a staple unit in tvt and libs are a staple tvp unit and used late game in tvz to counter ultras. I don't think any of these units see no play in the current meta. Even tanks get some situational use vs Protoss. It's not like hots where you prity much just wanted mines and not tanks except in tvt.
I think it's ok for units of each race to have a consistent theme and direction it adds to the flavor of the game for Terran one of the themes is sieged support units.
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On June 28 2017 05:33 Creager wrote:
You apparently didn't understand my post, I was referring to his point which implies that all new units in LotV have unique roles they fit into, which, to a certain extend, is not the case, since they at some point all overlap(ped) with already existing units, merely replacing them since they work out better instead of being a true and unique addition to the arsenal.
as long as we keep this question "as a matter of degree" your point is correct. there is some degree of overlap; there is some degree of uniqueness.
I should clarify rather than using "fanboy talk". So I'll clarify here:
i'm pleasantly surprised by the "degree of uniqueness" BIizzard managed to squeeze out every unit despite having such large # of units in each race. Before LotV came out i thought the degree of uniqueness would not be as good as it is and i thought there would be a tonne of overlap. I was pretty pessimistic and skeptical in this area. I'm glad I was proven wrong.
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A better question would be "where's the big design update that was promised a year ago"... that ended up being a small balance patch which then got reverted to be even smaller.
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On June 27 2017 12:45 DeadByDawn wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 12:35 xTJx wrote:
I guess the "mech not viable" guys will chill for a week or two after Gumiho won GSL. Their supreme leader is the only one mad enough to still complain right now. Hopefully. I am a Terran, and I like Mech. But I would not like the kind of mech that Avilo plays, turtling in your base to the ultimate army and then still losing. He wants to be able to beat better players simply by choosing to go mech, not to have to earn it like Gumigod. The gulf in play between a top level player and Avilo is amazing.
Wait what? I do not play that style of mech by choice. It's necessary because of Z/P lategame and how people in general turtle to invincible armies in a lot of games so you're forced to do the same thing as Terran which is accumulating mass raven/ghost.
If you've seen me play or commentate i always say that i dislike the fact that i can play as aggressive as possible off of mech/factories but if the opponent starts making swarmhost or rushes/turtles hivetech units you basically have no way to ever attack cost efficiently with mech and are forced to do the Terran equivalent if you want to win.
I would love it and so would many other mech players if you see an air transition to be able to mass produce some AA unit from the factory that can trade with those and not force you to turtle into mass viking/raven. But is that how the game is in reality? Nope.
In the current version of SC2, if your opponent starts massing air and you went mech, you now are forced to sit and build 4-5 starports and mass viking/lib/raven since there is no anti-air unit like the goliath available from the factory.
That's why the test mod myself and darkblizzard came up with had a tweak allowing vikings to be built from the factory with transformation mode adding another minute or so to when they can lift up into the air.
That allowed someone going mech to go up to 7-10 factories without being forced to wait another 2-3 minutes to get extra starports to counter air transitions. There was even a very significant game in the tourney i hosted where practiceX saw a Zerg player going for brood/corruptor and switched all of his factory production to mass vikings and it allowed him to compete with the air transition without being forced to turtle and wait for starports. He was able to keep attacking because AA was already on the way.
I think some people here don't quite understand the real issues that hold mech back from being viable or aggressive. The crux of the issue is mech has no anti-air available from the factory and it takes 1-2 minutes to sit and build those 4-5 starports and it takes another 500-600 vespene gas that you barely can afford at that point in the game when the Zerg can build 10+ corruptors at once or Protoss already has transitioned to an air fleet.
Mech is in dire need of anti-air and that will allow aggressive mech to become the norm, and then after that blizzard could look at adjusting ravens. Also swarmhosts are incredibly oppressive right now which also can stall games out forcing you to play "turtle mech" even if you don't want to. Soo did not abuse this during the GSL finals.
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In more relation to balance changes and what the community should really be focusing on asking blizzard to address are these things right now:
a) Protoss re-design/balance changes to adepts, zealots, gateway units, and adding 1500 mineral patches back to every patch on every base. The mineral change alone makes the game more Heart of the Swarm-esque and this will benefit Protoss. Protoss suffers in LOTV 100% because of the bad economy change forcing harrass/expand.
b) Address mech viability in the form of anti-air added to the factory / nerfing + removing the swarmhost so that it is not oppressive.
c) Zerg needs to be toned down. The queen range buff on AA needs a revert as it was only meant for back when liberators were OP at the time. Bane/hydra buffs need a revert imo as well.
d) Address mass air all across the board. This can be done by making all OP air units require more supply. example: BC/Carrier being 8-10 supply instead of 6. Ravens being 3-4 supply instead of 2. Broodlords being 6 supply instead of 4. This tones down mass air and intrinsically buffs ground anti-air because a player that opts to max out on air units will now have less air units while the player that opts to play ground oriented will now essentially have more AA in comparison. Changes like this tweak the gameplay of the game without actually changing or altering any unit interactions or base stat values which in turn allows blizzard to not break balance. This means units like hydralisks and thors inherently become stronger without actually needing to buff them any.
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the meta is so stale right now. there is very little room for creativity by terrans. same old tactics and unit compositions. every game looks the same. occasionally you see a pro terran abuse the map in an interesting way, but that's all. the core gameplay is gimmicky as hell.
WoL was a solid foundation which just got more and more convoluted over time. now there's too many dodgy spell-casters, specialty units and hard-counters...
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On June 28 2017 08:19 SHODAN wrote:
the meta is so stale right now. there is very little room for creativity by terrans. same old tactics and unit compositions. every game looks the same. occasionally you see a pro terran abuse the map in an interesting way, but that's all. the core gameplay is gimmicky as hell.
WoL was a solid foundation which just got more and more convoluted over time. now there's too many dodgy spell-casters, specialty units and hard-counters...
They added 2 spellcasters, which is not very much. And there aren't even that many hardcounters I mostly see only necessary ones.
(the 2 spellcasters are the viper and the oracle)
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On June 28 2017 08:19 SHODAN wrote:
the meta is so stale right now. there is very little room for creativity by terrans. same old tactics and unit compositions. every game looks the same. occasionally you see a pro terran abuse the map in an interesting way, but that's all. the core gameplay is gimmicky as hell.
WoL was a solid foundation which just got more and more convoluted over time. now there's too many dodgy spell-casters, specialty units and hard-counters...
A lot of this is fair, though I don't think the issue is the spellcasters. Sure, there are a lot, especially if you're P, but I think the real cause for a 'stale meta' is that they basically said, 'let's skip the first five minutes of each game'. Sure, it moves the games along quicker, gets the fights going faster, but it took a lot of different options away
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On June 28 2017 18:26 Corvuuss wrote:Show nested quote +On June 28 2017 08:19 SHODAN wrote:
the meta is so stale right now. there is very little room for creativity by terrans. same old tactics and unit compositions. every game looks the same. occasionally you see a pro terran abuse the map in an interesting way, but that's all. the core gameplay is gimmicky as hell.
WoL was a solid foundation which just got more and more convoluted over time. now there's too many dodgy spell-casters, specialty units and hard-counters... They added 2 spellcasters, which is not very much. And there aren't even that many hardcounters I mostly see only necessary ones. (the 2 spellcasters are the viper and the oracle)
Necessary hardcounters does not equal that those hardcouters provide a fun and good gameplay.
If you look at your own word "necessary", and ask yourself why its necessary in the first place.
On June 28 2017 19:40 reneg wrote:Show nested quote +On June 28 2017 08:19 SHODAN wrote:
the meta is so stale right now. there is very little room for creativity by terrans. same old tactics and unit compositions. every game looks the same. occasionally you see a pro terran abuse the map in an interesting way, but that's all. the core gameplay is gimmicky as hell.
WoL was a solid foundation which just got more and more convoluted over time. now there's too many dodgy spell-casters, specialty units and hard-counters... A lot of this is fair, though I don't think the issue is the spellcasters. Sure, there are a lot, especially if you're P, but I think the real cause for a 'stale meta' is that they basically said, 'let's skip the first five minutes of each game'. Sure, it moves the games along quicker, gets the fights going faster, but it took a lot of different options away
Fair? How is it fair when a player has little to no control? It straight up feels like shit.
But hots was also stale. Its the core gameplay that is the issue here.
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On June 28 2017 06:31 Spyridon wrote:
A better question would be "where's the big design update that was promised a year ago"... that ended up being a small balance patch which then got reverted to be even smaller.
What, you don't consider +10 hp hydras to be a huge design change?
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On June 28 2017 07:29 avilo wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 12:45 DeadByDawn wrote:On June 27 2017 12:35 xTJx wrote:
I guess the "mech not viable" guys will chill for a week or two after Gumiho won GSL. Their supreme leader is the only one mad enough to still complain right now. Hopefully. I am a Terran, and I like Mech. But I would not like the kind of mech that Avilo plays, turtling in your base to the ultimate army and then still losing. He wants to be able to beat better players simply by choosing to go mech, not to have to earn it like Gumigod. The gulf in play between a top level player and Avilo is amazing. Wait what? I do not play that style of mech by choice.
Lol. Of course you are.
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On June 27 2017 04:53 GUrbak wrote:Show nested quote +On June 27 2017 04:50 SetGuitarsToKill wrote:On June 27 2017 04:30 Scarlett` wrote:On June 27 2017 04:27 avilo wrote:
Where is the balance update for swarmhosts? 3 updates in a row now from the balance team...that have no actual balance changes.
Is the community actually ok with this? gsl final won by mech not enough for you? to be fair, soO didn't use any swarm hosts. obviously this is because they were too good and he didn't want to make it unfair, right? no it's because the best korean zerg doesn't know how to play vs mech obviously
This sounds like something Avilo would say...
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i sometimes wind up playing the same style of Mech as Avilo because my multitasking and APM are too weak to deal with several simultaneous early to midgame issues. I'm faced with these early/midgame issues because i have a smart opponent who is mechanically good at forcing several things on me at once. When my mechanics/APM/multitasking can't keep up i resort to turtling. What can i say. Sometimes I'm just not good enough. It has nothing to do with the Mech playstyle I've chosen. I guess Avilo can't admit he does the same thing.
I watch Code S level Terrans play and they are doing 8 things at once so fast i can hardly keep up with what they are doing even though i'm only watching them... not even playing. Terran Mech players like me and Avilo simply can't keep up with that pace. So we turtle as a last resort.
Some people can admit they are just not good enough. Others blame everyone but themselves and delude themselves into believing they know more about the SC2 meta than a Code S finalist whose been to 6 finals.
Often when my Mech games go sideways early and i turtle it isn't because of Swarmhosts its because my keyboard mechanics, multitasking, and APM just are not there. By the logic of some posters in here maybe I should tell Blizzard to remove the Zergling from the game.
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Most of the thread here is filled with complaints about tvz and mech (either it's good enough / too good bc 1 player in korea used it in 2 series in code s - or it's not viable bc avilo isn't code s etc.)
I will be brief on that overall but need to say - both sides in this argument aren't being objective and acting a bit like young children.
On the 1 side you hear - "zomg gumiho won code s with mech - problem solved"
On the other - "omg soo didnt use SH - not solved"
Let's think objectively about it -
As basically only 1 player in Korea has shown this style - how much practice do you think soO had against gumimech?
If gumiho was able to make it work - is it really fair to say it's not "viable"?
Clearly it's "viable" right - by the definition of the word and the fact that it was used with success.
Does this mean that it will become more than a short term gimmick? Or will see see - like we have for entirety of sc2 - that zerg will learn how to play vs it ? Time will tell.
So not as brief as I had planned - but on to the real point of my post.
There clearly is something wrong with the TvZ meta right now.
Is it not weird to anyone at all that of the 13 tvz's played from ro16 that:
8 out of 13 were 3 rax reaper
2 out of 13 were 11/11 builds.
2 were gumimech
1 was maru going oldschool 2-1-1 after literally cheesing 8 games in a row.
Thoughts please
???????????????
There was a patch between ro32 and ro16 but do we think the Thor buff and raven nerf was enough to force this?
Personally - I don't. In addition - as someone who's watched every season of code S since about the 4th season of wol - there is still enough gap in skill in the ro32 in my opinion to make it less relevant.
What I speculate is that as we've seen repeat over and over - zerg meta is evolving a bit slower than terran - based on the fact that the attributes of the game that make you a god with Terran mostly focus on your overall mechanical ability (micro/multi/macro - with macro being the last of the 3).
There's a reason Terran isn't going bio at all anymore - and to me I believe this to be due to the baneling and queen buff from hots to lotv - understand the macro mechanic was nerfed - but what you see now in pro games are loads of macro hatches. If the Terran doesn't snowball a large advantage from completely denying creep with 3 rax reaper - there really isn't an opening that I've seen that puts the Terran with the initiative going into the mid game - the standard of what we saw in beautiful ling/bling/muta vs bio games for sc2 history.
Let's not forget that bio was basically out of viability by the end of hots.
Do we really want tvz to become end of hots tvz? Game of chicken turtle - who will blink first and attack and lose?
I would speculate that the meta is heading there shortly again -
If we lower the skill ceiling to that point again - I think it's the nail in the coffin.
We need to work oppositely - to give zerg and protoss mechanics that allow players to separate themselves from the field as gods - it's not fucking broodwar - macroing perfectly in itself while defending and harassing was nearly impossible in broodwar - which made performing that exciting and unbelievable to watch. Sc2 is not the case! It's not difficult to macro and defend to a perfect comp max army - low level master players can do this! If we ever want viewership coming back - that needs to be a point of focus - or lets go back to pvz mass tempest vs swarmhost and tvz turtle mech vs hive tech - so there can be 1000 total viewers of the game all on brovilo stream.
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On June 28 2017 21:22 DomeGetta wrote:
Most of the thread here is filled with complaints about tvz and mech (either it's good enough / too good bc 1 player in korea used it in 2 series in code s - or it's not viable bc avilo isn't code s etc.)
I will be brief on that overall but need to say - both sides in this argument aren't being objective and acting a bit like young children.
very good point. i just wanted to highlight this. when i lose with a Mech playstyle its usually because i`m not good enough.
On June 28 2017 21:22 DomeGetta wrote:
Let's not forget that bio was basically out of viability by the end of hots.
Do we really want tvz to become end of hots tvz? Game of chicken turtle - who will blink first and attack and lose?
I would speculate that the meta is heading there shortly again -
i hope you are wrong on this point. but i see ur logic and reasoning here.
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Hey, I thought I'd just check in and watch a few games of SC2 to see how its changed over the years. Last time I played and watched was 2013 and I started in the Beta. To me, SC2 doesn't appear to have changed much. A few units and it starts faster into a harras but it still aims to be a dancing death ball. Fundamental that's been my biggest issue that'll appears unfixable no matter how much AOE you throw into the game to make it messy.
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United States1805 Posts
On June 28 2017 21:22 DomeGetta wrote:
Most of the thread here is filled with complaints about tvz and mech (either it's good enough / too good bc 1 player in korea used it in 2 series in code s - or it's not viable bc avilo isn't code s etc.)
I will be brief on that overall but need to say - both sides in this argument aren't being objective and acting a bit like young children.
On the 1 side you hear - "zomg gumiho won code s with mech - problem solved"
On the other - "omg soo didnt use SH - not solved"
Let's think objectively about it -
As basically only 1 player in Korea has shown this style - how much practice do you think soO had against gumimech?
soO didn't just fail to SH in game one because he's obstinate. He knew GuMiho was going to mech and he had a plan for it. A lot of factors go into choosing builds and strategies over the course of a seven game series. You should trust the opinion and decisions of a professional who played hundreds of games of ladder and customs in order to sculpt an appropriate strategy over that of unenlightened people (which in this case appears to include you). If he didn't go SH, he did it for a reason.
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On June 28 2017 21:40 mizenhauer wrote:Show nested quote +On June 28 2017 21:22 DomeGetta wrote:
Most of the thread here is filled with complaints about tvz and mech (either it's good enough / too good bc 1 player in korea used it in 2 series in code s - or it's not viable bc avilo isn't code s etc.)
I will be brief on that overall but need to say - both sides in this argument aren't being objective and acting a bit like young children.
On the 1 side you hear - "zomg gumiho won code s with mech - problem solved"
On the other - "omg soo didnt use SH - not solved"
Let's think objectively about it -
As basically only 1 player in Korea has shown this style - how much practice do you think soO had against gumimech?
soO didn't just fail to SH in game one because he's obstinate. He knew GuMiho was going to mech and he had a plan for it. A lot of factors go into choosing builds and strategies over the course of a seven game series. You should trust the opinion and decisions of a professional who played hundreds of games of ladder and customs in order to sculpt an appropriate strategy over that of unenlightened people (which in this case appears to include you). If he didn't go SH, he did it for a reason.
Not disagreeing with this statement at all - only highlighting that you can't draw a significant balance conclusion off of 1 series. The style is brand new in relative time - when have you ever seen the meta immediately having the answer to a new style that shows up over halfway through code S? Never. The answer to the first version of mech that came in lotv was mass queen / SH - this style is different for sure - but does that mean there is no answer? Maybe so - but we aren't anywhere near being able to make that inference.
Let this play out on the ladder over the next few weeks - and I would be extremely surprised if we don't see hots tvz again. For me - I hope it is broken and gets nerfed - because I don't want to see byun and maru leap frog pushing siege tanks across the map in a 45 minute game where the only interaction between the players is the 3 or 4 times the terran sends helions at a base.
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On June 28 2017 21:22 DomeGetta wrote:
1 was maru going oldschool 2-1-1 after literally cheesing 8 games in a row.
If 2-1-1 is oldschool for you, what is gasless 1 rax FE :D ?
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On June 28 2017 21:51 Creager wrote:Show nested quote +On June 28 2017 21:22 DomeGetta wrote:
1 was maru going oldschool 2-1-1 after literally cheesing 8 games in a row.
If 2-1-1 is oldschool for you, what is gasless 1 rax FE :D ?
lol - a relic build!
I still miss Taeja cc first into 3 cc helion banshee man. the good old days.
Only call it oldschool because it's basically phased out of existence.
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On June 28 2017 21:48 DomeGetta wrote:Show nested quote +On June 28 2017 21:40 mizenhauer wrote:On June 28 2017 21:22 DomeGetta wrote:
Most of the thread here is filled with complaints about tvz and mech (either it's good enough / too good bc 1 player in korea used it in 2 series in code s - or it's not viable bc avilo isn't code s etc.)
I will be brief on that overall but need to say - both sides in this argument aren't being objective and acting a bit like young children.
On the 1 side you hear - "zomg gumiho won code s with mech - problem solved"
On the other - "omg soo didnt use SH - not solved"
Let's think objectively about it -
As basically only 1 player in Korea has shown this style - how much practice do you think soO had against gumimech?
soO didn't just fail to SH in game one because he's obstinate. He knew GuMiho was going to mech and he had a plan for it. A lot of factors go into choosing builds and strategies over the course of a seven game series. You should trust the opinion and decisions of a professional who played hundreds of games of ladder and customs in order to sculpt an appropriate strategy over that of unenlightened people (which in this case appears to include you). If he didn't go SH, he did it for a reason. Not disagreeing with this statement at all - only highlighting that you can't draw a significant balance conclusion off of 1 series. The style is brand new in relative time - when have you ever seen the meta immediately having the answer to a new style that shows up over halfway through code S? Never. The answer to the first version of mech that came in lotv was mass queen / SH - this style is different for sure - but does that mean there is no answer? Maybe so - but we aren't anywhere near being able to make that inference. Let this play out on the ladder over the next few weeks - and I would be extremely surprised if we don't see hots tvz again. For me - I hope it is broken and gets nerfed - because I don't want to see byun and maru leap frog pushing siege tanks across the map in a 45 minute game where the only interaction between the players is the 3 or 4 times the terran sends helions at a base.
More on this -
I think it would be awesome to see a show-match between the best EU/NA zergs and Gumigod.
Scarlett / Snute / Nechio pls. Can someone organize this!
You gotta think - say for example sake soO has played 10K ladder tvz's - I think 90% is probably a fair estimate of how many of those games have been vs standard bio play.
The Eu/Na zergs- though they won't have much experience vs the Gumi-Mech - have more likely played closer to 30% vs some mech style - I'd be willing to bet they'd have a better answer - and it would be interesting to watch.
Gotta remember - rts is so much about quickly reacting perfectly - no matter how many practice games soO played vs people imitating Gumi - you wonder how many situations came up in the series where it was the first time he had been put in that situation - any time you don't have a preset response - your answer is usually less than ideal.
PROS PLS - DO IT!
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Norway839 Posts
There's already plenty of games of gumiho on youtube. A lot of the series between gumiho and myself and soo and gumiho on wardi's channel for example will give you a somewhat nuanced view of mech vs zerg. Surprise surprise, mech both wins and loses. It's still in the process of being figured out. Swarm host can appear ridicilous, same goes for vipers and terran ground or ravens. +++
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The issue with swarm host on the sub-top level is that hosts appear ridicilous to play against if you don't know exactly how to approach it from the get-go with a high level of skill (6200+ MMR?). Mech is also harder to play compared to mass swarm host on the sub-top level, so the most vocal players will most likely always state that swarm hosts are broken.
Personally i think mech is slightly inferior to bio, but i also know that a simple showmatch won't necessarily provide the answers people are looking for. It takes a decently large sample size of scenarios and situations with different openings, perhaps a replay pack of 20-50 games. There are ways to delay the onset of swarmhost such as turboshee, banshee into 2thordrop, and there are also ways for zerg to delay their own swarm host (3base, heavy roach ravager hydra viper before swarm host etc.). There are ways out such as mass muta switch, and switching from sky terran to ground etc. And more...
People don't look at large enough samples and a lot of the time the zerg makes mistakes. Right now, players in KR are indeed struggling with Mech, but from watching streams I can tell that both sides are making some pretty silly mistakes and that a lot of the time the games on average aren't as un-even as either side might think. But if you know that your opponent will always play mech from the start, or if you know that a zerg will only play roach hydra viper and no swarmhost or ONLY swarmhost no matter what for example, then yes it's easy to make either side look disgusting.
There aren't enough broadcast games to give a clear picture. Personally I think destroying mech terrans on EU is super easy for the most part. But word from KR is that mech is hard. So.. hard to tell.
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In the match-ups I play and watch (TvT, ZvT, TvP, ZvP) I'm actually pretty of happy overall with where the state of the game is in at the moment.
I agree with those that say the TvP meta is a bit stale. While I like that in LOTV T can be easily forced to defend, esp as they essentially had to be the aggressor in HOTS or die to Lazers(TM). It sucks that mech hasn't happened but I don't think it has to be viable in every match-up to' fix the game'. On the P side, stargate being pretty much the only opener is getting kind try, with not many pros having had much luck with consistency getting robo or twilight openers to reliably work. The adept health nerf was helpful to even things out a bit in the mid-game and it's good to see zealots again with the cheaper upgrade. I still think the shade cool-down should be increased slightly
Liberators definitely come into their own with range and are a bit of a problem if P isn't in a position to get tempests out, or keep the lib numbers down though consistently chipping away at them with blink stalkers. I think P should probably *something* to help counter ranged libs slightly earlier than tempests and to balance this, tempests should not counter them quite so hard. The other option prev suggested by some would be to make the freedom zone either start smaller and gradually expand +/- reduce maximum radius of the zone. I think the damage + range is in a pretty good place vs P now.
The addition of libs have definitely made the late-game dance (lib/ghost/viking/MMM/mine vs. Protoss splash fest+Tempests) much more enjoyable (for me) than the equivalent HOTS fights ever were, with T getting owned if they didn't gain a large enough lead in the mid-game. I also certainly prefer these late game encounters to watching a bunch of adepts shade on top of an army as phoenixes fly in to pick up every effective counter. I get that because of Libs many protoss now feel forced to try and either end it or cripple the T in the midgame with Phoenix/Adept. I dunno, but Phoenixes just seem to be pretty fucking durable to me, compared at least to their delicate appearance and shoot while-flying design. I think toning town their shields slightly (but still being barely able survive one widow mine shot) could help push them slightly more into a harass role. Either that or make them unable to pick-up widow mines that have started the burrowing animation, unless detection is present (might cause issues with defending mine drops..but could argue that to counter a mine drop the phoenixes should focus on intercepting the medivac instead). It just doesn't look right when they brazenly fly in, directly over a ball of marines+mines, as adepts shade in, then proceed to pick-up and kill a bunch of shit, while also taking out a couple of medivacs for good measure on their way out, all the while retaining most of the fleet with 50-60% of their health.
This is a straight up moan but it still bugs me that P can pretty much fuck off with their whole army at any point prior to T getting full bio upgrades+medivacs up and be able to defend or buy enough time with one unit's overcharge spam. Having the warp-in mechanic already helps to mitigate the risk. I know that P needs the MSC to be viable, I just wish there was something to make them think twice before sending their whole army out or building 3 tech structures off 3 units before getting gateways up.
In comparison, I'd argue that ZvT has a pretty healthy meta now, compared at least to 4-6 months ago. We see multiple varied Terran openings that are viable, with at least two distinct styles of mech to mix in (Innovation's cyclone heavy opener and Gumimech style). A good Zerg can respond any of these openers with either Roaches/Rav or ling/bling. I think it's appropriate that T should need to put some sort of pressure on the zerg to keep them honest in the early/start of mid-game. It just makes sense with their production mechanics. I'd say reaper grenades are slightly unbalanced still but only in the hands of Byun. It would be hard to tone them down just enough to retain the viability of 3-rax reaper without making it extinct at lower levels.
If the Z gets to lair tech on roughly even footing, then mutas, infestors, and even hydra/lurkers (thanks Solar) are viable in the hands of a good player. Swarm hosts have niche to be sure and can be hard to deal with but I'd disagree that they 'hard-counter' mech as hard as some suggest. Their relatively light use has probably resulted in counter play being under-developed so far, dealing with them requires higher map vigilance from T compared to usual vs Z. I would like to see their speed toned down slightly though.
When it comes to late game it's kind of harder to tell because so often one player is already ahead. I was super stoked to see how viable Raven/Viking/Thor was against Brood corruptor in GSL game one as both players entered the late game. Would have been interesting to see SoO attempt swarmhost/nydus/drops as that game went on but equally an extra infestor or two getting off a fungal on the raven cloud, combined with parasitic bomb would have made that game look a lot different. Bio vs. Z still is looks hard for many pros once ultras are out, esp if they are even or head but it's not impossible for Terran to counter them, same goes for air comps. As a terran player think Z deserves to have a slight edge for successfully reaching T3 without taking too much damage and for T to have to counter them at that point with either superior control or out positioning.
As for ZvP I don't watch a lot of it currently, looks like Zerg usually either wipes the protoss with an arc of hydra bain or dies shortly after this.
Maps will always affect balance one way or the other. As long as Tournament organisers are vigilant so as to prevent their pool from overly favouring one race/match-up too mcuh. In future, I think more experimentation with mineral/gas levels should definitely be explored, particularly if other balance changes stop.
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On June 28 2017 23:28 Liquid`Snute wrote: Surprise surprise, mech both wins and loses. It's still in the process of being figured out.
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Swarm host can appear ridicilous, same goes for vipers and terran ground or ravens. +++
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Mech is also harder to play compared to mass swarm host on the sub-top level, so the most vocal players will most likely always state that swarm hosts are broken.
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Personally i think mech is slightly inferior to bio
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There aren't enough broadcast games to give a clear picture. Personally I think destroying mech terrans on EU is super easy for the most part. But word from KR is that mech is hard. So.. hard to tell.
thanks for these insights.
so we have some vocal non-pro players screaming they've figured out TvZ completely and have ready-made solutions. and we have pros who pay their mortgage/rent by winning SC2 games saying stuff like "hard to tell" and "its still being figured out".
Regarding balance tweaks at this stage of LotV: i think Blizzard needs focus more on the top level and Blizz needs to focus less on NA Ladder guys like me.
if we were in the pre-beta stage of a new RTS game then Blizz needs to focus more on guys like me. That is not the case though.
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Thanks for the insight, it was an interesting read! I guess the whole discussion on the validity of mech and/or SH also depends heavily on maps no?
On June 28 2017 23:28 Liquid`Snute wrote:
[...]
There aren't enough broadcast games to give a clear picture. Personally I think destroying mech terrans on EU is super easy for the most part. But word from KR is that mech is hard. So.. hard to tell.
Aren't you also destroying bio terrans on EU anyway? ^^
It's really nice to have the opinion of pro player in these kinds of threads, instead of master/low GM that are good enough that wrongly see themselves as legit to talk about balance with certainty. There used to be interview done by Teamliquid of lots of pro player on balance/community update, they were often insightful, I kinda miss those.
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Interesting to have pro level feedback on this.
Would love to hear some insights from pro level Terran players as well.
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On June 28 2017 07:37 avilo wrote:
In more relation to balance changes and what the community should really be focusing on asking blizzard to address are these things right now:
a) Protoss re-design/balance changes to adepts, zealots, gateway units, and adding 1500 mineral patches back to every patch on every base. The mineral change alone makes the game more Heart of the Swarm-esque and this will benefit Protoss. Protoss suffers in LOTV 100% because of the bad economy change forcing harrass/expand.
b) Address mech viability in the form of anti-air added to the factory / nerfing + removing the swarmhost so that it is not oppressive.
c) Zerg needs to be toned down. The queen range buff on AA needs a revert as it was only meant for back when liberators were OP at the time. Bane/hydra buffs need a revert imo as well.
d) Address mass air all across the board. This can be done by making all OP air units require more supply. example: BC/Carrier being 8-10 supply instead of 6. Ravens being 3-4 supply instead of 2. Broodlords being 6 supply instead of 4. This tones down mass air and intrinsically buffs ground anti-air because a player that opts to max out on air units will now have less air units while the player that opts to play ground oriented will now essentially have more AA in comparison. Changes like this tweak the gameplay of the game without actually changing or altering any unit interactions or base stat values which in turn allows blizzard to not break balance. This means units like hydralisks and thors inherently become stronger without actually needing to buff them any.
Nobody will take you seriously, especially your disappearing act towards TLO's challenge & now you are back spouting your usual BS even though Gumigod just won with mech & Inno too (partially).
Your mod is even more laughable, can be summed up as:
Buff everything for turtle mech, reduce charge cost,
nerf everything else for Protoss, nerf everything for Zerg.
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On June 28 2017 19:40 reneg wrote:Show nested quote +On June 28 2017 08:19 SHODAN wrote:
the meta is so stale right now. there is very little room for creativity by terrans. same old tactics and unit compositions. every game looks the same. occasionally you see a pro terran abuse the map in an interesting way, but that's all. the core gameplay is gimmicky as hell.
WoL was a solid foundation which just got more and more convoluted over time. now there's too many dodgy spell-casters, specialty units and hard-counters... A lot of this is fair, though I don't think the issue is the spellcasters. Sure, there are a lot, especially if you're P, but I think the real cause for a 'stale meta' is that they basically said, 'let's skip the first five minutes of each game'. Sure, it moves the games along quicker, gets the fights going faster, but it took a lot of different options away
spellcasters is the wrong word... I meant spells in general.
terran is the race which probably didn't come into your mind first, so let's talk about terran spells. widow mine missiles, cyclone lock-on, KD8 Charge...
widow mine missiles are micro-manageable in theory. in practice, however, it is impossible to focus fire the missile during a typical battle. for example, when pro terrans play ~140 supply bio/mine vs line/bane/muta, they just burrow the mines, re-position them, and forget about them... luck decides the rest.
widow mines take 2 seconds to activate. let's give our pro terrans 300 APM. that's 5 actions per second. 10 actions available before the widow mines detonate. if we simplify the scenario greatly, it is possible to micro-manage 1 or 2 mines. for example, widow mine drop harass intended to kill workers, or small skirmishes involving a small number of units (think 1-1-1 vs protoss).
after this phase of the game is over, pro terrans lose control over the missile pathing. for example, when line/bane swarms you, or when adepts shade in, you want to burrow all the mines at once and try to avoid the splash. all the while, you are busy kiting your bio back and doing other things. all in all, there are very few opportunities in the game to show off your widow mine control. the act of burrowing mines and hoping for a lucky shot is not satisfying at all. you can of course use them to out-position an opponent, and this is impressive in its own way, but this is not what makes a unit inherently fun.
the old cyclone was a masterstroke in terms of design. in the days of massing cyclones in the late-game, man... I never had this much fun in sc2. they were fast, fragile, and extremely dangerous. there was a real tactile satisfaction using them. have you played hellion/cyclone/mine vs a roach/hydra/viper army? or kited an army of ultralisks all the way across the map? you had to keep moving. if you got cornered, you were done for. that was the name of the game. cyclones could outrun everything on the ground except lings. there was this magic synergy between hellions and cyclones... we were just beginning to see this fast and furious speedy mech style played by Innovation and TY. Innovation would open double factory and from there on, it was non-stop action.
and what did Blizz do? they replaced it with a boring 1A mech marine that can't even kill a liberator in one go. you literally can't micro the new cyclones at all. it's pathetic. the scoot and shoot magic is gone. this is the most tragic design change in the history of Starcraft. what the fuck were they thinking? sure, cyclones were obnoxious in the early game. 1 cyclone vs 1 banshee was not fair. but this could have been fixed. they could have reduced the non-upgraded AA damage. they could have increased the AA damage in tandem with the lock-on upgrade, just in time to deal with mutalisks or liberator pushes. but nah, they just killed everything that was fun about the unit. grinds my gears to no end.
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Great to have some professional input on the state of TvZ mech. Snute's takeaway seems to be that mech is more or less viable, depending of course on the opponent (like any other build). His words are also given substantial weight by the actions of INnoVation and Gumiho, who both incorporated mech into their recent Starleague victories.
The EU-KR Terran dynamic is interesting as well, though I suspect that the "Korean Terran" phenomenon is playing a role there. That being said, bio is still the name of the game and I've yet to see any mass exodus towards mech reminiscent of late 2015. So long as bio remains a viable way of ending the game in the midgame (and it is), I very much doubt we will see a big transition towards mech in TvZ.
As it stands, I'm very happy with the current meta of bio being the go-to default for TvZ while mech represents a minority. Bluntly put, 4M vs LBM is hugely entertaining to watch, while mech....isn't. The novelty is what gives mech its appeal, and while it's certainly refreshing to see some variation in TvZ, the appeal of mech wears off pretty fast once every single game ends in mass Ravens. So the current mostly-bio-plus-some-mech meta is the best of both worlds.
As far as avilo goes......well some semi-pro (if even that much) NA Terran who streams a lot claims one thing and is directly contradicted by the words of a highly accomplished veteran (Snute) plus the actions of two more Korean veterans that are serious contenders for the Terran throne. So yeah. Use your brains, people.
On a related note, regarding the viability of specific Terran builds, INnoVation (as always) is a great bellwether. That counts for double in the case of TvZ, since he is easily the most accomplished TvZ player in the world. The guy won his first GSL with bio TvZ and his second GSL with mech TvZ. Where he goes, Terrans follow.
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On June 29 2017 04:55 pvsnp wrote:
As far as avilo goes......well some semi-pro (if even that much) NA Terran who streams a lot claims one thing and is directly contradicted by the words of a highly accomplished veteran (Snute) plus the actions of two more Korean veterans that are serious contenders for the Terran throne. So yeah. Use your brains, people.
why don't you use your brains and actually read what avilo is advocating for? I don't like the guy, but somewhere underneath his outrageous hyperbole ("remove swarm hosts from the game!") he has some sensible ideas about terran mech. avilo's whining, while justified in many ways, unfortunately brings the mech cause more harm than good. people fixate on his trolling and assume that all mech players just want mech to be OP.
avilo wrote:
I do not play that style of mech by choice.
[...]
In the current version of SC2, if your opponent starts massing air and you went mech, you now are forced to sit and build 4-5 starports and mass viking/lib/raven since there is no anti-air unit like the goliath available from the factory.
see? nobody wants 2015 turtle mech, ravens, or invincible sky armies. we want a solid ground-to-air AA unit and heightened synergy between the current factory units.
factory-based mech, with some minor sky support, should be able to handle any situation (8 factories, 1 starport). we took 2 steps forward with the siege tank change and thor armour buff. we took 1 massive step back with the cyclone.
avilo thinks factory-vikings are the answer... personally, I don't agree with avilo's viking suggestion. I would prefer to see the core characteristics of the old cyclone reinstated with some adjustments:
- remove Tornado Blaster weapon from the game
- movement speed increased to 4.72
- health decreased to 160
- supply cost remains at 3
- reinstate ground-to-ground lock-on
- reinstate ground-to-air lock-on
- reinstate auto-cast
- lock-on deals 200 damage over 14 seconds vs light ground/air
- lock-on deals 400 damage over 14 seconds vs armored ground/air
- mag-field accelerator increases lock-on damage from 200 to 200 (+200) vs light ground/air, 400 (+400) vs armored ground/air
- mag-field launchers increases the cyclone's ground-to-air range from 7 to 9
I believe these adjustments to the cyclone would have wide-ranging positive effects in all match-ups:
1) banshees, medivacs and oracles would have a chance to survive lock-on during early-game harassment. warp prisms would be more punishable.
2) cyclones would be able to kill a liberator with a single iteration of lock-on.
3) renewed synergy between hellions and cyclones, thanks to their similar movement speed.
4) cyclone/mine would take over the thor's role of mutalisk defense. GuMiho's mech defense against mutalisks consists of 2 thors and 2 medivacs. he loads the thors in the medivacs so he can boost and chase after the mutalisks. unfortunately, this forces the mech player into a "soft turtle" phase where we wait for ~160 supply and 2-2 upgrades. thors take time to build, and there is an urgency to follow the thors with tanks because of the threat of a roach/ravager/hydra switch. if we give the role of mutalisk defense to cyclone/mine, this would remove the ground turtling phase and give mech a natural follow-up to the "speedy mech" style afforded by early game hellion/banshee harass. the lock-on upgrade would also allow mech to kite and buy time against a possible roach/ravager/hydra follow-up.
5) cyclones would have some micro potential again. right now, cyclones have the same micro potential as a missile turret. how can anyone think this unit is fun to use? Tornado Blaster is pure fucking cancer. how can terran players get any satisfaction from controlling a slow 1A mech marine? you traded in a glass cannon for a literal photon cannon that can move when it's not firing. it blows my mind that people were not up in arms about this change. I guess terran players kept quiet because it did more damage...
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On June 29 2017 06:27 SHODAN wrote:Show nested quote +On June 29 2017 04:55 pvsnp wrote:
As far as avilo goes......well some semi-pro (if even that much) NA Terran who streams a lot claims one thing and is directly contradicted by the words of a highly accomplished veteran (Snute) plus the actions of two more Korean veterans that are serious contenders for the Terran throne. So yeah. Use your brains, people. why don't you use your brains and actually read what avilo is advocating for? I don't like the guy, but somewhere underneath his outrageous hyperbole ("remove swarm hosts from the game!") he has some sensible ideas about terran mech. avilo's whining, while justified in many ways, unfortunately brings the mech cause more harm than good. people fixate on his trolling and assume that all mech players just want mech to be OP. Show nested quote +avilo wrote:
I do not play that style of mech by choice.
[...]
In the current version of SC2, if your opponent starts massing air and you went mech, you now are forced to sit and build 4-5 starports and mass viking/lib/raven since there is no anti-air unit like the goliath available from the factory.
see? nobody wants 2015 turtle mech, ravens, or invincible sky armies. we want a solid ground-to-air AA unit and heightened synergy between the current factory units. factory-based mech, with some minor sky support, should be able to handle any situation (8 factories, 1 starport). we took 2 steps forward with the siege tank change and thor armour buff. we took 1 massive step back with the cyclone. avilo thinks factory-vikings are the answer... personally, I don't agree with avilo's viking suggestion. I would prefer to see the core characteristics of the old cyclone reinstated with some adjustments: - remove Tornado Blaster weapon from the game - movement speed increased to 4.72 - health decreased to 160 - supply cost remains at 3 - reinstate ground-to-ground lock-on - reinstate ground-to-air lock-on - reinstate auto-cast - lock-on deals 200 damage over 14 seconds vs light ground/air - lock-on deals 400 damage over 14 seconds vs armored ground/air - mag-field accelerator increases lock-on damage from 200 to 200 (+200) vs light ground/air, 400 (+400) vs armored ground/air - mag-field launchers increases the cyclone's ground-to-air range from 7 to 9 I believe these adjustments to the cyclone would have wide-ranging positive effects in all match-ups: 1) banshees, medivacs and oracles would have a chance to survive lock-on during early-game harassment. warp prisms would be more punishable. 2) cyclones would be able to kill a liberator with a single iteration of lock-on. 3) renewed synergy between hellions and cyclones, thanks to their similar movement speed. 4) cyclone/mine would take over the thor's role of mutalisk defense. GuMiho's mech defense against mutalisks consists of 2 thors and 2 medivacs. he loads the thors in the medivacs so he can boost and chase after the mutalisks. unfortunately, this forces the mech player into a "soft turtle" phase where we wait for ~160 supply and 2-2 upgrades. thors take time to build, and there is an urgency to follow the thors with tanks because of the threat of a roach/ravager/hydra switch. if we give the role of mutalisk defense to cyclone/mine, this would remove the ground turtling phase and give mech a natural follow-up to the "speedy mech" style afforded by early game hellion/banshee harass. the lock-on upgrade would also allow mech to kite and buy time against a possible roach/ravager/hydra follow-up. 5) cyclones would have some micro potential again. right now, cyclones have the same micro potential as a missile turret. how can anyone think this unit is fun to use? Tornado Blaster is pure fucking cancer. how can terran players get any satisfaction from controlling a slow 1A mech marine? you traded in a glass cannon for a literal photon cannon that can move when it's not firing. it blows my mind that people were not up in arms about this change. I guess terran players kept quiet because it did more damage...
Viable doesn't mean you like the strategy, or that it's your preferred strategy, or even that it's a fun strategy. Viable means that a player can win with the strategy against another player of approximately equal skill.
While I agree with some of what you said about mech AA, especially the Cyclone (it is a stupid unit w/o micro potential confined to the early game), mech as it currently stands has been proven (by the words of Snute and the actions of INnoVation/Gumiho) to be viable. No, it is not perfect. No, it is not significantly better than bio (in fact I'd argue it's slightly worse). But at the highest level of Starcraft 2 TvZ, mech is viable.
That was, and still is, my point.
Incidentally, while I am not a huge fan of TvZ mech, I am a massive fan of TvT mech. The endless Marine-Tank doom drops that define the contemporary TvT meta are incredibly dull to watch and coinflippy to play. Bio vs Mech TvT, on the other hand, was amazing to watch and thrilling to play. I cite the legendary duel of TaeJa vs INnoVation on Newkirk Precinct, which to this day is still the greatest single game of Starcraft ever played.
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On June 29 2017 09:39 pvsnp wrote:Show nested quote +On June 29 2017 06:27 SHODAN wrote:On June 29 2017 04:55 pvsnp wrote:
As far as avilo goes......well some semi-pro (if even that much) NA Terran who streams a lot claims one thing and is directly contradicted by the words of a highly accomplished veteran (Snute) plus the actions of two more Korean veterans that are serious contenders for the Terran throne. So yeah. Use your brains, people. why don't you use your brains and actually read what avilo is advocating for? I don't like the guy, but somewhere underneath his outrageous hyperbole ("remove swarm hosts from the game!") he has some sensible ideas about terran mech. avilo's whining, while justified in many ways, unfortunately brings the mech cause more harm than good. people fixate on his trolling and assume that all mech players just want mech to be OP. avilo wrote:
I do not play that style of mech by choice.
[...]
In the current version of SC2, if your opponent starts massing air and you went mech, you now are forced to sit and build 4-5 starports and mass viking/lib/raven since there is no anti-air unit like the goliath available from the factory.
see? nobody wants 2015 turtle mech, ravens, or invincible sky armies. we want a solid ground-to-air AA unit and heightened synergy between the current factory units. factory-based mech, with some minor sky support, should be able to handle any situation (8 factories, 1 starport). we took 2 steps forward with the siege tank change and thor armour buff. we took 1 massive step back with the cyclone. avilo thinks factory-vikings are the answer... personally, I don't agree with avilo's viking suggestion. I would prefer to see the core characteristics of the old cyclone reinstated with some adjustments: - remove Tornado Blaster weapon from the game - movement speed increased to 4.72 - health decreased to 160 - supply cost remains at 3 - reinstate ground-to-ground lock-on - reinstate ground-to-air lock-on - reinstate auto-cast - lock-on deals 200 damage over 14 seconds vs light ground/air - lock-on deals 400 damage over 14 seconds vs armored ground/air - mag-field accelerator increases lock-on damage from 200 to 200 (+200) vs light ground/air, 400 (+400) vs armored ground/air - mag-field launchers increases the cyclone's ground-to-air range from 7 to 9 I believe these adjustments to the cyclone would have wide-ranging positive effects in all match-ups: 1) banshees, medivacs and oracles would have a chance to survive lock-on during early-game harassment. warp prisms would be more punishable. 2) cyclones would be able to kill a liberator with a single iteration of lock-on. 3) renewed synergy between hellions and cyclones, thanks to their similar movement speed. 4) cyclone/mine would take over the thor's role of mutalisk defense. GuMiho's mech defense against mutalisks consists of 2 thors and 2 medivacs. he loads the thors in the medivacs so he can boost and chase after the mutalisks. unfortunately, this forces the mech player into a "soft turtle" phase where we wait for ~160 supply and 2-2 upgrades. thors take time to build, and there is an urgency to follow the thors with tanks because of the threat of a roach/ravager/hydra switch. if we give the role of mutalisk defense to cyclone/mine, this would remove the ground turtling phase and give mech a natural follow-up to the "speedy mech" style afforded by early game hellion/banshee harass. the lock-on upgrade would also allow mech to kite and buy time against a possible roach/ravager/hydra follow-up. 5) cyclones would have some micro potential again. right now, cyclones have the same micro potential as a missile turret. how can anyone think this unit is fun to use? Tornado Blaster is pure fucking cancer. how can terran players get any satisfaction from controlling a slow 1A mech marine? you traded in a glass cannon for a literal photon cannon that can move when it's not firing. it blows my mind that people were not up in arms about this change. I guess terran players kept quiet because it did more damage... Viable doesn't mean you like the strategy, or that it's your preferred strategy, or even that it's a fun strategy. Viable means that a player can win with the strategy against another player of approximately equal skill. While I agree with some of what you said about mech AA, especially the Cyclone (it is a stupid unit w/o micro potential confined to the early game), mech as it currently stands has been proven (by the words of Snute and the actions of INnoVation/Gumiho) to be viable. No, it is not perfect. No, it is not significantly better than bio (in fact I'd argue it's slightly worse). But at the highest level of Starcraft 2 TvZ, mech is viable. That was, and still is, my point. Incidentally, while I am not a huge fan of TvZ mech, I am a massive fan of TvT mech. The endless Marine-Tank doom drops that define the contemporary TvT meta are incredibly dull to watch and coinflippy to play. Bio vs Mech TvT, on the other hand, was amazing to watch and thrilling to play. I cite the legendary duel of TaeJa vs INnoVation on Newkirk Precinct, which to this day is still the greatest single game of Starcraft ever played.
sorry, got my wires crossed on the "viable" thing.
for me, the holy grail of mech TvT is Mvp vs Innovation on Akilon Wastes
youtu.be
8 SCVs vs 30 SCVs.
"he may as well GG" - Artosis
15 minutes later
"the humiliated Innovation army is now retreating" - Tasteless
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On June 28 2017 23:28 Liquid`Snute wrote:There's already plenty of games of gumiho on youtube. A lot of the series between gumiho and myself and soo and gumiho on wardi's channel for example will give you a somewhat nuanced view of mech vs zerg. Surprise surprise, mech both wins and loses. It's still in the process of being figured out. Swarm host can appear ridicilous, same goes for vipers and terran ground or ravens. +++ + Show Spoiler +https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8FRBvg-wicw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2mqdxOQl40 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFNcPZNfY5M https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyQy9IyorYo https://youtu.be/CSDqIj-nHmM?t=9m41s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KuFssqo6Aig The issue with swarm host on the sub-top level is that hosts appear ridicilous to play against if you don't know exactly how to approach it from the get-go with a high level of skill (6200+ MMR?). Mech is also harder to play compared to mass swarm host on the sub-top level, so the most vocal players will most likely always state that swarm hosts are broken. Personally i think mech is slightly inferior to bio, but i also know that a simple showmatch won't necessarily provide the answers people are looking for. It takes a decently large sample size of scenarios and situations with different openings, perhaps a replay pack of 20-50 games. There are ways to delay the onset of swarmhost such as turboshee, banshee into 2thordrop, and there are also ways for zerg to delay their own swarm host (3base, heavy roach ravager hydra viper before swarm host etc.). There are ways out such as mass muta switch, and switching from sky terran to ground etc. And more... People don't look at large enough samples and a lot of the time the zerg makes mistakes. Right now, players in KR are indeed struggling with Mech, but from watching streams I can tell that both sides are making some pretty silly mistakes and that a lot of the time the games on average aren't as un-even as either side might think. But if you know that your opponent will always play mech from the start, or if you know that a zerg will only play roach hydra viper and no swarmhost or ONLY swarmhost no matter what for example, then yes it's easy to make either side look disgusting. There aren't enough broadcast games to give a clear picture. Personally I think destroying mech terrans on EU is super easy for the most part. But word from KR is that mech is hard. So.. hard to tell.
I think swarmhost are very ridiculous at all levels of play. There should not be any army in the game that consists of essentially one tech unit that requires no money to utilize and essentially generates free money and can freely escape across the map while attacking over terrain like a reaper for free.
And before your or anyone try to say i'm biased or something i'm being very objective - ravens are just as bad as swarmhost once you get 10+ of them because there's no downside at all to just "making more ravens" or "making more swarmhosts." Units like this in RTS dissuade either side from doing anything and you're fighting with free unit generators rather than trading unit for units that cost income.
Roach/hydra versus mech is fair because both players are interacting with the other player's units and making trades that cost income.
Mass swarmhost up to 20+ swarmhosts that are flying free locusts every 30 sec is not fair or balanced because you're essentially generating a free army of roach/hydra every 30 seconds. Normally you'd have to actually fight your opponent and risk losing units that cost money. With swarmhosts there is no such risk because you can launch locust from 3 screens away. I would say the same argument applies to mass raven when you have 10+ of them. You just spam auto-turrets/seeker and it turns into the tedious game of picking off units 1 by 1 instead of fighting your opponent.
KR Zergs do not know how to abuse SH like NA/EU Zergs do to show how ridiculously broken it is. There's also the factors that 99% KR Terran play bio instead of mech, and they basically have zero game knowledge or practice on what to do versus mech. Zero nydus play in the finals of Soo vs Gumiho, and if you or anyone is saying Soo went into that series expecting mech...yet still doesn't know to abuse nydus and swarmhosts...
The fact is balance isn't dictated at all by any 1 series of games. Game balance/design for SC2 is more of a "what is fair and balanced for players, and how the game can be strategically diverse." Swarmhosts are oppressive to the point they remove a lot of strategic diversity of Terran just solely because they exist in their current state. They are oppressive to mech being playable, and too easy to use. The counter-measures to swarmhosts require an insane amount of skill compared to the zero amount of skill required to simply "MAKE SWARMOSTS."
The swarmhost really no one can defend as a balanced unit in it's current state, and i'd be willing to debate anyone about it. And what you said snute about you personally finding mech Terrans easy to play vs on EU...it's because you understand how to abuse SH/viper like a lot of other NA/EU Zergs, but for some reason KR Zergs don't seem to quite grasp how strong these units are late game and they do really theoretically bad things like keep massing pure roach and corruptors.
Whenever i off-race on ladder with Z vs T and the Terran goes mech...it's basically a freewin because i know how to abuse mech so easily since i play it so often with my main race.
I will say though, if both players know the theoretical late game Zerg / mech late games....the game becomes really really bad because it's ends up being ghosts sniping vipers 1 by 1 or vipers abducting units 1 by 1 or units getting seekered 1 by 1 for the next 40 minutes with nothing happening because all of these units are energy based units.
With all of this being said, are swarmhosts/ravens unbeatable? Of course not, it's winnable for both the Z and T. THe better question is, "is this the type of gameplay that is healthy for SC2 players, viewers, and community?" The answer is: fuck no, there needs to be changes.
Also, on another note...i think what you said about how the game is way easy essentially if you 100% know the opponent will go mech before the game starts...is exactly why mech is not in a "viable" state at the moment.
A "viable" strategy is a strategy you can go into a game with even if your opponent knows you will do it yet still be effective with it. The best examples with this are ling/bane/muta and bio play. An opponent can know you are going to go for these strategies and yet both strategies remain effective and can win or lose the game without being insanely hard countered by 1 unit.
Mech on the other hand...the amount of games i play on ladder that are people literally metagaming because they see "avilo" and they immediately go up to swarmhosts and then i have to "metagame their meta" with speedshee or weird ass builds...all of this issue is created by the fact that swarmhosts hard counter an entire style and that should be addressed.
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Mech isnt funny to watch
It's just about frustration and impotence.
Wow what a great siege up you really deserve your gsl finals gg
When bio is entertaining. You just have to see the reactions after the blizzcon finals, people who didnt know much about the game were impressed, i'm not sure they would have been seeing this type of match.
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On June 29 2017 06:27 SHODAN wrote:Show nested quote +On June 29 2017 04:55 pvsnp wrote:
As far as avilo goes......well some semi-pro (if even that much) NA Terran who streams a lot claims one thing and is directly contradicted by the words of a highly accomplished veteran (Snute) plus the actions of two more Korean veterans that are serious contenders for the Terran throne. So yeah. Use your brains, people. why don't you use your brains and actually read what avilo is advocating for? I don't like the guy, but somewhere underneath his outrageous hyperbole ("remove swarm hosts from the game!") he has some sensible ideas about terran mech. avilo's whining, while justified in many ways, unfortunately brings the mech cause more harm than good. people fixate on his trolling and assume that all mech players just want mech to be OP. Show nested quote +avilo wrote:
I do not play that style of mech by choice.
[...]
In the current version of SC2, if your opponent starts massing air and you went mech, you now are forced to sit and build 4-5 starports and mass viking/lib/raven since there is no anti-air unit like the goliath available from the factory.
see? nobody wants 2015 turtle mech, ravens, or invincible sky armies. we want a solid ground-to-air AA unit and heightened synergy between the current factory units. factory-based mech, with some minor sky support, should be able to handle any situation (8 factories, 1 starport). we took 2 steps forward with the siege tank change and thor armour buff. we took 1 massive step back with the cyclone. avilo thinks factory-vikings are the answer... personally, I don't agree with avilo's viking suggestion. I would prefer to see the core characteristics of the old cyclone reinstated with some adjustments: - remove Tornado Blaster weapon from the game - movement speed increased to 4.72 - health decreased to 160 - supply cost remains at 3 - reinstate ground-to-ground lock-on - reinstate ground-to-air lock-on - reinstate auto-cast - lock-on deals 200 damage over 14 seconds vs light ground/air - lock-on deals 400 damage over 14 seconds vs armored ground/air - mag-field accelerator increases lock-on damage from 200 to 200 (+200) vs light ground/air, 400 (+400) vs armored ground/air - mag-field launchers increases the cyclone's ground-to-air range from 7 to 9 I believe these adjustments to the cyclone would have wide-ranging positive effects in all match-ups: 1) banshees, medivacs and oracles would have a chance to survive lock-on during early-game harassment. warp prisms would be more punishable. 2) cyclones would be able to kill a liberator with a single iteration of lock-on. 3) renewed synergy between hellions and cyclones, thanks to their similar movement speed. 4) cyclone/mine would take over the thor's role of mutalisk defense. GuMiho's mech defense against mutalisks consists of 2 thors and 2 medivacs. he loads the thors in the medivacs so he can boost and chase after the mutalisks. unfortunately, this forces the mech player into a "soft turtle" phase where we wait for ~160 supply and 2-2 upgrades. thors take time to build, and there is an urgency to follow the thors with tanks because of the threat of a roach/ravager/hydra switch. if we give the role of mutalisk defense to cyclone/mine, this would remove the ground turtling phase and give mech a natural follow-up to the "speedy mech" style afforded by early game hellion/banshee harass. the lock-on upgrade would also allow mech to kite and buy time against a possible roach/ravager/hydra follow-up. 5) cyclones would have some micro potential again. right now, cyclones have the same micro potential as a missile turret. how can anyone think this unit is fun to use? Tornado Blaster is pure fucking cancer. how can terran players get any satisfaction from controlling a slow 1A mech marine? you traded in a glass cannon for a literal photon cannon that can move when it's not firing. it blows my mind that people were not up in arms about this change. I guess terran players kept quiet because it did more damage...
It's interesting that you want the cyclone kind of reverted or pseudo reverted to how it used to be.
I dunno how many of you guys remember cyclones in LOTV Beta but...aggressive mech was actually viable you could go pure tank/cyclone/hellion in action packed games with aggression in multiple places on the map. Admittedly the original version was slightly overpowered in terms of range and lock-on...but it was a much healthier play style and it was really good anti-air.
You could counter carrier interceptors in LOTV beta with pure cyclones. It was fuckin amazing. But then for some reason, as usual, Blizzard decided they hated mech.
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On June 29 2017 13:33 avilo wrote:Show nested quote +On June 29 2017 06:27 SHODAN wrote:On June 29 2017 04:55 pvsnp wrote:
As far as avilo goes......well some semi-pro (if even that much) NA Terran who streams a lot claims one thing and is directly contradicted by the words of a highly accomplished veteran (Snute) plus the actions of two more Korean veterans that are serious contenders for the Terran throne. So yeah. Use your brains, people. why don't you use your brains and actually read what avilo is advocating for? I don't like the guy, but somewhere underneath his outrageous hyperbole ("remove swarm hosts from the game!") he has some sensible ideas about terran mech. avilo's whining, while justified in many ways, unfortunately brings the mech cause more harm than good. people fixate on his trolling and assume that all mech players just want mech to be OP. avilo wrote:
I do not play that style of mech by choice.
[...]
In the current version of SC2, if your opponent starts massing air and you went mech, you now are forced to sit and build 4-5 starports and mass viking/lib/raven since there is no anti-air unit like the goliath available from the factory.
see? nobody wants 2015 turtle mech, ravens, or invincible sky armies. we want a solid ground-to-air AA unit and heightened synergy between the current factory units. factory-based mech, with some minor sky support, should be able to handle any situation (8 factories, 1 starport). we took 2 steps forward with the siege tank change and thor armour buff. we took 1 massive step back with the cyclone. avilo thinks factory-vikings are the answer... personally, I don't agree with avilo's viking suggestion. I would prefer to see the core characteristics of the old cyclone reinstated with some adjustments: - remove Tornado Blaster weapon from the game - movement speed increased to 4.72 - health decreased to 160 - supply cost remains at 3 - reinstate ground-to-ground lock-on - reinstate ground-to-air lock-on - reinstate auto-cast - lock-on deals 200 damage over 14 seconds vs light ground/air - lock-on deals 400 damage over 14 seconds vs armored ground/air - mag-field accelerator increases lock-on damage from 200 to 200 (+200) vs light ground/air, 400 (+400) vs armored ground/air - mag-field launchers increases the cyclone's ground-to-air range from 7 to 9 I believe these adjustments to the cyclone would have wide-ranging positive effects in all match-ups: 1) banshees, medivacs and oracles would have a chance to survive lock-on during early-game harassment. warp prisms would be more punishable. 2) cyclones would be able to kill a liberator with a single iteration of lock-on. 3) renewed synergy between hellions and cyclones, thanks to their similar movement speed. 4) cyclone/mine would take over the thor's role of mutalisk defense. GuMiho's mech defense against mutalisks consists of 2 thors and 2 medivacs. he loads the thors in the medivacs so he can boost and chase after the mutalisks. unfortunately, this forces the mech player into a "soft turtle" phase where we wait for ~160 supply and 2-2 upgrades. thors take time to build, and there is an urgency to follow the thors with tanks because of the threat of a roach/ravager/hydra switch. if we give the role of mutalisk defense to cyclone/mine, this would remove the ground turtling phase and give mech a natural follow-up to the "speedy mech" style afforded by early game hellion/banshee harass. the lock-on upgrade would also allow mech to kite and buy time against a possible roach/ravager/hydra follow-up. 5) cyclones would have some micro potential again. right now, cyclones have the same micro potential as a missile turret. how can anyone think this unit is fun to use? Tornado Blaster is pure fucking cancer. how can terran players get any satisfaction from controlling a slow 1A mech marine? you traded in a glass cannon for a literal photon cannon that can move when it's not firing. it blows my mind that people were not up in arms about this change. I guess terran players kept quiet because it did more damage... It's interesting that you want the cyclone kind of reverted or pseudo reverted to how it used to be. I dunno how many of you guys remember cyclones in LOTV Beta but...aggressive mech was actually viable you could go pure tank/cyclone/hellion in action packed games with aggression in multiple places on the map. Admittedly the original version was slightly overpowered in terms of range and lock-on...but it was a much healthier play style and it was really good anti-air. You could counter carrier interceptors in LOTV beta with pure cyclones. It was fuckin amazing. But then for some reason, as usual, Blizzard decided they hated mech.
what I really love about the old cyclone is the effect it had on gas expenditure and mech infrastructure.
right now, mech players are forced to open 1-1-1 and spend a small fortune on starport units before they can even think about a ground army. this is necessary for several reasons... let's run up the costs.
150/100 for the starport
150/75 for a viking
the viking is absolutely essential for denying intel from the zerg and to prevent/delay nydus rushes. of course, it would be a massive over-investment to build a starport just for 1 viking, so our meching terran is tricked into building more crap from the starport in order to make the investment worth it. GuMiho typically builds 1 viking, followed by a combination of 2 or 3 other air units, depending on the map:
200/400 for raven/raven
400/300 for banshee/banshee with cloak
400/350 liberator/banshee with cloak
by the time all that is over, you've spent at least 1000 minerals and 475 gas on the starport. yet another spending obstacle in our struggle to build a ground-based mech army...
that was all different with the old cyclones. with the old cyclones, you could skip the starport entirely and open double factory. Innovation opened double factory reactor/techlab every game, with a quick mag-field accelerator upgrade. I can't emphasize enough how good this for the infrastructure and pacing of ground mech styles. gas expenditure was going in all the right places. and, of course, you could snipe overlords from the ground.
another big effect they had on gas expenditure... the old cyclone was not at the mercy of weapons upgrades. if you can get by on cyclones, you do not have to rush for double armory. you just need 1 armory. this made the synergy between hellion/mine/cyclone so fucking perfect.
2 of those units deal spell damage, so you can delay the weapons upgrade for quite some time. hellions in hellion mode do not benefit much from weapons upgrades. in fact, we want hellions primarily to guard the cyclones from lings and soak damage from roaches/queens.
if hellion/mine/cyclone is viable in the early/mid-game, you can spend the extra gas on more factories, techlab upgrades, and only 1 armory. what does this all mean? no more turtling. faster factories, strong and mobile ground presence, more movement all across the map, more skirmishes, more kiting, more action!
big missed opportunity for the TvZ match-up. I guess not many are nostalgic about this style. it was only just starting to gain traction in the pro Korean scene before the cyclone was suddenly changed to a mech marine. I wish I saved more replays of me playing this style... this is the only one I could salvage:
http://lotv.spawningtool.com/18403/
one more funny thing about cyclone-based mech vZ is that you could legit take a long-distance 4th on the opposite side of the map, just like in Brood War. what the fuck are roach/hydras gonna do? walk all the way across Frost and snipe a planetary? not when you have the best kiting unit in the game picking off units left and right, poised and ready to raid your hatches!
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Bot edit.
User was banned for this post.
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On June 28 2017 23:28 Liquid`Snute wrote:There's already plenty of games of gumiho on youtube. A lot of the series between gumiho and myself and soo and gumiho on wardi's channel for example will give you a somewhat nuanced view of mech vs zerg. Surprise surprise, mech both wins and loses. It's still in the process of being figured out. Swarm host can appear ridicilous, same goes for vipers and terran ground or ravens. +++ + Show Spoiler +https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8FRBvg-wicw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2mqdxOQl40 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFNcPZNfY5M https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyQy9IyorYo https://youtu.be/CSDqIj-nHmM?t=9m41s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KuFssqo6Aig The issue with swarm host on the sub-top level is that hosts appear ridicilous to play against if you don't know exactly how to approach it from the get-go with a high level of skill (6200+ MMR?). Mech is also harder to play compared to mass swarm host on the sub-top level, so the most vocal players will most likely always state that swarm hosts are broken. Personally i think mech is slightly inferior to bio, but i also know that a simple showmatch won't necessarily provide the answers people are looking for. It takes a decently large sample size of scenarios and situations with different openings, perhaps a replay pack of 20-50 games. There are ways to delay the onset of swarmhost such as turboshee, banshee into 2thordrop, and there are also ways for zerg to delay their own swarm host (3base, heavy roach ravager hydra viper before swarm host etc.). There are ways out such as mass muta switch, and switching from sky terran to ground etc. And more... People don't look at large enough samples and a lot of the time the zerg makes mistakes. Right now, players in KR are indeed struggling with Mech, but from watching streams I can tell that both sides are making some pretty silly mistakes and that a lot of the time the games on average aren't as un-even as either side might think. But if you know that your opponent will always play mech from the start, or if you know that a zerg will only play roach hydra viper and no swarmhost or ONLY swarmhost no matter what for example, then yes it's easy to make either side look disgusting. There aren't enough broadcast games to give a clear picture. Personally I think destroying mech terrans on EU is super easy for the most part. But word from KR is that mech is hard. So.. hard to tell.
thanks for the replays and for the very level-headed stance
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On June 29 2017 13:31 DieuCure wrote:Mech isnt funny to watchIt's just about frustration and impotence. Wow what a great siege up you really deserve your gsl finals gg When bio is entertaining. You just have to see the reactions after the blizzcon finals, people who didnt know much about the game were impressed, i'm not sure they would have been seeing this type of match.
You have no idea what you are talking about dude
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i personally find GSL Code S level Terran Mech entertaining. I find Gumiho's matches very entertaining. not sure how others feel about it.
playing against a Turtler-Mecher is frustrating for me in Diamond League, however, i do not think this warrants any changes from Blizzard.
When you're playing at my level of multitasking and APM with my weak keyboard mechanics .. some degree of frustration will sometimes be part of the game; there is nothing Blizzard can do about it. furthermore, i'm too lazy to make my keyboard mechanics better.
if i complained like some people in this thread i'd be demanding the removal of the Zergling.
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On June 30 2017 02:56 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
i personally find GSL Code S level Terran Mech entertaining. I find Gumiho's matches very entertaining. not sure how others feel about it.
playing against a Turtler-Mecher is frustrating for me in Diamond League, however, i do not think this warrants any changes from Blizzard.
When you're playing at my level of multitasking and APM with my weak keyboard mechanics .. some degree of frustration will sometimes be part of the game; there is nothing Blizzard can do about it. furthermore, i'm too lazy to make my keyboard mechanics better.
if i complained like some people in this thread i'd be demanding the removal of the Zergling.
Ofcourse you say all this, proofing that you dont know what you are even reading in this thread then. And ofcourse you think the RTS genre is declining with this knowledge of yours.
A healthy RTS GAME revolves around micro vs micro, and healthy decisions as "where to trade, where to attack, where to defend". With little to no hardcounters.
If you read very very carefully you will understand that the swarmhost and raven does the opposite of this. SC2 is a really unhealthy RTS game and the only thing to make it healthy IS TO CHANGE THE GAME.
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On June 30 2017 03:19 Foxxan wrote:
SC2 is a really unhealthy RTS game and the only thing to make it healthy IS TO CHANGE THE GAME.
When LotV first came out there was too much air play at my level of play; i think they've fixed that issue. I'm happy with the game as it is and i like the GSL.
On June 30 2017 03:19 Foxxan wrote: And ofcourse you think the RTS genre is declining with this knowledge of yours.
A healthy RTS GAME revolves around micro vs micro, and healthy decisions as ...
so you think the RTS genre is doing well? is that your point here? if the RTS genre is doing well there must be good alternatives to SC2 that have been released in the last 7 years. Let me know one of those good alternatives and i'll try it out. For now, I'm happy with SC2.
On June 30 2017 03:19 Foxxan wrote:
proofing that you dont know what you are even reading in this thread
Snute's perspective was clear. I understood it. and demonstrated that understanding in my post commenting on his insights.
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JimmyJRaynor you are the most high horse, ivory tower, big asshole i have ever seen. Every 2 posts you shit a little on other posters, aggressively or passively.
I used to think that you just love SC2 and you look to defend it, but that it's not the case. You are looking to create drama and conflict.
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your "create drama" claim is the only drama here. i am providing feedback to Blizzard in my posts.
i provided a rebuttal to this claim "you dont know what you are even reading".
if there is a specific line item i've misread or misunderstood i prefer to be corrected. the general comment "you don't know what you are reading" adds nothing to the discussion and is tantamount to the "shit a little on other posters" issue you bring up. pot? kettle?
so, is there something specific i'm misreading? if so, maybe we can clear that up and provide more high quality feedback to Blizzard to help make SC2 a better game
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On July 01 2017 02:13 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
your "create drama" claim is the only drama here. i am providing feedback to Blizzard in my posts.
i provided a rebuttal to this claim "you dont know what you are even reading".
if there is a specific line item i've misread or misunderstood i prefer to be corrected. the general comment "you don't know what you are reading" adds nothing to the discussion and is tantamount to the "shit a little on other posters" issue you bring up. pot? kettle?
so, is there something specific i'm misreading? if so, maybe we can clear that up and provide more high quality feedback to Blizzard to help make SC2 a better game
I am here to help, so of course i am going to help you.
Let's both start by not lecturing people about what is right, wrong, fun, etc. Let's both try to understand that just by sayng the same thing over and over (like RTS is not popular) is not going to help us, them, the thread, or anyone. Let us agree that we are not as smart as we think we are, and the smater and the more objective we try to be, the more Sappire will make fun of us 
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we can now ignore yesterday's claim "you dont know what you are even reading" because it adds nothing.... and nothing of substance came of it.... just useless flaming.
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On July 01 2017 03:19 JimmyJRaynor wrote:
we can now ignore yesterday's claim "you dont know what you are even reading" because it adds nothing.... and nothing of substance came of it.... just useless flaming.
Can you refrain from now on from making such post then?I will be there if you don't. Always watching, always looking out for starcraft i am
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I started playing sc2 recently again and jesus they changed those swarmhosts, blue flame hellions couldn't do anything when I kept catching them off guard rip ;;.
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EPT![[image loading]](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CM809rKWoAAiV0C.jpg)
