So who does this favor? Zerg players the most?

Protoss has to take time to find ideal wall-ins on all these maps.

However it favors cheese and allins too.

In the history bad maps have favored zerg because of zerg speed being able to move around obstructions. A good example is blood boil.

Kafka777

361 Posts

January 18 2018 16:32 GMT

#64

Such map pool change does not give all players equal opportunity to practice, simply because other events are taking place like IEM Katowice qualifiers. The best players who have a chance to qualify will have to stick with the old map pool in practice. For many players there will be a lot of downtime due to travel to Leipzig and/or PyeongChang. It will also give a slight advantage to some players (ex. Koreans) at IEM PyeongChang as they will have several days more to prepare..

Antares777

United States1971 Posts

January 18 2018 16:44 GMT

#65

It's important to have a rotating map pool, but the timing here seems a little risky. At least we know which maps will be added so that pros will have the opportunity to begin practicing on them before the patch date if they want, though it's unfortunate that they won't have much ladder practice on them before the tournament. IMO, 3 days is too short of a time period.

Elentos

55555 Posts

January 18 2018 16:44 GMT

#66

On January 19 2018 01:18 youngjiddle wrote:
So who does this favor? Zerg players the most?

There's only 1 race in WCS anyway

207aicila

1237 Posts

January 18 2018 17:20 GMT

#67

On January 19 2018 00:23 Musicus wrote:
This tweet makes you think.

The biggest problem as always is communication. Blizzard and DH didn't tell any of the pros which maps would be used until they randomly got asked on Twitter. It might have been possible that the pros showed up at the event and practiced the wrong maps for nothing.

I feel like this deserves to be in the OP, perhaps even moreso than the other tweets.

daskleinehotte

Germany76 Posts

January 18 2018 17:27 GMT

#68

On January 18 2018 18:21 hexhaven wrote:
Going to side with ShoWTimE here, this is just poor timing on Blizzard's part.

Again.

Musicus

Germany23576 Posts

January 18 2018 17:28 GMT

#69

On January 19 2018 01:44 Elentos wrote:

Show nested quote +

There's only 1 race in WCS anyway

Non-Koreans?

And Happy Birthday!

Elentos

55555 Posts

January 18 2018 17:40 GMT

#70

On January 19 2018 02:28 Musicus wrote:

Show nested quote +

Non-Koreans?

And Happy Birthday!

The cake is in Korean time, I still have to wait

WCS is a brave, lone Neebian village surrounded by space bugs.

sweffymo

United States62 Posts

January 18 2018 17:43 GMT

#71

I agree that they should have announced this earlier, but I also strongly disagree with the whole "pro players are getting screwed over more and more every year" thing. Prize pools and tournament opportunities have only gone up. The balance team has started to actually care about the game again. I'm not sure what Optimus is talking about at this point.

Vindicare605

United States16097 Posts

January 18 2018 17:44 GMT

#72

There is a middle ground here.

A new map in a tournament is not inherently a bad thing. 4 maps, however is probably too many.

If nothing else, 4 maps forces players to using their vetoes so that the majority of the games in the tournament are played on a very small number of maps. That sucks for the players, that sucks for the audience.

1-2 new maps in a tournament. I'm all for it. 4 maps? Too many.

There's a reason why HGC (thats the Heroes of the Storm equivalent to Starcraft's WCS) always plays a patch or two behind so that new potentially OP heroes cant come through and wreck the pro scene. Maps in Starcraft are just as important. Introduce a map that has a noticeable balance flaw that isn't corrected before a tournament and you end up possibly ruining the whole tournament.

Daedalus Point and Yeonsu were two extreme examples of that.

NewSunshine

United States5938 Posts

January 18 2018 17:57 GMT

#73

I think introducing new maps rapid-fire like this, in general, is okay. I largely agree with CatZ. This particular instance seems problematic though. For a lot of the players, long travel times and preparations are a thing they have to focus on, before they get to even think about playing a practice game. A 2-week period would be quite a bit better, since it would largely buffer out that difference. If it's going to be short notice, it needs to be equally short for everyone, and if some players have to travel to make it, it's shorter for them.

So I guess set the tourney in New Zealand. Equally long travel time for everyone. :p

bulya

Israel386 Posts

January 18 2018 17:58 GMT

#74

A problem with it is that there are IEM qualifiers on the old maps going on till 2 days to the WCS event.
So players who want to participate in the IEM qualifiers won't have the time to practice on the new maps.
Which is why making this WCS event played on the new maps is quite a bad idea. Players must choose whether they want to prepare for the WCS event or the IEM qualifiers. And I think that many would like to participate in both (especially the better players of them)

Kevin_Sorbo

Canada3217 Posts

January 18 2018 18:37 GMT

#75

If Bly wins with some random 4 minutes abusive bullshit I am gonna be pissed at Blizzard tbh. This could have been handled better. A 400k tournament with subpar games because of the new map pool is not doing anybody any good. Hope they can find a way to fix this. Or maybe I am wrong and we are going to see great games as some people posting here are expecting.

IArako

Germany195 Posts

January 18 2018 19:22 GMT

#76

Im split here, on the one side i think playing on new Maps is absolutely right, but on the other communication and announcement of the tounaments and maps is terribly handled, also im sure the releasedate of the maps could at least have been made not immediately before an event.

geokilla

Canada8244 Posts

January 18 2018 19:24 GMT

#77

Blizzard seriously has no idea how to run its esports division does it? This is why I've lost interest in WCS and just watch GSL and CS:GO instead. At least they know how to run tournaments, know how to bring in new players, and run the game.

billynasty

United States260 Posts

January 18 2018 20:08 GMT

#78

releasing the new map pool NOW is the only solution. Players would have more of a chance to practice on them & Blizzard still gets the new maps out.. win win

Kafka777

361 Posts

January 18 2018 20:18 GMT

#79

releasing the new map pool NOW is the only solution. Players would have more of a chance to practice on them & Blizzard still gets the new maps out.. win win

No, releasing them NOW is exactly the problem. They should be released (at least for tournament usage) after IEM PyeongChang.