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4 Posts
![[image loading]](https://www.teamliquid.net/staff/Olli/monkinterview.jpg)
TLnet's Destructicon sat down with our own Blizzard's Kevin "monk" Dong and lead UI designer Ryan Schutter at BlizzCon. We asked them about the upcoming patch, overall design goals for StarCraft II's multiplayer and co-op modes, and influences from other games.
Destructicon: Could you tell me a bit about yourself? Kevin, how has your experience been so far in transitioning to development, given your background of working for TLnet?
Ryan: Hi I’m Ryan Schutter and I am the lead UI designer for StarCraft II.
Kevin:As you said, I originally did work for TeamLiquid, but now I’m on the Blizzard Development Team working on both Co-op design as lead Co-op designer and in Versus. It’s been really great, not just given my experience with TLnet, but because I’ve been a fan of Blizzard games, especially StarCraft, my entire life. I grew up with StarCraft 1, grew up with Warcraft 3, and am especially exited to hear about the Warcraft Reforged announcement. For StarCraft II, I’ve been following the esports tournaments all throughout; I worked for TLnet on covering the professional scene as well as working with strategy content.
D: What do you think of the balance of the game at this point and how are you looking to improve it further?
K: So obviously we have the multiplayer balance/design patch that is coming soon after Blizzcon. I think that patch speaks to where we think the state of the game is right now. We’ve made adjustments not only to the balance of the game but also to the design of the game as well. For instance, one of our key goals in the coming year that we’re going to reinforce with additional changes, perhaps, is that we’re looking to more equalize late-game for the various matchups.
Just throughout the history of StarCraft, Terran has been seen as disfavored [in the late-game] in some matchups. So we’re trying to make it, maybe not 100% balanced or 50/50 balanced, but make it so that all races feel like they have a decent chance in the late-game depending on how they play. Our goal isn’t to ensure that each of the race’s final compositions can butt heads into each other and win 50% of the time.
We also want to encourage more interaction in the mid-to-late-game. We want to make it more skill-based. We want to make it so that your status going from the mid-game into the late-game matters a lot as well.
In addition to that, we want to bring back some of our old favorite unit compositions from the past. Muta/ling/baneling is one of the most famous unit compositions in SC2, and we saw that a lot in Wings of Liberty and Heart of the Swarm and even early Legacy of the Void, and it’s something we know fans really want to see back, so it's something we are working towards.
D: In the most recent balance update you reverted a proposed warp prism change from a previous patch. Originally the pick-up range was 6, then it was 5 and now it’s back to 6. The change arguably lowered the skill ceiling of the unit itself due to it being easier to pick-up from a distance, but it's been popular. Are you looking to add more interactions like that to the game?
K: I think the warp prism change is one of the most successful changes we’ve ever done in StarCraft II actually. One of the things it does and some of the feedback we get from pro players is that it really allows them to differentiate themselves. For example, I was watching  sOs vs Stats, where Stat warp prism micro was instrumental in helping him defend against sOs’ more aggressive tactics. I think Stats' warp prism micro is one of the most advanced and flashy in the world and I think that helps me identify with him and makes me be more of a fan of him and say “Stats is the warp prism guy” not just the standard macro toss, but he also has the best warp prism control in the world.
So to summarize, we think it increases the skill cap for StarCraft and it does it in a way which is very noticeable for the viewers back home.
D: Recently you announced a change to creep spread (increasing time of creep growth), which would slow the Zerg’s ability to spread creep. Tell us some of your thoughts behind that.
K: We’ve gotten a lot of feedback about creep spread before we announced the changes, as we were announcing the changes, and after we announced the changes. The feedback that we’ve gotten is that it’s not so much the size of the map but specifically how wide or narrow some of the passages are. For example, some maps have passage-ways which require one creep tumor to spread creep through, while others require two tumors. And we’ve gotten feedback from players that this is one of the key differentiators between how powerful creep can be on a given map. On Acid Plant you can spread creep in all three or four different directions. But at the same time it’s up to the other races to mitigate that creep spread. But they can usually limit creep spread in only one location at a time. So if they commit to stifling creep spread in one location it will just continue growing in the other.
D: How do you balance a unit that is extremely fun to play but also very strong/weak?
K: We look into how fun it is for the player using it, we also look at how fun it is for the player playing against it. If we feel it is incongruent, or there is not enough counter-play from the player on the receiving end, then we will look into tweaks. I think balance is not only about the win rate of each race or strategy, I think a lot of it is about how fun it is to play the game itself. After all StarCraft is a multiplayer game.
D: Have you considered adding new racial mechanics or expanding on the existing ones, such as regeneration during burrow?
K: I think in general our fans have come to expect what constitutes each race and the characteristics of each, so we are careful not to change those expectations too much. But something we’ve experimented relatively recently with is changing the unburrow speed of a lot of units. We think it’s a tweak that will not necessarily change the way the entire race feels and because in some ways we make it feel more "zergy" as you can have them pop out of nowhere. Those kinds of changes I think are minor enough and could potentially allow for a very interesting gameplay.
D: Some professional Korean players are near the age when they will have to start their military service. What steps are you taking to ensure a healthy competitive scene in Korea?
K: We can’t really speak as to the esports team that much, but what we can say is that we’ll keep the game nice and fresh, and updated with multiplayer balance patches up until when they’ll come back.
R: It’s great to see that a lot of pro players, as they finish their military service, start streaming again and start even competing again.
K: Yeah, we’ve seen PartinG and  TaeJa come back recently and I have heard rumors of other Korean players coming back, perhaps an American too.
D: What other games do you take inspiration from when designing SC2, either the multiplayer as a whole or the Co-op commanders?
K: I’m very familiar with RTS in general, but especially Warcraft 3. I played a ton of WC3 custom games and also helped work on them such as Footmen Frenzy and Castle Fight, so I have a lot of depth in that field. But I will say that one of my weaknesses as a game designer is that maybe I don’t have as much breath as some of the other game designers that are very fortunate to be working for Blizzard.
And now I am working on playing all of the best games of the year to find new inspiration for Co-op commanders as for Versus. Speaking of Versus, we do tend to get a lot of inspiration from Co-op as well. We try all these wacky, crazy abilities in Co-op and some of them we found are really fun and sometimes we think, hey maybe we can use this in multiplayer.
D: Leading into that question, what mechanics would you like to experiment with from other games, if any? Specifically something like cover — if you could implement that into SC2, how do you think that would work?
K: I know Ryan plays a wide variety of games and has a lot of experience with the different mechanics of other games.
R: My focus is primarily on the UI and user experience with the various systems that we have. What we are doing is often looking at other games and seeing the types of systems that they put in to support their product or to make it easier for the players to engage with the various types of gameplay that they have. And we’ll see what’s working and what’s not.
We actually have such a variety of games inside Blizzard and it’s great that I can actually, without even looking outside the company, reach out to various designers and ask them “why did you do this?” or “have you encountered this problem?”. And I can even go to lunch with them or just talk to them about their various experiences.
K: Specifically: we experimented with a new mechanic altogether of procedural generation and it’s something we’ve never done in StarCraft before. And for me, at least personally, a large part of that was due to inspiration from other Blizzard games such as the Dungeon realm of Hearthstone. So that’s just an example of a type of inspiration we receive from the other games.
As for your specific question regarding cover, cover is something found in other RTS and it is something usually map wide. We try to design commanders and maps separately, so maybe we can have a commander that can make his own cover, like maybe a forcefield mechanic, but that would be maybe more of a map design.
D: Do you plan to have more interactions between the units and the maps at some point?
K: Map design is something we are heavily looking into for the upcoming year. We want to add potentially new features or new options for map makers to put on the map. For example: on one map we experimented with neutral missile turrets and we got a lot of interesting and fun games out of those, maybe they could be a bit more refined but this is just a starting point and I am very excited for the future.
D: Could something like the lava mechanic make it into multiplayer?
R: We did have a map like that; I believe it won the Red Bull tournament.
D: What were your goals when you decided to turn to the F2P model for StarCraft II, and have you achieved those goals since making the switch?
R: So, primarily the goal for F2P was to get the game to be accessible for a large number of players. And it has absolutely been successful! We have had a lot of new players come into the game and they are still playing it. So F2P has been great, not just for the newer people playing it but I think it has helped on the esports side as well. I think a lot of the people that have come into F2P have become interested in WCS and I think that has been a pretty successful process.
K: And, just anecdotally, I was at WCS Austin to get player feedback, and watch some games of course. And I talked to some fans and I was like “So, how are you here?”, “What brought you here?”, “ How did you get into StarCraft?”. And I had two instances, one where the people had come in just from F2P, and the second instance where they had played StarCraft before, but because of F2P he was watching the games with his son. Just like the commercial we ran last year.
D: What paid content do you have planned for StarCraft II? What kind of extra free content?
K: Well of course we have the Zeratul Co-op commander which you can purchase pretty soon.
R: We’ve been running the Warchest program for the last couple of years, which is an event we do once or twice per year that allows players to pay to gain access to this event and play the game to unlock rewards such as unit skins. We are doing another Warchest hopefully before the end of the year, we’re trying to get it out in December. We’ll also be doing a few things differently with it, we’re putting in building skins in addition to the unit skins so players can complete their collection and have a total army converted to the “Special Forces” for Terran, the “Forged Protoss” which is basically the Tal’Darim for Protoss, and the “Simulant Zerg” which has been the super popular skin from Warchest 3 for which we’re adding the building skin now.
The other thing we are doing differently now is we’ll allow players to earn XP for the Warchest and unlock those rewards through Twitch. So they will be able to just watch StarCraft II content on Twitch, hopefully find a channel that has the extension in it, and they will be able to earn XP watching those and unlock the rewards. We are looking at the Warchest as a good long term way to support the game in addition to Co-op commanders, but we are also constantly updating the multiplayer for the game. We are looking into ways to improve the custom games and arcade as well as reward content that we give out in line with events. For example, during BlizzCon we have a bunch of drops and those kinds of things, we’ve recently also added race banners as a reward that makes it easy to have something we can hand out at events.
D: Do you see a situation where you won’t want to develop any more new Commanders for Co-op? In other words, what do you think is the “right” amount of Commanders for players?
K: So we don’t have anything to announce right now but we are definitely dedicated to creating new commanders in the future. We know there is definitely a huge appetite for new commanders with additional skill-sets, like the “prophetic vision” ability for Zeratul or Tychus’ hero focused style of play, but nothing additional for now.
D: Overwatch League, in terms of esports, is one of the most successful products in Blizzard’s repertoire. What kind of lessons are you drawing from Overwatch World League, and how would you implement those in SC2?
R: It’s difficult to speak for the esports team, but we do look at the OWL, we love what they are doing, it’s a really entertaining game. We don’t know exactly what the esports team is learning from that but from our side we are watching and seeing what lessons we can take from spectating and see if there is anything we can do to improve StarCraft.
D: Lastly, do you have any closing comments?
K: Please cheer for me. I promise to show good games!
R: WCS Finals are gonna be awesome!
D: Thank you both!
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You wanna bring back the Zealot Dragoon speshul tactiks?
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they have some ambitious goals for SC2. i'm glad they are not aiming low. 
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Nice interview, thank you! Sadly nothing new, since they did a lot of interviews and were on the "what's next for sc2" panel.
What I would really love is an interview with Kim Phan or someone else from the (sc2) esports team. A man can dream.
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WHO IS COMING BACK THOUGH THAT'S AMERICAN?!?!?!
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For instance one of our key goals for the upcoming year, which we are looking to reinforce with additional changes as needed, is that we are looking to equalize lategame for the various match-ups. We are not just looking into the lategame compositions and making sure they are equally viable, all with 50% win rates, and that they can butt heads into each other, but we’ve also taken a look into the mid-game as well. We want to make it more of a skill based thing and make it so that your status in the mid-game going into the late game matters.
this sounds interesting. Balance team used to have their "assymetrical balance" ideal.
Yeah, we’ve seen PartinG and TaeJa come back recently and I have heard rumors of other Korean players coming back, perhaps an American too.
IdrA hype!
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On November 14 2018 03:08 Jimmon wrote:
WHO IS COMING BACK THOUGH THAT'S AMERICAN?!?!?!
The memer inside me wants to say Polt since he's been playing ladder again and was nicknamed Captain America lol. Other than that? Well, it could be Idra, but idk y he would come back. Maybe Hitman? Other than him, I can't really think of anyone. Qxc makes board games now. LZGamer retired long ago and has no reason to come back. Most other notable players from NA like HuK are Canadian. So maybe Polt, Idra, or Hitman?
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On November 14 2018 03:48 StasisField wrote:Show nested quote +On November 14 2018 03:08 Jimmon wrote:
WHO IS COMING BACK THOUGH THAT'S AMERICAN?!?!?! The memer inside me wants to say Polt since he's been playing ladder again and was nicknamed Captain America lol. Other than that? Well, it could be Idra, but idk y he would come back. Maybe Hitman? Other than him, I can't really think of anyone. Qxc makes board games now. LZGamer retired long ago and has no reason to come back. Most other notable players from NA like HuK are Canadian. So maybe Polt, Idra, or Hitman?
just watch IdrA beat Serral in the next WCS finals.
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Canada8989 Posts
On November 14 2018 03:48 StasisField wrote:Show nested quote +On November 14 2018 03:08 Jimmon wrote:
WHO IS COMING BACK THOUGH THAT'S AMERICAN?!?!?! The memer inside me wants to say Polt since he's been playing ladder again and was nicknamed Captain America lol. Other than that? Well, it could be Idra, but idk y he would come back. Maybe Hitman? Other than him, I can't really think of anyone. Qxc makes board games now. LZGamer retired long ago and has no reason to come back. Most other notable players from NA like HuK are Canadian. So maybe Polt, Idra, or Hitman?
OMG please be Hitman that would be so funny.
But I was thinking of Vibe comming back full time
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On November 14 2018 03:48 StasisField wrote:Show nested quote +On November 14 2018 03:08 Jimmon wrote:
WHO IS COMING BACK THOUGH THAT'S AMERICAN?!?!?! The memer inside me wants to say Polt since he's been playing ladder again and was nicknamed Captain America lol. Other than that? Well, it could be Idra, but idk y he would come back. Maybe Hitman? Other than him, I can't really think of anyone. Qxc makes board games now. LZGamer retired long ago and has no reason to come back. Most other notable players from NA like HuK are Canadian. So maybe Polt, Idra, or Hitman?
Polt - American ... pick one
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On November 14 2018 03:51 Charoisaur wrote:Show nested quote +On November 14 2018 03:48 StasisField wrote:On November 14 2018 03:08 Jimmon wrote:
WHO IS COMING BACK THOUGH THAT'S AMERICAN?!?!?! The memer inside me wants to say Polt since he's been playing ladder again and was nicknamed Captain America lol. Other than that? Well, it could be Idra, but idk y he would come back. Maybe Hitman? Other than him, I can't really think of anyone. Qxc makes board games now. LZGamer retired long ago and has no reason to come back. Most other notable players from NA like HuK are Canadian. So maybe Polt, Idra, or Hitman? just watch IdrA beat Serral in the next WCS finals.
Inb4 sOs hallucs him out in the semis.
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On November 14 2018 03:10 Charoisaur wrote:Show nested quote +For instance one of our key goals for the upcoming year, which we are looking to reinforce with additional changes as needed, is that we are looking to equalize lategame for the various match-ups. We are not just looking into the lategame compositions and making sure they are equally viable, all with 50% win rates, and that they can butt heads into each other, but we’ve also taken a look into the mid-game as well. We want to make it more of a skill based thing and make it so that your status in the mid-game going into the late game matters.
this sounds interesting. Balance team used to have their "assymetrical balance" ideal. Show nested quote +Yeah, we’ve seen PartinG and TaeJa come back recently and I have heard rumors of other Korean players coming back, perhaps an American too. IdrA hype!
lol i really don't think there is any chance that IdrA will ever come back, I would be way more excited to have Polt back than any of those other na players
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Nothing necessarily new or groundbreaking in this interview like i had hoped, but anytime we hear anything from the folks at Blizzard thats a good thing.
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i would love to see qxc, minigun or goswser come back
maybe xenocider?! he's still pretty young
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More (mini) campaigns please, take my moneys! Must be plenty of stuff that can be done there to milk the community. I want a Tychus campaign for Christmas, a Stukov campaign for Easter, a Vorazun campaign for midsummer, a Zagara campaign for Halloween or something 
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United States33347 Posts
Made a correction to the answer on the current state of balance, as the meaning partially changed during the transcription/editing process.
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On November 14 2018 03:51 Charoisaur wrote:Show nested quote +On November 14 2018 03:48 StasisField wrote:On November 14 2018 03:08 Jimmon wrote:
WHO IS COMING BACK THOUGH THAT'S AMERICAN?!?!?! The memer inside me wants to say Polt since he's been playing ladder again and was nicknamed Captain America lol. Other than that? Well, it could be Idra, but idk y he would come back. Maybe Hitman? Other than him, I can't really think of anyone. Qxc makes board games now. LZGamer retired long ago and has no reason to come back. Most other notable players from NA like HuK are Canadian. So maybe Polt, Idra, or Hitman? just watch IdrA beat Serral in the next WCS finals.
More like IdrA leaving won games and lose in the semis despite looking really good
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On November 14 2018 06:08 Rob-Zero wrote:Show nested quote +On November 14 2018 03:51 Charoisaur wrote:On November 14 2018 03:48 StasisField wrote:On November 14 2018 03:08 Jimmon wrote:
WHO IS COMING BACK THOUGH THAT'S AMERICAN?!?!?! The memer inside me wants to say Polt since he's been playing ladder again and was nicknamed Captain America lol. Other than that? Well, it could be Idra, but idk y he would come back. Maybe Hitman? Other than him, I can't really think of anyone. Qxc makes board games now. LZGamer retired long ago and has no reason to come back. Most other notable players from NA like HuK are Canadian. So maybe Polt, Idra, or Hitman? just watch IdrA beat Serral in the next WCS finals. More like IdrA leaving won games and lose in the semis despite looking really good
Right, and then he picks up his keyboard and whacks it over the head of his opponent when he comes for the handshake.
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Swarmhosts/Ravager.... im glad they brought this beautiful composition "back from the past". Or what about disruptors annihilating everything in a matter of seconds.
So much fun gameplay in lotv.
...
User was warned for this post.
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bringing back the meme freedom circle is also a good option tho.the inarguably fact that no amount of terran comprehensive buffs could help terran's pass mid game after dumpstering this unit is enough to tell how important this meme unit was
you guys give it time and it might replace siege tank as an iconic terran unit
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Still sad that they won't do new campaigns 
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gimme back my 4M vs muta ling bling
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Nice interview. Bringing back muta/ling/bane is definitely a good idea.
I am not sure if anyone really wants to see swarmhosts though, or stalker disruptor...
Colossus on the other hand could use some love to not be useless, I am not sure how much the turret tracking really does if anything at all.
on the other hand I think zealots should get an extra armor and adepts one extra range so that protoss can go allout gateway push
adepts and zealots are pretty much hardcountered by widow mines and banes anyway.
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I remember alt tabbing out of hour long mech games to ask how to kill mech vs monk on TL ahahahaha
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Ummm... I miss me some good ol Archon Toilet!! Nothing like seeing an entire army disappear in the blink of an eye.
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On November 14 2018 09:36 Freeborn wrote:on the other hand I think zealots should get an extra armor and adepts one extra range so that protoss can go allout gateway push adepts and zealots are pretty much hardcountered by widow mines and banes anyway.
?
you think adepts and zealots are TOO WEAK and other races shouldn't be able to counter aggressive low tech play with splash damage? what? when adepts were stronger every game was an unwatchable 2 base allin, and zealots are already a core unit with massive harass strength and perfectly respectable main army strength considering they are mineral only. you literally can already take games off of a terran going like 10 gate stalker zealot.
can't agree with you here at all. your suggestions would break the game in favor of P, and i am a protoss player myself.
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Awesome interview. Excited for the future.
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On November 14 2018 06:47 Siegetank_Dieter1 wrote:
Swarmhosts/Ravager.... im glad they brought this beautiful composition "back from the past". Or what about disruptors annihilating everything in a matter of seconds.
So much fun gameplay in lotv.
...
It's been around 1-2, maybe 3 months or so since any big patch was announced/discussed, and swarmhosts versus mech are at this point purposely left out of any discussions involving Blizzard? it seems really shady that the unit is continuously never brought up despite being the most problematic unit in the history of the game, and it still currently is.
Great if they are going to "keep an eye" on things, but they always say this every year, while leaving things like swarmhsots in the game in their current form is kind of a slap in the face.
I'd like everyone here, reddit, etc. to open a constructive discussion about swarmhosts, and how they can be addressed - because they NEED to be addressed.
This unit is not fun to play versus, it takes zero skill to use, and it is heavily disrupting the state of mech/Terran for the last year and a half.
Many players have been waiting for a fix and balance patch for over a year now so we can actually play Starcraft 2 again versus our opponent's, instead of versus free creep waves.
Like...is there ANY WORD at all from Blizzard about addressing swarmhosts vs mech? There's so many ways this could be fixed by making swarmhosts light + more expensive, or simply making it so locusts can't fly, or increasing their supply even further to something like 6 so that you're unable to make them as your entire army.
For those of you unaware - for the last year or so, ever since the swarmhosts changes to their price making them half as cheap + locusts being able to fly, if you go mech vs Zerg a Zerg can make 20 swarmhosts everygame with hydras that are basically untouchable while banking resources.
Please open a discussion about swarmhosts.
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Watching mech players who are actually pretty good, they still seem to win against players who use swarmhosts by moving out of their base and attacking so they seem fine to me.
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we want to bring back some of our old favorite unit compositions from the past
Time to bring back broodlord infestor 
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nice job nerfing proxy btw
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On November 14 2018 11:45 ZigguratOfUr wrote:Show nested quote +we want to bring back some of our old favorite unit compositions from the past Time to bring back broodlord infestor
No no, muta ling bling!
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There have been some awesome games with early nydus+swarmhost play in the past. I think that is the kind of unit that swarm hosts should be, or as a kind of lategame stalling mechanism a la Life vs Zest 80 minutes edition. They shouldn't be viable as late-game offensive artillary to whittle down a 4 base Terran with little counterplay.
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On November 14 2018 11:01 avilo wrote:Show nested quote +On November 14 2018 06:47 Siegetank_Dieter1 wrote:
Swarmhosts/Ravager.... im glad they brought this beautiful composition "back from the past". Or what about disruptors annihilating everything in a matter of seconds.
So much fun gameplay in lotv.
... wall of text
without swarmhosts its too hard to play against people who just camp to 2/1 mech and push with no interaction all game
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in context: David Kim is back. 
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On November 14 2018 12:52 Scarlett` wrote:Show nested quote +On November 14 2018 11:01 avilo wrote:On November 14 2018 06:47 Siegetank_Dieter1 wrote:
Swarmhosts/Ravager.... im glad they brought this beautiful composition "back from the past". Or what about disruptors annihilating everything in a matter of seconds.
So much fun gameplay in lotv.
... wall of text without swarmhosts its too hard to play against people who just camp to 2/1 mech and push with no interaction all game
Not really. You can be a progamer and still be incredibly biased and not know good game design.
Having 20 free swarmhosts that are unattackable and constantly send league of legends creep waves at the enemy base is the definition of uninteractive. The only reason mech players camp in the first place is because they're end up forced to camp because of units like swarmhosts/vipers, which hard counter mech.
No one is saying swarmhosts are unbeatable, because they aren't. They're just probably one of the worst units in the game to play versus because they fundamentally break the rules of the game - they create free minerals and gas every 30 sec.
You'd probably agree that 30 ravens spamming infinte free seeker bombs are just as bad as swarmhosts, yet those were deleted from the game via the seeker nerfs, Zerg's equivalent energy unit deserves the same treatment. Otherwise it's just anti-Terran bias in terms of game balance.
There's been a consistent history with balancing, that if it's Terran, it needs to be nerfed out of the game. But if it's Zerg, it's completely fine we have mech vs swarmhost games where there's 20 swarmhosts being built with zero interaction and really bad gameplay.
Swarmhosts need to be adjusted, and that is a hard fact.
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China6329 Posts
So monk is now the new David Kim?
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K: I think the warp prism change is one of the most successful changes we’ve ever done in StarCraft II actually.
considering the release of the headless client for linux and rumors the deepmind team is tackling sc2, i feel like this exact mechanic should be changed for a real comparison between AI vs human abilities regarding RTS.
it's way too easy to code the dodge of individual attacks with blink/warp prism/overlord/medivacs and a human could never achieve that accuracy. these mechanics may be flashy for human vs human matches, but i cannot imagine a human beating a very dumb program, which manages to dodge pretty much every missile fired towards its units.
but this is a simple mechanical problem and has nothing to do with intelligence or decision making.
this "instant warp/blink" is way too prone to abuse via code. it maybe is a bit early to talk about these problems, but here are some ideas i came up with to try to solve it:
* add a delay to blink and loading into the warp prism similar to the recall ability. (just shorter delay, and/or make it distance dependent)
* let the medivac and overlord land similar to the viking for it to be able to load units into it.
this would weaken the mechanic (and for terrans the race as a whole a lot) and should make it impossible to dodge missiles with it while leaving it in the game for tactical purposes.
another thing - thou this might be just personal experience - while i love the game sc2, i feel the UI/controls are very lacking. it feels like playing golf with chopsticks. i would love if we would be allowed to use our own home-build clients for ladder/tournements at some point (yes, yes. i'm a script kiddy ;3)
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On November 14 2018 19:17 digmouse wrote:
So monk is now the new David Kim?
Yes.
If someone has a good balance suggestion, just PM him
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David Kim. I missed you. Bring back my good old days in HotS.
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I think the biggest problem with Swarm Hosts is that they are to fast, they are faster than Reapers on creep (5.37 vs 5.25)! Helions (and boosted Medivacs) are the only Terran unit that can catch up to them which is ridiculous, considering that they do no damage to them. Reduce their speed a small amount so the new Cyclone and Speed Banshees can chase them, which is already hard vs Hydra.
I at least find them impossible to chase down, which is why they are so frustrating to play against. I feel like i can't punish their locust down time.
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On November 14 2018 12:52 Scarlett` wrote:Show nested quote +On November 14 2018 11:01 avilo wrote:On November 14 2018 06:47 Siegetank_Dieter1 wrote:
Swarmhosts/Ravager.... im glad they brought this beautiful composition "back from the past". Or what about disruptors annihilating everything in a matter of seconds.
So much fun gameplay in lotv.
... wall of text without swarmhosts its too hard to play against people who just camp to 2/1 mech and push with no interaction all game
I agree that mech could potentially become too strong vs zerg, if you would only remove swarmhosts and be done with it.
But swarmhosts on the other hand are too strong as well and shut down mech too efficient. My point is that swarmhosts are a terrible unit from a design perspective. If you look at how swarmhosts work, its just not fun, not interesting. I know someone may feel different, but thats just my subjective opinion.
In my opinion it would be the best to either remove or redesign the unit so that both players have more options to actually interact with it in a way that feels fair.
If zerg players then struggle vs mech, you could still adjust numbers. You can always tweak things. Balance is a numbers game.
I'm convinced that there is no need to have such a weird ridiculous unit in the game. If zerg struggles without or with a changed swarmhosts, then give zerg compensation in other areas.
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On November 14 2018 03:08 Jimmon wrote:
WHO IS COMING BACK THOUGH THAT'S AMERICAN?!?!?!
Idra
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Nerfing creep spread nerfs heavily swarm host. Also swarm host map aka dreamcatcher is no more. Don't forget these when you say that swarm hosts are untouched
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I think zerg players learned to use SHs to the point where they became oppressive in both ZvMech and ZvP (in some maps), it needs to be addressed.
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On November 15 2018 00:37 MarcDaKind wrote:
I think the biggest problem with Swarm Hosts is that they are to fast, they are faster than Reapers on creep (5.37 vs 5.25)! Helions (and boosted Medivacs) are the only Terran unit that can catch up to them which is ridiculous, considering that they do no damage to them. Reduce their speed a small amount so the new Cyclone and Speed Banshees can chase them, which is already hard vs Hydra.
I at least find them impossible to chase down, which is why they are so frustrating to play against. I feel like i can't punish their locust down time.
one post account who support avilo, how cute!
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On November 15 2018 00:37 MarcDaKind wrote:
I think the biggest problem with Swarm Hosts is that they are to fast, they are faster than Reapers on creep (5.37 vs 5.25)! Helions (and boosted Medivacs) are the only Terran unit that can catch up to them which is ridiculous, considering that they do no damage to them. Reduce their speed a small amount so the new Cyclone and Speed Banshees can chase them, which is already hard vs Hydra.
I at least find them impossible to chase down, which is why they are so frustrating to play against. I feel like i can't punish their locust down time.
this is a very good first post! and an anti-swarmhost post by a terran player.
"things that make you go hmmmm...."
anyhow, i think we need to wait and see if the slower creep growing effectively nerfs the Swarmhost. If it does not do so i then agree that a small decrease in the swarmhosts speed on creep is a good nerf with which to experiment. its supposed to be a siege unit after all.
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On November 15 2018 02:45 polpot wrote:Show nested quote +On November 15 2018 00:37 MarcDaKind wrote:
I think the biggest problem with Swarm Hosts is that they are to fast, they are faster than Reapers on creep (5.37 vs 5.25)! Helions (and boosted Medivacs) are the only Terran unit that can catch up to them which is ridiculous, considering that they do no damage to them. Reduce their speed a small amount so the new Cyclone and Speed Banshees can chase them, which is already hard vs Hydra.
I at least find them impossible to chase down, which is why they are so frustrating to play against. I feel like i can't punish their locust down time. one post account who support avilo, how cute!
Hey, I dont really care for Avilo, little to toxic for my taste. But I still think the SH is to fast, just my opinion though.
There always has to be a first post when you are new to a forum. Got here when I saw this post on reddit, and use the wiki all the time when theory crafting.
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Terran have always been a slower more campy race since BW. The reason is that their units are slower and less dynamic. The reason for that is lore related, loosely speaking. Terran defend and slowly inch out while upgrading their insanely strong immobile mech army. Vultures/hellions are used to deal damage and distract (as well as soak damage) while the main mech army prepares to end the game. Bio terran is more active because they are faster.
Zerg should feel lucky that their units permit them to be dynamic, active, and siege/defend into the lategame with several different tech options. Just comparing sc2 balance to bw accentuates the issues.
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Canada8989 Posts
On November 15 2018 06:43 Rodya wrote:
Terran have always been a slower more campy race since BW. The reason is that their units are slower and less dynamic. The reason for that is lore related, loosely speaking. Terran defend and slowly inch out while upgrading their insanely strong immobile mech army. Vultures/hellions are used to deal damage and distract (as well as soak damage) while the main mech army prepares to end the game. Bio terran is more active because they are faster.
Zerg should feel lucky that their units permit them to be dynamic, active, and siege/defend into the lategame with several different tech options. Just comparing sc2 balance to bw accentuates the issues.
Terran isn't especially campy in SC2, first obviously because bio has been the more popular meta in SC2 and is a resolutely aggressive play style and I feel that libs did an ok job at making it possible to transition from bio into the late game. And it's quite possible in SC2 to play aggressive mech composition (the good old 160 supply push for example), it's usually not the best but you can do it.
Protoss is, and has almost always been, the campy/defensive race in SC2, they are the one that are the most fragile in the early game and that scale up the best with patient defensive play against aggressive opponent. Sc2 mech play is defensive and slow but it's not really a matter of surviving until your mech army is ready for the late game more about getting to the late game in a dominant position and play from there. It's pretty rare that you kill a mech player before he has a fourth, it can happen of course, but usually it's more a game of slowing the mech player down while yourself transitioning into the late game faster (viper-Blord-Tempest-BC-Ranged libs...) and winning there.
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On November 15 2018 07:06 Nakajin wrote:Show nested quote +On November 15 2018 06:43 Rodya wrote:
Terran have always been a slower more campy race since BW. The reason is that their units are slower and less dynamic. The reason for that is lore related, loosely speaking. Terran defend and slowly inch out while upgrading their insanely strong immobile mech army. Vultures/hellions are used to deal damage and distract (as well as soak damage) while the main mech army prepares to end the game. Bio terran is more active because they are faster.
Zerg should feel lucky that their units permit them to be dynamic, active, and siege/defend into the lategame with several different tech options. Just comparing sc2 balance to bw accentuates the issues. Terran isn't especially campy in SC2, first obviously because bio has been the more popular meta in SC2 and is a resolutely aggressive play style and I feel that libs did an ok job at making it possible to transition from bio into the late game. And it's quite possible in SC2 to play aggressive mech composition (the good old 160 supply push for example), it's usually not the best but you can do it. Protoss is, and has almost always been, the campy/defensive race in SC2, they are the one that are the most fragile in the early game and that scale up the best with patient defensive play against aggressive opponent. Sc2 mech play is defensive and slow but it's not really a matter of surviving until your mech army is ready for the late game more about getting to the late game in a dominant position and play from there. It's pretty rare that you kill a mech player before he has a fourth, it can happen of course, but usually it's more a game of slowing the mech player down while yourself transitioning into the late game faster (viper-Blord-Tempest-BC-Ranged libs...) and winning there.
Rodya's entire post is some incoherently made attempt at drawing a parallel between 2 diametrically diffeerent races in 2 diametrically different games.
While also saying that "the issues" (whatever they seem to be), can be seen while comparing the balance of Starcraft 2 to the balance of a game where there was a clear hierarchy of Terran > Zerg > Protoss for over a decade.
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On November 15 2018 01:13 Siegetank_Dieter1 wrote:Show nested quote +On November 14 2018 12:52 Scarlett` wrote:On November 14 2018 11:01 avilo wrote:On November 14 2018 06:47 Siegetank_Dieter1 wrote:
Swarmhosts/Ravager.... im glad they brought this beautiful composition "back from the past". Or what about disruptors annihilating everything in a matter of seconds.
So much fun gameplay in lotv.
... wall of text without swarmhosts its too hard to play against people who just camp to 2/1 mech and push with no interaction all game I agree that mech could potentially become too strong vs zerg, if you would only remove swarmhosts and be done with it. But swarmhosts on the other hand are too strong as well and shut down mech too efficient. My point is that swarmhosts are a terrible unit from a design perspective. If you look at how swarmhosts work, its just not fun, not interesting. I know someone may feel different, but thats just my subjective opinion. In my opinion it would be the best to either remove or redesign the unit so that both players have more options to actually interact with it in a way that feels fair. If zerg players then struggle vs mech, you could still adjust numbers. You can always tweak things. Balance is a numbers game. I'm convinced that there is no need to have such a weird ridiculous unit in the game. If zerg struggles without or with a changed swarmhosts, then give zerg compensation in other areas.
LOL its not like pre-hive zerg have no options to slow down ground mech reaching thier peak and death push...
swarm hosts option is just cheap,less effort and guarantee a hive stage along with one billion naturals behind
i would love to see a non-swarm host zerg race get carted by 200 supply death push and one billion yummy delicious whine topics and then we can start discuss how to nerf ground mech but that toxic unit named swarm host needs to GO
but i hardly believe zeg players can't figure out because otherwise they all should 've switched to terran mech in HOTS because zeg is unplayable...
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On November 15 2018 07:06 Nakajin wrote:Show nested quote +On November 15 2018 06:43 Rodya wrote:
Terran have always been a slower more campy race since BW. The reason is that their units are slower and less dynamic. The reason for that is lore related, loosely speaking. Terran defend and slowly inch out while upgrading their insanely strong immobile mech army. Vultures/hellions are used to deal damage and distract (as well as soak damage) while the main mech army prepares to end the game. Bio terran is more active because they are faster.
Zerg should feel lucky that their units permit them to be dynamic, active, and siege/defend into the lategame with several different tech options. Just comparing sc2 balance to bw accentuates the issues. Terran isn't especially campy in SC2, first obviously because bio has been the more popular meta in SC2 and is a resolutely aggressive play style and I feel that libs did an ok job at making it possible to transition from bio into the late game. And it's quite possible in SC2 to play aggressive mech composition (the good old 160 supply push for example), it's usually not the best but you can do it. Protoss is, and has almost always been, the campy/defensive race in SC2, they are the one that are the most fragile in the early game and that scale up the best with patient defensive play against aggressive opponent. Sc2 mech play is defensive and slow but it's not really a matter of surviving until your mech army is ready for the late game more about getting to the late game in a dominant position and play from there. It's pretty rare that you kill a mech player before he has a fourth, it can happen of course, but usually it's more a game of slowing the mech player down while yourself transitioning into the late game faster (viper-Blord-Tempest-BC-Ranged libs...) and winning there.
yeah terran need to move out at some point eventually ...no one is gonna let a fuck ton of tanks and hellbats sitting in thier base for years when all of those bloodlords and golden armadas are about to knock thier ass
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I think David Kim's been doing a great job recently. Thanks for supplying this interview.
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On November 15 2018 07:06 Nakajin wrote:Show nested quote +On November 15 2018 06:43 Rodya wrote:
Terran have always been a slower more campy race since BW. The reason is that their units are slower and less dynamic. The reason for that is lore related, loosely speaking. Terran defend and slowly inch out while upgrading their insanely strong immobile mech army. Vultures/hellions are used to deal damage and distract (as well as soak damage) while the main mech army prepares to end the game. Bio terran is more active because they are faster.
Zerg should feel lucky that their units permit them to be dynamic, active, and siege/defend into the lategame with several different tech options. Just comparing sc2 balance to bw accentuates the issues. Terran isn't especially campy in SC2, first obviously because bio has been the more popular meta in SC2 and is a resolutely aggressive play style and I feel that libs did an ok job at making it possible to transition from bio into the late game. And it's quite possible in SC2 to play aggressive mech composition (the good old 160 supply push for example), it's usually not the best but you can do it. Protoss is, and has almost always been, the campy/defensive race in SC2, they are the one that are the most fragile in the early game and that scale up the best with patient defensive play against aggressive opponent. Sc2 mech play is defensive and slow but it's not really a matter of surviving until your mech army is ready for the late game more about getting to the late game in a dominant position and play from there. It's pretty rare that you kill a mech player before he has a fourth, it can happen of course, but usually it's more a game of slowing the mech player down while yourself transitioning into the late game faster (viper-Blord-Tempest-BC-Ranged libs...) and winning there.
This is true. Mech (outside of the mass Raven eras) has always been a timingpush-based composition and not a turtle-to-lategame composition.
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On November 15 2018 00:37 MarcDaKind wrote:
I think the biggest problem with Swarm Hosts is that they are to fast, they are faster than Reapers on creep (5.37 vs 5.25)! Helions (and boosted Medivacs) are the only Terran unit that can catch up to them which is ridiculous, considering that they do no damage to them. Reduce their speed a small amount so the new Cyclone and Speed Banshees can chase them, which is already hard vs Hydra.
I at least find them impossible to chase down, which is why they are so frustrating to play against. I feel like i can't punish their locust down time.
Your speed numbers are wrong. Swarm Hosts move at 4.095 on creep, which is considerably slower than stim bio and the new-old Cyclone.
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On November 15 2018 08:05 Athenau wrote:Show nested quote +On November 15 2018 00:37 MarcDaKind wrote:
I think the biggest problem with Swarm Hosts is that they are to fast, they are faster than Reapers on creep (5.37 vs 5.25)! Helions (and boosted Medivacs) are the only Terran unit that can catch up to them which is ridiculous, considering that they do no damage to them. Reduce their speed a small amount so the new Cyclone and Speed Banshees can chase them, which is already hard vs Hydra.
I at least find them impossible to chase down, which is why they are so frustrating to play against. I feel like i can't punish their locust down time. Your speed numbers are wrong. Swarm Hosts move at 4.095 on creep, which is considerably slower than stim bio and the new-old Cyclone.
Then the information on the wiki is outdated:  Swarm Host (Legacy of the Void)
But if I do the math, (1.3 * 3.15 = 4.095) you should be correct. Good news I guess. They do feel super hard to chase down though, but the new patch might help with that!
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On November 14 2018 03:08 Jimmon wrote:
WHO IS COMING BACK THOUGH THAT'S AMERICAN?!?!?!
Select comes to the top of my mind, I wonder if he a naturalized American citizen because Korea doesnt allow duel citizenship.
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On November 14 2018 03:08 Jimmon wrote:
WHO IS COMING BACK THOUGH THAT'S AMERICAN?!?!?!
Probably Stephano, the greatest NA player to have ever lived.
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On November 15 2018 01:13 Siegetank_Dieter1 wrote:Show nested quote +On November 14 2018 12:52 Scarlett` wrote:On November 14 2018 11:01 avilo wrote:On November 14 2018 06:47 Siegetank_Dieter1 wrote:
Swarmhosts/Ravager.... im glad they brought this beautiful composition "back from the past". Or what about disruptors annihilating everything in a matter of seconds.
So much fun gameplay in lotv.
... wall of text without swarmhosts its too hard to play against people who just camp to 2/1 mech and push with no interaction all game I agree that mech could potentially become too strong vs zerg, if you would only remove swarmhosts and be done with it. But swarmhosts on the other hand are too strong as well and shut down mech too efficient. My point is that swarmhosts are a terrible unit from a design perspective. If you look at how swarmhosts work, its just not fun, not interesting. I know someone may feel different, but thats just my subjective opinion. In my opinion it would be the best to either remove or redesign the unit so that both players have more options to actually interact with it in a way that feels fair. If zerg players then struggle vs mech, you could still adjust numbers. You can always tweak things. Balance is a numbers game. I'm convinced that there is no need to have such a weird ridiculous unit in the game. If zerg struggles without or with a changed swarmhosts, then give zerg compensation in other areas.
Zerg is completely fine without using swarmhosts versus mech. I played Zerg for 3 months, was able to beat Terran grandmasters without even using vipers in half of my games, and purposely played without swarmhosts.
Although...to be fair, i have thousands of Terran mech games from the Terran perspective...maybe that's why i found it extremely easy and favorable to play versus mech Terrans? I actually liked when Terrans went mech instead of bio, the game was 10x easier for me as Zerg.
It's easily do-able, it's just more difficult than making 20 swarmhosts, swarmhosts are basically a crutch unit because they're overtuned.
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Bringing back old compositions? Would be nice to see mech being viable especially in tvp like they promised would happen for hots and lotv beta phases and then forgot about it, i guess the big reason there is the majority of people who don't play mech themselves hate mech, and most of the people who used to play it have since moved on, so there's no one left to ask for it.
"K: We look into how fun it is for the player using it, we also look at how fun it is for the player playing against it"
Mech needs changes that make people not hate playing against it if it's ever gonna become a thing.
Then again, apparently people have tons of fun playing against things like carriers,disruptors, storm,tempests or swarm hosts and vipers. I know I had fun using mass raven for 8 years before seeker was removed.
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On November 15 2018 12:13 Assaulter wrote:
Bringing back old compositions? Would be nice to see mech being viable especially in tvp like they promised would happen for hots and lotv beta phases and then forgot about it, i guess the big reason there is the majority of people who don't play mech themselves hate mech, and most of the people who used to play it have since moved on, so there's no one left to ask for it.
"K: We look into how fun it is for the player using it, we also look at how fun it is for the player playing against it"
Mech needs changes that make people not hate playing against it if it's ever gonna become a thing.
Then again, apparently people have tons of fun playing against things like carriers,disruptors, storm,tempests or swarm hosts and vipers. I know I had fun using mass raven for 8 years before seeker was removed.
the fact is as long as there are ways to use mobile units to harass mech and poke weak points, according to a shocking percentage of mech players this is "imbalance." because of their game philosophy mech-only players think it's normal and fair that if you set up enough tanks, turrets and planetaries at the proper timings you should essentially just be invulnerable and the game should "skip cutscene" to mass lategame sky armies, because that literally is the type of game they prefer to play.
i'm not even being sarcastic or suggesting that mech players are dumb or wrong - just that they're trying to play a slower-paced and less stressful version of SC2, whereas many of the rest of us prefer for things to actually occur in the game. that's fine for them, and everyone is entitled to enjoy different things about games. we're already aware that certain prominent mech advocates think their specific way of playing should somehow naturally result in them winning WCS. but giving mech enthusiasts what they want changes the shape of the game in a way that i frankly think sucks dick, and i'm definitely not the only one.
you can go DTs or 2 base adepts or baneling bust or mass muta or burrow roach and win games that way, but none of those things are overwhelmingly standard and all of them have counterplay that shuts them down. for the life of me i don't understand why mech-only players think mech has to be anything more than that: a pocket strategy that can work but isn't high-percentage in all cases. mech isn't a race, so its matchup winrates mean nothing. you can simply choose to play properly instead of playing mech. it's like if printf spent 8 years coming to TL and posting novels about how the game doesn't work right because he can't beat high level players with cannon rushes every single game. just do something else!
imagine if zergs simply demanded that infestor ling midgames be viable in all matchups or if protoss players insisted on playing immortal/void ray every game and having a 50% WR with it. suddenly you have to balance not just 3 matchups per race but an infinite combination of playstyles just to make everyone feel special for their preference. pretty soon balance falls apart and we just have another mediocre RTS.
and no, "the siege tank is an iconic unit" isn't a real argument, and "factory units should be used together" is also not a real argument
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On November 15 2018 12:47 brickrd wrote:Show nested quote +On November 15 2018 12:13 Assaulter wrote:
Bringing back old compositions? Would be nice to see mech being viable especially in tvp like they promised would happen for hots and lotv beta phases and then forgot about it, i guess the big reason there is the majority of people who don't play mech themselves hate mech, and most of the people who used to play it have since moved on, so there's no one left to ask for it.
"K: We look into how fun it is for the player using it, we also look at how fun it is for the player playing against it"
Mech needs changes that make people not hate playing against it if it's ever gonna become a thing.
Then again, apparently people have tons of fun playing against things like carriers,disruptors, storm,tempests or swarm hosts and vipers. I know I had fun using mass raven for 8 years before seeker was removed. the fact is as long as there are ways to use mobile units to harass mech and poke weak points, according to a shocking percentage of mech players this is "imbalance." because of their game philosophy mech-only players think it's normal and fair that if you set up enough tanks, turrets and planetaries at the proper timings you should essentially just be invulnerable and the game should "skip cutscene" to mass lategame sky armies, because that literally is the type of game they prefer to play. i'm not even being sarcastic or suggesting that mech players are dumb or wrong - just that they're trying to play a slower-paced and less stressful version of SC2, whereas many of the rest of us prefer for things to actually occur in the game. that's fine for them, and everyone is entitled to enjoy different things about games. we're already aware that certain prominent mech advocates think their specific way of playing should somehow naturally result in them winning WCS. but giving mech enthusiasts what they want changes the shape of the game in a way that i frankly think sucks dick, and i'm definitely not the only one. you can go DTs or 2 base adepts or baneling bust or mass muta or burrow roach and win games that way, but none of those things are overwhelmingly standard and all of them have counterplay that shuts them down. for the life of me i don't understand why mech-only players think mech has to be anything more than that: a pocket strategy that can work but isn't high-percentage in all cases. mech isn't a race, so its matchup winrates mean nothing. you can simply choose to play properly instead of playing mech. it's like if printf spent 8 years coming to TL and posting novels about how the game doesn't work right because he can't beat high level players with cannon rushes every single game. just do something else! imagine if zergs simply demanded that infestor ling midgames be viable in all matchups or if protoss players insisted on playing immortal/void ray every game and having a 50% WR with it. suddenly you have to balance not just 3 matchups per race but an infinite combination of playstyles just to make everyone feel special for their preference. pretty soon balance falls apart and we just have another mediocre RTS. and no, "the siege tank is an iconic unit" isn't a real argument, and "factory units should be used together" is also not a real argument
"the fact is as long as there are ways to use mobile units to harass mech and poke weak points, according to a shocking percentage of mech players this is "imbalance."
I don't think so, using mobile units to harass mech and poke weak points? yeah, GREAT that's exactly what literally everyone WANTS to happen when u play mech! And it even used to happen in WoL tvz with mutas harass, runby etc and tvt against bio with medivac drops and bio being more mobile in general. Now instead u don't have any of that and u just have the other race turtling too and beating you that way anyways, even though it's supposed to be what mech is strong at. I.e building swarmhosts and carriers to beat mech, u dont need to do any harass with other units at all. I have no clue how you could miss this without being disingenuous. Oh wait, did you mean to say swarmhosts are "mobile units that harass openings"? I honestly didn't realise at first. I guess you got me there, i think it's imbalance.
You saying you don't like mech is exactly why i made the point that it needs to be changed to be made more fun to play against so we don't have people like you saying "but giving mech enthusiasts what they want changes the shape of the game in a way that i frankly think sucks dick, and i'm definitely not the only one."
Mech doesn't HAVE to be a "boring turtle" type of playstyle, but it HAS been because it's too hard to move out if u also don't want to throw away your late game. This needs to get changed so people aren't forced to turtle as much and there's actual interaction happening in-game between players and there's more opportunites for BOTH players to actually do something.
Your other paragraphs where you liken playing mech to cannon rushing and various other cheese builds and don't see why it's distinctly different... Dunno what I can say to that, besides that it just shows you probably haven't been a starcraft fan for very long. Won't argue those.
"you can simply choose to play properly instead of playing mech" Lol that's exactly why we are making these posts, so that playing mech can become a part of "playing properly".
"and no, "the siege tank is an iconic unit" isn't a real argument"
Literally the only reason blizzard gave everyone for when they brought back the Carrier after saying it was going to get removed and people complained because it was an "iconic unit" So it sure does seem to work. But that's not my argument or what I necessarily believe. And in this very interview we are discussing, they are admitting they are working to bring back muta/ling/bling because the community wants this iconic playstyle/ unit composition back, which is the only reason i ever brought up mech in the first place.
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when we will get a swarmhosts buff? swarmhosts cooldown is so bad, horrible unit!
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Please make mech viable TvP!!!
The recent balance patches seem they will REALLY help in that aspect though with the huge AA buffs and carrier rework/nerf, etc.
Excited if this is a goal of theirs! Idc about "viable in pro level", I was very happy with mech tvp in HotS, it worked totally fine for me on ladder. Only got a bit tough lategame when toss could have tempest + strong ground comp like immortal/HT which forced me to also split my army into ground and air, which means mech is weak on the ground cus splash isn't as relevant.
Got sad that when i tried to get back into lotv in the last year or so, mech tvp feels soo hard due to having very little stuff when trying to get a third base. Adept attacks and WP harass feels so difficult to defend against as mech. And then there were the carriers that felt too powerful, but they are addressed now. Curious how things will play out from here!
Also WOW monk is with blizz now? Is he the lead sc2 balancer like david kim?
Also, if he only joined recently, who was the lead balancer before monk? After david left, wasn't there like 2-3 years in LotV? Was there a singular lead balancer or just a team? Thanks i'm super curious
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Edit: Just skimmed some other comments in this thread. I am NOT advocating for turtle mech that auto wins with decent macro. I always mech. I LOVE the games where the opponent urgently try to rush me down, and I am struggling to position everything right and stay in the game. It's very intense and dynamic. It's very different from the feel of something more mobile like bio.
With bio, positioning isn't as important; you can make a much higher number of smaller interactions, harass, pokes, etc.
But with mech, positioning is very important, and it feels more like chess in ways; you make a smaller number of plays, but the plays you make have a lot of weight. Such as counter attacking at a crucial time or out-manuevering your opponent and being able to deny a base. I enjoy that these plays are more committal than bio, because mech is slow and expensive and you better be confident you're making the right move. It's just a very different feel and I love it! Positioning is much more important and that can mean that the mech player being out of position is much more painful than if you were bio, but at the same time, your positional wins mean more as with mech than with bio. Bio is more mobile and is more about the micro. Very different styles and reasons they are fun in different ways.
I think if mech is done right, then like someone previously said, the opponent will not just turtle to SHs/carriers and win without making any interactions. The mech player shouldn't be the one trying to do a quick timing push... they aren't Protoss. I think it's most entertaining and fun for both sides if the mech player is the one constantly under pressure and attack. Not saying it has to ALWAYS be like that, but from my experience it seems preferred for the opponent to simply turtle and beat the mech player late game. I'm not sure if this is more true now than back in HotS. Perhaps the Raven nerfs were a primary reason why people don't try to kill the mech player before lategame now? Or other stuff like SHs/Carriers too?
Now, I'm not asking for them to do all this just for mech, and make it perfect in every MU. Just sharing my thoughts of what it should ideally be like. There are players who will just out turtle and out lategame the mech player instead of attacking, that's fine. Mech doesn't always have to be the one defending, they can push too. And I'm sure there will still be players that love to pick apart the Mech player in early and mid game instead of turtling. Variety is good.
I don't know how good mech is considered in the pro level anymore. My understanding is it's still viable TvZ but not stronger than Bio like people realized in later HotS. Viable, but a a bit weaker overall than bio. In TvT, I don't think I've seen pros go mech anymore? Then again, maybe it's just because the pro scene has fewer players now. In TvP, I think mech is way worse than in HotS, where it actually worked. I think the main issues from my limited experience are:
1) Adept timing attacks and/or WP harass strategies hit when the Terran should be taking a 3rd base, and as a mech player you just do not have enough units to defend all of this without a big struggle. Splash means almost nothing due to the spread out Protoss units. Cyclones are useful for zoning/taking down WPs and are OK vs Adepts, but really you need to have ~15-20 hellions/hellbats to deal with the ~20 initial adepts that attack. Tanks and splash do not really matter. However, it is hard to have such a high number of hellions and hellbats at this point, unless perhaps you pinpoint their build early on. Maybe I just don't know what to scout for, I'm not sure if it's possible to scout early enough or not.
2) Protoss transition into carriers is way too easy vs mech. Even if the mech player scouts when the protoss only has 2 carriers out, the mech player is in a very dangerous position already. Even if you manage to get like 10 vikings vs 4 carriers, it is still a very dangerous position because carriers can snowball so quickly. I am glad the carriers are getting reworked, as the burst damage just made for too volatile gameplay IMO. They made engagements too committal and stressful. I'd rather them be more like BW where you build up mileage with the carriers over time with good positional pokes and harass (which I think is what the new patch is trying to do). Now the mech player can use Cyclones and Thors more in their composition to deal with air transitions. I think this is great. Carriers will still beat out Cyclones/Thors in higher numbers I'm sure, especially since air units stack dps, which is totally fine. I am not saying ground mech should straight up beat Protoss air, just that I think the patch will help make things less volatile now. It's not like Terran can make 2-4 BCs and suddenly beat the protoss if they do not scout it super early. For mech it is an issue because you have to be really on point with your composition and balance the right number of tanks and AA.
I'm not sure, but the new Cyclones might help deal with the Adept/WP strategies. Since they are mobile and could possibly help zone out WPs early on. Or at least when defending, they can target down WPs faster, and kite adepts. I think mech tvp might actually be in a good spot after this patch and I am excited!
I do worry though that the BC will need to be nerfed more. Honestly, I think they have been overall buffed, haha, due to being able to shoot while moving! Though perhaps if mech players have the threat of BCs lategame, it will encourage the other races to interact and pick apart the mech player.
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On November 14 2018 19:17 digmouse wrote:
So monk is now the new David Kim?
Monk is the lead co-op designer, for 1v1 we have Michael Scipione as the face of the balance team now.
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Canada11349 Posts
D: Lastly, do you have any closing comments?
K: Please cheer for me. I promise to show good games!
Well, monk. I hadn't played SC2 for a very long time, but this summer I was grinding out games in co-op with a friend- a very enjoyable. So well done. monk fighting!
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They should add in zerg simulant as a commander. The leader will be a simulant adjundent. Powers could be really cool.
User was temp banned for this post.
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I unironically would love to see those Swarmhosts capable of forcing 3 hour maps.
Players are soooooo good nowadays that I doubt the games would look like that.
"Wield your hatred and crush me! I wellcome it!"
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EPT
