Alright... as we all know, starcraft is a unique RTS in many ways. One of the ways starcraft has always seemed the most unique to me was in it's use of the keyboard. Have you ever watched other RTS games played live by top players? They don't use the keyboard a tenth as much as a Starcraft player does. We play an incredibly difficult mind game while our left hand glides over the keyboard with precision and and style. This makes Starcraft possibly the most difficult game ever created. We're hitting combos on our keyboard like it's street fighter, meanwhile out positioning our opponents like chess. But there's even more than this going on.
Have you ever noticed the patterns on your keyboard? Most of the starcraft players i talk to who aren't koreans don't... Here are a few of my favorite keyboard combinations 4d5d6d7d8d9d0d (i've just made seven dragoons in half a second), 0p9p8o (two probes from my nexus and then an observer), 4z5z6z7t8t9t0t (three zeals, four temps... i'll prob morph one group into an archon ; ). I know exactly which fingers to use on which keys and it allows me to get big tasks out of the way more quickly so i can focus the rest of my energy on strategy. As most koreans do, and foreigners don't, you can practice these keyboard combinations even if your not playing starcraft... Just practice them in wordpad or something.
In my own mind... Starcraft has always reminded me of a game that Day[9] and me grew up playing together as children. Beatmania. We love this game btw.
This game has always struck me as remarkably similar to starcraft. Obviously he's not out thinking someone... but his hands are tapping the keys rapidly in a pattern. In starcraft we have a bigger controller and we play the entire thing with our left hand (because we're SO GOD DAMN SEXY! ; ). Mastering patterns with your left hand can greatly help increase your skill... I'll play another song i like to play when I'm doing some PvT fast nexus on Gaia. I named it 'Eschobars Nightmare' becuase i actually name all my builds after i write them out (nerd pride folks)... Here, i'll play it for you now:
0p0p0pbp0p0p0p0p0pbn 0pbg0pba0p0pbybg4z0p 9p9pbp4d5d6s0p9pbp4d <-- 6s is me making dragoon range. 5d0p9pbp0p9p4d5dbn0p 9p4d5dbp0p9pvrbgbg
there may be a few mistakes... that was just from memory, when i play it's easier to do because seeing my food/money/army helps me stay on top of the next few notes i have to play. There's also another branch i can easily transition into if i want to get my two gateways and robo before my second nexus. My music can take me to many places ;D
Originally i was opposed to MBS... you can see me ranting like a lunatic about it in this thread: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?currentpage=All&topic_id=53602&show_part= After thinking it over i think MBS will allow for more difficult patterns to master while playing the game. I want to see for myself first, but i think it will be good...
But i want more... i want more sexy things i can do with my keyboard. I want it to be a step up from starcraft! Here's my ideas.
Upgrades:
Why do we need one hotkey for an upgrade? That's too simple... i already know a basic combo i can do to upgrade out of three forges fast... everyone knows it. w [click] a [click] s [click]. Now i've upgraded out of three forges in a second. But wouldn't it be cooler if i had a special combination i had to do for just one upgrade? What if for my level one attack upgrade i had to do this combination on the keyboard:
wga <--- this combination would take three fingers, obviously you can do it quickly, but this would follow the basic keyboard pattern logic starcraft was based off of...
what about a level two weapons upgrade?
wgart <--- now it's four fingers instead of three. Better upgrades = harder combos.
What about level three?
wgart[space] <--- now i've used five fingers (thumb on space) to get a level three upgrade.
If a player does this combination wrong he is punished and has to start over again. We could do different cool patterns depending on the race and the upgrade.
But i want more still... What about that mother ship? It seems like it could kick some ass. But if i find out the mother ship is easy to make (hotkeywise) i'm going to be pissed... What if i just have to hit 'm' on the keyboard... wtf? NO WAY! lets step it up. Okay this might be a little too crazy... but what if the mothership requires a big keyboard combination to produce? Here are some of my ideas.
If the mothership is SO powerful and can only be produced once... maybe we could make it a two hand keyboard combination to produce. you would have to hit these combinations at the same time, otherwise start over. This would mean you can't use your mouse at all while making the mother ship.
Left hand. | Right hand. vdsa | nkl; asdv | ;lkn qq | pp
The final move will involve your entire left hand making a chopping motion on the left hand side of the keyboard:
[esc] ~ [tab] [caps lock] [shift] [ctrl]
You would have to hit all these keys at once... like your making a karatie chop on your keyboard.
What do you guys think? This would be a totally new way to use the keyboard and pick up the intensity of the game on all fronts. This would also make SC2 revolutionary for stepping up the use of the keyboard for the sake of game play.
What do you guys think? Do you have any sexy keyboard combinations you think should be implemented?
sorry, but no typing game could be seriously implemented to be part of an RTS
you could however, very easily make a UMS out of that idea ^^
starcraft is already typing game. no joke. did you not see that song i played for you? This is the most basic and fundamental element that the game is built off of. most people are too busy clicking on buildings and not hotkeying things to notice this... It's obviously more than just a typing game too... it's the most difficult game ever created. Keyboard combos, strategy, mouse micro, psychology and more. The perfect game.
sorry, but no typing game could be seriously implemented to be part of an RTS
you could however, very easily make a UMS out of that idea ^^
starcraft is already typing game. no joke. did you not see that song i played for you? This is the most basic and fundamental element that the game is built off of. most people are too busy clicking on buildings and not hotkeying things to notice this... It's obviously more than just a typing game too... it's the most difficult game ever created. Keyboard combos, strategy, mouse micro, psychology and more. The perfect game.
Let us build upon perfection.
players use the keyboard becouse it is faster than clicking but i have to make those combos i would rater just click on the upgrade.
Remove keyboard, make controls a combination of voice-activated and Wii-controls. "Gogogo" builds Marines. Use Wii-controller to highlight group, yell "attack" to target location, and so on. Also, use tongue-twisters to build Mothership.
Instead of that ridiculous combination of hotkeys to build a mothership, I'd rather just use the mouse, hover over the "build mothership" icon, and click it. Would take less than a second.
But... if we had hotkey combinations like this... it would be really awesome watching someone play Starcraft basically dominating the entire keyboard with their left hand.
that would actually be really awesome (i love learning/mastering these sorts of things) but i'd be totally surprsied if they did something like this, because it'd be too hard to have other people learn and be too obviously an artificial difficulty restriction.
but i do think the game needs some mechanical skill to keep it interesting, so i hope they come up with reasonable ways in which these sorts of mechanics still come into play without being TOO contrived... maybe if you need to assemble different pieces of the mothership together from different buildings or something, dunno.
I think that's not quite an RTS game. The point of using the keyboard is to get stuff out faster, but the keyboard is not an integral part of the game. You are proposing that Starcraft should become a fusion of keyboardness (yes, I make up words) and normal RTS. Personally, I wouldn't like that, and I would be pretty pissed if Blizzard did that to Starcraft, but it could be fun for other people.
The part with the mothership is exaggerated imo. I see no point in using such a hard combination to produce basically ONE unit. However, the upgrade idea is pretty nice. You wouldn't have to hotkey your forge, pressing "qart" very quickly will automatically select an available forge and start tier one weapons upgrade for example, if you have resources. This idea is rather revolutionary, and I like it very much. The nicest part is that you'd have to be pretty gosu to know (not to mention to master) all the combinations.
In my own opinion, i think koreans are probably better at starcraft overall because they seem to be more keyboard oriented. Koreans play in PC bangs where they get to see other koreans who are good playing... they also get to see how good players use their hands. I think seeing someone play live, first person, is a way better learning experience than watching a replay. I'm not saying foreigners are dumb; just by reading tl.net you can easily see that foreigners have a very strong strategic grasp of this game. I just think we don't focus anywhere near as much on simple game play mechanics such as hand positioning... probably because most foreigners practice at home... where they don't get to see other players play. Think of how many foreigners could be 10x better if someone showed them how to correctly hot key everything. What fingers should be used on each key. Think of how many people have probably spent countless hours playing the game via clicks while their keyboards sat right in front of them.
Why not get rid of the option to upgrade clicking all together? Starcraft has two possible methods of action. You can click do do almost anything or you can use the keyboard to do almost anything. On the surface it's much more appealing to click than to find a key on the keyboard. So many people who start the game focus on clicking to do things like build units and upgrade. Unfortunately (once mastered) the keyboard is 10x more efficient than unnecessary clicks. But you would have to play this game for quite a while to figure that out.
If we got rid of the option to click we would avoid the risk off people learning the game the wrong way. If we HAD to use the keyboard people could learn how to play from the get go rather than years later. Some people don't even know to break off their windows keys before they start to play.
I once remember seeing this player at a lan four years ago. He was egar to get better at Starcraft so i offered to break off some keys on his keyboard so that it would be easier to play. He immediately clutched his keyboard to his chest, like a child with a teddybear. He refused to break off his keys. I tried to explain to him that you basically HAVE to break off your windows keys to play the game because otherwise you'll probably end up tabbing yourself out of the game every other time you try to use your pinky or thumb to bind a hotkey. But he didn't want to damage his keyboard. After the lan i felt very bad because i knew even if he went home and practiced all the time, he would probably focus so much on clicking that he would never find this more efficient manner of playing.
Did you know protoss has five basic hand positions? You constantly shift between them while your playing. I'll write them up for the tl.net strat section sometime later this week. I don't want to steer this thread off topic. ; )
Starcraft can only be played efficiently if the players left hand is constantly moving. It starts out slow, but once the game picks up... it never stops. That's what makes starcraft starcraft. Becuase it's the only RTS game where the player looks like he's playing a musical instrument with over fifty buttons only using his left hand... meanwhile he is rhythmically clicking his mouse, moving it with surgical precision... in his head he is out thinking his opponent through pure strategy. Starcraft involves psychology too of course. Otherwise you wouldn't be able to trick someone by faking a build early, like making a second gateway and then canceling and expanding after you kill his scouting scv. But you can only focus on something like that if your using the hotkeys enough to keep up with the game.
This is just the way i always saw starcraft.
But i do think it would be wise for blizzard to remove the 'clicking' option for commands which COULD be used for the keyboard.
In fact i wouldn't even mind seeing some other features like special patterns and formations you could do with your mouse to cast a spell. Like making circles with your mouse to cast a spell in a specific area. I think they had something like that in this other computer game called Black and White. Although that game wasn't a fast paced RTS...
These are the roots of starcraft and i really hope blizzard keeps this in mind when making the game. I want more stuff like this. I think if Starcraft can build on these 'beatmania' like motions on the keyboard, they could make a fucking incredible game. They just need to incorporate hotkey patterns into the single player mode or something... or have a training mode where players can practice using all their fingers.^^
Why doesn't blizzard just make a real time strategy high level gaming language. Kind of like java or c but oriented to gaming. The idea is that you wouldn't even use the mouse the entire game. The beginning of a game would look like this.
*game starts*
move all min1 //moves all units to min1 move p2 min2 //moves 2nd probe to second mineral patch move p3 min3 //moves 3rd probe to third mineral patch move p4 min4 //moves 4th probe to 4th mineral patch mb = main1 //sets variable mb as the first nexus/hatchery/cc
mb p //makes a probe pn min5 //tells the newest probe to mine from mineral patch 5
mb p pn min6
mb p pn mov (21, 77) //tells to move the newest probe to the map coordinates (21,77)
this wraps up the early game commands along with scouting. Next I'm going to describe the art of a zergling rush..
i really like innovation of the game but the intentional complication of controls seems extremely silly - how realistic (as much as possible in a fictional game set in the future in deep space with three races battling each other) is it to make the interface even more difficult to use?
part of starcraft's challenge is the mechanics, which is a disgustingly simple system with an already extremely high skill ceiling. handspeed and accuracy as it is now is a huge part of the game even for pros (exe, how many can successfully execute reaver/sair and skterran, or multitask like savior?) and this is just overstressing it - it'd be a huge turnoff when it automatically culls newbies by the masses. on the same note droves of good players will eventually master the keyboard patterns until they are nothing more than an annoyance: do you want to be watching a professional game come down very close, and instead of one player winning by mindfucking ingenuity, the other player just slips in some combination? yes, consistency is a part of skill and even 100% of skill in some games, but it should not matter to this degree in starcraft.
so while i do want to see challenging mechanics again in starcraft 2, i don't want a system that can directly interfere with other aspects of the game, or hog a player's priorities. keep it clean or make it cleaner as long as the endless potential stays.
you bring up a very interesting idea though which i think is pretty cool. taking away building by mouse will help a lot of people get closer to their potential by emphasizing keyboard usage. the downside would be a bit more unfriendliness towards beginners.
i have know a few people who i just wish could see me play first person, not because i'm amazing, but because their use of hotkeys is awful and really, really holds them back. the problem cascades too: too much reliance on the mouse means less free time (normally gained by efficient keyboard use) to be spent on other things, meaning a lower speed ceiling translating into worse multitask and micro/macro, which again translates into practice time wasted trying to fix these things instead of thinking about strategy and builds.
on another note i never really thought about it but yeah beyond hard dedicated practice koreans must really benefit from seeing each other play in person and being close with other gamers. while we have to type out our shit in [help] threads and make fpvods with commentaries, they can just meet up at a pcbang, watch, and ask questions!
Alright... as we all know, starcraft is a unique RTS in many ways. One of the ways starcraft has always seemed the most unique to me was in it's use of the keyboard. Have you ever watched other RTS games played live by top players? They don't use the keyboard a tenth as much as a Starcraft player does. We play an incredibly difficult mind game while our left hand glides over the keyboard with precision and and style. This makes Starcraft possibly the most difficult game ever created. We're hitting combos on our keyboard like it's street fighter, meanwhile out positioning our opponents like chess. But there's even more than this going on.
Have you ever noticed the patterns on your keyboard? Most of the starcraft i talk to who aren't koreans don't... Here are a few of my favorite keyboard combinations 4d5d6d7d8d9d0d (i've just made seven dragoons in half a second), 0p9p8o (two probes from my nexus and then an observer), 4z5z6z7t8t9t0t (three zeals, four temps... i'll prob morph one group into an archon ; ). I know exactly which fingers to use on which keys and it allows me to get big tasks out of the way more quickly so i can focus the rest of my energy on strategy. As most koreans do, and foreigners don't, you can practice these keyboard combinations even if your not playing starcraft... Just practice them in wordpad or something.
In my own mind... Starcraft has always reminded me of a game that Day[9] and me grew up playing together as children. Beatmania. We love this game btw.
This game has always struck me as remarkably similar to starcraft. Obviously he's not out thinking someone... but his hands are tapping the keys rapidly in a pattern. In starcraft we have a bigger controller and we play the entire thing with our left hand (because we're SO GOD DAMN SEXY! ; ). Mastering patterns with your left hand can greatly help increase your skill... I'll play another song i like to play when I'm doing some PvT fast nexus on Gaia. I named it 'Eschobars Nightmare' becuase i actually name all my builds after i write them out (nerd pride folks)... Here, i'll play it for you now:
0p0p0pbp0p0p0p0p0pbn 0pbg0pba0p0pbybg4z0p 9p9pbp4d5d6s0p9pbp4d <-- 6s is me making dragoon range. 5d0p9pbp0p9p4d5dbn0p 9p4d5dbp0p9pvrbgbg
there may be a few mistakes... that was just from memory, when i play it's easier to do because seeing my food/money/army helps me stay on top of the next few notes i have to play. There's also another branch i can easily transition into if i want to get my two gateways and robo before my second nexus. My music can take me to many places ;D
Originally i was opposed to MBS... you can see me ranting like a lunatic about it in this thread: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?currentpage=All&topic_id=53602&show_part= After thinking it over i think MBS will allow for more difficult patterns to master while playing the game. I want to see for myself first, but i think it will be good...
But i want more... i want more sexy things i can do with my keyboard. I want it to be a step up from starcraft! Here's my ideas.
Upgrades:
Why do we need one hotkey for an upgrade? That's too simple... i already know a basic combo i can do to upgrade out of three forges fast... everyone knows it. w [click] a [click] s [click]. Now i've upgraded out of three forges in a second. But wouldn't it be cooler if i had a special combination i had to do for just one upgrade? What if for my level one attack upgrade i had to do this combination on the keyboard:
wga <--- this combination would take three fingers, obviously you can do it quickly, but this would follow the basic keyboard pattern logic starcraft was based off of...
what about a level two weapons upgrade?
wgart <--- now it's four fingers instead of three. Better upgrades = harder combos.
What about level three?
wgart[space] <--- now i've used five fingers (thumb on space) to get a level three upgrade.
If a player does this combination wrong he is punished and has to start over again. We could do different cool patterns depending on the race and the upgrade.
But i want more still... What about that mother ship? It seems like it could kick some ass. But if i find out the mother ship is easy to make (hotkeywise) i'm going to be pissed... What if i just have to hit 'm' on the keyboard... wtf? NO WAY! lets step it up. Okay this might be a little too crazy... but what if the mothership requires a big keyboard combination to produce? Here are some of my ideas.
If the mothership is SO powerful and can only be produced once... maybe we could make it a two hand keyboard combination to produce. you would have to hit these combinations at the same time, otherwise start over. This would mean you can't use your mouse at all while making the mother ship.
Left hand. | Right hand. vdsa | nkl; asdv | ;lkn qq | pp
The final move will involve your entire left hand making a chopping motion on the left hand side of the keyboard:
[esc] ~ [tab] [caps lock] [shift] [ctrl]
You would have to hit all these keys at once... like your making a karatie chop on your keyboard.
What do you guys think? This would be a totally new way to use the keyboard and pick up the intensity of the game on all fronts. This would also make SC2 revolutionary for stepping up the use of the keyboard for the sake of game play.
What do you guys think? Do you have any sexy keyboard combinations you think should be implemented?
Discuss!!^^
OMFG AWESOME!! but now sc2 will be even uncooler than it would have..
MyLostTemple; you should play this game called Darwinia. It's a rts/rtt, and you create units by making certain gestures with your mouse. Like, you hold alt, then draw a rocket, and you get a bazooka squad. You hold alt, then draw an arc, you get a grenade squad. Und so weiter. It adds sooo much fun to a game. I have to click to many icons in office allready. Therefore I use Opera :D
Edit: I also like very much how your song is in a 9/8 beat.
I agree that would be cool. It would be GREAT for a mod or something. But for the regular game, no thanks. New players don't want to deal with that crap, and good players would just get annoyed with it after awhile.
There is no idea in complicating the game controls until most players can perfectly control everything as it is. And with control perfectly, I mean always start new units exactly when the previous finished, dodge every lurker spine, move-shoot every goon-shot, perfect surrounds with your speedlings, almost instant irradiate clones with 12 science vessels etc. No player is even close to that perfect control, so I really don't see the point in complicating the interface further. Don't force the players to play two games at once.
tasteless explained this to me in person back in march. i literally had him repeat it 3 or 4 times before i grasped the fullness of it. i suggest that everyone reads and rereads it several times because it is likely the most intelligent thing about sc that you have ever read.
On June 29 2007 12:19 Artosis3 wrote: tasteless explained this to me in person back in march. i literally had him repeat it 3 or 4 times before i grasped the fullness of it. i suggest that everyone reads and rereads it several times because it is likely the most intelligent thing about sc that you have ever read.
I've read it twice and still don't like it.
He said it wasn't a joke but I really hope the mothership part was, having to hit esc and tab etc is just begging for someone to accidently close starcraft or minimize to desktop ;p
Anyway, as much as I'm against making the game easier to play, I'm also against making it artifically harder by implementing actions that serve absolutely no purpose.
I enjoy the rhytmn of pressing 4z5z6z7z8z9z0z because I'm producing zealots quickly not because I enjoy punching keys that do nothing.
On June 29 2007 12:19 Artosis3 wrote: tasteless explained this to me in person back in march. i literally had him repeat it 3 or 4 times before i grasped the fullness of it. i suggest that everyone reads and rereads it several times because it is likely the most intelligent thing about sc that you have ever read.
I've read it twice and still don't like it.
He said it wasn't a joke but I really hope the mothership part was, having to hit esc and tab etc is just begging for someone to accidentally close starcraft or minimize to desktop ;p
Anyway, as much as I'm against making the game easier to play, I'm also against making it artificially harder by implementing actions that serve absolutely no purpose.
I enjoy the rhythm of pressing 4z5z6z7z8z9z0z because I'm producing zealots quickly not because I enjoy punching keys that do nothing.
Obviously you could turn off the binding that would case the game to minimize (at least i think/hope you can lol!). If the risk of tabbing out isn't there the key combination would work fine and make the players hands look even sexier. If there is some strange key configuration that causes that and can't be avoided... just break the keys off and keep the motion there. We had to do that in the original starcraft anyways.
blizzard has already made the game easier on different fronts.... we can select as many units as we want now. We don't have to spam 1 [click] 2 [click] 3 [click] to move our troops out of a battle. Instead we select the whole group and retreat with one swift click. If you still want stuff to be doing with your hands this is room for something new.
If you enjoy the rhythm of making zealots i don't see why you wouldn't enjoy the rhythm of getting a level three upgrade for attack. Why do we have hit 'w' every time to get the weapons upgrade? over and over... it's dull and repetitive. Why not make the better upgrades more complex? It's just another pattern with your fingers. A different pattern. I want more patterns. 4z5z6z7z8z9z0z is a much more complex pattern than the upgrade pattern i showed you in the first post.
I know I would enjoy the motions required for higher units and upgrades since this game was built of basic hand patterns. I don't see how this is 'punching keys doing nothing.' The original sc was too focused on key patterns sheerly for unit production. MBS seems to keep this production rate at a more compact speed AND it uses more finger combos (like doubling and trippingly). So why not fill in the gaps with sexy combos for upgrades and other events occurring in the game?
If the mother ship is only made once i don't see why people wouldn't want some super elite action to create it. It would even be better as a spectator sport if we could get some shots of the players doing crazy motions with their hands. Why not give each of the races more unique patterns on the keyboard or motions with the mouse for unit production? That would make them more unique from each other and still keep starcraft like starcraft.
While button combinations of the nature suggested in this thread seem quite arbitrary, I think it might indeed foster a sort of pimpness. Of course, others have mentioned that clicking an icon on the GUI accomplishes the same thing with much less hassle. But let me explain how such a system might prove a boon for the dedicated gamer, if properly implemented.
Allow me to use Tekken as a specific example. Ever since T3, Mishimas have been able to do what is known as an EWGF. There is also an inferior version, a WGF. Both moves juggle, but the EWGF, in addition to having more eye candy (electricity!!1), gives mad frame advantage on block, is relatively faster, and recovers faster: all of these make mastering the EWGF fucking essential; if you can't do an EWGF, don't bother playing Tekken. Now both moves are performed basically by inputting a dragon punch motion, then pressing right punch. But whereas executing a WGF is easy, EWGF has much less room for sloppiness. The down to down-right motion must be done quickly, and right punch must be executed on or within two frames of inputting down-right. Considering that Tekken runs at 60fps, it may seem daunting that one has only a .033 second margin of error in input. While I can't be bothered to use proper Tekken notation, for the curious, check out the legend on tekken zaibatsu.
The previous paragraph probably appears really fucking tangential. However, there is a point I am attempting to make: good execution should be rewarded. Ergo, one can apply this philosophy to SC2. Besides good old b-n-b hotkeying, Blizzard could provide complex motions to do certain things, PROVIDED that there exists an incentive to doing so. A leet input might, for example, yield slightly faster build/research times. Or for spellcasters, extra mana upon spawning. The list goes on.
Hell, to throw something truly outlandish, one might hatch Zerg larva not by the standard method, but by doing combos of the nature provided in this thread. A Zerg "combo" in this case might reward the player with, say, less overall mineral/gas comsumption or quicker gestation, but if the player fucks up, well... imagine a pregnant woman getting drunk, whose offspring will most likely become some retarded fuckwad. You get the point.
To reiterate: as far as complex keyboard motions for the sake of, well, complex keyboard motions goes, I am whole-heartedly opposed to that. There is no need to make a game NEEDLESSLY complex.
But if one provides two choices: a easy way and a gosu way, with rewards for the latter, then the proposal entertained in the OP might become feasible.
Hooray for my first post. And most likely my last. Carry on.
On June 30 2007 06:30 FrozenArbiter wrote: Having these 'gosu combos' would kill the simplicity that everyone so loves in SC, it's very 'raw', nothing fancy -_-
I personally wouldn't play SC2 if I had to type in a combo of useless keys to get some 10% build time decrease..
But you already type in combos to get a build time decrease. 4z5z6z7z8z9z0z. That saves you time you can focus on other things. You get all your zealots out at the exact same time so you can do the motion again. The player is rewarded if he uses his hotkeys and does the pattern correctly. If you mess up you might not make zealots out of every gateway. There are good players who click to make zealots and sometimes they can still beat players who use every hotkey possible. But realistically if you want to master this game your going to be dancing on your keyboard while your eyes and thoughts are more focused on strategy. would you actually want the same style of play in the old sc to upgrade your buildings? Do you really just want to click on 'w' for weapons now that MBS going to be in SC2?
I don't understand what you mean by simplicity. Sure the graphics are simple and any command can be done via clicks... but the fact of the mater is that Starcraft is far far far from the simple. Everyone who i speak with about this game... they love starcraft for complexity, not simplicity. Starcraft's simplicity dies shortly after a newb gets completely raped by some gosu who took the whole map and got maxed out in 12 minutes while the new player was building his first expansion. At least that's when i fell in love with the game... when i realized how much better one player could be than another.
I liked what bottomtier had to say in his post. It's an interesting idea if the player is actually punished for incorrect hotkey actions. I'm not here to make sc insanely complex via the keyboard. Although anyone who played starcraft competitively should already know that Starcraft IS ALREADY a bunch of complex keyboard patterns. I'm here to argue that keyboard patterns should be in SC2, and newer, sexier keyboard patterns at that.
Did you really think those keyboard patterns are any more difficult to do than 4d5d6d7d8d9d? They're just new... it wouldn't take more than two minutes of doing them over and over on your keyboard to get them down perfectly. Just like people practice 4d5d6d7d8d9d in between games you could easily practice wgart[space] in the same manner.
If people are really this afraid of new keyboard actions then blizzard should incorporate the whole keyboard concept in the single player storyline. Have every mission incorporate keyboard usage so the player can learn how starcraft is ACTUALLY played more easily and wont be shocked and horrified when they start getting owned in multilayer mode because they can't figure out how the hell people are getting units so fast.
Koreans are the only people who overall actually play starcraft through keyboard usage. This is also the only country where Starcraft incredibly successful... the most successful esport game ever. It's probably because in korea they know it's more fun to use the keyboard as much as possible. If SC2 is going to get big like the original SC was... then we need similar keyboard usage. At least that's my opinion... ; )
We made 4z5z6z7z8z9z0z through using what the game never originally intended. 1-0 ctrl groups were for armies, not buildings (originally).
We work with the game, the game doesn't work with us. (ie. Terran Wall In)
In Super Smash Brothers Melee, Wavedashing is a glitch that is hard to perform (to most). In Super Smash Brothers Brawl, this will be an easy to perform glitch, therefore ruining it's usefulness.
I don't use 4z5z6z7z8z9z0z for making zlots, FA does. I use F2 to go to my gates, then I have enough speed to click z, click z, click z, click z, faster than what it would take for my hand to move from 4 to 0, and I would say I have a HIGH typing speed among the forum...
Using the same resourceful technique in different ways is what makes the game fun. Wavedashing, for example, can be not used at all, and the player can still win by a huge margin, or it can be used, and the player can lose as well.
Leave the game to the players. If you want 10% faster building, make those units ASAP when you get the resources instead of waiting, or wasting click, or misclicking. The players make the game, not the other way around.
P.S. - I'm sorry you don't find pressing W for the 3rd weapon upgrade satisfying. Don't take it out on this game.
This idea is god awful for Starcraft. First of all we aren't really doing "combos" like you are proposing. It is simply patterns of hotkeys from common play styles. Secondly artificially making the game harder is a huge no no. That's why I'm all for not having a unit selection cap because that would simply be another artificial hardener. Like others have said I would simply be clicking on the screen instead of using the hotkeys if I had to type in a combo. And if it forced me to do a combo and didn't let me click the screen I'd throw my keyboard against the wall and never play Starcraft II again.
if its serious then i dont think the "combo" thing will really work. itll only make it even HARDER for the noobs to start playing.
your idea that the things that can be done with keyboard NOT be able to click is a good one. this would encourage people to learn the hotkeys and not stay in shit mode their whole lives.
Dude, this is just a video game(getting too much into it is hazardous to your health), video games are meant to deliver fun in your spare time, not uber-neurotic actions. If you want some crazy keyboard actions go to a typing contest (where you will get owned). And doing some crazy combos in a video game doesnt make you look sexy. I think you should waste your creative energy in something better like getting a job, and a girlfriend (but please dont show her how "good are you in SC", else you may get single again before getting laid). And if you think that these are great ideas, why dont you simply mail them at blizzard, im sure they will appreciate them greatly.
On July 04 2007 06:02 Manaldski wrote: Dude, this is just a video game(getting too much into it is hazardous to your health), video games are meant to deliver fun in your spare time, not uber-neurotic actions. If you want some crazy keyboard actions go to a typing contest (where you will get owned). And doing some crazy combos in a video game doesnt make you look sexy. I think you should waste your creative energy in something better like getting a job, and a girlfriend (but please dont show her how "good are you in SC", else you may get single again before getting laid). And if you think that these are great ideas, why dont you simply mail them at blizzard, im sure they will appreciate them greatly.
Lol with who the hell are you talking to? You sound like you'd like a ban...lol
On June 29 2007 00:16 fight_or_flight wrote: Why doesn't blizzard just make a real time strategy high level gaming language. Kind of like java or c but oriented to gaming. The idea is that you wouldn't even use the mouse the entire game. The beginning of a game would look like this.
*game starts*
move all min1 //moves all units to min1 move p2 min2 //moves 2nd probe to second mineral patch move p3 min3 //moves 3rd probe to third mineral patch move p4 min4 //moves 4th probe to 4th mineral patch mb = main1 //sets variable mb as the first nexus/hatchery/cc
mb p //makes a probe pn min5 //tells the newest probe to mine from mineral patch 5
mb p pn min6
mb p pn mov (21, 77) //tells to move the newest probe to the map coordinates (21,77)
this wraps up the early game commands along with scouting. Next I'm going to describe the art of a zergling rush..
This is all very interesting tasteless, I've never thought about it like that before.
However, as we can see from the peon auto-mining, multi-gateway selection, and other newly announced aspects of the game, SC2 is pretty clearly being designed with the intent to be less mechanical.
The way Blizzard seems to be thinking, this would be a step backward rather than a step forward.
k i read first few posts dunno if anyone said this or not already but with your karate chop idea, im pretty sure blizzard would make their own custom keyboard because there would be alot of really pissed off progamers out at best buy buying new keyboards from getting really into a game and karate chopping the shit out of their keyboard... lmfao... other than that i can see what you meant but making multi key combinations for units would kinda be stupid. It defeats the purpose of "Hotkeys" which is a key which gives you a quick shortcut to the counterpart of clicking on the button. So meh... IMO of course... sorry if someone said this already.
Now, koreans aren't espacially training on the keyboard.. they just tend to play very fast, and by doing so, other players replicate why they see live;
Also, I wondered for long why they were "naturaly" so fast. Because even early back in 99-2000, where the global pro gamer's level was starting to grow, even amongst mediocre players in lan, they were all playing very fast.
Now here's what I think : foreigners tend to play slower because they have larger hands than the average korean kid, thus allowing us to make less hand movements to reach the keys with our fingers, and thus, not getting us to make naturaly any kind of effort concerning the hand speed. While koreans have smaller hands, i often so kids, like when chojja was around 16-17, having a real hard time to reach the keys fast on the keyboard, and because of that, developing an insane speed.
On July 05 2007 07:38 MeMe wrote: Now, koreans aren't espacially training on the keyboard.. they just tend to play very fast, and by doing so, other players replicate why they see live;
Also, I wondered for long why they were "naturaly" so fast. Because even early back in 99-2000, where the global pro gamer's level was starting to grow, even amongst mediocre players in lan, they were all playing very fast.
Now here's what I think : foreigners tend to play slower because they have larger hands than the average korean kid, thus allowing us to make less hand movements to reach the keys with our fingers, and thus, not getting us to make naturaly any kind of effort concerning the hand speed. While koreans have smaller hands, i often so kids, like when chojja was around 16-17, having a real hard time to reach the keys fast on the keyboard, and because of that, developing an insane speed.
here is the real reason. Just play on a keyboard for 2 years+ and youll have a very fast hand. Its like anything dude ppl sorta tend to think sc is the only thing with speed and that only koreans are godly. I dont get that. Remember folks (you are human so is an asian kid) it just takes time and thats all it takes.
Thats not very true. Many foreigners I saw coming to korea were playing starcraft since the begening of it. THey weren't any close to the hand speed of a korean pro gamer. Just ask around. I bielive many don't actually realise the hand speed of small handed players such as cho jja. The only foreigner I ever saw, matching the korean keyboard / mouse gaming speed was Slayer, who is btw, the only foreigner (aside Grrrr...) to have won a korean tournament on the korean ground.
Another problem with this system (besides the fact it doesn't actually look fun) is that lots of devices (Belkin N52 SpeedPad, Razer Tarantula, etc.) allow you to program macros consisting of multiple keystrokes. So the whole 9p9pbp4d5d6s0p9pbp4d sequence you suggest for dragoon range can be reduced down to a single hotkey regardless.
This is the kind of thing that makes games unpleasurable because it is a burden to learn certain aspects of the game. The fact that people use different combinations of the same basic hotkeys shows the versatility of the game, and why would you destroy that by giving set hotkeys?? interesting but ridiculous.
First I'd like to clarify that by chop i didn't actually mean 'karatie chop the shit out of your keyboard.' i simply said 'chop' so people could visualize the hand position i was trying to portray. I really just meant 'push all these buttons with the side of your left hand.' Keep in mind you can only produce one mothership... this means your probably only going to 'chop' once every game. A climactic hand position for the most powerful unit in the game :D!
For those of you who don't like combos... combos were in SC1 and they are definitely going to be in SC2. Look:
SC1 Combo:
4z5z6d7d
SC2 Combo with same hotkeys using MBS:
4zzdd
These are both 'combos.' Just different combos. Aren't units going to produce slower in SC2?... This gives us a lot more free time with our hands. A lot of the people who don't know how to play SC1 actually believe that they don't need to use their keyboards to be the best... They're dead wrong. The keyboard is so much a part of Starcraft you can not separate the two.
I'm baffled by people leaving comments that RTS games are supposed to have the most simplistic interface known to man. Why do you people even like Starcraft to begin with? :o... This is basically the only RTS with a complex interface and that's what makes it so good. In order to master such an interface you must master the combos used on the keyboard to fully engage the game itself. Starcraft wasn't just perfect because of the immense amount of strategy behind it... it was perfect because it was light years ahead of it's time. It's the only RTS game to utilize the keyboard in such an incredible manner.
In a sense Starcraft is a combination of this:
Concept A:
btw This Beatmania player is named Lisu. Have you ever heard of an amazing protoss player named Bisu?... COINCIDENCE? Where the hell else did he get that name from? I bet bisu knows his builds as well as Lisu knows this song.
Now add Concept B:
Watch blue Magneto VERY closely... SooMighty waits for the right moment... and sets up what is known in MVC2 terms as 'the infinite.'
Setting up this combo is incredibly difficult. He must wait for the exact right moment... then attack. Alot like you wait for the exact right moment to do a bulldog rush to a terran who fast expos... then after the attack is successful you are in a safe position. All you must do from there on out is combo your way to victory. 4d5d6d7d8d9d0d bpbp f2pf3pf4p 4d5d6d7d8d9d0d bpbpbp f2pf3pf4p. The SC combo can take a long time to complete unlike the MVC2 combo.
Now to Concept C:
Here is a game which requires perfect mouse precision and mouse control. I'm sure you all know it.
These guys do NOT miss click... neither does boxer when he's microing his medics and marines. Head shots are like gosu PSI storms... they involve perfect clicks.
Concept D:
An old but incredibly influential game. Lets pretend the first movie is the first few minutes of a starcraft game:
He has to micro his units or risk losing the game. Here we see the object oriented clicking/maneuvering SC is based off of. He must assign the roles to his lemmings perfectly. Late game there are more units to control.
now pretend we see late game SC
Late game SC involves more unit micro, so do harder levels in lemmings. Make a mistake and you may lose all your units faster than you can blink.
Now to Concept E:
Have you ever played this game? These two are gosu's at it.
Chess, much like Starcraft is about positioning. You can't just get maxed and then win. One must expand to crucial places that give you strategic positioning over your opponents. Just like Kasparov knows to quit this game due to the position of the chess pieces on the board, the SC player knows to quit the game when he is far behind on expansions or has lost his entire army while his opponent proceeds to outmacro him. SC is about map control just like Chess is about Board control.
A + B + C + D + E = BW
Here's the game we all play:
first sc highlight clip involves concepts C and D (click control and unit manipulation) Next clip involves concepts E (moving giant pieces to strategic positions). Both of the two clips were SETUP using the logic of concept B (their opponents are in positions, they realize the position allows them to setup a powerful attacks via keyboard/gamepad combos). What you don't see is that all clips involve concept A (memorizing your builds).
I don't want to turn SC into a Concept A game only. I just want to build off the Concept A idea and make the game more creative in this area.
To add further affect to A + B + C + D + E concept, try playing A B C D E movies all at the same time and scroll up and down looking at each of them... think about playing starcraft.
On July 05 2007 12:27 BalloonFight wrote: I think this is an extremely interesting concept, but I'm not sure how much it would appeal to the mainstream players.
Also off topic, I'm 1-0 lifetime vs SooMighty.
it already appeals to mainstream Korea. keep in mind Koreans are the only ones who are using the keyboards more efficiently than us.
why wouldn't it appeal to everyone everywhere?
you beat soomighty!? NICE^^ The best mvc2 players I've beaten are LightingStorm from KC and BigRex from Saint Louis. Those were the only places i ever traveled to for mvc2 tournaments : )
who do you play as?
i like Cable (anti air assist) Sentinel (ground assist) captain commando (anti air assist)
I fucking love Lemmings man, that has got to be the best classic game ever. i would play that for hours and not get bored. There was one acid leve i could never beat. I was like 8 years old at the time so it is probably easy now.
On July 05 2007 12:27 BalloonFight wrote: I think this is an extremely interesting concept, but I'm not sure how much it would appeal to the mainstream players.
Also off topic, I'm 1-0 lifetime vs SooMighty.
it already appeals to mainstream Korea. keep in mind Koreans are the only ones who are using the keyboards more efficiently than us.
why wouldn't it appeal to everyone everywhere?
you beat soomighty!? NICE^^ The best mvc2 players I've beaten are LightingStorm from KC and BigRex from Saint Louis. Those were the only places i ever traveled to for mvc2 tournaments : )
who do you play as?
i like Cable (anti air assist) Sentinel (ground assist) captain commando (anti air assist)
I usually use either matrix, Storm/Sent/Cyclops, thrax, Storm/Sent/Capcom, or some type of mag team for fun. I also like using strider/doom (which i think is the team Day uses)
Fun story, the first time I played clockw0rk, aka best S/D player, I of course had to pick strider/doom/sent, the team he popularized, to play him. He looked at me and said nice team. lol Then we played like 20 games in a row, me winning 3 -_-.
The best players I've beaten are kind of the old school marvel players, like Genghis, Shadyk, clockwork and soomighty. But I have beaten Potter once, but hes just sick good and it was basically all luck.
If I fly out to WCG finals in Seattle, I want to play you and Day.
In FF6, you had to punch combo's in order to do special attacks with one of your characters. (Sabin, I think? It's been a while). In Black and White, you had to do patterns with your mouse in order to cast spells. I think in moderation, this should be in the game. However, it sounds easy to go overboard. Plus you run into problems with different keyboards and different hotkeys due to different language versions.
On July 05 2007 12:27 BalloonFight wrote: I think this is an extremely interesting concept, but I'm not sure how much it would appeal to the mainstream players.
Also off topic, I'm 1-0 lifetime vs SooMighty.
it already appeals to mainstream Korea. keep in mind Koreans are the only ones who are using the keyboards more efficiently than us.
why wouldn't it appeal to everyone everywhere?
you beat soomighty!? NICE^^ The best mvc2 players I've beaten are LightingStorm from KC and BigRex from Saint Louis. Those were the only places i ever traveled to for mvc2 tournaments : )
who do you play as?
i like Cable (anti air assist) Sentinel (ground assist) captain commando (anti air assist)
I usually use either matrix, Storm/Sent/Cyclops, thrax, Storm/Sent/Capcom, or some type of mag team for fun. I also like using strider/doom (which i think is the team Day uses)
Fun story, the first time I played clockw0rk, aka best S/D player, I of course had to pick strider/doom/sent, the team he popularized, to play him. He looked at me and said nice team. lol Then we played like 20 games in a row, me winning 3 -_-.
The best players I've beaten are kind of the old school marvel players, like Genghis, Shadyk, clockwork and soomighty. But I have beaten Potter once, but hes just sick good and it was basically all luck.
If I fly out to WCG finals in Seattle, I want to play you and Day.
YOUR ON!
I was wondering if anyone would ever notice where Day's other nickname is from (Strider Doom). Did you know that Clockw0rk used to play Starcraft all the time? he used to 2;2 with Zizou21, another tl.net user and also another mvc2 player. I know a few other SC players who were big mvc2 players.
Genghis, Shadyk, Clockwork and Soomighty? Impressive list, that's like the Boxer, Nal-ra, SAvior of MVC2. Sadly I never got good at MVC2 due to the lack of competition and quarters . IMO it had the deepest strategy for a fighting game, and that's coming from a 3rd Strike player. SC1 type timing against traps & character build order.
Why do you people even like Starcraft to begin with? :o... This is basically the only RTS with a complex interface and that's what makes it so good.
I would think it is more the strategy, tactical micro and/or large scale battles than the button mashing
On July 05 2007 15:13 [X]Ken~D wrote: Genghis, Shadyk, Clockwork and Soomighty? Impressive list, that's like the Boxer, Nal-ra, SAvior of MVC2. Sadly I never got good at MVC2 due to the lack of competition and quarters . IMO it had the deepest strategy for a fighting game, and that's coming from a 3rd Strike player.
On July 05 2007 12:27 BalloonFight wrote: I think this is an extremely interesting concept, but I'm not sure how much it would appeal to the mainstream players.
Also off topic, I'm 1-0 lifetime vs SooMighty.
it already appeals to mainstream Korea. keep in mind Koreans are the only ones who are using the keyboards more efficiently than us.
why wouldn't it appeal to everyone everywhere?
you beat soomighty!? NICE^^ The best mvc2 players I've beaten are LightingStorm from KC and BigRex from Saint Louis. Those were the only places i ever traveled to for mvc2 tournaments : )
who do you play as?
i like Cable (anti air assist) Sentinel (ground assist) captain commando (anti air assist)
I usually use either matrix, Storm/Sent/Cyclops, thrax, Storm/Sent/Capcom, or some type of mag team for fun. I also like using strider/doom (which i think is the team Day uses)
Fun story, the first time I played clockw0rk, aka best S/D player, I of course had to pick strider/doom/sent, the team he popularized, to play him. He looked at me and said nice team. lol Then we played like 20 games in a row, me winning 3 -_-.
The best players I've beaten are kind of the old school marvel players, like Genghis, Shadyk, clockwork and soomighty. But I have beaten Potter once, but hes just sick good and it was basically all luck.
If I fly out to WCG finals in Seattle, I want to play you and Day.
YOUR ON!
I was wondering if anyone would ever notice where Day's other nickname is from (Strider Doom). Did you know that Clockw0rk used to play Starcraft all the time? he used to 2;2 with Zizou21, another tl.net user and also another mvc2 player. I know a few other SC players who were big mvc2 players.
Haha, didn't know clock played SC. I know he was REALLY into FF11 for a long ass time, hell I bet he still is.
On July 05 2007 15:13 [X]Ken~D wrote: Genghis, Shadyk, Clockwork and Soomighty? Impressive list, that's like the Boxer, Nal-ra, SAvior of MVC2. Sadly I never got good at MVC2 due to the lack of competition and quarters . IMO it had the deepest strategy for a fighting game, and that's coming from a 3rd Strike player.
Why do you people even like Starcraft to begin with? :o... This is basically the only RTS with a complex interface and that's what makes it so good.
I would think it is more the strategy, tactical micro and/or large scale battles than the button mashing
Yeah, I was never better than those players, but I could at least hang out with their skill level. Sadly I've never played Justin Wong, who I consider the Boxer of marvel. ;p
Also, imo, the best marvel player I've ever played is Bagnus. Only hardcore mvc2 people will know who he is, heh.
Fun fact, clockwork has the best omega red out of anyone. You'd think thats a joke, but its not.
How is the user interface in Starcraft complex? It simply gives you two options for most actions, a mouse click or a keyboard click. Plus there is the addition of the 0-9 control groups but that's not that complex either. Hot keys are simply used to speed up your macro while you micro. They are not there for us to play combo games with the keyboard. It just happened that as the skill level in Starcraft progressed there became common patterns or combos of hot key usage that players determined was the fastest and best way to play. But the intent of hot keys and control groups is definitely NOT to create combos or anything like that; it is just used for multitasking purposes to speed up your game and to help you control large armies with the control groups.
This idea really does go against what Starcraft is about. When the new game comes out why don't you simply become one of the pioneers that figures out the best combos of hotkeys to use if you like doing this sort of thing so much. There is no point in making a hot key any more than one letter or it's not even a fucking hot key anymore. Starcraft is not about using the keyboard to do fancy combos at all. You do have to do "combos" or hot key patterns (although these are by no means universal, players get to choose whatever pattern suits them best) if you want to be good at the game but that's just a byproduct of the progression of skill.
I think it's pretty clear Blizzard was not trying to make Starcraft a game where the keyboard had any preeminence over any other aspect in the game. It's simply there to help multitasking and speed up the game. Obviously the better you are at using the keyboard the faster you can play and the better you can multitask and the better player you will be. Ironically you want to use the keyboard to slow down gameplay. Especially with the penalities; this will just slow down game play even more, and you are essentially completely changing the function of the keyboard. In short, this idea is a complete disaster.
edit- I repeated myself a bit but you get the point.
On July 05 2007 15:32 boghat wrote: How is the user interface in Starcraft complex? It simply gives you two options for most actions, a mouse click or a keyboard click. Plus there is the addition of the 0-9 control groups but that's not that complex either. Hot keys are simply used to speed up your macro while you micro. They are not there for us to play combo games with the keyboard. It just happened that as the skill level in Starcraft progressed there became common patterns or combos of hot key usage that players determined was the fastest and best way to play. But the intent of hot keys and control groups is definitely NOT to create combos or anything like that; it is just used for multitasking purposes to speed up your game and to help you control large armies with the control groups.
This idea really does go against what Starcraft is about. When the new game comes out why don't you simply become one of the pioneers that figures out the best combos of hotkeys to use if you like doing this sort of thing so much. There is no point in making a hot key any more than one letter or it's not even a fucking hot key anymore. Starcraft is not about using the keyboard to do fancy combos at all. You do have to do "combos" or hot key patterns (although these are by no means universal, players get to choose whatever pattern suits them best) if you want to be good at the game but that's just a byproduct of the progression of skill.
I think it's pretty clear Blizzard was not trying to make Starcraft a game where the keyboard had any preeminence over any other aspect in the game. It's simply there to help multitasking and speed up the game. Obviously the better you are at using the keyboard the faster you can play and the better you can multitask and the better player you will be. Ironically you want to use the keyboard to slow down gameplay. Especially with the penalities; this will just slow down game play even more, and you are essentially completely changing the function of the keyboard. In short, this idea is a complete disaster.
edit- I repeated myself a bit but you get the point.
I'm not trying to be rude but i don't think your getting my point. You might as well call your argument the 'Starcraft Intelligent Design Argument'
I think there's A LOT that sc uses that Blizzard never intended. Like the keyboard mastering that we're talking about here... micro is another example of a feature that i'm sure Blizzard never dreamed could be utilized in such a manner. Is it really important what blizzard intended?... or is it important to see what the game became after the entire world, and especially korea, began to play it? Obviously Starcraft is a whole new game now. By taking one piece of a big picture we can see that part of this game is about mastering simple combos to macro faster. There is also little room for hotkey variation unlike what your saying. How many different starting numbers can you possibly hotkey your gateways or hatcheries too? Eventually your going to have 4 to 0 filled up one way or another. You can't hotkey attacking groups too differently either, you have to use 1a2a3a early.
I'm not trying to make Starcraft into a keyboard dominant game. I'm trying to explain that the keyboard is a big part of this game. I don't even want the keyboard to be AS BIG of a part of the game in Sc2. I just want the keyboard to be new and interesting. The unit production combos will be simpler in sc2. So why not have a few other simple combos for upgrades and other things? As far as i understand Sc2 will have slower unit production, so you wont have to be keyboarding like a mad man to keep up.
penalties was an idea brought up by someone else that i found interesting. However i could see this going either way. There are so many ways someone could implement a feature like that... it would be a whole other discussion.
Has anyone seen Lisu's face? I google image searched it and i couldn't find anything. That one handed Beatmania video is supposedly the best Beatmania player in the world (Lisu). Don't you find it odd that the names of the best P player and the names of the best Beatmania player are so similar? If they're not the same person... it's at least a reference.
On July 05 2007 15:32 boghat wrote: How is the user interface in Starcraft complex? It simply gives you two options for most actions, a mouse click or a keyboard click. Plus there is the addition of the 0-9 control groups but that's not that complex either. Hot keys are simply used to speed up your macro while you micro. They are not there for us to play combo games with the keyboard. It just happened that as the skill level in Starcraft progressed there became common patterns or combos of hot key usage that players determined was the fastest and best way to play. But the intent of hot keys and control groups is definitely NOT to create combos or anything like that; it is just used for multitasking purposes to speed up your game and to help you control large armies with the control groups.
This idea really does go against what Starcraft is about. When the new game comes out why don't you simply become one of the pioneers that figures out the best combos of hotkeys to use if you like doing this sort of thing so much. There is no point in making a hot key any more than one letter or it's not even a fucking hot key anymore. Starcraft is not about using the keyboard to do fancy combos at all. You do have to do "combos" or hot key patterns (although these are by no means universal, players get to choose whatever pattern suits them best) if you want to be good at the game but that's just a byproduct of the progression of skill.
I think it's pretty clear Blizzard was not trying to make Starcraft a game where the keyboard had any preeminence over any other aspect in the game. It's simply there to help multitasking and speed up the game. Obviously the better you are at using the keyboard the faster you can play and the better you can multitask and the better player you will be. Ironically you want to use the keyboard to slow down gameplay. Especially with the penalities; this will just slow down game play even more, and you are essentially completely changing the function of the keyboard. In short, this idea is a complete disaster.
edit- I repeated myself a bit but you get the point.
I'm not trying to be rude but i don't think your getting my point. You might as well call your argument the 'Starcraft Intelligent Design Argument'
I think there's A LOT that sc uses that Blizzard never intended.
Obviously Blizzard never thought people would play this game so much that skill would get this high. So they didn't foresee just what kind of micro was possible with control groups or what kind of blazing macro you could get using hotkeys. However Blizzard did intend for these things to be used, they just didn't foresee them being mastered so well. I don't know how much Blizzard foresaw combos being used so much but they at least knew it was theoretically possible, they put the controls for them in the game afterall. They probably didn't expect people to be making 'songs' out of the combos but they knew the hotkeys and control groups would be very useful for skilled players. Something Blizzard definitely didn't intend though was to make you do random combos on the keyboard to produce things simply for the sake of using the keyboard, but...
On July 05 2007 22:36 MyLostTemple wrote:
I'm not trying to make Starcraft into a keyboard dominant game. I'm trying to explain that the keyboard is a big part of this game. I don't even want the keyboard to be AS BIG of a part of the game in Sc2. I just want the keyboard to be new and interesting. The unit production combos will be simpler in sc2. So why not have a few other simple combos for upgrades and other things? As far as i understand Sc2 will have slower unit production, so you wont have to be keyboarding like a mad man to keep up.
...I definitely agree with you the keyboard is a big part of the game, I never denied that. I simply want the keyboard to be used for practical things, not random combos. Now I understand your fear that unit production combos will be much simpler and unit production slower in sc2 but I don't know how justified that really is considering we haven't seen or learned much yet; I'm guessing it's because of multiple building selection and new methods of production like the Protoss one we saw (although I haven't been following the new mechanics of sc2 too closely so I don't know really know if your concerns are that justified or not; that may be).
In my post I was just assuming that the really skilled players are still going to have to use hotkeys and combos as much as in sc1 to be the best. It might be initially easier for noobs to be good (which is a good thing) but I'm assuming (and hoping) that to be highly skilled you will still have to utilize the keyboard as much as in sc1.
Because even if macro combos are going to be simpler this surely means you can use control groups and hotkeys to micro better. You could probably do some crazy micro stuff with control groups and spells if you didn't need to focus so much on macro. It seems to me you could probably figure out some crazy micro combos to maximize battles. I can see why you'd want to add in random keyboard combos if you think the keyboard is going to be used less but I don't see why you have much reason to think it will be.
Although in the end I agree with you that Blizzard never thought keyboard mastering was going to be such a big part of the game. But that could also mean that when sc1 was made there wasn't supposed to be such a huge emphasis on the keyboard but there did become after the skill level increased. So perhaps therefore even if there initially appears to not be as much of a emphasis on the keyboard for sc2 most likely the best players will still eventually use the keyboard as much as they do now, and this will be part of what makes them the best.
TBH, as a guy infatuated with fighting games (don't take that wrong :/ ), I reside more with the camp that advocates combining simple shit to create complex manuevers. Bringing up Tekken again and referencing a previous poster, Mishimas have to master vital movement techniques, one of which is wavedashing. This is essentially repeated crouch dashing: f~n~d~d/f~n, f~n~... repeatedly. There is also what is known as BDC, aka backdash cancel: b,b~d/b, b,b~d/b ad infinitum. Both sound simple to do, huh? After all, it's just random shit you do with your joystick. By that premise, I suppose Asians like to masturbate A LOT:
Why were Mishimas sooooooo good in TTT? By combining these techniques, you practically CONTROL your opponent by 1. spacing and 2. the sickest mixups known to man. An aside, Koreans loved TTT then. I've been to the most ghetto and varied arcades in Busan, yet they all share one thing in common: EVERY fucking arcade has TTT. I suppose there was reason why: mastering the game was just so worthwhile and fulfilling.
Are such motions made needlessly complex like snk supers? No. What kind of self-respecting fighting game player does not know how to do a dragon punch? Or tap backwards twice? But such simple motions now become intricate, gosu mosaics of skill. There was EFFICIENCY, and PRECISION: the things one does when he micros and macros in SC. Manipulating the most mundane tasks to do great things. It's like improvising in jazz.
By golly though, a game shouldn't be dumbed down to hell. There's a reason you don't use macros (different sense of the word) in fighting games. I'd be fucking PISSED if some asshole pressed some buttons and suddenly did like 293874829374982x mag resets. Of course, the fact that mag still can is worrisome :/ but at least the player should be competent enough to execute it. Hence "just frames" in fighting games, for example. What if Daigo only needed to tap forward once to parry all of Chun's SA2? Actually, that's a bad hypothetical example: it's fucking INANE just to imagine the idea.
Now I'm no RTS player. Hell, I haven't even touched BW since, iono, way back fucking when (that'll change with SC2 ) Shit, I play source too much for my own good. But a balance between simplicity and complexity ought to be achieved, as paradoxical as it sounds. Tapping a key and instantly getting an army is stupid. FORCING a player to, I dunno, type out the konami code in less than a millisecond is also stupid. Which leads to another thing that ought to be addressed...
A game should not be so artificially made complex or dumbed down. Why did Koreans, for the most part, stop playing T4 when it originally came out? They "fixed" (i.e. removed) BDC, but removing the things which make a game BEAUTIFUL is plain idiotic. (Actually, T4 sucked for other reasons *COUGH*JFLS*COUGH* but that's irrelevant) Arbitrariness destroys a game.
I've mentioned before that the OP's concept indeed seemed arbitrary. It still does (and so does my previous ideas, lol). So how does one implement such 'gosu combos' while still making it NATURAL? As natural as infinites in marvel? As natural as corner lockdowns in sf? As natural as the original SC?
Let me attempt an example. The OP griped about one button upgrades. Why not allow the option to upgrade individual classes of units, at a lower price but obviously requiring more keyboard use? Say you don't intend to use, iono, the muta morphs. Then you can upgrade the muta while ignoring its derivatives, and apply the goodies where they count as opposed to a blanket upgrade. Does a scourge really need an armor upgrade? Probably not, so don't.
Perhaps the ability to "micro your macro" can be a solution. I dunno. But I've talked enough. To reference that same earlier poster, I agree the player should control the game, not vice versa. Can the OP's notion and that previous statement reconcile? Hopefully.
To conclude, this is a little demonstration from 3s, for the truly attentive:
I can't do that option select shit fast enough lol
I don't know if this is reasonable, or if it has already been discussed yet in this thread or others, but I'll still put it out there.
What if we could have another set of control groups? Not another place on the keyboard, but pressing say.... the `/~ key would switch to the 2nd set. So you have 1 and 2 sets, for a total of.... 20 control groups? Just throwing it out there. it could open up possibilities. The macro bar and the micro bar? lol now it's sounding stupid :/
On July 07 2007 23:44 SayaSP wrote: I don't know if this is reasonable, or if it has already been discussed yet in this thread or others, but I'll still put it out there.
What if we could have another set of control groups? Not another place on the keyboard, but pressing say.... the `/~ key would switch to the 2nd set. So you have 1 and 2 sets, for a total of.... 20 control groups? Just throwing it out there. it could open up possibilities. The macro bar and the micro bar? lol now it's sounding stupid :/
doesn't sound stupid at all! I think more of the tl.net community should engage new interface ideas rather than cast them away. i actually broke my ~ key off so i always knew if i was hitting my 1 key. Honestly, I don't see why they didn't use the f# keys so we could assign more control groups either.
I really think we need to throughly discuss the interface of RTS games for the future of Starcraft 2. There is so much that has not yet been tangled with on the RTS front in regards to interface. If you have other ideas you should share them. That goes for everyone on this forum too!
I like your idea sayaSP, it's quite interesting. There may be a problem though... if players can use the ~ key to cycle through groups this could case two diffrent methods of playing. This, in a sense, could cause a similar problem to the 'too much clicking' problem most foreigners have a habit of doing. Something like this could teach some players to use the ~ key too much and they would never learn other hotkey patterns required to master the game.
Prophecy1: prehaps you would like to elaborate on what your thinking. You probably still have your windows keys on your computer don't you? =[ Some people still never learned how to play this game. Too bad. I guess the best i could ask of you is to keep your dog shit attitude out of this forum since i doubt you have any clue what your talking about. Keep clicking on your gateways newbie ; )
On July 09 2007 11:58 FrozenArbiter wrote: Isn't he saying pressing ~ would make pressing one 1 select control group 11, not 1, 2 would select 12 etc..?
Anyway, I still have my windows key T_T I like my keyboard looking neat.
YOU STILL HAVE YOUR WINDOWS KEYS ON YOUR KEYBOARD?
How can you possibly access the right shift key w/ your thumb!? How do you not tab yourself out of the game if your using the right ctrl key!? BREAK THEM OFF NOW!
I don't use the right shift or ctrl key haha, I key the 0 with my mouse hand since I only use it for my nexus and then gateway, so it's only used twice in a game for me. Same with 9 pretty much, starting nex, first exp, gate, then I keep my gate keys until the game is over unless something exceptional happens.
On July 09 2007 12:35 FrozenArbiter wrote: I don't use the right shift or ctrl key haha, I key the 0 with my mouse hand since I only use it for my nexus and then gateway, so it's only used twice in a game for me. Same with 9 pretty much, starting nex, first exp, gate, then I keep my gate keys until the game is over unless something exceptional happens.
Why not? You want gateways keyed 99% of the time so I leave the gates keyed until I need those keys for units, but you never have 10 groups of units as toss so 9 and 0 stay as gateways until they are either destroyed or something exceptional happens in the game.
Besides, I'm pretty sure I've seen pros take their hands off the mouse to key. Hm, wasn't it yellow who used to use 2 hands when macroing (ages ago tho and I'm pretty sure he changed), I think he said so in an interview.
In fact I'm pretty sure I just saw nal_ra use his right hand to key his expo nexus while taking a break from fighting vs oversky's hydras, in his about starcraft game vs him.
Yes he used 2 hands to macro while his right hand was above the numeric pad. With this way he could make units rather fast at least faster than 1 handers.
Btw tasteless, tbh it's not really a big deal to have the windows key near the ctrl or alt key even with the right ctrl / win / alt key thing. I mean i've played worth more than dozens thousand of game and i've pressed it like what ? 50 times maybe ? That was when i wasn't really used to macro as i do now. Also keep in mind that not every keyboard are the same. If i remember correctly korean keyboards do not have the right ctrl and for some europeans keyboard (like mine) there's another buton instead of the windows key, which doesn't fuck up the game at all (near the right ctrl). I don't really want to put off the window key since i use it here and there (or every so and then dunno which one to use correct me if i'm wrong >_<)
However i do like you idea about making combos for faster upgrades or faster building units, but wouldn't that piss the beginners off since they could not have played sc at all, let's say every now and then (hey maybe that was the CORRECT one ?) ?
Last but not least, that'd fuck up the players which are used to hit butons really hard. They'd have to change their keyboard at least 1 time per year. Wouldn't it be ridiculous ? Well it doesn't matter for me because i don't tap it hard at all but i don't think everyone are like me. :p
I appreciate your input Raiz. But your dead wrong in your keyboard analysis.
I spoke with Nal Ra, Yellow and some other progamers last time i was in Korea. I asked them about keyboard techniques and they admitted you should never be using two hands on the keyboard. EVER. Yellow was using two hands to macro a while back because his hot key setup was wrong. If you hot key everything correctly and have the right keys missing you should never need two hands.
this is what your keyboard SHOULD look like if you're a true SC player:
You should be using the right AND left shift key regardless of your race, I'll use protoss to exemplify this point.
Here's the key locations protoss uses for the 'build' command, notice the build key is highlighted.
You should always be using two fingers to build anything. Right after you build something you immediately goto the shift key so you can tell the probe to return to gathering minerals.
by = pinky on b ring finger on y thumb on shift key. bp = pinky on b index finger on p thumb on shift key. bn = pinky on b ring finger on n thumb on shift key.
going to the far left shift key will waist time since you can hit the shift key on the right with your thumb more quickly. Fuck the windows keys, BREAK THEM OFF NOW.
You even need to do this with the advanced building key, only to make the observatory though
use index on 'o' for the vo command, pinky on v and thumb on the right shift.
I wouldn't trust what you see pros do with their hands to begin with. I don't think the vast majority of them are too interested in sharing hot key positioning and patterns. Look at this VOD:
Why the fuck is boxer spamming the arrow keys? They shot from this angle so people could see how to use your hands. And instead he's actually randomly hitting the arrow keys as if to make things more confusing. Now you get a whole bunch of newbs spamming arrow keys at lans and they don't even know why they're doing it. And for god sake no one respond to this saying that you should ever be using the arrow keys in starcraft.
Now look at this picture:
This picture is a lot more recent than the other one... He sure seems to have a lot more keys missing too... You need keys missing and to truly master Starcraft you must master the keyboard along with all the complex strategies intertwined in the game. Otherwise you'll just be a smart starcraft player who can't keep up.
This is the whole point of me bringing up new keyboard combinations to build off of how starcraft was played. Instead this thread has had only a few new ideas brought up since apparently the vast majority of tl.net has not yet learned how to use their keyboards x.x what a shame indeed.
.. BoxeR is famous for using the arrowkeys when playing (at least he USED to use them, I dunno).
And what you are saying with regards to my post is that, nal_ra decided that aboutstarcraft, the on TV showmatch, isn't worthy of him playing seriously so he just decided to take his right hand off his mouse to hotkey his expo? Oh and btw, his keyboard looked like a normal keyboard.
There's a clip of boxer's hands while he's playing Junwi on OGN (I think at least, it's on bifrost) and he's using his arrowkeys (as far as I remember) to position the screen while he's microing vultures vs lurkers.
There is not some universal 'right way' to use the keyboard for SC for fucks sake.. I don't mind removing a few keys but I hit them once in a blue moon anyway so why bother? If I was playing for a living sure I'd remove them, I wouldn't want to hit the windows key on TV.
On July 12 2007 11:58 FrozenArbiter wrote: .. BoxeR is famous for using the arrowkeys when playing (at least he USED to use them, I dunno).
And what you are saying with regards to my post is that, nal_ra decided that aboutstarcraft, the on TV showmatch, isn't worthy of him playing seriously so he just decided to take his right hand off his mouse to hotkey his expo? Oh and btw, his keyboard looked like a normal keyboard.
nal ra found out about breaking keys off the keyboard late, most likely because he has "_" in his name. A p player should always have the "_" key missing because they are constantly hitting 0 and P. You wouldn't want to get your fingers in the wrong location and end up not making a probe or something. I think Nal Ra also learned about breaking off the right windows key later than other pros did.
The pros had to learn how to play SC the best way possible. They didn't start out knowing it. Some didn't even learn about it until AFTER they played on tv. That's probably why you've seen some with all their keys. Who knows? Maybe boxer didn't know to break off those other keys because he hadn't learned that technique yet. Regardless, he's done it now, probably because it's VERY important to do.
I don't buy that whole using the arrow keys crap. Why in the world would you EVER use your arrow keys playing starcraft. I don't care who's doing it. How would arrow keys help you at all, you should be using your mouse to move the screen, not the fking arrow keys. Just think about it.
I don't fucking know, all I know is boxer used it all the time in the past. People don't question it because it's boxer=.= Yes, it seems stupid, but he used it for something (I think someone said he had them to very low sensitivity for careful movement of the screen or something, I dont know).
Well you need to know that nobody plays the same style as yours nor boxer. And i think it's all good since each player has his own style of keyboard typing. I'm not a P player, therefore i don't really use (if not exclusively) the right shift. But i do play right ctrl a lot since i don't really have bigs hands for groups 8 9 0 (even if i can reach them i'd rather use the right ctrl which is easier). Also keep in mind that noone has the same mouse sensitivity. Therefore they'd rather play with arrow keys because it'd take a long way for slows mice. I know a player which really excels at arrow key, and it doesn't hurt him at all. Hell he'd even beat a lot of players with his style :x Usually, the chance for experienced players to miss a key is no more like 1% per game, if not less. Look at me : i use 3 u for burrowing lurkers, 0 w for defilers then darkswarms and i don't miss them at all unless maybe in importants matches which i lack of. But i recently used it and there was no problem. I think you're a bit too deep about hotkeys. No offense
Also arbiter is right : Boxer used the arrow keys against someone else where he was microing vultures and, believe it or not, they were very usefull. Constantly microing vultures while you can move them everywhere thank to the arrow keys. Even if i don't like him, you need to know that he used to own everybody by this style, so i'd think twice before saying something that you're not truely aware of.
I still don't understand how on earth boxer could use his arrow keys to actually help him in what he was doing. And maybe i'm crazy but i still don't buy that he's constantly using the arrow keys when he's not being filmed first person. He obviously owned everyone with his own style back then but he doesn't own people like he used to because of this new macro style that many of the new pro korean players use.
I doubt the legitimacy of the arrow keys also due to the fact that at WCG Italy Iloveoov had the arrow keys broken off on his keyboard. I even pointed at them and asked him why they were gone. He shook his head and said that the arrow keys are bad to use. Keep in mind he knew boxer very very well on SKT1, in fact boxer was originally his teacher and best friend.
I'm not bashing on boxer, I'm just saying i wouldn't' be surprised if he was hitting those arrow keys in his fpvods so other people couldn't copy his keyboard patterns as easily. That's all.
On a side note, I use "by" with thumb, pointer, pinky on the left shift key.
EDIT: Omg, I do the same thing with "bn"!
Thanks for the labeled diagrams, since I didn't realize the advanced buildings only require use of the right shift key for the observatory.
An additional question: For upgrades, should a hotkey be assigned to the building (let's say the core) so after the main upgrade from the building (range, usually) is done, we can reassign the hotkey once we have enough units/buildings? For instance, I frequently reassign 7 to the Arbiter Tribunal, so once it researches Stasis, I can quickly research recall immediately. Once I grab my ups (+energy too), I reassign 7 to whatever I feel like my strategy calls for.
one of the reasons why sen is the best foreigner around is because of the way he plays starcraft using his keyboard.. he uses like all 5 fingers so he can do things really fast
EPT
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