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Were pros "supposed" to be so good at creep? - Page 3

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WombaT
Profile Blog Joined May 2010
Northern Ireland24909 Posts
September 26 2020 20:36 GMT
#41
On September 27 2020 04:43 [Phantom] wrote:
I don't completely agree it's necessary. You could flank or use infestors for example to slow units down, which was exactly what zergs did when their creep spread wasn't as good.


....what is this rapid fire "with multiple commands" you guys speak of....have I been playing wrong all this time?


I don't think creep spread is that big of a problem honestly.

Let’s say you remap an alternate to build a structure to e. Pylon is also e, so you can hold e to build a pylon.

Multiple alternates you can edit the hotkey profile to have the ‘build’ command to be also say, c, b and g.

So you can just hold c, b or g to build a cannon, battery or a gateway if you wanted.

Rapid fire warping (the best method) works like this.
'You'll always be the cuddly marsupial of my heart, despite the inherent flaws of your ancestry' - Squat
CicadaSC
Profile Joined January 2018
United States1555 Posts
September 26 2020 22:30 GMT
#42
if zergs werent supposed to be good at creep spreading Blizzard would have nerfed it by now.
Remember that we all come from a place of passion!!
Thaniri
Profile Blog Joined March 2011
1264 Posts
September 26 2020 22:37 GMT
#43
For TvZ:

Creep has been nerfed recently so that hellions can kill it easily and it recedes faster.

Previously creep was literally OP bullshit and I would be the first person in this thread complaining about it.

At this point, creep is in a pretty good spot balance wise because zergs just lose fights off of creep.

I do not envy the balance team in a couple of years when people start complaining that zerg cannot fight off of creep. If you buff their armies then they become too strong on creep.

For PvZ:

¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Dangermousecatdog
Profile Joined December 2010
United Kingdom7084 Posts
Last Edited: 2020-09-26 23:36:37
September 26 2020 23:28 GMT
#44
.
Dangermousecatdog
Profile Joined December 2010
United Kingdom7084 Posts
September 26 2020 23:30 GMT
#45
On September 27 2020 04:43 [Phantom] wrote:
....what is this rapid fire "with multiple commands" you guys speak of....have I been playing wrong all this time?
It's been changed a fair few times but you can bind alternate keys so pressing your hotkey counts as fast as left mouse button, which creates the effect as clicking as fast as your keyboard repeat rate. Was first popularised for spamming infested terrans on demand. No idea why they are calling it rapid fire though, as back then it was just simply called bind alternate hotkey which was self descriptive in itself.
ScrappyRabbit
Profile Joined March 2016
200 Posts
September 27 2020 04:16 GMT
#46
[B]No it isn't. This is a loaded question. Rather than ask if it is an issue, therfore implying it is an issue, the onus is on you to explain why creep spread is an issue. But you cannot or is unwilling to do so.


Fair enough, and good points. I would say it's an "issue" to the extent that at the top level, a Zerg can have a game won for 10+ minutes before the gg actually comes. If zerg gets well enough ahead to creep-lock their half of the map with an 80-85 drone count that allows them to print banelings/eventually get to Ultras, the game is pretty much over, but you see the other race stay in for a long, long time (relatively speaking) because they're obligated to look for miracle engagements that aren't going to come, until finally Zerg gets a big enough counter/gets up to Ultras and finally make their straight-on push. (I call it "anaconda Zerg.")

It's like when one boxer is significantly better than another one but doesn't have knockout power, so you see the opponent get chipped away at for 12 rounds when it was clear he was outmatched in the first round.

To use a Starcraft analogy, this reminds me the most of that late-HOTS meta when Terrans were playing ultra-turtle mech into BC (specifically Innovation and Flash), and if they were able to take all the bases they wanted to, they were effectively unbreakable and just waiting for their ultimate army to end the game. Of course, it wasn't the army they built into at 25 minutes that ended the game, but the hellion run-by at 3 minutes that allowed Terran to get to their comfort zone -- it just took another 22 minutes for it to become official.

Obviously, there's a lot of merit to the "if you can't win from that position, don't get in that position" argument, but I wonder if games could get a bit more dynamic if creep was easier to handle in the late-midgame.
bela.mervado
Profile Joined December 2008
Hungary383 Posts
September 27 2020 07:02 GMT
#47
On September 26 2020 21:29 WombaT wrote:
I’m with Luolis not necessarily to the extent that rapid fire is bad per se. However Zerg seem to benefit from it the most.

Rapid injects and creep spread, their core macro mechanics both benefit from rapid fire. Infested Terrans historically as well. Protoss have rapid warp ins which is always useful, and Terrans basically have rapid snipes and muling, which can be useful in certain situations but It doesn’t augment their regular macro cycle hugely.

As per the spirit of the thread I think Zerg users have both employed rapid fire alongside creep spreading improvements to levels not really intended. Which isn’t necessarily a problem, the fun of strategy games is the player base expanding the game.

I guess the problem comes when there’s an asymmetric scaling of the ceilings of these improvements across races.

As per rapid fire vs scroll wheel stuff, it’s ridiculous. Pros are mapping 3-5 alternates for commands to enable certain things to be done by rapid fire. Which is not intuitive at all to a new player and it can’t be done in the game UI, so it’s really not functionally different to software remapping your scroll wheel.


You are wrong on the inject part.
Yes, you can find tutorials on rapid fire injecting, but that is not what pro players use.
For injects there are basically 2 efficient methods, some players use both in a single game, depending on the situation.

1. having your injecting queens hotkeyed then
(select inject queens group) (press shift) (press inject hotkey) (base cam 1) (click) (base cam 2) (click) (base cam 3) (click) (release shift).
There is no rapidfire involved in this. Advantage is that it is very fast, you can inject 3 bases very quickly. Drawback is that it is not consistent (just like with the rapidfire inject), because when one of the queens are low on energy, the others will start to wander/move around the map. Serral uses this method before lategame when they can spare the hotkey to have the inject queens on them, and they are sure that there is energy on all queens. For example in a longer mid game fight they would do this. Some zergs have all their queens on one hotkey group so they can do this inject then use the same group to plant tumors or respond to air (Dark).

2. base cam + box selecting queen + manual inject. this is slower but reliable, you only work with one base at a time, whatever queen(s) you can box select there, you grab it and inject the hatch with it. This is a slower but more reliable method.

(3. The rapidfire inject requires a keyboard that repeats both keys when you press two keys at once. You need a hotkeyed queen at all bases, which is a lot of supply later when you have 6+ hatcheries. And the queens will start to wander if they are low on energy. This is not used by any pro that I know of.)

Rapidfire does affect creep spread.
You have to ctrl+click on an active tumor to select all in the area, then press the spread creep / rapidfire key, and wave the mouse pointer around. You can spread a lot of tumors this way, but the tumors does not tend to fan away very well, they tend to stay together. This actually does not make creep spread much faster, you simply cover the creep path with more tumors. But that is very useful, because it takes more time to kill like 4 * n tumors than to kill only 1 set of 1 * n tumors in an area. I think selecting tumors one by one and spreading creep without RF is a cleaner technique. (Dark, Serral seems to do one by one).
DRG yesterday morning in GSL used RF to spread.
When a terran cleans a patch of creep, some zergs select creep queens and uses RF to plant new tumors (select creep queens) + (press shift) + (press inject / rf key) + (wave mouse) as a reaction, but it seems they sometimes, when they have the time, correct this to plant only a few.

I think RF is more important in throwing biles (quickly focus tanks/liberators/bcs overlords prizm or sometimes air), and I believe most of the pro zergs would be ok without RF creep spread.
Let's trade it for cyclone auto lock

Dedraterllaerau
Profile Joined May 2019
113 Posts
September 27 2020 07:17 GMT
#48
Zerg is to forgiving which is why the best Zerg players perform so consistently, they play an easier race argue all you want but if you look at mistakes made you cant argue against that fact.

This is another reason why Protoss players are so inconsistent because Protoss must play near flawless and on top this they easily get build order disadvantages they can't control.Which makes me sad because Stats is such a talented player but game is forcing him to play all inn PVZ which effectively robs him of his strengths.

Zerg and Terran can make a lot more mistakes and get more "attempts" to succeed.


I honestly can't believe big personalities in SC2 can sit with a straight face and say Zerg is balanced grow a damn spine people
Vision_
Profile Joined September 2018
861 Posts
Last Edited: 2020-09-27 08:52:39
September 27 2020 08:39 GMT
#49
On September 26 2020 18:08 Luolis wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 26 2020 13:07 Aesto wrote:
The main reason Zerg got more effective at creep spread is because Zerg players use a lot more Queens than they used to in WoL and HotS. The reasons for that are a) Queens got buffed, b) Zerg players realized how good they are for defense (most Zerg units are good at exactly one thing - but Queens are super versatile), and c) the LotV economy allows it. The reason Zergs didn't used to spread as much creep back in the day is because Zerg just couldn't afford those extra queens. In WoL and HotS, Zerg economy was always balancing on a razor's edge, there was no margin for error, you couldn't afford to be too greedy nor too safe. Now there is a bit more of a margin for error, and Zergs realized that they could spend this money on Queens which are an excellent insurance policy. And thanks to creep spread, they pay off even if they're not needed for defense. That being said, IF Zerg is too strong, I don't think it is because of creep spread. Creep is more of a symptom than the 'disease'.

D) Spreading creep is much faster with rapidfire, since you can hold a button down for a sec and it puts down like 10 tumors. I don't think rapidfire should be allowed in competitive sc2.



I couldn t think my lecture of this thread will stop to the third posts
WombaT
Profile Blog Joined May 2010
Northern Ireland24909 Posts
September 27 2020 10:57 GMT
#50
On September 27 2020 16:02 bela.mervado wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 26 2020 21:29 WombaT wrote:
I’m with Luolis not necessarily to the extent that rapid fire is bad per se. However Zerg seem to benefit from it the most.

Rapid injects and creep spread, their core macro mechanics both benefit from rapid fire. Infested Terrans historically as well. Protoss have rapid warp ins which is always useful, and Terrans basically have rapid snipes and muling, which can be useful in certain situations but It doesn’t augment their regular macro cycle hugely.

As per the spirit of the thread I think Zerg users have both employed rapid fire alongside creep spreading improvements to levels not really intended. Which isn’t necessarily a problem, the fun of strategy games is the player base expanding the game.

I guess the problem comes when there’s an asymmetric scaling of the ceilings of these improvements across races.

As per rapid fire vs scroll wheel stuff, it’s ridiculous. Pros are mapping 3-5 alternates for commands to enable certain things to be done by rapid fire. Which is not intuitive at all to a new player and it can’t be done in the game UI, so it’s really not functionally different to software remapping your scroll wheel.


You are wrong on the inject part.
Yes, you can find tutorials on rapid fire injecting, but that is not what pro players use.
For injects there are basically 2 efficient methods, some players use both in a single game, depending on the situation.

1. having your injecting queens hotkeyed then
(select inject queens group) (press shift) (press inject hotkey) (base cam 1) (click) (base cam 2) (click) (base cam 3) (click) (release shift).
There is no rapidfire involved in this. Advantage is that it is very fast, you can inject 3 bases very quickly. Drawback is that it is not consistent (just like with the rapidfire inject), because when one of the queens are low on energy, the others will start to wander/move around the map. Serral uses this method before lategame when they can spare the hotkey to have the inject queens on them, and they are sure that there is energy on all queens. For example in a longer mid game fight they would do this. Some zergs have all their queens on one hotkey group so they can do this inject then use the same group to plant tumors or respond to air (Dark).

2. base cam + box selecting queen + manual inject. this is slower but reliable, you only work with one base at a time, whatever queen(s) you can box select there, you grab it and inject the hatch with it. This is a slower but more reliable method.

(3. The rapidfire inject requires a keyboard that repeats both keys when you press two keys at once. You need a hotkeyed queen at all bases, which is a lot of supply later when you have 6+ hatcheries. And the queens will start to wander if they are low on energy. This is not used by any pro that I know of.)

Rapidfire does affect creep spread.
You have to ctrl+click on an active tumor to select all in the area, then press the spread creep / rapidfire key, and wave the mouse pointer around. You can spread a lot of tumors this way, but the tumors does not tend to fan away very well, they tend to stay together. This actually does not make creep spread much faster, you simply cover the creep path with more tumors. But that is very useful, because it takes more time to kill like 4 * n tumors than to kill only 1 set of 1 * n tumors in an area. I think selecting tumors one by one and spreading creep without RF is a cleaner technique. (Dark, Serral seems to do one by one).
DRG yesterday morning in GSL used RF to spread.
When a terran cleans a patch of creep, some zergs select creep queens and uses RF to plant new tumors (select creep queens) + (press shift) + (press inject / rf key) + (wave mouse) as a reaction, but it seems they sometimes, when they have the time, correct this to plant only a few.

I think RF is more important in throwing biles (quickly focus tanks/liberators/bcs overlords prizm or sometimes air), and I believe most of the pro zergs would be ok without RF creep spread.
Let's trade it for cyclone auto lock


Cheers for the clarification. Have not really dabbled in Zerg so got that one wrong!
'You'll always be the cuddly marsupial of my heart, despite the inherent flaws of your ancestry' - Squat
Comedy
Profile Joined March 2016
456 Posts
Last Edited: 2020-09-27 12:43:13
September 27 2020 12:39 GMT
#51
On September 27 2020 19:57 WombaT wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 27 2020 16:02 bela.mervado wrote:
On September 26 2020 21:29 WombaT wrote:
I’m with Luolis not necessarily to the extent that rapid fire is bad per se. However Zerg seem to benefit from it the most.

Rapid injects and creep spread, their core macro mechanics both benefit from rapid fire. Infested Terrans historically as well. Protoss have rapid warp ins which is always useful, and Terrans basically have rapid snipes and muling, which can be useful in certain situations but It doesn’t augment their regular macro cycle hugely.

As per the spirit of the thread I think Zerg users have both employed rapid fire alongside creep spreading improvements to levels not really intended. Which isn’t necessarily a problem, the fun of strategy games is the player base expanding the game.

I guess the problem comes when there’s an asymmetric scaling of the ceilings of these improvements across races.

As per rapid fire vs scroll wheel stuff, it’s ridiculous. Pros are mapping 3-5 alternates for commands to enable certain things to be done by rapid fire. Which is not intuitive at all to a new player and it can’t be done in the game UI, so it’s really not functionally different to software remapping your scroll wheel.


You are wrong on the inject part.
Yes, you can find tutorials on rapid fire injecting, but that is not what pro players use.
For injects there are basically 2 efficient methods, some players use both in a single game, depending on the situation.

1. having your injecting queens hotkeyed then
(select inject queens group) (press shift) (press inject hotkey) (base cam 1) (click) (base cam 2) (click) (base cam 3) (click) (release shift).
There is no rapidfire involved in this. Advantage is that it is very fast, you can inject 3 bases very quickly. Drawback is that it is not consistent (just like with the rapidfire inject), because when one of the queens are low on energy, the others will start to wander/move around the map. Serral uses this method before lategame when they can spare the hotkey to have the inject queens on them, and they are sure that there is energy on all queens. For example in a longer mid game fight they would do this. Some zergs have all their queens on one hotkey group so they can do this inject then use the same group to plant tumors or respond to air (Dark).

2. base cam + box selecting queen + manual inject. this is slower but reliable, you only work with one base at a time, whatever queen(s) you can box select there, you grab it and inject the hatch with it. This is a slower but more reliable method.

(3. The rapidfire inject requires a keyboard that repeats both keys when you press two keys at once. You need a hotkeyed queen at all bases, which is a lot of supply later when you have 6+ hatcheries. And the queens will start to wander if they are low on energy. This is not used by any pro that I know of.)

Rapidfire does affect creep spread.
You have to ctrl+click on an active tumor to select all in the area, then press the spread creep / rapidfire key, and wave the mouse pointer around. You can spread a lot of tumors this way, but the tumors does not tend to fan away very well, they tend to stay together. This actually does not make creep spread much faster, you simply cover the creep path with more tumors. But that is very useful, because it takes more time to kill like 4 * n tumors than to kill only 1 set of 1 * n tumors in an area. I think selecting tumors one by one and spreading creep without RF is a cleaner technique. (Dark, Serral seems to do one by one).
DRG yesterday morning in GSL used RF to spread.
When a terran cleans a patch of creep, some zergs select creep queens and uses RF to plant new tumors (select creep queens) + (press shift) + (press inject / rf key) + (wave mouse) as a reaction, but it seems they sometimes, when they have the time, correct this to plant only a few.

I think RF is more important in throwing biles (quickly focus tanks/liberators/bcs overlords prizm or sometimes air), and I believe most of the pro zergs would be ok without RF creep spread.
Let's trade it for cyclone auto lock


Cheers for the clarification. Have not really dabbled in Zerg so got that one wrong!


he's wrong about pressing shift. Nobody presses shift. Rest is correct. method is the same way, you're just not pressing shift when your creep tumor is already on a rapid fire key, youre just holding it down. With inject youre not pressing shift because youre hardly gaining anything by doing that, if anything it will mess up queens a bit more.

Pro zerg players actually up the repeat rate on their keyboard a ton. There are keyboards that have this functionality built in (Ducky), but there is also software that let's you do the same thing. It will change repeat delay and repeat rate values in the registry. Maybe up to 4 times faster than standard windows keyboard repeat rate. So this helps with rapid fire everything, but it also helps a ton with building units when spending like 30 larva in <0.5 second cuz of insanely high repeat rate and low repeat delay.
skdsk
Profile Joined February 2019
138 Posts
September 27 2020 13:50 GMT
#52
I think the reason isnt because zerg is too good or whatever or players became to good, the reason is simple zergs builds lots of queens for defense, in old days you would get 1queen per hatch and 1-2 queens for creep spread, now you get like 5-8queens creep spreading and getting involved into fights (use banes/lings for attacks/runbies and use queens for defense), this actually is really balanced and well made strategy. Now the problem with this mass queen style is creep spread is insane and makes zerg seem OP.

How to solve this?
If you make queens for expensive you are nerfing entire race, which is bad idea.

Make creep more expensive mana wise, bad idea again, it wont solve the mass queen strategy and zergs still get more queens and every other playstyle will get nuked.

1. Possible solution
Make creep tumor actually cost mineral or gas, something like 30 minerals. Now when you trade units to kill tumors, you actually trading for minerals instead of energy, now zerg needs to decide if he wants 50 creep tumors to see everything, just like terran or protoss building depots/pylons sending marines and observers around the map and using scans.
FFW_Rude
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
France10201 Posts
Last Edited: 2020-09-27 14:55:08
September 27 2020 14:46 GMT
#53
On September 27 2020 21:39 Comedy wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 27 2020 19:57 WombaT wrote:
On September 27 2020 16:02 bela.mervado wrote:
On September 26 2020 21:29 WombaT wrote:
I’m with Luolis not necessarily to the extent that rapid fire is bad per se. However Zerg seem to benefit from it the most.

Rapid injects and creep spread, their core macro mechanics both benefit from rapid fire. Infested Terrans historically as well. Protoss have rapid warp ins which is always useful, and Terrans basically have rapid snipes and muling, which can be useful in certain situations but It doesn’t augment their regular macro cycle hugely.

As per the spirit of the thread I think Zerg users have both employed rapid fire alongside creep spreading improvements to levels not really intended. Which isn’t necessarily a problem, the fun of strategy games is the player base expanding the game.

I guess the problem comes when there’s an asymmetric scaling of the ceilings of these improvements across races.

As per rapid fire vs scroll wheel stuff, it’s ridiculous. Pros are mapping 3-5 alternates for commands to enable certain things to be done by rapid fire. Which is not intuitive at all to a new player and it can’t be done in the game UI, so it’s really not functionally different to software remapping your scroll wheel.


You are wrong on the inject part.
Yes, you can find tutorials on rapid fire injecting, but that is not what pro players use.
For injects there are basically 2 efficient methods, some players use both in a single game, depending on the situation.

1. having your injecting queens hotkeyed then
(select inject queens group) (press shift) (press inject hotkey) (base cam 1) (click) (base cam 2) (click) (base cam 3) (click) (release shift).
There is no rapidfire involved in this. Advantage is that it is very fast, you can inject 3 bases very quickly. Drawback is that it is not consistent (just like with the rapidfire inject), because when one of the queens are low on energy, the others will start to wander/move around the map. Serral uses this method before lategame when they can spare the hotkey to have the inject queens on them, and they are sure that there is energy on all queens. For example in a longer mid game fight they would do this. Some zergs have all their queens on one hotkey group so they can do this inject then use the same group to plant tumors or respond to air (Dark).

2. base cam + box selecting queen + manual inject. this is slower but reliable, you only work with one base at a time, whatever queen(s) you can box select there, you grab it and inject the hatch with it. This is a slower but more reliable method.

(3. The rapidfire inject requires a keyboard that repeats both keys when you press two keys at once. You need a hotkeyed queen at all bases, which is a lot of supply later when you have 6+ hatcheries. And the queens will start to wander if they are low on energy. This is not used by any pro that I know of.)

Rapidfire does affect creep spread.
You have to ctrl+click on an active tumor to select all in the area, then press the spread creep / rapidfire key, and wave the mouse pointer around. You can spread a lot of tumors this way, but the tumors does not tend to fan away very well, they tend to stay together. This actually does not make creep spread much faster, you simply cover the creep path with more tumors. But that is very useful, because it takes more time to kill like 4 * n tumors than to kill only 1 set of 1 * n tumors in an area. I think selecting tumors one by one and spreading creep without RF is a cleaner technique. (Dark, Serral seems to do one by one).
DRG yesterday morning in GSL used RF to spread.
When a terran cleans a patch of creep, some zergs select creep queens and uses RF to plant new tumors (select creep queens) + (press shift) + (press inject / rf key) + (wave mouse) as a reaction, but it seems they sometimes, when they have the time, correct this to plant only a few.

I think RF is more important in throwing biles (quickly focus tanks/liberators/bcs overlords prizm or sometimes air), and I believe most of the pro zergs would be ok without RF creep spread.
Let's trade it for cyclone auto lock


Cheers for the clarification. Have not really dabbled in Zerg so got that one wrong!


he's wrong about pressing shift. Nobody presses shift. Rest is correct. method is the same way, you're just not pressing shift when your creep tumor is already on a rapid fire key, youre just holding it down. With inject youre not pressing shift because youre hardly gaining anything by doing that, if anything it will mess up queens a bit more.

Pro zerg players actually up the repeat rate on their keyboard a ton. There are keyboards that have this functionality built in (Ducky), but there is also software that let's you do the same thing. It will change repeat delay and repeat rate values in the registry. Maybe up to 4 times faster than standard windows keyboard repeat rate. So this helps with rapid fire everything, but it also helps a ton with building units when spending like 30 larva in <0.5 second cuz of insanely high repeat rate and low repeat delay.



Wasn't Zowie celeritas banned because you could 8x rapidfire with it ? Never actually used it since you need to be plugged in PS/2 for it to work
#1 KT Rolster fanboy. KT BEST KT ! Hail to KT playoffs Zergs ! Unofficial french translator for SlayerS_`Boxer` biography "Crazy as me".
Lucasmus
Profile Joined September 2015
35 Posts
September 27 2020 15:40 GMT
#54
On September 27 2020 22:50 skdsk wrote:
I think the reason isnt because zerg is too good or whatever or players became to good, the reason is simple zergs builds lots of queens for defense, in old days you would get 1queen per hatch and 1-2 queens for creep spread, now you get like 5-8queens creep spreading and getting involved into fights (use banes/lings for attacks/runbies and use queens for defense), this actually is really balanced and well made strategy. Now the problem with this mass queen style is creep spread is insane and makes zerg seem OP.

How to solve this?
If you make queens for expensive you are nerfing entire race, which is bad idea.

Make creep more expensive mana wise, bad idea again, it wont solve the mass queen strategy and zergs still get more queens and every other playstyle will get nuked.

1. Possible solution
Make creep tumor actually cost mineral or gas, something like 30 minerals. Now when you trade units to kill tumors, you actually trading for minerals instead of energy, now zerg needs to decide if he wants 50 creep tumors to see everything, just like terran or protoss building depots/pylons sending marines and observers around the map and using scans.


I like this idea. I think 30 minerals may be even too expensive because you lose them a lot. Maybe experiment with 10 or so. This also makes it more rewarding to hunt creep, and maybe make the game more dynamic, because zerg cant spread creep everywhere as easily.

Other options that could be explored are that creep cant extend beyond a certain distance to a hatchery or that creep costs supply. The latter might be a bit too draining.
ThunderJunk
Profile Joined December 2015
United States675 Posts
September 27 2020 16:06 GMT
#55
On September 28 2020 00:40 Lucasmus wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 27 2020 22:50 skdsk wrote:
I think the reason isnt because zerg is too good or whatever or players became to good, the reason is simple zergs builds lots of queens for defense, in old days you would get 1queen per hatch and 1-2 queens for creep spread, now you get like 5-8queens creep spreading and getting involved into fights (use banes/lings for attacks/runbies and use queens for defense), this actually is really balanced and well made strategy. Now the problem with this mass queen style is creep spread is insane and makes zerg seem OP.

How to solve this?
If you make queens for expensive you are nerfing entire race, which is bad idea.

Make creep more expensive mana wise, bad idea again, it wont solve the mass queen strategy and zergs still get more queens and every other playstyle will get nuked.

1. Possible solution
Make creep tumor actually cost mineral or gas, something like 30 minerals. Now when you trade units to kill tumors, you actually trading for minerals instead of energy, now zerg needs to decide if he wants 50 creep tumors to see everything, just like terran or protoss building depots/pylons sending marines and observers around the map and using scans.


I like this idea. I think 30 minerals may be even too expensive because you lose them a lot. Maybe experiment with 10 or so. This also makes it more rewarding to hunt creep, and maybe make the game more dynamic, because zerg cant spread creep everywhere as easily.

Other options that could be explored are that creep cant extend beyond a certain distance to a hatchery or that creep costs supply. The latter might be a bit too draining.


I'm in favor of trade-offs that the player needs to balance when deciding how to approach the game. That's something that makes the game fun. Whatever the solution - I'm not in charge of that, and I probably shouldn't be - the queen is objectively a Mary Sue unit. It's tanky, supply-efficient, good at supporting in fights, good at boosting macro, and good at increasing map vision.

I always find it frustrating when I commit 70% of my strategic thinking to clearing a certain spot on the map of creep (I can't exactly strategize around destroying production buildings, and strategizing around sniping tech buildings doesn't work more than once per opponent) then my army gets pushed back and another 2 queens just stroll in and drop 6 tumors like it's nothing.

I know asymmetric balance is a supremely tricky problem to tackle, but Terran and Protoss need to make strategic and economic sacrifices to obtain scouting information. That's a GOOD thing. Zerg gets free scouting information for spreading creep, which doesn't have a cost besides APM and not having queens to defend at the base. And because of the limited time a scan lasts, it's actually favorable for the zerg to just spam out as many creep tumors as the queens have energy.

Whatever Activision-Blizzard's solution ends up being, I just hope they make it more fun. As a Diamond Protoss it just feels like I need to invest 3 times as much effort into creating original strategies to catch the Zerg off-guard, and they each only work one time. Then the Zerg Borgs me by making one or two very small tweaks to their builds which are otherwise exactly the same every game. It's super discouraging.
I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.
skdsk
Profile Joined February 2019
138 Posts
Last Edited: 2020-09-27 16:26:35
September 27 2020 16:25 GMT
#56
Another solution that would be more extreme, would be making creep tumors visible.
That would solve the problem of players needing to invest more to clearing creep than for zerg spreading it.
RKC
Profile Joined June 2012
2848 Posts
September 27 2020 16:55 GMT
#57
On September 28 2020 01:25 skdsk wrote:
Another solution that would be more extreme, would be making creep tumors visible.
That would solve the problem of players needing to invest more to clearing creep than for zerg spreading it.


Or maybe delayed invisibility (30-60 seconds)? Might make some interesting creep tumour hunting dynamics. Opponent has to be equally active on the map to catch fresh tumours.
gg no re thx
bela.mervado
Profile Joined December 2008
Hungary383 Posts
September 27 2020 17:05 GMT
#58
On September 27 2020 21:39 Comedy wrote:
he's wrong about pressing shift. Nobody presses shift. Rest is correct. method is the same way, you're just not pressing shift when your creep tumor is already on a rapid fire key, youre just holding it down. With inject youre not pressing shift because youre hardly gaining anything by doing that, if anything it will mess up queens a bit more.

Pro zerg players actually up the repeat rate on their keyboard a ton. There are keyboards that have this functionality built in (Ducky), but there is also software that let's you do the same thing. It will change repeat delay and repeat rate values in the registry. Maybe up to 4 times faster than standard windows keyboard repeat rate. So this helps with rapid fire everything, but it also helps a ton with building units when spending like 30 larva in <0.5 second cuz of insanely high repeat rate and low repeat delay.


10+ (more than 2-3) tumors off of 2-3 creep queens
-> must be shift + RF (lot of lazy Z streamers do this, but they are not pros)
2-3 tumors off of 2-3 creep queens
-> either RF without shift,
or shift + RF with not enough queen energy,
or clean style (shift) + (spawn tumor) + 2-3x left click. 2019 Blizzcon Ro16 gr B Serral vs Time: https://imgur.com/a/nSZme8d (note the green line) he has 23 and 56 energy on the 2 creep queens, still queues 2 tumors at 11:13. There are more examples in this game.

Injecting without shift: i'm using the core, with which you can press and release the shift key basically freely (it's under your thumb, and it does not matter if you press it before or after inject command, all that matters is that you press it before the first left click). And when you have shift pressed you do not have to press the inject key again at the 2nd and 3rd bases. So if using std keyboard setup shift might be harder to reach and it is easier to just repeat the (cam) + (inject) + (left click) for each base without shift. But at least with core, injecting is faster with shift.
Comedy
Profile Joined March 2016
456 Posts
Last Edited: 2020-09-27 18:06:32
September 27 2020 18:06 GMT
#59
On September 28 2020 02:05 bela.mervado wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 27 2020 21:39 Comedy wrote:
he's wrong about pressing shift. Nobody presses shift. Rest is correct. method is the same way, you're just not pressing shift when your creep tumor is already on a rapid fire key, youre just holding it down. With inject youre not pressing shift because youre hardly gaining anything by doing that, if anything it will mess up queens a bit more.

Pro zerg players actually up the repeat rate on their keyboard a ton. There are keyboards that have this functionality built in (Ducky), but there is also software that let's you do the same thing. It will change repeat delay and repeat rate values in the registry. Maybe up to 4 times faster than standard windows keyboard repeat rate. So this helps with rapid fire everything, but it also helps a ton with building units when spending like 30 larva in <0.5 second cuz of insanely high repeat rate and low repeat delay.


10+ (more than 2-3) tumors off of 2-3 creep queens
-> must be shift + RF (lot of lazy Z streamers do this, but they are not pros)
2-3 tumors off of 2-3 creep queens
-> either RF without shift,
or shift + RF with not enough queen energy,
or clean style (shift) + (spawn tumor) + 2-3x left click. 2019 Blizzcon Ro16 gr B Serral vs Time: https://imgur.com/a/nSZme8d (note the green line) he has 23 and 56 energy on the 2 creep queens, still queues 2 tumors at 11:13. There are more examples in this game.

Injecting without shift: i'm using the core, with which you can press and release the shift key basically freely (it's under your thumb, and it does not matter if you press it before or after inject command, all that matters is that you press it before the first left click). And when you have shift pressed you do not have to press the inject key again at the 2nd and 3rd bases. So if using std keyboard setup shift might be harder to reach and it is easier to just repeat the (cam) + (inject) + (left click) for each base without shift. But at least with core, injecting is faster with shift.


ya of course if you want to queue up commands you use shift for tumors (like using shift for any queue'ed up command in the game). but we were talking normal situation. I don't know why shift isnt used for injects, it just isn't (ask any pro).
bela.mervado
Profile Joined December 2008
Hungary383 Posts
September 27 2020 19:39 GMT
#60
On September 28 2020 03:06 Comedy wrote:
ya of course if you want to queue up commands you use shift for tumors (like using shift for any queue'ed up command in the game). but we were talking normal situation. I don't know why shift isnt used for injects, it just isn't (ask any pro).


Yea I did go back to Lambo's inject video just because of this thread, he doesn't use shift.
I think it's because of the standard-ish hotkey setup. I actually found the shift inject on some pages to be called the core inject method. I guess on the std setup its a bit awkward to press shift so pros would want to avoid it whenever they can.
And it must be the same situation with laying creep tumors, whenever they have some time, it is more precise to use shift. Otherwise just RF fuck it anything goes.

I believe you.
Actually your previous comment sounded like it was written by a ~26 year old canadian zerg pro with nice creep skills so I was extra careful to check anything I write -.-
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