On June 22 2023 17:50 Agh wrote: This format needs to be axed. Seriously just run a full DE tourney with seeding and be done with it.
The fact that heromarine, elazer, skillous, and lambo only got to lose one series and be eliminated is bogus.
The results for this tournament outside of first and second are pretty meaningless.
So you want them to be able to lose twice to better players? None of that was luck of the draw, they went in, face a player who was better and lost. It is a tournament. Even in double elimination, they'd still run into better players, they'd just have the added benefit of losing twice cuz they're not as good.
On June 22 2023 19:53 Hildegard wrote: The bigger point, in my opinion, is that he stayed Zerg. If Protoss was the easier race to win tournaments with, he probably would have switched. Serral beat him 3:0 this time. Do you think he would have beaten him as Protoss?
If this was a reasonable opinion, wouldn't by your logic all the protoss players switch to terran or zerg? Strange that protoss is extremely over represented in the number of pro and grand master players.
The latest patch had small buffs for Zerg and Terran, but not for Protoss.
The latest patch had nerfs for Protoss. Disruptors and Shield Battery Overcharge were nerfed (as were Interceptors).
On June 22 2023 13:08 Glorfindelio wrote: People are a little too dismissive of what Reynor was able to accomplish in a short time with his Protoss, especially against Zerg. With a few months of semi-regular part-time practice, he was able to display PvZ on-par, if not better than a lot of full-time P players. Granted, he's a true mechanical monster, but I honestly can't imagine top Protoss pros playing as Zerg or Terran and taking games off the best Protoss players with a few months of practice. Or at least I haven't seen it in any tournaments so far.
If anything, this speaks both to the problem of Protoss design and also to their overall talent pool gap with Zergs and Terran. Granted, having Serral and Maru respectively skews that a lot.
What if Reynor became the #1 Protoss in the world but never won a tournament or made it to a finals again? Wouldn’t that prove our point?
I'm not trying to be obtuse, but I do think Reynor proved in small does that everybody is, in a way, correct. Protoss has underlying design flaws that makes their gameplay incredibly difficult to balance at the top, and I don't think there's any doubt that's affected the number of championships their standard-bearers have been able to accumulate. At the same time, it feels like they've lacked a truly transcendent talent in their prime. Stats and Zest are all-timers, but a step below the Maru/Serral/Rogue triumvirate. Trap was a monster, but didn't always play his best when it counted most, though he was a lot more consistent than people give him credit for. SoS has some of the best accomplishments but narrow success in LotV. I still think if Rain had stayed, he would have been the guy, easily.
Reynor being able to take multiple games off top-level pros as P while off-racing crystalizes that for me. I would agree that if Reynor became the #1 Toss and couldn't win-out against a bracket of PvZ and PvT, that'd be hard proof of your point. Unfortunately, I don't think we'll get to see that scenario. We did see him win series against lower level pros and push some of the top Zs as Protoss in an incredibly short amount of time, so that's something to me.
Congrats to Serral on adding another title to his already illustrious career. Wow. Sad to have missed out on ESL Masters Summer DreamHack this past weekend.
On June 23 2023 23:58 Vision_ wrote: It s always macro player who wins.
Rogue won 3 world championships and was one of the cheesiest pros out there. His super unorthodox cheesey teammate, sOs, won 2. Byun won a world championship in decent part thanks to his 3 racks reaper play.
No matter the race or era, I don't think this assessment holds.
On June 23 2023 23:58 Vision_ wrote: It s always macro player who wins.
Rogue won 3 world championships and was one of the cheesiest pros out there. His super unorthodox cheesey teammate, sOs, won 2. Byun won a world championship in decent part thanks to his 3 racks reaper play.
No matter the race or era, I don't think this assessment holds.
Rogue had cheese in his locker but I think it’s fair to say being a macro monster definitely was a big factor in his WC wins too.
$o$ I mean he won in HoTS. I’ve long felt Legacy squashing the early/midgame and accelerating the flow fucked his style and strengths more than almost anyone else in the scene.
He was never really a hardcore cheeser Has style, most of his funkiness you’d see in that early game thru midgame transition with the old economy. Do odd stuff that destabilises your opponent in that phase and win by a combination of forcing a type of game you’re directing and more comfortable playing than most of your foes. He’s a little like Gumiho in that sense I suppose
Tech comes very quickly and easily in Legacy, it’s harder to find ways to get around that and exploit a missing piece with the eco changes.
I think it’s broadly fair to say the game has been dominated by macro players for quite a while. I guess it’s to be expected the more things are figured out that defensive macro players gain more and more edges over cheesy ones.
On June 23 2023 23:58 Vision_ wrote: It s always macro player who wins.
Rogue won 3 world championships and was one of the cheesiest pros out there. His super unorthodox cheesey teammate, sOs, won 2. Byun won a world championship in decent part thanks to his 3 racks reaper play.
No matter the race or era, I don't think this assessment holds.
Rogue had cheese in his locker but I think it’s fair to say being a macro monster definitely was a big factor in his WC wins too.
$o$ I mean he won in HoTS. I’ve long felt Legacy squashing the early/midgame and accelerating the flow fucked his style and strengths more than almost anyone else in the scene.
He was never really a hardcore cheeser Has style, most of his funkiness you’d see in that early game thru midgame transition with the old economy. Do odd stuff that destabilises your opponent in that phase and win by a combination of forcing a type of game you’re directing and more comfortable playing than most of your foes. He’s a little like Gumiho in that sense I suppose
Tech comes very quickly and easily in Legacy, it’s harder to find ways to get around that and exploit a missing piece with the eco changes.
I think it’s broadly fair to say the game has been dominated by macro players for quite a while. I guess it’s to be expected the more things are figured out that defensive macro players gain more and more edges over cheesy ones.
I somewhat agree with this overall. But this is a nuanced take with some qualifiers, and is a far cry from `always macro player who wins '.
I think, on the balance, Rogue got a huge amount of his strength from (really excellent, well executed) gambling. Even against players he could beat in macro games comfortably, he still often cheesed. He was the complete package, but full-on cheese was a big enough part of his play that I wouldn't call him `a macro player'. Even his macro was often aggressive, high stakes stuff (like nydus SH play).
No, because Protoss is obviously the easiest race to pick up and reach a high level. The discussion is about whether there is a ceiling for macro Protoss to win games. Showtime had some incredibly close series against Serral and took him to the absolute late game. If you watch these games, they don't look like Serral massively outplayed him. Showtime is underrated, in my opinion, because he plays a style that is simply not as strong as the trickier Protoss way with timing attacks and all-ins. But of course, Serral is an absolute monster, a master of all the play styles Zerg offers.
The latest patch had small buffs for Zerg and Terran, but not for Protoss. The balance problem is that Protoss is too easy on all levels except the very top. The question is if it's possible at this stage of the game, when major overhauls are unlikely, to buff Protoss in a way that doesn't affect ladder. Maybe a combination of nerfs and buffs is necessary.
nerf protoss to make it a lot harder to win on the low to medium level, that would solve a lot of the current problem; then give protoss a bit more bonus for microing units properly, and that should do the rest. Just don't buff the a-moving army of protoss or their already enormous potential for cheap cheese
nerf protoss to make it a lot harder to win on the low to medium level, that would solve a lot of the current problem; then give protoss a bit more bonus for microing units properly, and that should do the rest. Just don't buff the a-moving army of protoss or their already enormous potential for cheap cheese
Basically requires a complete redesign of the race.
None of their finesse units scale very well. herO, Trap at his best, Parting would work magic with things like Phoenixes, Blink Stalkers, Oracles in little midgame skirmishes and whatnot. Warp prism magic, I mean these guys can do that stuff
Phoenixes melt too quickly to do much with them when max approaches vT outside of phoenix/Colossus, and that’s a very a-move friendly comp, and Zerg can just put out too much stuff too early for phoenixes to be too useful. Stalkers you can get work done but it requires a commitment to going very stalker heavy, and over the course of the game their lack of DPS and actual speed sees them drop off.
And so on and so forth. You need to ball up and you need your AoE and this gets pretty a-movey
I actually think Protoss has some of the better designed units with a bunch of utility in the game. Phoenixes for one example are a surgeon’s scalpel of a harassment unit that you have to babysit, don’t wipe a mineral line in seconds, and you can lift priority targets in battles, even save your own units with lifts. Pretty neat.
They just all fit into a game where damage to HP isn’t forgiving, game speed is quick and your whole army’s firepower is focused really easily and in quite dense areas.
Hopefully something the Frost Giant guys can learn from. As much as people moan about Protoss their design is clearly influenced by how brutally strong MMM is
Is the developer team for SC:2 still able (and even allowed) to make a complete redesign ? Wouldn't there be a huge controversy no matter what choices the developers made? There is also the issue of players quitting when their play style is removed from the game after a decade.
On June 24 2023 14:43 Hildegard wrote: Is the developer team for SC:2 still able (and even allowed) to make a complete redesign ? Wouldn't there be a huge controversy no matter what choices the developers made? There is also the issue of players quitting when their play style is removed from the game after a decade.
Given the game state and popularity it's close to impossible.
Imagine there would be a complete re-design, everyone is happy with it...and then the next big tournament comes around and there is no protoss in the Ro8 People would go apeshit SO bad...
It won t be so hard to redesign AND rebalance the game. Problem comes from Activision which doesn t care about SC2 and their community.
There s no difficulty to rebalance the relationship between armored/light units (because of the lack of light units), and there s no difficulty to decrease the firepower of all units (decreasing dps => slow fight).
There s no difficulty to add a ground terrain that forbid base heavy buildings (while light defensive buildings could be build upon this type of ground called the battlefield ground and be identified outside platforms => more strategy to control ground, more defensives structures protecting chokes points).
No difficulty to avoid minerals of being always near bases which would ask/mean to players new path strategies for harvesting minerals (while today patterns bases are all similar / workers can for example cross over cliffs )
No difficulty to remove stupid spells like tumors creation with "rapid fire"(cooldowns..), or abduct and parasite bomb of the viper,
and finally give a "deeper" identity to the protoss.
SC2 isn t a strategy game, it s a competitive speed game and a tons of players would like in my opinion a redesign to something clever.
There s no difficulty to have ideas but without "Free-License" of the game, SC2 will die slowly
I think you kinda underestimate how difficult completely rebuilding the game would be Vision. Not that I’m innately against such things but retooling a huge amount, rebalancing and getting player buyin is rather tricky at this stage
On June 24 2023 22:26 WombaT wrote: I think you kinda underestimate how difficult completely rebuilding the game would be Vision. Not that I’m innately against such things but retooling a huge amount, rebalancing and getting player buyin is rather tricky at this stage
Yes it s tricky but i would prefer to fail and give a try, i would prefer some kickstater projects instead of see community pay for prize pools, the game is addictive mostly because of laddering and a pro scene which give entertainement to the niche so would you prefer to thanks the base players or the pro scene ? ... nvm
There s a LAN version for tournament made by Blizzard, if they offer this version of the game, new mods could be created and support their own ladder, today, casual players haven t time to invest to a game in order to be a cannon fooder for hard core gamers, if you want to keep SC2 alive then i don t see any other solution than give free licence to community while it still exists
MOBA are great examples, they are liked because of their updates...
On June 24 2023 22:26 WombaT wrote: I think you kinda underestimate how difficult completely rebuilding the game would be Vision. Not that I’m innately against such things but retooling a huge amount, rebalancing and getting player buyin is rather tricky at this stage
I would wish a deep redesign of economy but i have already gave my opinions a tons of time and maybe i will post one day some picture to illustrate my words (maybe with the map editor, i can create this next sunday a poll to discuss about these ideas)
But like a small example i can say that i m thinking of a balance between stalkers and lurkers. As there are not enought light units number, i would have tought to switch stalkers to light armor units (with some attributes tweaks) and in the same time, adjust damage of lurkers from 20+10 against armored to 17+13 against armored. This simple tweak could help beginners players and could have no big impact at high level. The issue is that lurkers are too good against everything.
I m not for big balances changes, i would prefer to see some core changes(*) increasing the mapmaking diversity. actually the shape of the maps is too restricted to the idea/fact that each base must be next to each other
(*) - reduce workers count. (**) - slow dps in fight - workers can pass over cliffs and harvest minerals to the lowest ground where no heavy structures are allowed (you can only build defensive structures on this field and you must think how you will defend and prioritize the richer mineral fields available on this ground i.e path strategy for harvesting). When they are harvesting far from base, a new building can be built to protect them while they are mining (against harassement, air attacks, etc...)
(**) - Inject Larvas will be tweak due to the reduction in number of workers
On June 24 2023 22:26 WombaT wrote: I think you kinda underestimate how difficult completely rebuilding the game would be Vision. Not that I’m innately against such things but retooling a huge amount, rebalancing and getting player buyin is rather tricky at this stage
I would wish a deep redesign of economy but i have already gave my opinions a tons of time and maybe i will post one day some picture to illustrate my words (maybe with the map editor, i can create this next sunday a poll to discuss about these ideas)
But like a small example i can say that i m thinking of a balance between stalkers and lurkers. As there are not enought light units number, i would have tought to switch stalkers to light armor units (with some attributes tweaks) and in the same time, adjust damage of lurkers from 20+10 against armored to 17+13 against armored. This simple tweak could help beginners players and could have no big impact at high level. The issue is that lurkers are too good against everything.
I m not for big balances changes, i would prefer to see some core changes(*) increasing the mapmaking diversity. actually the shape of the maps is too restricted to the idea/fact that each base must be next to each other
(*) - reduce workers count. (**) - slow dps in fight - workers can pass over cliffs and harvest minerals to the lowest ground where no heavy structures are allowed (you can only build defensive structures on this field and you must think how you will defend and prioritize the richer mineral fields available on this ground i.e path strategy for harvesting). When they are harvesting far from base, a new building can be built to protect them while they are mining (against harassement, air attacks, etc...)
(**) - Inject Larvas will be tweak due to the reduction in number of workers
So now we're trying to make protoss stronger at lower levels and not impact the higher levels?
On June 24 2023 22:26 WombaT wrote: I think you kinda underestimate how difficult completely rebuilding the game would be Vision. Not that I’m innately against such things but retooling a huge amount, rebalancing and getting player buyin is rather tricky at this stage
I would wish a deep redesign of economy but i have already gave my opinions a tons of time and maybe i will post one day some picture to illustrate my words (maybe with the map editor, i can create this next sunday a poll to discuss about these ideas)
But like a small example i can say that i m thinking of a balance between stalkers and lurkers. As there are not enought light units number, i would have tought to switch stalkers to light armor units (with some attributes tweaks) and in the same time, adjust damage of lurkers from 20+10 against armored to 17+13 against armored. This simple tweak could help beginners players and could have no big impact at high level. The issue is that lurkers are too good against everything.
I m not for big balances changes, i would prefer to see some core changes(*) increasing the mapmaking diversity. actually the shape of the maps is too restricted to the idea/fact that each base must be next to each other
(*) - reduce workers count. (**) - slow dps in fight - workers can pass over cliffs and harvest minerals to the lowest ground where no heavy structures are allowed (you can only build defensive structures on this field and you must think how you will defend and prioritize the richer mineral fields available on this ground i.e path strategy for harvesting). When they are harvesting far from base, a new building can be built to protect them while they are mining (against harassement, air attacks, etc...)
(**) - Inject Larvas will be tweak due to the reduction in number of workers
So now we're trying to make protoss stronger at lower levels and not impact the higher levels?
yes, it s stucked. And now i have seen the stormgate last video i feel nothing better than SC2 will be created
EPT
