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Hello,
Normally I'd post this on Reddit, but I'm PERMA BANNED from reddit (for something stupid which I won't get into).
That being said, this is a post I'm putting on here just for fun. I think it's fun to talk about this sort of stuff.
Also just in general for this post, I only play Protoss, so I don't have a super high understanding of TvT, ZvZ, TvZ, so if you think any of my suggestions would break the matchup, please feel free to flame me.
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To start, I want to use Harstem's Video as a jumping off point. I agree with pretty much everything he had suggested in his video. Except for Energy recharge/Infestors which I have different solutions.
Here's a recap to summarize.
Protoss
* Dark Templar can now attack immediately after blinking
Terran
* Widow mine becomes invisible after the armory finishes
Zerg
* Evo chamber now enables Ventral Sac Mutation (Drop)
* Centrifugal hooks will now grant +5 hp on banelings
* Microbial shroud now negates 50% of spell damage
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I am also going to take in some suggestions from Pig's changes, however, only some of them so I'll try to list them individually below.
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Zerg:
* Spire Build time change (-6s)
* Bane HP Change (+5hp, same as harstem)
* Overlord change (ms nerf)
* Ravager change (6 seconds faster to morph, revert of nerf)
* Queen/Hatch/Spore Reversal (Back to previous patch cost)
* Lurker HP Change (Back to 200hp)
Terran:
* Mines change (Same as harstem, cloak after armory)
* Raven Surveillance / Lower subgroup priority
* Lib change (Give back lib range)
Protoss:
* Tempest Change (1 more supply, 1 more range. honestly not sure if this would be better of nerfing mothership)
* Disruptor change ( 4 to 3 supply, damage reversal. although i hate this unit)
 T blink fix (same as harstem)
* OBs surveilance virus nerf 10% (a bit too strong i agree)
Also all of his bug fixes
Otherwise I don't really want any of the other suggestions he made like ghosts being light, or giving infested terrans to zerg, or the oracle changes, etc.
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My goals for a patch:
1) Adjusting Energy Overcharge to be less powerful early game
2) Increase build diversity in all 3 matchups by forcing every race to play safer, aka, making scouting more difficult
3) Increase build diversity in all 3 matchups by making less viable units stronger and fun to use. This should be the most important thing in my opnion, is keeping the game fun!
4) Protoss Aggressive options/cheeses
5) Increasing visibility for invisible units
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SECTION ONE: Energy Overcharge
It is without a doubt energy overcharge is too powerful in its current iterations.
I think there are three major problems with it.
Comes online too early against Terran to see what Terran is doing
Comes online too early against Zerg to defend against aggression
Warping in double storm
Now Harstem’s suggestion would cut #3, so we don’t need to worry about that.
In Pig’s video, Pig suggested making oracles shoot without energy, and nerfing hallucination. While these would solve 1 & 2, I think there is a simpler solution. Especially if you consider that oracles/hallucinations weren’t a problem until this most recent patch.
My solution:
Make it so Energy overcharge becomes available after warpgate is researched. Also it gives 75 Energy not 100 (to nerf 2x storm). This means its coming online around 3:50 to 4:05 depending on the matchup and opener.
PVT:
If Energy overcharge isn’t available until 4 minutes game time, Protoss can not use it to scout Terran’s base right away. The only way you could get an early scout in would be if you open sentry first / sentry 2nd, and it would not be an immediate scout either. (Which was not broken in previous patches)
It would also leave your sentry without energy, leaving you susceptible to reaper/hellion all in. (as you normally FF your wall after sending scouts out. My friend Haffy literally waits till i sent out both hallucinations to reaper grenade in)
I think it probably would make more sense to tie it to game time, rather than warpgate - But warpgate typically finishes around 3:50 in PvT or slightly later (or 10s earlier if you chrono i guess), which is coincidentally, around the time terran is leaving with their medivac.
What’s cool about this is I think you could potentially try to predict where they’re moving with the flying unit and intercept it, or track the drop after the initial hit.
PVZ:
If Energy overcharge isn’t available until 4 minutes game time, Zerg would have the ability to flood lings into Protoss’s third. If it's tied to warpgate, i believe it would come on around 4 minutes? (As wg is generally delayed since you go SG into gate unit) Right now, straight up, I often will go 3rd nexus before my oracle starts in this matchup. This is insane. I can get a nexus down at like 3 minutes game time because it’s difficult for zerg to punish. My oracle pops out, gets energy, and i can defend ling attacks generally speaking.
This would also be a slight buff to early game ling floods in the natural, but I think it would come online late enough we could still defend if we handle the initial wave quick enough.
This also I think would give Zerg enough time to get their queen count high enough to deal with Oracles with more juice.
PVP:
I think this could potentially make proxy immortal harder to hold, or 4 gate builds. It certainly would be a big nerf to 1gate in PvP (which i think is actually a good thing).
Right now in 1g meta your first oracle pops out and you send it across the map immediately with 3 stasis wards for your opponents minerals. Now I don’t think you’d be able to do that.
SECTION TWO - Nerfing Scouting
In order to increase build diversity, I think scouting should be more difficult on all sides - making it more difficult to hard counter your opponent.
With this, I can’t really comment on ZvT as I am not super knowledgeable on the matchup. However I think the dynamic would play out pretty similarly with the changes I’m suggesting.
Also keep in mind, we just covered the energy recharge nerf I suggested, so that would be making a huge impact here.
PvT Early Game
PvT early game, there’s really 3 units that scout.
Sentries, Adepts, and Reapers. With the change previously suggested, sentries would go back to where they were initially last patch - a huge investment with a delayed scout.
I think that early game scouting was buffed for protoss due to it being an actual problem - it was very difficult to sniff out what Terran was doing in this matchup before.
Therefore, if you’re going to massively nerf energy recharge - I think the adept should get a slight buff to compensate to even it out. You have to understand before sentry scout it was SO difficult to figure out what the terran was up to.
Buff Adept Vision Shade from 4 to 7 (Reversal of nerf from Patch 3.8 when they were 9)
Right now, when you shade as an adept, there’s really not that much you can see. You can shove it up Terran’s ramps, but you’re not going to see what Terran is doing behind their wall at all - especially if Terran keeps their buildings far from the barracks. You wouldn’t be able to see addons on structures, and adept could still be denied by a Cyclone, but maybe you see the edge of a 2nd rax or a Factory or something, which will give Protoss a little more comfort early game.
It got nerfed previously when it had 9 vision radius, which maybe is too much, but maybe a slight buff here to compensate for hallucination nerf.
This technically would be a buff to glaives in PvZ as well - But let’s be real, glaives sucks ass in PvZ as of current meta due to a lack of a strong followup. I also think you typically see everything you need to anyway just due to the large amount of adepts you’re shading at a time.
The other unit that plays a scouting role in this matchup is the reaper - However, you can’t really nerf the reaper imo. Literally the only thing you can adjust for that unit, is reaper walls and how many buildings can be used. I don’t think there is anyway to regulate that for perpetuity or some sort of gentleman's agreement to let protoss not have to put pylons in wall - So I would leave this unit alone.
PvZ Early game
PvZ Early game, there’s 4 units that scout - Adepts, Oracles, Overlords, Zerglings
I think I agree with Pig’s suggestions here of nerfing overlord speed slightly. Right now it kind of feels like Zerg’s can send an overlord into my base and escape stalkers. This can be a bit frustrating at times. Especially when I open with a voidray, rally it to where I saw the overlord, and the bitch is gone.
I don’t think you can do anything to stop mapmakers from putting pervert pillars all over the place, so I think this is the most reasonable suggestion.
I also don’t think you can do much to change the dynamic with the other units either - And the vision radius buff I suggested for adepts I think would be inconsequential to the early game in this matchup.
PvP Early Game
With energy overcharge nerf it would just be going to how it played last patch, just without super battery, so I don’t think this would matter much or needs to be talked about.
SECTION THREE - Making less viable units stronger in all matchups
This section I might get a little crazy - but frankly, this is the fun part! I think right now there are a lot of matchups in the game where we just don’t see certain units being built - which is a problem. The more complexity there is, the more players have their own agency and unique styles - which is fun for the player and fun for the viewer.
So my goals here with these suggestions is to make units that don’t exist in certain matchups more prominent. Here are my three goals. Keep in mind these coincide with the suggestions harstem made, which included buffs to mines, dts, infestors, banes, etc.
Buffing Mech in PvT
Buffing Mutas in ZvT
Making Queens stronger off creep
Buffing Adepts/Archons/Phoenix in PvT
Protoss Cheese
Buffing Mech in PvT
Hellbat
Right now in PvT we are seeing heavy zealot comps with low gas protoss just throwing units at the Terran. Why not make Hellbats a little more powerful? (The man writing this spams only zealots btw).
I think it’s fun when I play against someone and I see them using these units. Here’s what I would do.
Hellbat new ability, stim pack, only available in Hellbat form. Functions pretty much like stim like Marauders/Marines, EXCEPT NO DAMAGE, just movement speed. Maybe a slight adjustment to fire AOE radius if you really want instead of attack speed like stim.
Costs 30 HP
Increases microability against disruptors, storms, aoe making hellbat bio medivac comps stronger.
Would force terran players using mech to still get it from a barracks with tech lab which would increase build diversity while not just outright buffing mech in ZvT.
This would probably be very impactful in ZvT too - But let’s be real, when have we ever seen Hellbat bio comps work vs Zerg? If it’s too crazy, don’t go huge on buffing the flamethrower. I really doubt we’d see stim + blueflame builds, but who knows. I don’t think this would outright buff in ZVT too as it would require stim to be researched on rax.
Maybe this gives Terran a little more agency in ZVT so there’s less camping, especially with other mech suggestions.
If this is too strong, maybe nerf armory cost since mines/hellbats are getting buffed at the same time.
Vikings
In my opinion, when it comes to late game, one of the things that I find frustrating about the viking is how susceptible it is to storm. Other flying units that fill similar roles, such as voidrays, corrupters, and phoenix, have regenerable hp/shields which makes AOE less punishing.
Air units in general are very susceptible to AOE damage due to the flying/stacking nature of the unit.
To me, when I’m fighting against vikings, it feels like I just try to delay until I get a couple storms in, and then actually engage. I think Terran should have an easier time recovering from a bad storm.
Therefore, I’d suggest:
Passive Effect: Vikings now repair 3x as fast by SCVS/Cost half to repair.
I am almost certain that uThermal would find some way to turn this into cheese/content.
Maybe this opens up some weird cheeses, Idk, but I think it would be quite funny.
I’m not sure how this would impact TvT as the unit is quite prominent in the matchup, and I don’t think this would affect TvZ as who builds vikings vs zerg?
Cyclones
Cyclones spell now scales with armory upgrades
The cyclone in its current bugged iteration is a bit frustrating especially in ZvT.
I think this unit just needs to scale better with armory upgrades to give battlemech more agency as the game goes on, but less power in the early game.
I don’t really want to make number suggestions here as I don’t play the matchup. Frankly it’s not super strong mid to late vs Toss so this could be a cool change.
Also off topic but i think they should’ve given terran the previous salvage suggestions for turrets/sensor towers.
Ghosts
Changes:
2 Supply cost, Nerf auto attack from 10+10 light 10+5 light, potential snipe nerf ? (costs 25 energy if ghost snipes but target runs out of snipe before it goes off, maybe add a cooldown on snipe of a few seconds too)
I( really want to avoid talking about this, as I don’t play the matchup - But personally I am not a fan of 3 supply ghosts. It makes it quite difficult to split your army late game as your army is much smaller when you have high supply units. If you want Terran to move out more, I think their army needs to be bigger when splitting.
I also think EMP is fine as is in PVT and would make no changes there.
I think it’s a bit silly that the ghost’s auto attack is so strong - I would nerf the damage vs light.
I think I’d make ghosts do 10+5 vs light, so they don’t 2 shot lings, and take 4 shots instead of 3 to kill locusts.
I think in theory Swarmhost + harstem’s infestor change would be stronger vs the ghost PF meta. (infestor spell would prevent aoe damage on locusts, snipes)
Potentially they could slightly nerf snipe by making it so ghosts still spend energy when a unit runs out of range of the snipe.
I do think Terran is quite reliant on ghosts, so I’m hoping the supply change + Lib range change + hellbat stim would be enough to justify these adjustments. I am not a TVZ player though so would prefer if people in the matchup commented.
2) Buffing Mutas in ZvT
You can’t pull up a thread on /r/StarCraft these days without advocating for muta ling bane. It also I think would be the perfect composition for dealing with an aggressive dropping terran like Clem.
Buff: Mutas now have +1 base armor.
This would make the unit much more difficult to clean up with marines while still allowing things like Mines and thors to be strong against the unit. You still wouldn’t want to fight marines with the muta, but it would allow you to retain them much easier in those cleanup situations.
(This could be problematic in ZvZ as it would make queens/Hydras slightly worse against them, could maybe tweak spore damage, im not sure how big of a problem this would be. Queens would require 15 shots instead of 14, and hydras would require 11 shots instead of 10.)
B) Making Queens stronger off creep
I think it’s a bit silly in the current iteration for Queens to not be able to use transfuse natively. This would potentially cause queen walk to be too strong - My suggestion would be to let queens have transfuse natively all the time - But make them progressively slower the LONGER they are off creep. So when it gets to the middle of the map, maybe they move more slow than they do currently. Takes longer to get across for creepless queen walks but makes them stronger defensively earlier.
3) Buffing Adepts/Archons/Phoenix in PvT
Phoenix
Phoenix does +1 damage per shot. (If this is op, can just increase attack speed maybe as phoenix fire 2x)
Phoenix is currently pretty underwhelming in PvT due to the strength of the cyclone. Part of that is the bug, but without super battery phoenix is also much weaker especially with Phoenix colossus being nerfed (due to lack of super battery). My goal with buffing Phoenix is just to make them slightly stronger during the early game when dealing with pushes. Frankly, I think if you made these changes, you could keep the cyclone in it’s current version.
Phoenix currently does 5x2 per shot. Which equates 10 damage per volley. Medivacs have 150 hp, meaning it takes 15 volleys. Vikings having 135 HP so it would take 11.25 volleys (12 volleys basically) instead of 14. If you buffed Phoenix damage to 6 per shot, it would take 13 volleys instead to clear a medivac.
I think this would change PvZ slightly better for the Phoenix as well, which, tbh, when are we seeing mass phoenix strategies in the matchup currently? The dynamic would not change vs mutas with the +1 base armor suggestion, but would make them stronger vs queens, hydras, anything they can lift.
Archons in PvT
Archons are pretty ass in PvT in the mid to late game, while also quite strong before ghosts come out - My suggestion is pretty simple. Give them the same treatment Colossus got.
Archons no longer have 350 shields and 10 hp - Instead have 80 hp (which for the lore nerds is the equivalent of the hp combined of TWO HIGH TEMPLARS 40+40, F YOU NERDS) and 270 shields.
This would make them easier to retain after being EMP’d, allowing players to pull them back to save or let them live a little longer in the fight. It would also mean that armor upgrades actually benefit archons - We don’t typically see Protoss get shield upgrades early on which means they take more damage than other units.
Stalker Late Game Buff
This is probably too much, but something to consider - Stalkers currently in SC2 are ASS late game. You really don’t want to spend a lot of cash on them as they cost a lot of gas. They get pooped on by all hive units and owned by bio. If you’re gonna buff Broods/Lib Range, you could potentially add a long research time upgrade on the dark shrine.
New Upgrade: Extended Particle Disruptors
Cost: 100/100, Build time 120 seconds, requires blink. Researches off of Dark Shrine.
Adds +2 Anti Air Range for stalkers
This makes dealing with extended range liberators easier in the ultra late game and easier to clear lib range spots. This also makes them a bit stronger vs tier three air units like carriers/broods/bcs.
Section Four - Protoss Aggressive Options
A few patches ago, Protoss early game was nerfed pretty hard when they were trying to address the proxy voidray problem in PvT. There were 3 changes that went through to nerf this build (and it was basically nerfed completely out of the game rather than make it weaker, which is a bit frustrating)
They nerfed voidray build time, they nerfed voidray cost, and they nerfed battery energy outside of nexus range.
The battery nerf in particular shutdown a lot of early all ins from protoss - I remember watching parting cannon rush with proxy battery immortal all the time.
As frustrating as they can be to play against, proxy battery builds are really one of the only options Protoss has for aggression and they are basically useless now starting with no energy when used offensively.
Therefor I would I would buff the starting energy slightly on batteries to give Protoss more options early game - Maybe not 100% like before, but instead of 50% it could be 75%?
Especially if you’re buffing build time on Ravager, this would keep cannon rush viable in pvz, and maybe open offensive battery pushes in the other matchups.This would also help vs 3rav builds, which i think are going to be quite strong without super battery if ravager build time is changed in situations where you can't take nexus
Section Five - Making things visually easier to see on the screen
In my opinion, one of the best things they did with Sc2 in the past few years was add the red line to the widow mine. Let’s be real, people playing this game are older. Things should be easier to see.
One of the things I hate is how you have to play on low graphics to see invisible units easier. Shit should not be based off of your graphic settings.
I think all invisible units should be visually easier to see.
Burrowed mines should be easier to spot out (sometimes on some maps you literally can not tell)
Stasis wards should be more obvious - This would feel less bullshit especially with the current energy meta, and reward people for paying attention
Dark Templar should be more obvious
Burrowed infestors/roach should be easier to see (visual suggestion like this, less extreme)
Observers should be easier to see, cloaked banshees too
I would also make it so you don’t have to hover over your supply to see worker count - it should just be there without having to move my mouse.
Other:
I also think they should make it so terran can pick what side of their buildings their addons go onto.
Change it so ghost cloak / banshee cloak upgrades look different
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Northern Ireland26531 Posts
Some interesting ideas there for sure, will have to have a proper think on how I feel about some of them!
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Reddit is for goldfish anyways. I don't like the PiG + Harstem starting point, not that it's all bad, but they already have jumbled ideas and putting this all together doesn't make it less of a jumbled mess.
I might agree on the premise that scouting is too strong, but too quick, and I think it's funny to see how fast people are to jump to conclusion that NOW things need to be changed, when in fact the patch now is way better than the patch previously, and this is actually one of those patches that I'd like to see settle and see where it takes us. Protoss have sucked for soooo long, so the idea that now suddenly we're in the worst timeline, is something that I cannot get behind.
Sure, I see no reason why they needed to do the Queen/Hatch change, and the mothership not being abducted is salt in the wound, but these pros really got to deal with the fact that we've had the worst balance for protoss and even then they would complain about protoss, so believing them now would be a mistake.
Zerg uses banelings to great effect and yet everyone is on the buff baneling hype train, seems strange.
But I did always think Banelings even from Hatch tech should be 35 hp, because Mariners since ByuN micro was invented and because there're less larvae in LotV, it seems way easier to gun down the banelings then pick-up, rather than do marine splits, which was always the way cooler option, its dmg should be that of WoL, but AoE nerfed to 2, this is also a nerf vs. Probes so we might not need to fix the upgrades into those values that make no sense.
And this is really my biggest issue with some of your changes, it doesn't make much sense and isn't very elegant when you do changes like, Nexus can only Overcharge after Warp Gate research, what does the Nexus have to do with Warp Gate research? Does it make sense that you can have a hellion unit that can then transform into a hellbat, stim itself down to 15 hp and then transform back into a hellion with almost nill health?, is the vehicle or the guy the hp? Does it make sense that a Viking is just repaired by 3x the value of every other unit?, does it make sense that microbial should that reduce dmg, probably because of vision obstruction, you can imagine that 50% of attacks would miss and so this is the reason that it reduces attack damage, but does it make sense that this then reduces Psionic storm damage. The worst one is probably the queen, which maybe it makes sense for lore reasons, but is both too complex for sc2, but also hard to implement.
It's easier to point out what I agree with, the Ghost should probably be a 2 supply unit and could be made Light, the disruptor should probably be a 3 supply unit, I think the void ray should also be 3 supply btw. The phoenix damage to 6, I agree with, I think it should deal 6+3 vs. light. This also makes it less of a phoenix counter in PvP making the transition into other units a smoother transition. +1 armour on phoenix actually makes sense and fits with the corsair, but the muta is the smallest flier and should absolutely not have 1 armour. Shield batteries do spawn with 50 energy already, and 75 makes no sense, just like how it makes no sense that Ghosts or Infestors, or Ravens start with 75, but I guess cabal do, do cabal things. Shield batteries could be 50/200 imo like all other energy units, and it wouldn't make late game too busted I think, because the unit in terms of hp is still a weak unit. I like the idea of putting down an early shield battery that then acrues energy and gets stronger over time.
I don't actually think overcharge is too bad, it needs to be as strong as the OLD battery overcharge to be strong enough for Protoss success and that was 100% faster healing + no energy used.
Oracles are a bit oppressive, but they themselves buffed the sight range of Stasis, this was a stupid change then, and is even stupider now. Sentry scout is not too powerful, because Sentry is extremely expensive, it's equivalent to get the 100/100 overlord speed upgrade, which do you think is stronger? If the sentry scout needs a nerf the easy solution is to put back in the hallucination research on the cyber core. Another way would be to make it a requirement to have the robo: to hallu collossus, immortals and prisms, and star gate the requirement to hallu phoenix, oracles and void rays. I do agree that scouting is perhaps closer to being too good than too bad, but then isn't this the argument against 4 player maps?, so I say, if scouting is so damn good, let's bring back 4 player maps 
The Adept shade to 7 is too much, I like these low sight ranges, but do find it inelegant that a 4 sight unit, the adept has 4 attack range on transformation, so you cannot actually shade into the most optimal attack range for the Adept because then you wouldn't be able to see the unit. So maybe the sight of the shade should be 4.5, or 5.
I really do like the overlord nerf and the Observer (should be overseer as well) Siege mode nerfs, but those are PiG's suggestions. Spore crawler should also require evolution chamber.
Edit: I think if Oracle needs a nerf, it's best to nerf its hp making it less of a combat unit. This would empower queen walks as well as give Zerg a chance to get ahead from drones, if you opt to go the Oracle route.
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Northern Ireland26531 Posts
How does one get perma banned from Reddit anyway? :O
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On July 19 2025 23:58 WombaT wrote:
How does one get perma banned from Reddit anyway? :O
I mentioned Luigi too many times.
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Revert to whatever Blizzard did last.
Let maps take care of balance.
EDIT:
Asking professional players* who have a vested interest in their race being stronger to come up with balance patches was a dumb idea then and it's a dumb idea now.
*or even regular players, because balance whining is a shit show throughout the community, my own dumb ass included.
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On July 20 2025 02:28 MJG wrote:
Revert to whatever Blizzard did last.
Let maps take care of balance.
EDIT:
Asking professional players* who have a vested interest in their race being stronger to come up with balance patches was a dumb idea then and it's a dumb idea now.
*or even regular players, because balance whining is a shit show throughout the community, my own dumb ass included.
Voidray meta?
Idk dude.
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Northern Ireland26531 Posts
On July 20 2025 02:28 MJG wrote:
Revert to whatever Blizzard did last.
Let maps take care of balance.
EDIT:
Asking professional players* who have a vested interest in their race being stronger to come up with balance patches was a dumb idea then and it's a dumb idea now.
*or even regular players, because balance whining is a shit show throughout the community, my own dumb ass included.
The last Blizzard patch was, kinda bad to be fair. Of all the Balance Council patches, which have varied a bit in quality, the one to shift away from the Void Ray Skytoss PvZ meta was a legit solid one.
I don’t know how you balance with maps when the player base at large routinely vetoes anything that’s slightly different from standard.
It’s 100% an approach that can work, but the playerbase has yet to really buy into that approach at all.
I’ve suggested a whole bunch of potential ways to approach this for at least half a decade, probably considerably longer. More maps outright with corresponding extra vetoes. Matchup-specific maps. All sorts!
End of the day whatever the most different map in the latest pool is, will be the most vetoed. Almost always.
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On July 20 2025 02:28 MJG wrote:
Revert to whatever Blizzard did last.
Let maps take care of balance.
EDIT:
Asking professional players* who have a vested interest in their race being stronger to come up with balance patches was a dumb idea then and it's a dumb idea now.
*or even regular players, because balance whining is a shit show throughout the community, my own dumb ass included.
Have people really forgotten that the balance council got created because the last patch sucked? Since blizz made the game a legacy one the last official patch was supposed to be THE patch for the game because they weren't gonna touch it again. But people hated it and the council was created to try because of that.
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Having a unit (when combined with hellion) you can't catch while picking away at you simply isn't fun for the player on the receiving end, especially as zerg. From a design standpoint the unit needs to be reworked. Nerfing them early I agree with, making them scale better is scary. Maybe if they shoot faster but had shorter range and scaled better I wouldn't mind that! Make it so it compliments a mech army as filler giving them some mobility (if you must). I don't like it being the infinity range core though.
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On July 20 2025 04:28 HeavenSC wrote:Show nested quote +On July 20 2025 02:28 MJG wrote:
Revert to whatever Blizzard did last.
Let maps take care of balance.
EDIT:
Asking professional players* who have a vested interest in their race being stronger to come up with balance patches was a dumb idea then and it's a dumb idea now.
*or even regular players, because balance whining is a shit show throughout the community, my own dumb ass included. Voidray meta? Idk dude.
Broodwar managed to wrap around balance on map design all in all but I do wonder how viable map design is being racial balance in Sc2. Highground for example isnt as strongly valued in sc2 as it is in broodwar
Voidray meta was definitely boring AF
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On July 20 2025 04:28 HeavenSC wrote:Show nested quote +On July 20 2025 02:28 MJG wrote:
Revert to whatever Blizzard did last.
Let maps take care of balance.
EDIT:
Asking professional players* who have a vested interest in their race being stronger to come up with balance patches was a dumb idea then and it's a dumb idea now.
*or even regular players, because balance whining is a shit show throughout the community, my own dumb ass included. Voidray meta? Idk dude.
I don't actually care which meta* it would revert to because that's not the angle I'm coming from.
The balance council is a failed experiment. We know from multiple testimonies that the balance council had a deeply flawed decision making process, and we also know that prominent members of the balance council were specifically biased against Protoss. It's therefore impossible to disentangle the balance council's "good faith" changes from their "bad faith" changes. They shouldn't be allowed to dictate changes to the game going forward because they can't be trusted not to act in self-interest and/or with malicious intent, and the changes they did make should be undone for the same reason.
If Blizzard can't be subsequently convinced to take a proper interest in updating the game then it shouldn't be updated (outside of the bug fixes and map-pool rotations they've already shown commitment towards).
*Whilst my argument doesn't rest on whether or not the Void Ray meta was better than what we currently have, I would like to point out that the community's collective inability to view Void Rays as anything other than a meme unit is an amazing encapsulation of why the community can't be trusted to balance the game lmao.
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On July 20 2025 06:50 Lexender wrote:Show nested quote +On July 20 2025 02:28 MJG wrote:
Revert to whatever Blizzard did last.
Let maps take care of balance.
EDIT:
Asking professional players* who have a vested interest in their race being stronger to come up with balance patches was a dumb idea then and it's a dumb idea now.
*or even regular players, because balance whining is a shit show throughout the community, my own dumb ass included. Have people really forgotten that the balance council got created because the last patch sucked? Since blizz made the game a legacy one the last official patch was supposed to be THE patch for the game because they weren't gonna touch it again. But people hated it and the council was created to try because of that.
Yeah the first balance council patch was good. But after that they really dropped the ball, they should have dissolved the balance cuncil after fixing the Voidray meta
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On July 21 2025 17:45 MJG wrote:Show nested quote +On July 20 2025 04:28 HeavenSC wrote:On July 20 2025 02:28 MJG wrote:
Revert to whatever Blizzard did last.
Let maps take care of balance.
EDIT:
Asking professional players* who have a vested interest in their race being stronger to come up with balance patches was a dumb idea then and it's a dumb idea now.
*or even regular players, because balance whining is a shit show throughout the community, my own dumb ass included. Voidray meta? Idk dude. I don't actually care which meta* it would revert to because that's not the angle I'm coming from. The balance council is a failed experiment. We know from multiple testimonies that the balance council had a deeply flawed decision making process, and we also know that prominent members of the balance council were specifically biased against Protoss. It's therefore impossible to disentangle the balance council's "good faith" changes from their "bad faith" changes. They shouldn't be allowed to dictate changes to the game going forward because they can't be trusted not to act in self-interest and/or with malicious intent, and the changes they did make should be undone for the same reason. If Blizzard can't be subsequently convinced to take a proper interest in updating the game then it shouldn't be updated (outside of the bug fixes and map-pool rotations they've already shown commitment towards). *Whilst my argument doesn't rest on whether or not the Void Ray meta was better than what we currently have, I would like to point out that the community's collective inability to view Void Rays as anything other than a meme unit is an amazing encapsulation of why the community can't be trusted to balance the game lmao.
Idk dude, i think its better than no changes
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First patch was solid, I agree. But we see that even reddit have a better grasp of balance than the pros, since their changes is what finally made protoss viable, that is if it happened due to the patch and not the maps.
I agree maps or mods should balance sc2 it's way better to slow peter out that die to a thousand cuts, because they just do changes for the sake of it. If you do changes for the sake of it that means you value novelty higher than quality, since you did a change that wasn't needed. I do like energy overcharge, so mb that on top of the first patch and see where that takes us?
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Northern Ireland26531 Posts
Pros have biases but be real, the vast majority of community suggestions from the rest of us, frequently appalling.
Joe and Jane public have plenty of good ideas about the general direction of things and what they’d like to see, where pain points are. But many lack any in-depth knowledge of timings and how things intersect or interact, and if one neglects those factors, very undesirable results may happen. Pros, if nothing else do have that knowledge.
Some pros are insanely biased, some are considerably more neutral. Harstem for example to pick one, he went against the grain of a lot of whining and said PvZ wasn’t actually that bad for multiple patches, and there was a danger that Toss might get overbuffed.
Which absolutely did happen, especially at lower levels of play.
I don’t think the central idea of some kind of Balance Council is fundamentally flawed, it does however need pros, or semi-pros to act more as technical consultants on ideas and the vision of some more neutral designer type.
Have some kind of general idea for what you want to fix or incentivise with a patch, and actually work around that.
That element’s been really lacking in patches in the Balance Council era. To the degree patches that are meant to neuter generally disliked turtle styles, end up actually buffing them
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On July 22 2025 00:24 HeavenSC wrote:Show nested quote +On July 21 2025 17:45 MJG wrote:On July 20 2025 04:28 HeavenSC wrote:On July 20 2025 02:28 MJG wrote:
Revert to whatever Blizzard did last.
Let maps take care of balance.
EDIT:
Asking professional players* who have a vested interest in their race being stronger to come up with balance patches was a dumb idea then and it's a dumb idea now.
*or even regular players, because balance whining is a shit show throughout the community, my own dumb ass included. Voidray meta? Idk dude. I don't actually care which meta* it would revert to because that's not the angle I'm coming from. The balance council is a failed experiment. We know from multiple testimonies that the balance council had a deeply flawed decision making process, and we also know that prominent members of the balance council were specifically biased against Protoss. It's therefore impossible to disentangle the balance council's "good faith" changes from their "bad faith" changes. They shouldn't be allowed to dictate changes to the game going forward because they can't be trusted not to act in self-interest and/or with malicious intent, and the changes they did make should be undone for the same reason. If Blizzard can't be subsequently convinced to take a proper interest in updating the game then it shouldn't be updated (outside of the bug fixes and map-pool rotations they've already shown commitment towards). *Whilst my argument doesn't rest on whether or not the Void Ray meta was better than what we currently have, I would like to point out that the community's collective inability to view Void Rays as anything other than a meme unit is an amazing encapsulation of why the community can't be trusted to balance the game lmao. Idk dude, i think its better than no changes
Self-interested professional players amateur game developers tinkering with the game is better than no changes?
Just look at the current state of the game/community discourse!
Change isn't always good.
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Northern Ireland26531 Posts
Ah that’s just standard anti-Protoss banter, can’t say I approve as a Toss lad myself but seems a bit harsh if it’s just off of that like
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On July 20 2025 13:46 goody153 wrote:
...but I do wonder how viable map design is being racial balance in Sc2. Highground for example isnt as strongly valued in sc2 as it is in broodwar
This is frequently brought up but it will not be possible to balance around maps because of the variety of unit compositions per race as well as their economic needs in the LotV economy. For example, a defendable forward base that Protoss players would enjoy would be equally if not better for Mech terran in the vast majority of cases.
There are too many design issues that have not been addressed for maps to play the role they want them to.
As for the discussion with the council, or balance changes in general, the major issue is that after the team departed there has been 0 direction for which these changes are made. They exist only to solve present issues at face value, the people who are in the council have 0 hours of game design experience at production levels and the combination of those things lead to the deeper hole the balance state is currently in. At no point in LotV, or anywhere in SC2's lifespan was there a time where the meta was truly good and balanced, the end of each patch would eventually have some strateg(ies) creep up and disrupt everything again.
The biggest problem is that SC2's community had a dependency on Blizzard to fix everything for them; and Blizzard kept introducing questionable solutions to major issues, bandaid after bandaid. And now that they are gone, players want that same interaction between the developer and gameplay that no longer exists. Not to mention the people who are at Blizzad implementing these changes frequently breaking things due to their incompetence with the engine. Players are incredibly good at pointing out problems, and notoriously bad at offering solutions.
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Northern Ireland26531 Posts
On September 04 2025 08:28 Avexyli wrote:Show nested quote +On July 20 2025 13:46 goody153 wrote:
...but I do wonder how viable map design is being racial balance in Sc2. Highground for example isnt as strongly valued in sc2 as it is in broodwar This is frequently brought up but it will not be possible to balance around maps because of the variety of unit compositions per race as well as their economic needs in the LotV economy. For example, a defendable forward base that Protoss players would enjoy would be equally if not better for Mech terran in the vast majority of cases. There are too many design issues that have not been addressed for maps to play the role they want them to.
You could do it, but you’d have to have a bigger map pool with maps that are only queued for specific matchups I think. I’d love to see what mapmakers could do in trying to make say, the ultimately PvZ map, or TvZ map and balance around the metas and trends in those matchups. Instead they kinda have to make a bunch of maps that are vaguely balanced across the board, which doesn’t leave for a huge amount of experimentation
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On September 04 2025 08:28 Avexyli wrote:Show nested quote +On July 20 2025 13:46 goody153 wrote:
...but I do wonder how viable map design is being racial balance in Sc2. Highground for example isnt as strongly valued in sc2 as it is in broodwar As for the discussion with the council, or balance changes in general, the major issue is that after the team departed there has been 0 direction for which these changes are made. They exist only to solve present issues at face value, the people who are in the council have 0 hours of game design experience at production levels and the combination of those things lead to the deeper hole the balance state is currently in. At no point in LotV, or anywhere in SC2's lifespan was there a time where the meta was truly good and balanced, the end of each patch would eventually have some strateg(ies) creep up and disrupt everything again.
That's not true at all.
Several of Legacy of the Void's patches have been balanced from a statistical point-of-view, especially once you allow for the presence of outstanding players like Serral or Maru skewing tournament wins in their race's favour.
Blizzard just needs to roll back to one of those patches and have done with it.
The very first Balance Council patch (5.0.9) would work just fine. It won't trigger the community's pathological hatred of Void Rays like Blizzard's final patch did, it retains the majority of Blizzard's intended "final state" for the game, the Balance Council hadn't had enough time to go full clown mode before implementing those changes, and both balance statistics and tournament results look relatively fair when viewed in retrospect.
There's really no reason not to do this. We need to accept that Blizzard no longer wants to actively develop the game, and thus accept that there needs to be a "final state" balance patch.
And we really really really don't need self-interested content creators (who only want changes so they can pump out content about the changes) or professional players (who are always going to want their race to be stronger because it makes it easier for them to earn money) tinkering with things when they're not experienced game developers.
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Of course, you can balance using only maps, they said the same about 2v2, 2v2 just doesn't play the same in sc2.. If you don't try, you don't know.
I don't mind if we stay on this patch, it's a broken one, but it works. I'd probably rather be on the last blizzard patch, since it feels more legitimate, but think we should go to using custom mods to try out changes from here on out.
I have a lot of passion for what sc2 could ultimately be, but there's no trust anymore, so give us mods that work, and let the work do the speaking.
My wish for sc2 is that for it to be as slow as WoL,,but keep the zaniness of lotv and lost awesomeness. For instance, when I want to play terran, I want to bunker up and use ghosts and mass ravens, or bcs. When I play protoss I want to do archon toilet and even have disruptor shot as cherry on top, and as zerg I want to use mutas, and set up tactical flanks or hold fire lurkers, or bane mines.
I thought the tankivac was silly, but if it's gated behind an expensive upgrade, then why not. Make the game slow by locking all expansion units behind new buildings, and lock the crazy power behind upgrades, and give back a ton of money so that we can see huge armies clash again.
Disruptors aren't even an issue if you can rebuild armies, the problem comes when the mineral line blows up, because that hinders the rebuild ability. And I mean slow, tanks should require siege mode again, muta regen/speed and medivac boost should be upgrades. Stim should be 150\150 and have long research time and wg as well. Stuff like this, I like the half mineral patches, but they should be 1000/2000 so there's the same WoL amount, and perhaps 8 worker start, or reduce mineral income from 5->4.
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EPT
