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5.0.15 Patch Balance Hotfix (2025-10-8)

Forum Index > SC2 General
84 CommentsPost a Reply
1 2 3 4 5 All last
Creager
Profile Joined February 2011
Germany1920 Posts
October 13 2025 09:19 GMT
#66
On October 13 2025 17:32 MJG wrote:
Show nested quote +
On October 13 2025 16:58 RandomPlayer wrote:
Maybe they should make Nexus cost 450 so that protoss doesn't expand like crazy.

Maybe they should restore the number of resources per base, and reduce the number of bases per map, so that Protoss doesn't have to.


Oh, then please also revert the starting workers to 6 while you're at it.
... einmal mit Profis spielen!
MJG
Profile Joined May 2018
United Kingdom1371 Posts
October 13 2025 09:45 GMT
#67
On October 13 2025 18:19 Creager wrote:
Show nested quote +
On October 13 2025 17:32 MJG wrote:
On October 13 2025 16:58 RandomPlayer wrote:
Maybe they should make Nexus cost 450 so that protoss doesn't expand like crazy.

Maybe they should restore the number of resources per base, and reduce the number of bases per map, so that Protoss doesn't have to.

Oh, then please also revert the starting workers to 6 while you're at it.

Yes please!

puking up frothing vitriolic sarcastic spittle
ejozl
Profile Joined October 2010
Denmark3463 Posts
October 13 2025 17:38 GMT
#68
I have been thinking that it's a strange design choice to actually have queens, if you want zerg to be the mass expanding race, since hatch + queen is obviously more expensive than nexus. Mb queen should've been a toss unit. The queen core ship?
SC2 Archon needs "Terrible, terrible damage" as one of it's quotes.
Harris1st
Profile Blog Joined May 2010
Germany7006 Posts
October 14 2025 07:48 GMT
#69
On October 14 2025 02:38 ejozl wrote:
I have been thinking that it's a strange design choice to actually have queens, if you want zerg to be the mass expanding race, since hatch + queen is obviously more expensive than nexus. Mb queen should've been a toss unit. The queen core ship?


Love it! The Queen Core!
Go Serral! GG EZ for Ence. Flashbang dance FTW
tigera6
Profile Joined March 2021
3443 Posts
Last Edited: 2025-10-14 12:19:06
October 14 2025 12:09 GMT
#70
Queen was a Hero unit back in WOL alpha irrc, would be fun if we go back to that idea.
RogueTheGOAT
Profile Joined July 2025
166 Posts
October 14 2025 12:48 GMT
#71
On October 14 2025 02:38 ejozl wrote:
I have been thinking that it's a strange design choice to actually have queens, if you want zerg to be the mass expanding race, since hatch + queen is obviously more expensive than nexus. Mb queen should've been a toss unit. The queen core ship?

The Queen exists in part so that Zerg players do not need to build as many macro hatcheries, so the comparison is not to other town hall buildings but to army production buildings. Considering all of the other utility that Queens provide, you can't say with a straight face that Zerg gets the bad end of that trade.
goody153
Profile Blog Joined April 2013
44236 Posts
October 14 2025 14:50 GMT
#72
On October 14 2025 02:38 ejozl wrote:
I have been thinking that it's a strange design choice to actually have queens, if you want zerg to be the mass expanding race, since hatch + queen is obviously more expensive than nexus. Mb queen should've been a toss unit. The queen core ship?


Back in initial sc2 release I always found it odd they changed the formula of how zerg operates with larva. I thought it was much harder to balance than just the previous hatcheries.

Also yeah they feel more a toss unit

On October 14 2025 21:09 tigera6 wrote:
Queen was a Hero unit back in WOL alpha irrc, would be fun if we go back to that idea.


Hmm

On October 14 2025 21:48 RogueTheGOAT wrote:
Show nested quote +
On October 14 2025 02:38 ejozl wrote:
I have been thinking that it's a strange design choice to actually have queens, if you want zerg to be the mass expanding race, since hatch + queen is obviously more expensive than nexus. Mb queen should've been a toss unit. The queen core ship?

The Queen exists in part so that Zerg players do not need to build as many macro hatcheries, so the comparison is not to other town hall buildings but to army production buildings. Considering all of the other utility that Queens provide, you can't say with a straight face that Zerg gets the bad end of that trade.

They could've implemented the creep tumor in a different way tbqh. It was a good idea but I was never a fan of injects.
this is a quote
Vision0
Profile Joined February 2024
27 Posts
Last Edited: 2025-10-15 08:20:56
October 15 2025 08:20 GMT
#73
it s obvious that the design of creep tumor could evolved (since 15 years) because of the mechanic can be abused by hardcore players (against casual) so in a way the ease of their use is not in favor of fun or strategy
playnice
Profile Joined October 2011
Malaysia302 Posts
October 15 2025 19:06 GMT
#74
The Queen is in the game because all 3 races were designed with production acceleration mechanics in SC2. Income rate, production rate and production density(production per area) for each race are all buffed with Chronoboost, Warp gates, Mules, factory add-ons and larvae inject. Different mechanics but with the same goal of maintaining growth parity among all the races with an accelerated and compressed game state.

Perhaps the weirdest design decision that is set in stone is how SC2 expanded BW's scopes but limits its scale by sticking to 200 maximum unit cap. The cap was probably a technical necessity rather than a design choice, but lets just assume that it was intended to shorten game length and incentivize attacking at peak strength instead of getting countered by an opponent with free supply to do so.

Zergs however breaks this paradigm. Banking larvae essentially made Zergs grow beyond max supply with no penalty. In fact the more Zergs turtle and bank resources and larvae after max supply, the better their chances gets. This has been a permanent fixture of the game. With worker supply starting higher and a higher income rate it only makes any strategy with the goal to get to late game quicker more appealing for Zergs.

This is not to say that the design is "bad", but is undeniably the flavor of SC2 which has stayed this way for a while now. The unit cap is supposed to act as a point of diminishing return if player remain defensive or passive. But since production limits only apply to P and T, they hit this diminishing point while Z continues to grow. Had the game scale increased to include a higher cap, P and T may have more options to assemble compositions or more avenues of attack that forces Z urgent spending of larvae to stay competitive.

Which brings us back to the Queen the unit directly enables and cements the flavor of SC2. Not because it has injects, but because it was patched into being the best defensive unit in the game, which just means that it's a very good unit to be a catchall for Z early game vulnerability. It's worth pointing out that the patches were way before increased starting workers and the fetish for huge maps. If Blizz intern values the dynamism of the game, he should reexamine the role of the Queen (protector/protectee) and how it contributes to the compression of game states reducing gameplay diversity viability in the game.
ThunderJunk
Profile Joined December 2015
United States717 Posts
October 15 2025 19:58 GMT
#75
On October 16 2025 04:06 playnice wrote:

Which brings us back to the Queen the unit directly enables and cements the flavor of SC2. Not because it has injects, but because it was patched into being the best defensive unit in the game, which just means that it's a very good unit to be a catchall for Z early game vulnerability. It's worth pointing out that the patches were way before increased starting workers and the fetish for huge maps. If Blizz intern values the dynamism of the game, he should reexamine the role of the Queen (protector/protectee) and how it contributes to the compression of game states reducing gameplay diversity viability in the game.


The idea that zerg counters to every attack in the early-midgame is just queens + lings always irked me.

Injects are an ok mechanic - maybe not my favorite, but not terrible. Creep tumors are ridiculous. They grant vision, so zerg never has to worry about managing vision on their side of the map. Transfuse is ridiculous. You forget a bunch of injects because you're bad, and the game rewards you by making you hard to kill because the extra energy pools up?

To have all 3 of these abilities on a single unit that doesn't even require larva to produce is just terrible imho.
I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.
playnice
Profile Joined October 2011
Malaysia302 Posts
October 16 2025 02:35 GMT
#76
To have all 3 of these abilities on a single unit that doesn't even require larva to produce is just terrible imho

This is in addition to the Queen being an actual fighting unit. 2 Queens have the DPS of a Spine/Spore crawler and more total HP.
stevejon
Profile Joined October 2025
1 Post
October 16 2025 10:03 GMT
#77
--- Nuked ---
Captain Peabody
Profile Blog Joined May 2009
United States3126 Posts
October 16 2025 11:36 GMT
#78
everything people complain about with the Queen and larvae and Chronoboost and Warp Gate and M&M&M is in fact just good asymmetric design. SC2 is very well designed precisely because all three races have unique things that not only are, but feel strong to the point of busted, but in reality are made up for by things that the other races have. that's precisely what makes the game fun and successful. players want to feel like they can explode and do crazy things and get away with things: that's the whole appeal of an RTS game with asymmetric balance.

this is in fact just as if not more true in BW, where every race has things that are absolutely busted and would be unplayable if ported into SC2.

the opposite is what makes dime-a-dozen RTSes fail, when races are either more or less identical except for slightly different units, with no mechanics that set them strongly apart in terms of playstyle, or when special units and mechanics feel weak and like they don't have much visceral impact on the gamestate.
Dies Irae venit. youtube.com/SnobbinsFilms
TeamMamba
Profile Joined June 2025
149 Posts
Last Edited: 2025-10-16 13:50:26
October 16 2025 13:48 GMT
#79
People still complaining about queens mechanics?

If anything it’s the mule / scan that is broken and never been fixed.

Free detection + free worker. Literally doesn’t cost anything

Before the dumb people comes out and say “each scan cost 200 minerals”. Nope. Scan doesn’t cost anything. It only cost terran the opportunity to get 200 minerals faster but doesn’t physically cost 200
tigera6
Profile Joined March 2021
3443 Posts
October 16 2025 19:33 GMT
#80
On October 16 2025 22:48 TeamMamba wrote:
People still complaining about queens mechanics?

If anything it’s the mule / scan that is broken and never been fixed.

Free detection + free worker. Literally doesn’t cost anything

Before the dumb people comes out and say “each scan cost 200 minerals”. Nope. Scan doesn’t cost anything. It only cost terran the opportunity to get 200 minerals faster but doesn’t physically cost 200

By that logic free larvae, free creep and free healing isnt OP?
playnice
Profile Joined October 2011
Malaysia302 Posts
October 17 2025 09:25 GMT
#81
On October 16 2025 20:36 Captain Peabody wrote:
everything people complain about with the Queen and larvae and Chronoboost and Warp Gate and M&M&M is in fact just good asymmetric design. SC2 is very well designed precisely because all three races have unique things that not only are, but feel strong to the point of busted, but in reality are made up for by things that the other races have. that's precisely what makes the game fun and successful. players want to feel like they can explode and do crazy things and get away with things: that's the whole appeal of an RTS game with asymmetric balance.

this is in fact just as if not more true in BW, where every race has things that are absolutely busted and would be unplayable if ported into SC2.

the opposite is what makes dime-a-dozen RTSes fail, when races are either more or less identical except for slightly different units, with no mechanics that set them strongly apart in terms of playstyle, or when special units and mechanics feel weak and like they don't have much visceral impact on the gamestate.

SC2 is very well designed not only with asymmetric design but asymmetric strength that changes throughout the game. Consistent change in racial imbalance in-game is what makes RTS great. Simple harmonic motion of strength displacement in a 1v1 game. When this motion gets heavily impeded or stops by and not by player intervention the game losses its defining quality as a great RTS game. Imagine a pendulum that swings both ways and in different magnitude representing maximum potential of a faction at any given time. The pendulum gets stuck one way and doesn't fall back down for a very long time once Z max out and turtles.

This is bad because all other timing Z can take to get ahead pales in comparison to this one late game strategy and is just not worth taking. I assume by giving Z quicker access to spire and better Banes Blizz intern is pushing for increased variety and incentivize Z enough to take a different path. But without addressing late game mechanics that's fundamental to the game, there is now more tools for Z to get there.
ejozl
Profile Joined October 2010
Denmark3463 Posts
Last Edited: 2025-10-23 07:33:38
October 22 2025 17:57 GMT
#82
So, I wonder how it'd play out if you let queens be absolutely stellar on defense, but heavily nerfed the macro mechanics and put that power into the hatchery instead. So what the council tried to do with the small 25 mineral exchange, but going the whole nine yards. Part of my impetus to look at this is also because zergs are on their way to extinction like the dinosaurs and the primal zergs. And over the years there were talk about auto inject and stuff like this to make zerg less like a chore.

So, what if:
Queen starting energy from 25->50.
Inject cost from 25->50 [Now fully stacks, more injects can trigger from same hatchery].
Creep tumour cost from 25->50 [could backtrack some of the nerfs, like cd on spawn tumour]
Transfuse now heals instantly [can be used off creep]

You also revert the 25min cost changes, and make hatchery spawn more larvae and quicker, could possibly go up to 5 larvae, and spawn rate increased by a similar amount, so that when there would spawn 3 larvae, now there would be 5.

Queen walks could be a thing again, which helps zerg overcome the dreaded skytoss, but at the same time it would be way more telegraphed, as queens for pure larvae, or creep is now less powerful.
Queens for injecting late game would probably still be the best approach.

Ofc, it's impossible to know if smth like this is balanced and you won't know till you try.

+ Show Spoiler +
Similarly you could give the nexus:
Energy overcharge cooldown removed [now each nexus cannot reach other nexi energy recharge cast ranges.
Recall cost from 50->75, and cooldown removed.

Protoss players should now be more thoughtful of each nexus' energy expenditures, but players that manage it well could do some cool pooling strategies. This would lead to even more signature play by protoss players, since some want to be more in the opponents faces, ie recall, others would be spell slinging, and others would macro with probes or do chrono timings on researches, or upgrades.


edit: I guess larvae spawn rate from hatch would go from every 11s -> every 7s.
SC2 Archon needs "Terrible, terrible damage" as one of it's quotes.
ejozl
Profile Joined October 2010
Denmark3463 Posts
November 05 2025 18:14 GMT
#83
On October 11 2025 02:56 ejozl wrote:
Will ghosts now survive the outer radius of nuke? That would be hilarious. Also, what is the tick dmg of storm, they should aim for it not to contain decimals.

What do peeps think about ghosts if they had their range increased from 6 to 7, and snipe being reduced to 7 range, but uninterruptible, unavoidable and old dmg value? Meaning dmg won't interrupt and you can't walk out of its range. I also don't think mana should be returned on fail.
This should be in place of +25 hp.

What do you think about this ghost change and the queen+hatch change above? Worth a try?
SC2 Archon needs "Terrible, terrible damage" as one of it's quotes.
Vision0
Profile Joined February 2024
27 Posts
Last Edited: 2025-11-07 09:44:31
November 07 2025 09:42 GMT
#84
Mana cost for creep tumors is clearly not enought expensive,
I m against the over use of rapid fire so i prefer transfuse spell working not instantly

I think like you that injection should be increase to 4 (or 5)
The reason is because i would be happy to see bases only built for mineral harvesting (not able to create workers for Protoss and Terran), which one you could evolve in the original base with their actual spells (scan, mule, chronoboost, etc..).

Then Zerg could benefit from two larva by injection in this harvesting base (mainly oriented for army supply and not drones)
Those bases would cost approximately 200 minerals

Then it s just to turn the game into something slower with more macro strategy decision, more buids option, and more platform combat positions
ejozl
Profile Joined October 2010
Denmark3463 Posts
November 07 2025 18:32 GMT
#85
I'm for a slower game, but more steady game, where max supply is almost never reached, or perhaps is only reached when 3\3 is done. It's pretty ridiculous to look at maxpax and clem and being 160 supply while upgs are only 1\1, that seems like a mismatch to me.

For my queen, inject would be weaker as it wohld do the same as now but cost twice the amount, the plus side is that you would be able to spam them late game ike mules. It's the hatch that is boosted and provide more larvae.
SC2 Archon needs "Terrible, terrible damage" as one of it's quotes.
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