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Taken from game replays.com:
“In the event” that an expansion is produced for the upcoming Starcraft II, Blizzard Entertainment will likely consider introducing a fourth race to the prodigious RTS franchise – or so says the company’s co-founder and Vice President Frank Pearce.
“We don’t have the resources or time to add a fourth race to the launch of StarCraft II, but I’m sure in the event that we decide to do an expansion set it’s a feature that’ll come up for discussion,” said Pearce, in an interview with VG247.
Pearce explained that the possibility of establishing a new faction had been discussed earlier in Starcraft II’s development cycle. “But we felt like we had a finite amount of great ideas and wanted to make sure we focused all the cool, best ideas on the existing three races rather than diluting those ideas across four races” he said.
Starcraft II is set to feature the three races from the original game: the Zerg, Protoss and Terran and as is the case with all Blizzard titles, you can expect to see it on the shelf “when it’s done”.
Thoughts? Ideas?
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I always wanted a fourth race, and since they weren't going to make another for the original game, I naturally hoped they would make one in an expansion. I somewhat doubt it will happen though... they're probably going to have trouble just adding a few more units in, let alone a whole new race
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I don't want another race, i think Blizzard was somewhat lucky that they managed to get SC as balanced as they did, and that just wont happen again if they decide to add another fourth race.
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It was also mentioned in earlier interviews and Q&As that they don't want to have too many units per race, and that there was a "perfect" number. Brood war elevated the SC unit count to that "perfect" number, but now they're starting with a similar ammount of units in vanilla SC2. Judging by the design of the current units, I think it might be difficult for them to squeeze any more without adding redundancy, which goes directly against blizzard's design philosophy. That being said, I think if there is an expansion is a likely possibility that it will feature a brand new race rather than focusing on refining the previous three like brood war did. Then again, devellopement isn't over yet and some SC2 units may yet get cut. Even SC lost units during beta phase, and we aren't even there yet.
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Look at WC3 with its 4th race. Race became more and more similar with patches and the expansion. I would prefer Blizzard to save the ideas and put it into the existing race in any new expansion.
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If they keep the 4th race like the Naga thats OK, but including a playable multiplayer 4th race for the expansion could be a disaster for balance and is best left alone.
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I'd say that it would be certainly possible for blizzard to add another race, and out of all the game companies I would trust blizzard the most, but it would be an extremely difficult endeavor. Starcraft balance depends on the asymmetries between races that allow mapmakers to custom-tailor the balance with features that help or hinder certain races, and adding a race with enough differences to exploit for balance would probably be almost impossible.
Of course, knowing blizzard they will think very long and hard about the idea. And if they decide to do it, I have every confidence that it will be at least decently done (after many patches).
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Dammit no 4th races. Perhaps a 4th race which you can play in campaign and in custom UMS's but not a fully functional 4th race.
edit:
If they keep the 4th race like the Naga thats OK, but including a playable multiplayer 4th race for the expansion could be a disaster for balance and is best left alone.
you already said it for me 
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Blizzard should stick to the formula that worked for SC/BW's greatness. aka simply create an expansion for SC2 that has new units, and abilities for each of the current three races -> 100% analogous to SC having brood war.
great success!
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Sam Wise has already stated how severely unwanted a 4rth race is in the multilayer, and that it will not happen, not even in an expansion. That's not to say a 4th playable race in the campaign is out of the question though, just in multilayer it is.
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lulz, and many were disappointed when there was no fourth race revealed. So easily influenced by blizzard media. xD
I became contented with them setting the number of races to 3 but partly the reason was because I expect the 4th race to be out in the expansion. There are quite a few posts I've seen of TLers who hinted this expectation as well.
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If a 4th race is added for multiplayer, too many elements/themes will overlap. Just look at WC3.
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51446 Posts
A fourth race for Single player campaign is good enough for me.
Just don't ruin the multiplayer balance.
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if a 4th race is introduced, it will no doubt destroy starcraft as we know it. 3 races is the magic number for RTSes. One of the reasons warcraft 3 is not as balanced is because of a 4th race, nobody can refute that. the classic "Z>P>T>Z" of starcraft is multiplied by tenfold when you apply this analysis to warcraft 3, meaning that it is less balanced. no 2 ways about it. if blizzard announces that there will be a 4th race for the expansion, i think that we should start a petition against it.
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3 Lions
United States3705 Posts
On August 30 2008 11:10 ohhsuup wrote:
if a 4th race is introduced, it will no doubt destroy starcraft as we know it. 3 races is the magic number for RTSes. One of the reasons warcraft 3 is not as balanced is because of a 4th race, nobody can refute that. the classic "Z>P>T>Z" of starcraft is multiplied by tenfold when you apply this analysis to warcraft 3, meaning that it is less balanced. no 2 ways about it. if blizzard announces that there will be a 4th race for the expansion, i think that we should start a petition against it.
i totally agreed
this is kinda off-topic (sorry), but has anyone started a petition against MBS?
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I only aprove of a panda race. Nothing else. And even then, it should only be in single player.
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Well I don't really care but it would be nice to see the ancient race that they were talking about in BW in that bonus mission. If its the Xel-naga then good. Even if it is just for the campaign i would be fine with it. I dunno why they are leaving the Xel-naga out so much till now but don't you guys and gals think that it would be interesting to know how the Xel-naga would feel like to play.
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" we want innovative fun games starcraft is getting boring"
" we want balance at all costs don't add anything new"
Seriously if you want balance at all costs then they should make only one race playable. balancing 4 races isn't hard at all and it would make starcraft not so boring. All you see is the same old units same everything not much variety because there's not much to pick from. More units+ more races = more fun but oh no! balance will suffer!! balance never seemed to stop kespa from putting interesting maps into leagues. anyone who opposes more variety probably played only starcraft and has no idea how a game with 4+ races works
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On August 30 2008 12:26 freshtowers wrote:
anyone who opposes more variety probably played only starcraft and has no idea how a game with 4+ races works
It's called WC3. The game is fun, but the fun is fleeting because of balnance. I played Dawn of War which was also fun, but watched as the game was flogged to death with race after race after race at the expense of game balance.
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If they're going to make a fourth race, they should make it completely imba so as to be banned from competitive play. Failing that, I think a "supplemental" race (i.e. one that can't build combat units but can boost unit production etcetera might be cool for team games. You know, for all those people who can't stand the sight of blood.
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4th race campaign only. terran, zerg, protoss is all thats needed for multiplayer.
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I think a 4th race would be very intersting for both multiplayer and single player...
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I thought the discussion of a fourth race was old news...
Guess I'm just having de ja vu
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I wouldn't mind a fourth race for multiplayer, as long as they put it through epically thorough testing and balancing to make sure that nothing gets fucked up as a result. If they fuck things up, oh well, it's a game. Life will go on D: But let's hope it doesn't come to that.
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On August 30 2008 12:26 freshtowers wrote:
More units+ more races = more fun
GREAT PHILOSOPHY. Lets add 10 races, 10 TIMES THE FUN!!!!
You only have to look at warcraft 3 for a second to see the problem with adding more races. Less uniqueness between the races. More overlap of units.
Starcraft currently has very little overlap of units. Each unit is very different from every other unit in the game, and gives each race a unique way of going about the game. The closest two units I can think of in starcraft would be the Ultralisk and the Archon. However they are still very different in the strategies used with them.
If you look at warcraft 3, the similarities between units and races is just in your face the entire game. Tauren, Abominations, Knights are basically the same units with slightly differing stats.
Footmen, Grunts, Ghouls.
Catapults, Meat Wagons, Glaive Throwers.
The more the races overlap, the less unique they are, the worse this game will be off.
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On August 30 2008 12:55 moebius_string wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2008 12:26 freshtowers wrote:
anyone who opposes more variety probably played only starcraft and has no idea how a game with 4+ races works
It's called WC3. The game is fun, but the fun is fleeting because of balnance. I played Dawn of War which was also fun, but watched as the game was flogged to death with race after race after race at the expense of game balance.
And why in the world would the race number have anything to do with those games being imbalanced? Infact wc3 is fairly balanced it's not nearly as bad as people make it out to be and dawn of war isn't created by blizzard so it has nothing to do with anything. Balancing 4 races is very very easy and doesn't take long especially with input from pros. It's just up to how commited blizzard is to balancing it, if they are they can balance 6 races, it will take time but the finished product would be alot funner than 3 races. How are you going to be playing the sc2 ladder with a mirror matchup every 2 games or so? Going to be really boring
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On August 30 2008 14:37 Fen wrote:GREAT PHILOSOPHY. Lets add 10 races, 10 TIMES THE FUN!!!! You only have to look at warcraft 3 for a second to see the problem with adding more races. Less uniqueness between the races. More overlap of units. Starcraft currently has very little overlap of units. Each unit is very different from every other unit in the game, and gives each race a unique way of going about the game. The closest two units I can think of in starcraft would be the Ultralisk and the Archon. However they are still very different in the strategies used with them. If you look at warcraft 3, the similarities between units and races is just in your face the entire game. Tauren, Abominations, Knights are basically the same units with slightly differing stats. Footmen, Grunts, Ghouls. Catapults, Meat Wagons, Glaive Throwers. The more the races overlap, the less unique they are, the worse this game will be off.
2 very similar races are way better than just one unique because there will be less mirrors. Look at iccup so so so many players who are not korean pros training always pick a different race to avoid a boring mirror and just because wc3 races are slightly similar doesn't mean anything. Blizzard was abit less creative, so? It's not hard to make things not overlap if you put effort into it. If you don't think the more tha merrier then why not just limit the game to a single race? oh that's just too boring and 3 is still to little you guys never even tried a 4 race starcraft it's not like they couldn't remove the fourth race if it failed in beta. Look at the starcraft leagues at the moment and the talk about the decline that's all because it's too much of the same there's not enough things to make someone stand out and practicing 3 matchups is very easy. This will create more interest and raise the skill level because now you have to memorize 4 matchups instead of just 3
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i'm so tired of people complaining about mirror matches, when imo they can be some of the funnest games to watch and really are the only way to determine if someone is better than someone else because they have the same shit to work with.
but on topic, i'll really be surprised if there isnt a 4th race in the single player campaign just because they said they will be continuing the story line and that story line includes a protoss/zerg hybrid race. soooo yea. but if they put it in multiplayer, balance is going to altqq.
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On August 30 2008 14:48 freshtowers wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2008 12:55 moebius_string wrote:On August 30 2008 12:26 freshtowers wrote:
anyone who opposes more variety probably played only starcraft and has no idea how a game with 4+ races works
It's called WC3. The game is fun, but the fun is fleeting because of balnance. I played Dawn of War which was also fun, but watched as the game was flogged to death with race after race after race at the expense of game balance. And why in the world would the race number have anything to do with those games being imbalanced? Infact wc3 is fairly balanced it's not nearly as bad as people make it out to be and dawn of war isn't created by blizzard so it has nothing to do with anything. Balancing 4 races is very very easy and doesn't take long especially with input from pros. It's just up to how commited blizzard is to balancing it, if they are they can balance 6 races, it will take time but the finished product would be alot funner than 3 races. How are you going to be playing the sc2 ladder with a mirror matchup every 2 games or so? Going to be really boring
Balancing is not as easy as you think or Blizzard wouldn't have to patch these games multiple times. Go to MYM website and read the article on the pros opinions on the newest WC3 patch. Even if you could theoretically balance 6 races, how unique would those 6 races be? I brought up Dawn of War because it is a prime example of what you can get when the developer is primarliy focused on pleasing the ADD generation with imbalance and cheap gimmicks simply to keep people from getting bored.
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On August 30 2008 15:09 moebius_string wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2008 14:48 freshtowers wrote:On August 30 2008 12:55 moebius_string wrote:On August 30 2008 12:26 freshtowers wrote:
anyone who opposes more variety probably played only starcraft and has no idea how a game with 4+ races works
It's called WC3. The game is fun, but the fun is fleeting because of balnance. I played Dawn of War which was also fun, but watched as the game was flogged to death with race after race after race at the expense of game balance. And why in the world would the race number have anything to do with those games being imbalanced? Infact wc3 is fairly balanced it's not nearly as bad as people make it out to be and dawn of war isn't created by blizzard so it has nothing to do with anything. Balancing 4 races is very very easy and doesn't take long especially with input from pros. It's just up to how commited blizzard is to balancing it, if they are they can balance 6 races, it will take time but the finished product would be alot funner than 3 races. How are you going to be playing the sc2 ladder with a mirror matchup every 2 games or so? Going to be really boring Balancing is not as easy as you think or Blizzard wouldn't have to patch these games multiple times. Go to MYM website and read the article on the pros opinions on the newest WC3 patch. Even if you could theoretically balance 6 races, how unique would those 6 races be? I brought up Dawn of War because it is a prime example of what you can get when the developer is primarliy focused on pleasing the ADD generation with imbalance and cheap gimmicks simply to keep people from getting bored. This is just an issue of blizzard putting effort into sc2 and they said they want to make it as good as possible. wc3 patches take 2 years to release because its not big enough for them to care about it, blaancing 4 races isn't hard at all. If i took 2 years to do something I'm sure it would seem like my job is really hard when it isn't
On August 30 2008 15:07 yOko[LuNyA] wrote:
i'm so tired of people complaining about mirror matches, when imo they can be some of the funnest games to watch and really are the only way to determine if someone is better than someone else because they have the same shit to work with.
but on topic, i'll really be surprised if there isnt a 4th race in the single player campaign just because they said they will be continuing the story line and that story line includes a protoss/zerg hybrid race. soooo yea. but if they put it in multiplayer, balance is going to altqq.
except mirror matches have the most luck involved in them just because both players get to use the exact same units. One player is 100 % going to have the lesser build of the 2 unless they do the EXACT same thing. ZvZ for example is almost all build order unless you're jaedong. Even mondragon beat savior in this matchup
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Okay I just read the word 'funner' and 'funnest' and I'm like 60% sure they aren't real words. Anyways, I always thought that it would be neat if there was some sort of mini-races you could hire. It doesn't fit into the Starcraft lore, but I thought the premise was pretty fun...I mean, funner. Like a cow or a fish race might at a little variety and all of a sudden a TvZ is suddenly a TCvZF or the Zerg might be bold and go with that turkey race no one ever chooses because they are too micro-intensive.
There are still three races, but for those who want more races added in, this may be able to satisfy (I hope) while still maintaining balance~
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On August 30 2008 15:22 Ozarugold wrote:
Okay I just read the word 'funner' and 'funnest' and I'm like 60% sure they aren't real words. Anyways, I always thought that it would be neat if there was some sort of mini-races you could hire. It doesn't fit into the Starcraft lore, but I thought the premise was pretty fun...I mean, funner. Like a cow or a fish race might at a little variety and all of a sudden a TvZ is suddenly a TCvZF or the Zerg might be bold and go with that turkey race no one ever chooses because they are too micro-intensive.
There are still three races, but for those who want more races added in, this may be able to satisfy (I hope) while still maintaining balance~
What does it matter if it's a word or not isn't the whole purpose to communicate? Is this an essay that will determine my future? must everything I type be done to the most utter perfection?
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On August 30 2008 11:10 ohhsuup wrote:
if a 4th race is introduced, it will no doubt destroy starcraft as we know it.
IT'S NOT SC AS YOU KNOW IT: IT'S A 60 DOLLAR NEW GAME.
fuck. i dont know if this will kill it or not but the idea that we have to make sc2-sc2x exactly like sc-bw is annoying the hell out of me.
i dont know if i want a 4th race or what for the expansion but take some risks, wow me. i want more than two new units is all i'm sayin even if it, gasps, means change.
i want a new game, at least a little, when i buy a new game.
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On August 30 2008 15:41 choboPEon wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2008 11:10 ohhsuup wrote:
if a 4th race is introduced, it will no doubt destroy starcraft as we know it. IT'S NOT SC AS YOU KNOW IT: IT'S A 60 DOLLAR NEW GAME. fuck. i dont know if this will kill it or not but the idea that we have to make sc2-sc2x exactly like sc-bw is annoying the hell out of me. i dont know if i want a 4th race or what for the expansion but take some risks, wow me. i want more than two new units is all i'm sayin even if it, gasps, means change. i want a new game, at least a little, when i buy a new game.
Exactly. There are already articles about starcraft declining in korea so why keep going down the same road?
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If they can pull off a fourth race, then I'm all for it. Hopefully they learned from the mistakes they made in WC3 and will make this fourth race as different from the other ones as they can without making it OP.
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On August 30 2008 15:26 freshtowers wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2008 15:22 Ozarugold wrote:
Okay I just read the word 'funner' and 'funnest' and I'm like 60% sure they aren't real words. Anyways, I always thought that it would be neat if there was some sort of mini-races you could hire. It doesn't fit into the Starcraft lore, but I thought the premise was pretty fun...I mean, funner. Like a cow or a fish race might at a little variety and all of a sudden a TvZ is suddenly a TCvZF or the Zerg might be bold and go with that turkey race no one ever chooses because they are too micro-intensive.
There are still three races, but for those who want more races added in, this may be able to satisfy (I hope) while still maintaining balance~ What does it matter if it's a word or not isn't the whole purpose to communicate? Is this an essay that will determine my future? must everything I type be done to the most utter perfection?
Um...sorry? Didn't mean to insult you, I just thought it was funny...
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english as a third language, sorry if i mess up a word or two.
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what i was hoping they were going to do from jump was leave terran, protoss, zerg alone and balance a xel-naga or some new race
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On August 30 2008 16:35 yOko[LuNyA] wrote:
english as a third language, sorry if i mess up a word or two.
It's okay if you mess up a word or two, it's no big deal just as long you get your point across. I just find it a little depressing that my suceeding generation actually uses words incorrectly. Although, I'm not that much better myself -_-;;
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Russian Federation4235 Posts
Establish 3-way balance at least close to what SC1 was. THEN, make race 4. Not a tad earlier. Oh, and when balancing race 4, DON'T touch races 1-3. At all.
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there is NO WAY they will add a race in an expansion. the risk of insta killing game balance is too great, not to mention all the lore and campaign that they need to add to the mix.
expansion is something they wanna do with the least amount of additional money yet earn the most profits by the end of the day.
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From a multiplayer point of view a 4th race is very good. Just count the number of unique matchups. It adds a lot of stuff to learn and master.
Problem is balance since that also gets harder and harder for the same reason.
Also, there is no candidate for a 4th race lore wise.
Also, the argument that an expansion needs an added race because otherwise it's too silimar is also nonsense.
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MrHoon
10183 Posts
4th Race?
Awesome for Singleplayer
Terrible Terrible Idea for Multiplayer
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I think adding a 4th race after the first 3 are already (hopefully) balanced makes sense, and I'd like to see what Blizzard can come up with. I do agree that there are possible issues with overlap between the races, though.
edit: I agree with BluzMan - the way to do the balancing without an unmanageable explosion of complexity is to just implement the 4th race to be balanced with the others, without changing the original 3.
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The return of the Xel'naga?
I don't think they would add a whole race available for multiplayer through an expansion though... then they would have to rebalance the other three races. I can only seeing it happening for plot reasons in the campaign mode.
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Aotearoa39261 Posts
I dont see any real point in this thread - blizzard have never been known to make dramatic changes in expansion packs (at most adding about 25% more content) and adding a whole new race just isn't like them. In addition to that we have this continual stupid debate between warcraft and starcraft going on again (with undercurrents linking back to the topic at hand). Plus some people are getting a little heated about a stupid issue.
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Sweden33719 Posts
I disagree about closing this, as it's from an official source.
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On August 30 2008 10:23 moebius_string wrote:
If they keep the 4th race like the Naga thats OK, but including a playable multiplayer 4th race for the expansion could be a disaster for balance and is best left alone.
this is pretty much all there is to say. of course, everyone wants SC2 to have 10 cool races.. if that were viable. but to maintain balance 3 will always be the best number.
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“I’m sure in the event that we decide to do an expansion set it’s a feature that’ll come up for discussion,” said Pearce, in an interview with VG247.
So, in the event(1) that they decide(2) to do an expansion set in the future(3), they will discuss(4) adding the 4th race. IMHO, this is pointless, we don't even have the game yet and we are discussing about a future event they may decide to discuss. C'mon guys... come back.
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Sweden33719 Posts
Blizzard IS going to make an expansion tho. That's not a question, it's a fact ;p
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I am not against adding a 4th race.
But problems are:
-balance: maybe they can do this. Balancing 4 races are much harder then 3, because there are 6 non-mirror matchups as opposed to the previous 3. But it seems possible. Any more than 4 races cannot be balanced in my opinion.
-variety: The first 3 races, terran, zerg , protoss couldn't really be any more different. I mean.. these are like archetypes.. How can you fit in a 4. unique race?
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its impossible to balance 4 races
3 is hard enough
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4th race would be cool
if there are balence issues, im sure we'd find it, complain and they'd fix it and we'd get a super new cool sc
isnt that how sc2 is working right now? ><
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Gonna be messed up like War 3.
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I don't think 4 races works, regardless of who is making the game. It just forces the game to use tons of overlapping units. Honestly whats different about footmen and grunts besides some random stats like hp and dmg? they're the exact same unit
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Canada9720 Posts
On August 30 2008 14:48 freshtowers wrote:
And why in the world would the race number have anything to do with those games being imbalanced?
Because the more races, the more permutations of unit combat to account for, and more matchups to balance. It's a fairly simple concept, and shouldn't really broach argument.
Infact wc3 is fairly balanced it's not nearly as bad as people make it out to be and dawn of war isn't created by blizzard so it has nothing to do with anything.
Actually, you were the one who insinuated that other games had successfully achieved balance with other races, by implying that people who only played starcraft had a misconstrued idea about RTS games with more than 3 races.
Balancing 4 races is very very easy and doesn't take long especially with input from pros. It's just up to how commited blizzard is to balancing it, if they are they can balance 6 races, it will take time but the finished product would be alot funner than 3 races. How are you going to be playing the sc2 ladder with a mirror matchup every 2 games or so? Going to be really boring
You're completely wrong, balancing a game with 4 races is not easy. WC3 isn't balanced, and it never really was. It took Starcraft a long time to become balanced with just 3 races.
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On August 30 2008 10:23 moebius_string wrote:
If they keep the 4th race like the Naga thats OK, but including a playable multiplayer 4th race for the expansion could be a disaster for balance and is best left alone.
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add a 4th race if they can perfectly balance it, if not gtfo.
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i like how all the balancing work up til the expansion would be completely reset by a fourth race.
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United States7166 Posts
Blizzard's smart enough to know not to add a 4th race. Even if they wanted to make it work, I don't believe they could, not enough to be satisfied with the result. It'll never happen, they've struggled enough with just trying to modify the 3 existing races, adding an entirely new race consisting of not only new units but unique and fun to play with and against, is too difficult.
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If there are more interesting unitconcepts. They should be included in the original 3 races. Ad more units or scrap a mediocre units.
Why cap the number of unittypes in a race? A race becoming too well rounded without a strategical weakness? Or is Blizzard afraid the player will get confused with too many units and techroutes to chose from? I don't get it.
A fourth race sounds cool but the risk of imbalance or too simular races is too big.
We could end up with enough viable ideas for 3 1/2 races. Having a fourth races but not enough uniqueness.
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On August 30 2008 10:23 moebius_string wrote:
If they keep the 4th race like the Naga thats OK, but including a playable multiplayer 4th race for the expansion could be a disaster for balance and is best left alone.
Perfect.
I suppose they could make it work regardless as long as they tie it into whatever is to come within Starcraft II, though. I suppose I wouldn't mind in the end.
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United States3824 Posts
Now if the fourth race isn't in SCII because of time constraints for the launch, that means that they know when the game is going to be launched.
BLIZZARD LIES!
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i will only be ok with this if it is used in the single player, they are having a hard enough tiem balancing 3 races already
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It would be awesome with a fourth race. But they would have to do all of that Unit regulation again... That is ALOT to do..
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I think Blizzard are far too conservative to do this. A shame, because a big part of me wishes Blizzard would take a few risks. What's more they wouldn't do it half-arsed, they would be careful and test it a lot, they would do a good job of it.
I find the Warcraft 3 arguments tiresome and fallacial. WC3 doesn't have perfect balance, but nor does SC. Yes overall SC's balance is better, but WC3's balance is still very good, and where it falls short of SC's balance that's largely down to all the other complexities WC3 has over SC: heroes, items, shops, mercenaries, creeps, more units per race, many more special abilities and spells per unit etc, which all make the balance picture much more muddy. The fact there's a 4th race, whilst not insignificant, somewhat pales in comparison to those other elements combined
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4th race singleplayer would be cool. I've always hoped for more or longer campaigns. Couldn't they release a new campaign every 3 months (idc if they make em all at the same time, more economic) for a smaller prize, like $10? Because i'll play the campaign 3 times as it is, and i'd like to play more campaign if i didn't know it that well already...
i'm having my doubts about a 4th multiplayer race. Probably not a good idea...
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Canada9720 Posts
On September 04 2008 04:38 Asgard wrote:
I think Blizzard are far too conservative to do this. A shame, because a big part of me wishes Blizzard would take a few risks. What's more they wouldn't do it half-arsed, they would be careful and test it a lot, they would do a good job of it.
I find the Warcraft 3 arguments tiresome and fallacial. WC3 doesn't have perfect balance, but nor does SC. Yes overall SC's balance is better, but WC3's balance is still very good, and where it falls short of SC's balance that's largely down to all the other complexities WC3 has over SC: heroes, items, shops, mercenaries, creeps, more units per race, many more special abilities and spells per unit etc, which all make the balance picture much more muddy. The fact there's a 4th race, whilst not insignificant, somewhat pales in comparison to those other elements combined
Do you think there's much of a difference between balancing the units of different races, versus balancing how those units can use things like items and mercenaries? It boils down to the same concept - ensuring that one race's unit, or combinations of units don't have an advantage over the units of another race. The items and mercs are the same for each race.
Certainly heroes are a different matter, but they're also analogous to balancing unit combat. The 4th race adds quite a bit of complexity. You think it's fallacious to use WC3 as an example of balance issues because you deem the 4th race issue not as important?
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This got me thinking about how difficult adding a fourth race in will be.
For a start you have just as many match-ups to balance as the original game.
+ Show Spoiler +If you add a fourth race you have 3 more match-ups to balance. ?vT ?vP ?vZ
There are 3 match-ups in the current game already PvZ, TvZ and PvT.
Consider the fact that when adding in the new race you can't change the existing first 3 races because that alters their balance.
Now consider Starcraft is relatively balanced in all phases of the game. Also that all races can execute rushes fairly well or go for macro builds.
So when they have decided on a new mechanic they have to make sure it is well balanced against all races, is not overly strong in a certain game phase and still leaves the player many options of build order.
This is going to limit their creativity so much that I suggest it will to be almost impossible for them to balance a 4th race AND make it dynamic and interesting at the same time.
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If they can find a new unique niche for the 4th race and are willing to put in the 1000's of hours necessary to balance it then I say go for it. Another race would completely revolutionize starcraft scene. Watching the pro's figure out a new race would be supremely entertaining/interesting. Imagine Boxer with a whole new set of toys :o
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A 4th race in progames would cause tons of balance problems even if there aren't any. Even if you suppose all 4 races are perfectly mathematically balance to have an equal chance of beating one another on equal skill level. What happens is that the skill level itself would take too long to balance. Think about it, years of players developing strats for the same races, then out comes a new one from scratch that no one ever played before, no one knows what it's good or bad about it.
If players succeed in progaming with that new race. Is it overpowered because it's easier to figure how to play with it than how to play against it? Or is it fair because it just haven't been long enough to stabilize? There is no way to know.
If players keep failing with it in progaming. Is it underpowered because it's easier to find a counter for it than to find out how to play with it? Or is it fair because it just haven't been long enough to stabilize? Again there is no way to know.
How do we define what is "long enough"? How do we balance how hard it's to play with vs how hard is it to play against?
So I think either make all 4 races at the same time or don't add a new race at all. Adding races after the others have been around for a while will bring skill level imbalances even IF the races are perfectly balance for equal skill.
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since it looks like starcraft 2 is going down the lane "Friday Night Pre-Party Entertainment" rather than "Competitive Tournament Gaming", then yea sure why not?
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really what race/niche could they fill
they got the humans
they got the futuristic aliens
they got the dirty slimy bug like aliens
dosnt really leave much for originality
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im the kind of person that hates change, had blizzard just released starcraft 1 in a shiny new case with a new battlenet and more money for tournaments i would have been very happy TT
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You know theoretically you could also fall off your bed and die in your sleep 
I don't think this will happen though, and I don't think a fourth race will be added.
Btw what's a troll? If this guy is making us waste time on something that he knows won't happen would that qualify? Not that I'm saying he is because he has a quote, but is the person who wrote the quote a troll?
edit: troll:One who posts a deliberately provocative message to a newsgroup or message board with the intention of causing maximum disruption and argument
urban dictionary.
Maybe this could work.
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On September 04 2008 00:46 milly9 wrote:
I don't think 4 races works, regardless of who is making the game. It just forces the game to use tons of overlapping units. Honestly whats different about footmen and grunts besides some random stats like hp and dmg? they're the exact same unit
whats the difference between a zergling and a zealot, besides some random stats like hp and damage?
or the hydra and marine?
or the wraith and scout?
each unit has 1 upgrade different than the other, there is already overlapping in sc, with the addition of a fourth race it could continue, but then again, it might not, there is no reason why blizzard cant add a fourth race, and have it balanced, its all about understanding what each race can do, and make a new unit that can do one, or two of these things, but mix them up.
There are 3 canidates for new races atm, the zerg/protoss hybrid (which i think would suck ass)
the Xel'naga (no reason there couldnt be a small pact still alive) and whatever race that samir duran is working for.
and warcraft three isnt imbalanced because there are 4 races, its imbalanced because blizzard hasnt found the medium yet, in my opinion their heros are the real reason for imbalance, take for example the blademaster, he can almost single handedly destroy any other hero. more people play dota anyway, so wc3 melee is almost a moot point.
I'm up for a fourth race, i think blizzard can do it, it will not be easy and if it comes out in the expantion then fucking great, people can play regular sc2 instead of sc2x. just like people play counterstrike 1.6 over counterstrike source.
if they dont, then damn they just saved themselves a lot of work, but at expens of what?
gl blizzard
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On September 04 2008 10:05 spydernoob wrote:
really what race/niche could they fill
they got the humans
they got the futuristic aliens
they got the dirty slimy bug like aliens
dosnt really leave much for originality
A robot society created from rouge AI that has since forth gone unnoticed until now.
Either that or...
An entire race of critters that have grown tired of being clicked on all the time and are coming out of the woodworks to exact revenge.
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how about we just wait for SC2 first?
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4th race for single player campaigns : Good idea
4th race for e-sport oriented multiplayer mode: Stupid
Stupid of Blizzard employees to talk about a 4th race when the actual game is nowhere near balanced for multiplayer, let alone finished.
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On September 04 2008 14:50 bubblegumbo wrote:
4th race for single player campaigns : Good idea
4th race for e-sport oriented multiplayer mode: Stupid
I agreed with this, almost all the people here agree with this, but if this will be their marketing strategy to sell the game like pancakes then so be it..
But here is what I think they "might" do.
So they add the forth race only on the campaigns, then they will ask for fan's feedback if we want that forth race to be added on the multiplayer or not. If we want, then they will create a new expansion so that the 4th race will be there... if not, maybe will all stick to the last expansion they create.
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I don't think anyone should make a silly claim like 3 races being the magic number of balance since our only best example is StarCraft made by Blizzard themselves. Although many RTSs implemented the 3 races formula but it still does not mean that it is the best formula and besides, most if not all are still not balanced. So what's the difference in the gamble on having a fourth race?
Blizzard are the ones who balanced StarCraft with 3 races. If they want to balance it for 4, then let them. It's harder, so what? They're Blizzard, they have the money. They have the time. They have the skills. They have the experience. It seems that all the worry is about Blizzard making another WarCraft 3. That's just being pessimistic since they have shown us their intent on not making a WC3 in space with their builds. Experience does not mean repeating the same mistakes over and over you know.
But overall, still, we should not expect a multiplayable 4th race at least until the game hits the stores. It still feels too damn early for a discussion.
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i think we should all hope, pray and spam that its gonna be a campaign only thing like the naga and blood elf races in wc3. with 4 races in multiplayer SC, random would be imba on bnet since if your opponent chooses his race there'll probably only one, maybe two possible builds to counter all possible cheese. also what makes sc so great is its complexity is intrinsic in strategy and tactics rather than a mass of different units to choose from. SC is great, but you cant just keep adding for the sake of having something new without eventually removing some things. SC fans want something new but also want the same "feel" and satisfying both of those i believe has been Blizzards greatest task with regards to SC2
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is there something to be said that the triangle is the sturdiest geometrical shape?
anyway, make it a four sided game, go go squarecraft 2!!!
fourth race = xel-naga
their theme, a race devoted to keeping the peace through scientific, psionic mastery. this curious race devoted their entire existance constantly asking why? their curiousity led them down the road of studying the universe and everything that goes on in it, during this process they try recreating life, and are succsessful, creating the protoss race, giving them a planet to inhabit, and they study them, until they are discovered by their ingenious prodigy. they abandon them in fear that they would distructively impact the protoss culture, so they start over again with the zerg, a race that are easier to control, one of pure organic manipulation. until their creation discovers them, and developes an aggressive impulse and turns on their creator. most of the xel-naga are annhilated, but a small pact escapes. their studies continue, and they feel that the perfect samples would be a mix between the zerg and the protoss, so they send a knewly discovered human to be infested by the zerg to gain a grasp of the current leader of the universe, kerrigan, then uses him to manipulate the theatre to set the stage for the xel-naga to come in with their perfected race of zerg/protoss hybrid to claim their mistakes and revert the universe back to peace by destroying all aggressive factions.
thats my fuzzy understanding of how the xel-naga could come back into play.
how they would be balance, thats for blizzard to work on, they get paid to do it
quote to discribe each race
Zerg - Quantity over Quality
Terran - KILL IT WITH FIRE
Protoss - Quality over Quantity
Xel-Naga - Peace Through Superior Firepower
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For the expansion they should remove a race.
Think about THAT for a minute.
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On September 04 2008 17:35 Kleander wrote:
is there something to be said that the triangle is the sturdiest geometrical shape?
anyway, make it a four sided game, go go squarecraft 2!!!
fourth race = xel-naga
their theme, a race devoted to keeping the peace through scientific, psionic mastery. this curious race devoted their entire existance constantly asking why? their curiousity led them down the road of studying the universe and everything that goes on in it, during this process they try recreating life, and are succsessful, creating the protoss race, giving them a planet to inhabit, and they study them, until they are discovered by their ingenious prodigy. they abandon them in fear that they would distructively impact the protoss culture, so they start over again with the zerg, a race that are easier to control, one of pure organic manipulation. until their creation discovers them, and developes an aggressive impulse and turns on their creator. most of the xel-naga are annhilated, but a small pact escapes. their studies continue, and they feel that the perfect samples would be a mix between the zerg and the protoss, so they send a knewly discovered human to be infested by the zerg to gain a grasp of the current leader of the universe, kerrigan, then uses him to manipulate the theatre to set the stage for the xel-naga to come in with their perfected race of zerg/protoss hybrid to claim their mistakes and revert the universe back to peace by destroying all aggressive factions.
thats my fuzzy understanding of how the xel-naga could come back into play.
how they would be balance, thats for blizzard to work on, they get paid to do it
This is one cool post!
Hhhmm.. Can you think of any special skill that will make them unique with the other races?
Example:
Xel-Naga found a Marine corpse with an Ultralisk..
"Oh Look there's a human corpse lying with this UltraLisk.."
Let us use our special ability to revive and train this corpse... into
Ultraman!
![[image loading]](http://psharbaugh.files.wordpress.com/2007/10/ultraman5.jpg)
Just Kidding ^_^ making things fun.. sorry for being such a retard.. 
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If they have the time and effort to make it balanced, then they should make a fourth race. If worst comes to worst, e-sports can just ignore the new race if glaring imbalances are obvious.
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On September 05 2008 02:36 randomKo_Orean wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2008 12:26 freshtowers wrote:
Seriously if you want balance at all costs then they should make only one race playable. balancing 4 races isn't hard at all and it would make starcraft not so boring. anyone who opposes more variety probably played only starcraft and has no idea how a game with 4+ races works
You are a dumbass. I've played Wc3, and trust me, balancing is hard as shit. everyone will yell out imba even if it was remotely close to being balanced
Heroes makes games much harder to balance and forces the races to play in the same way, one extra race just is twice of the same. If you have 3 perfectly balanced races and make a new one, you could just tweak every abuse the new one can do towards the old 3 so that it gets balanced vs all of them, it is not that much more work than getting 3 balanced races in the first place.
The hardest part is keeping all matchups interesting, trying to avoid things like zvz.
PS the reason heroes forces all the races to play in the same way is because heroes with their experience systems always favors unit preservation and killing as many with as few losses as possible. It just would not work to have matchups like zvt or zvp then.
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On August 30 2008 15:45 freshtowers wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2008 15:41 choboPEon wrote:On August 30 2008 11:10 ohhsuup wrote:
if a 4th race is introduced, it will no doubt destroy starcraft as we know it. IT'S NOT SC AS YOU KNOW IT: IT'S A 60 DOLLAR NEW GAME. fuck. i dont know if this will kill it or not but the idea that we have to make sc2-sc2x exactly like sc-bw is annoying the hell out of me. i dont know if i want a 4th race or what for the expansion but take some risks, wow me. i want more than two new units is all i'm sayin even if it, gasps, means change. i want a new game, at least a little, when i buy a new game. Exactly. There are already articles about starcraft declining in korea so why keep going down the same road?
WHAT? SC has been out for 10 years. I'm sure everyone would love for SC2 to go down a path where it enjoys prosperity for 10 years and then goes on a rumored "decline".
*If* SC2 were to add a 4th race, I'm sure it would be able to pull it off much better than War3 did simply because there are no heroes to balance. I'm sure Blizz can come up with enough ideas to create a unique 4th race.
Btw ZvZ rocks.
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On August 30 2008 09:59 grobo wrote:
I don't want another race, i think Blizzard was somewhat lucky that they managed to get SC as balanced as they did, and that just wont happen again if they decide to add another fourth race.
can you imagine, if they took this long to balance 3 races (as they have been lucky in sc), what the 4th race will cause? that means by the time the human race is about to become extinct, we'll still have no sc2 in the world.
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we already have a 4th race its called random
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I know that if we start spamming the thread with various over the top suggestions it will be closed eventually but.. what about Xel Naga .. ghosts? Purely psionic, coming from a hell/underworld dimension, slowly deteriorating over time.. (in contrast to zerg regeneration for instance..) - it's at least different (other ideas include Ninja-race and Chuck Norris-race ofc).
Anyway to contribute something - I think some people have too high expectations for SC2. Don't get me wrong, I will buy it as soon as it hits the shelves as most of you guys but seriously - it will not be balanced, at least not in the first year when the new strats will be composed and countered etc. There's only so much the internal testers can try. Yes, balancing 3 races is easier than balancing 4 (which according to some is twice as hard - 3 different non-mirror match-ups) but with the proper feedback from the community, it's not impossible, not with all the moneyz from WoW at Blizzard's disposal.
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How about 2v2 with 4 races, even harder to balance (2v2 is still part of SC and WC3 some online/offline tournaments).
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i hate when people say that sc being balanced is based on luck >_>
everytime you say that you discredit the hard work that blizzard put into making the game the way it is.
blizzard made the game balanced, wether it was luck that they thought of ways to balance it or not is up to interpritation, but sc is the way it is because blizzard put time and effort into making it a good game. thats why i think balancing a fourth race for them shouldnt be too diffiuclt, the only negative difference it will make is the release date, and as we all know blizz fans have to be very patient, we can wait if they can produce.
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On September 05 2008 08:32 antiq wrote:
I know that if we start spamming the thread with various over the top suggestions it will be closed eventually but.. what about Xel Naga .. ghosts? Purely psionic, coming from a hell/underworld dimension, slowly deteriorating over time.. (in contrast to zerg regeneration for instance..) - it's at least different (other ideas include Ninja-race and Chuck Norris-race ofc).
lol having a deteriorating army would sure put preassure on the player to be aggressive: imagine the situation playing a terran who just bunkers up and defends the entire game, he never has to worry, because A) terran are bad ass mother fuckers while camping a location. and B) he can sit it out and slowly push while your units get weaker, and weaker.
it would definetly put a time limit on parts of the game, maybe terran should deteriorate, like "rust" if a unit sits in 1 place too long, they start doing less damage/attack slower. make it impossible for those assholes to start up a campfire while all my shit is getting irradiated.
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i've mentioned this before but xel naga cannot be added as a race in sc2
zerg killed xel naga and assimilated their knowledge , that is how they found out about the protoss
xel naga = dead , 4th race = no thx
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On September 06 2008 21:02 PobTheCad wrote:
i've mentioned this before but xel naga cannot be added as a race in sc2
zerg killed xel naga and assimilated their knowledge , that is how they found out about the protoss
xel naga = dead , 4th race = no thx
A Mr Samir Duran wants to see all you children at Dark Origins.
Also, they do not have to go under the Xel'Naga name as they are likely to comprise of themselves and their 'pets'.
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I think it's a viable and interesting option. Could work great with the storyline too. I'm sure there are LOTS of ideas that Blizzard could work with if given a new template for race design.
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In my a opinion 4 races is perfect, it adds a whole other level to the game, and lowers the chance of mirror match, the problem is that the higher the races the more error and bad match ups that are available.
If Blizzard can promise to nail the balance and ensure that patches are like bi-seasonal to fix imbalances, then it is a good idea.
but knowing blizzard, and knowing wc3 it wouldnt work.
i prey to god they balance the 3 races properly, which doesn't seem entirely likely for a while. So maybe if they nail it, in an expansion it's possible, but it's cutting it thin.
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If they implemented a fourth race I would think it would have to be with the original SC2. Adding it into an xpac would just change the game too much. The expansions for Blizz RTS's have traditionally been meant to balance and tighten up the vanilla game (BW-->SC, TFT-->RoC.) Adding a fourth race just screws up balance big time.
It'll prolly appear in campaign mode.
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I agree with OC.
Adding a race is a bit more than you would expect from an 'expansion'. Expansions shouldn't drastically change the game, it should just offer new and exciting units/missions balance patching etc to the original game. Adding a new race would make it closer to SC3 rather than SC2:Expansion
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On September 05 2008 05:50 imperfect wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2008 09:59 grobo wrote:
I don't want another race, i think Blizzard was somewhat lucky that they managed to get SC as balanced as they did, and that just wont happen again if they decide to add another fourth race. can you imagine, if they took this long to balance 3 races (as they have been lucky in sc), what the 4th race will cause? that means by the time the human race is about to become extinct, we'll still have no sc2 in the world.
i've seen some pessimistic posts here at TL.net, but this one has been the most pessimistic i've seen.
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On September 08 2008 10:58 prOxi.swAMi wrote:
I agree with OC.
Adding a race is a bit more than you would expect from an 'expansion'. Expansions shouldn't drastically change the game, it should just offer new and exciting units/missions balance patching etc to the original game. Adding a new race would make it closer to SC3 rather than SC2:Expansion
Well, if the trend in WoW is any indication, they have been adding new races with expansions. Of course, it's a completely different genre, but I'm just saying it's no longer beyond them to put that kind of effort into an expansion.
That said, they'd better have some damned good ideas, or it's going to be worthless. People should remember, that expansions don't take that long to come out after the game has been released (a year give or take a few months?). BroodWar went thru a tonne of balance changes even after it was released. SC Vanilla could have been balanced, but Blizzard chose to make the game more interesting. My concern is that a new race might not be interesting enough. It can't be a hybrid of the other three races, it has to be as different from them as they are from each other. In the BroodWar story plot, the new race is a hybrid of Zerg and Protoss, which suggests mostly that it'll be a single player non-functional race.
In short: The game will be balanced thru a myriad of patches whether or not a new race is added. The important thing is being confident that this new race won't take away from the games diversity by adding a race that's just a compromise of every other race.
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If they really do add a fourth race into multiplayer for the sc2 expansion it would take years to develop because I think they would have to totally rebalance the entire game. This could be done, however the time it would take as well as the effort make it pretty unlikely. Maybe a single player four race or something along those lines but if they were going to add a new race they would have done so in the sc2 vanilla rather then the expansion
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EPT
