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[T] Potential Solutions to Automine - Page 6

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Doctorasul
Profile Blog Joined October 2004
Romania1145 Posts
Last Edited: 2008-11-18 00:04:54
November 18 2008 00:02 GMT
#101
On November 18 2008 08:54 Osmoses wrote:
Sure, but I don't think nerfing automine is going to solve anything but that little "forcing you to glance at your base" thing, which really sounds kind of silly. Something more involved and less contrived than a nerfed ui to decide where your attention needs to be please.

No, sorry, you have not shown how it's contrived. We are forced to do everything we do to win in a game of BW. Why aren't you upset you are being forced to learn the tech tree? Or learn the map? Or learn the hotkeys?

Saying "forcing you to glance at your base thing is silly" is missing a huge part of why BW is both popular and successful at a pro level. Without that frantic element that can never be perfectly mastered and that requires complete immersion and involvement from the player, the game will die. If it's fun and it's good for progaming, then we want it in SC2. It's not "little" or "uninvolved", that's simply an ignorant thing to say.
"I believe in Spinoza's god who reveals himself in the harmony of all that exists, but not in a god who concerns himself with the fate and actions of human beings." - Albert Einstein
SlickR12345
Profile Blog Joined April 2008
Macedonia408 Posts
November 18 2008 00:11 GMT
#102
Since my thread was deleted I'll post my idea in a compact and full manner once again in this thread, so that people don't need to search for my 2 posts to find out how this really works:

What if workers don't immidiatly start mining minerals?
Say you build an SCV and that SCV will be idle for 5(subject to balance) seconds, you can order it to mine minerals and acchieve an advantage or after 5 seconds the SCV will start mining automaticly!

Game start potential problem (where casual players won't put workers to mine manually and immidiately start with a disadvantage)
There is an easy solution:
The actuall 6 starting workers can be made to mine immidiatly, but every worker that comes out of the nexus/CC/hatchery will have that 5 seconds idle mechanic!
armed_
Profile Joined November 2008
Canada443 Posts
Last Edited: 2008-11-18 00:14:26
November 18 2008 00:12 GMT
#103
On November 18 2008 08:42 vsrooks wrote:Select all workers... Control 0... hit 0, hit hotkey... repeat

Ugh, forgot about unlimited hotkeying. In that case just make the ability need a target, and the buff gets cancelled if the worker switches to another task as well as time running out.

That or have a seperate unit cast the buff, or a building or something, so you have to manually target workers.
On November 18 2008 08:57 Doctorasul wrote:
I think your use of the word "artificial" is confusing.

Artificial as in it's not really part of the design of the game once you get past the interface.

When I say artificial in terms of execution, I mean there's no reason the task couldn't be executed with a much simpler input; an ideal input would be just as complex as is needed for the action to be executed exactly as the player wants it, anything more complex then that is just adding artificial difficulty to the execution while not actually making the underlying game any more complex.

By extension of that, any mechanic that only adds to the game due to changes to the interface or somesuch is largely artificial.

That said the interface is just as much part of the game as anything, but in the case of SC2 Blizzard already seems to be focusing on making the interface as little of an obstacle as possible(which is obviously the trend in modern RTS) so the word artificial seems appropriate.

EDIT: Yeah, I'm not good at conveying my thoughts. ;p
On November 18 2008 08:57 Doctorasul wrote:
You also need to show how the current BW setting is not "artificial", yet this proposal is.

BW's depth is very artificial given the above. The only reason the game is as skill-based as it is is because of the limitations of the interface; it gets away with not actually having that much to do because it's much more difficult than it would be in a perfectly efficient interface. Again, it's not that I see anything wrong with the game being like that, it's just that Blizzard clearly isn't taking that approach with SC2.
Doctorasul
Profile Blog Joined October 2004
Romania1145 Posts
Last Edited: 2008-11-18 00:22:33
November 18 2008 00:21 GMT
#104
Okay, unless I'm completely misunderstanding you again, it seems like your objections are also applicable to BW then. I'm sure we would all love SC2 to be better than BW in every possible way, but I'll be happy with macro being "only" as good as BW; it would be a pretty big step from the state of SC2 macro right now.
"I believe in Spinoza's god who reveals himself in the harmony of all that exists, but not in a god who concerns himself with the fate and actions of human beings." - Albert Einstein
EntSC
Profile Joined November 2008
47 Posts
November 18 2008 00:26 GMT
#105
Hello

Hi everyone... I've lurked on here for a very long time, but never got round to registering. Used to play SC with Jamie and a few other people (quite badly! ).

Anyway, I had an idea that I thought was worth sharing.

The guiding principle behind selecting workers and telling them to mine is macro + return to base, so players are managing a battle whilst also effectively controlling their economy. I appreciate the reasons for automine, but I agree with some of those on this site, and think that whilst MBS is inevitable, they should get rid of automine and attack rally points.

I think the original suggestion is interesting, but is an overly complex and artificial solution (with various percentages dependent on how many workers you have etc).

Idea

I thought the position of crystals could slowly deteriorate over time, creating problems for workers. I've called this dealignment. I think it could be represented visually by a glow effect, with the player required to individually click on each mineral patch and move an arrow toward the direction of the cc/nexus/hatch etc.

The crystals would dealign over time, reducing the number of minerals gathered per trip, or creating a longer route for the workers.

This idea will a) encourage good players to handle their crystal alignment, but will not force bad players to worry about perfect efficiency; b) require players to return to their base in a way which is not contrived (because it provides an additional element rather than complicating the mining process); and c) provide a scaleable, easily balanced solution (so Blizzard can modify the rate at which the crystals dealign, and also decide whether or not crystals will require alignment more than once (so it could be even more of a macro sink if they wanted).

This could even form a more sophisticated meta game, with players required to correctly orientate a line that was pulsing (something like a Trauma Centre New Blood heart massage mechanic, if anyone is familiar with that). This would be more interesting, and more impressive when progamers rapidly align a series of crystals (echoing impressive cloning).

Hope my idea meets with some approval!

Cheers

E
Ki_Do
Profile Blog Joined July 2008
Korea (South)981 Posts
November 18 2008 00:29 GMT
#106
we better dont have false hopes
we can try to help but better not get too high for the fall dont be too hard

Kenni Idea + STIM for workers is very good
the ammount of percents and numbers might not be a bad thing, u dont need to know that, just
dont drag all ur workers cause it will not be as good as clicking one by one.

I cant think of a different thing without adding things that dont have place in starcraft universe.
But if:
5 was the new optimal number for a vespene geiser then it would be good to raise macro
I've got a point, and i'm ready to kill or die for it.
armed_
Profile Joined November 2008
Canada443 Posts
November 18 2008 00:34 GMT
#107
On November 18 2008 09:21 Doctorasul wrote:
Okay, unless I'm completely misunderstanding you again, it seems like your objections are also applicable to BW then. I'm sure we would all love SC2 to be better than BW in every possible way, but I'll be happy with macro being "only" as good as BW; it would be a pretty big step from the state of SC2 macro right now.

I'm not saying that the way BW's interface limitations achieve a higher skill ceiling is bad and I want SC2 to be better, I'm just saying that it's very unlikely, given the expectations of the casual market, that it's even possible for Blizzard to take that approach again(it's not like they meant to take that approach the first time, BW is just old). Unless I'm wrong on that(and it would be nice if I am), the only way to get even close to BW quality of gameplay is to just to, put simply, add completely new things to do rather than make old things harder.
fusionsdf
Profile Blog Joined June 2006
Canada15390 Posts
November 18 2008 00:41 GMT
#108
I love how everyone is addressing all the posts except for mine
SKT_Best: "I actually chose Protoss because it was so hard for me to defeat Protoss as a Terran. When I first started Brood War, my main race was Terran."
Grobyc
Profile Blog Joined June 2008
Canada18410 Posts
November 18 2008 00:44 GMT
#109
I love madcatdf's idea, and for my own
+ Show Spoiler +
Maybe for automine, you can set a rally point for your worker so he automines that patch, but after the current SCV building is done then you have to re-set the automine location, otherwise he will just 'regular' move to the patch, instead of automining it.

As for all the other 5 pages, TL;DR, sorry haha
If you watch Godzilla backwards it's about a benevolent lizard who helps rebuild a city and then moonwalks into the ocean.
Osmoses
Profile Blog Joined October 2008
Sweden5302 Posts
November 18 2008 00:45 GMT
#110
On November 18 2008 09:11 SlickR12345 wrote:
Since my thread was deleted I'll post my idea in a compact and full manner once again in this thread, so that people don't need to search for my 2 posts to find out how this really works:

What if workers don't immidiatly start mining minerals?
Say you build an SCV and that SCV will be idle for 5(subject to balance) seconds, you can order it to mine minerals and acchieve an advantage or after 5 seconds the SCV will start mining automaticly!

Game start potential problem (where casual players won't put workers to mine manually and immidiately start with a disadvantage)
There is an easy solution:
The actuall 6 starting workers can be made to mine immidiatly, but every worker that comes out of the nexus/CC/hatchery will have that 5 seconds idle mechanic!


It's been mentioned, by me among others (pretty sure someone else said it too).
Excuse me hun, but what is your name? Vivian? I woke up next to you naked and, uh, did we, um?
-orb-
Profile Blog Joined September 2007
United States5770 Posts
November 18 2008 01:02 GMT
#111
On November 18 2008 08:54 Osmoses wrote:
Sure, but I don't think nerfing automine is going to solve anything but that little "forcing you to glance at your base" thing, which really sounds kind of silly. Something more involved and less contrived than a nerfed ui to decide where your attention needs to be please.


Did you even read the suggestions here, or are you just trolling for the sake of trolling?

Going for a nerfed UI would be getting rid of automine, like we'd been fighting for the past who-knows-how-many-months.

This thread is to stop fighting that fight and instead go with an idea that is creative and adds something of strategy to the game... not nerf the UI.
'life of lively to live to life of full life thx to shield battery'
how sad that sc2 has no shield battery :(
Dromar
Profile Blog Joined June 2007
United States2145 Posts
November 18 2008 01:06 GMT
#112
Interesting idea. However...

1. Scouting SCVs would then be able to "speed boost" while scouting.
2. I think it should be a decreased required time to mine for that worker, rather than a faster movement. This will still have the effect of faster mining, but without the tricky changing movement speed.
3. It should last approx. 30 seconds and be a non-resetting boolean value.
4. Also it should not be able to be reactivated. This clears up the problems Chill mentioned.

If it's reusable, it'll become way too important for any game that lasts longer than 10 minutes, even at pubbie level. If that's the case, they might as well just remove automine. With the ideas I've mentioned above, it's still important, similar to mining the closest minerals first, but with maybe greater effect. Get the bonus money sooner rather than later.
-orb-
Profile Blog Joined September 2007
United States5770 Posts
November 18 2008 01:07 GMT
#113
On November 18 2008 08:42 vsrooks wrote:
Show nested quote +
On November 18 2008 08:01 armed_ wrote:
On November 18 2008 07:41 Kennigit wrote:
A unit upgrade that increases the speed of repair/mining/building does not increase macro or resource management. The speed upgrade buff/spell/inherent ability only would affect players looking to play at a level above "1 v1 Play/obs Python" on east.

To be clear, it's a self-buff that would have to be constantly cast to stay in effect, not a passive upgrade. Effectively it would achieve the same thing as your idea of having to go back and manually order your workers to the minerals every so often to keep them mining at top speed in a normal situation, albeit to a lesser degree.
On November 18 2008 07:41 Kennigit wrote:
It's not about increase the amount of clicks - its about broadening the potential for increasing skill - you can get better at collecting resources when everything is done for you just hitting 1sss every 25 seconds. We are talking about a mechanic that forces high level players to be involved with their resource management IF they want to play at high level etc etc.

Being involved with resource management = more actions used in it overall, no?
On November 18 2008 07:46 Doctorasul wrote:
That's not true, it does something that was nicely explained in a post above you, it forces the competitive player to watch his base - not just click or press hotkeys, but go back to his base and watch it.

If the only reason the player has to go back to his base and watch it is because they're being actively forced to and there's really no reason for them to look at all aside from completely artifical limitations, then looking at your base was never part of the design of the game, and that's what you need to change if you want to have a good game rather than forcing them.
On November 18 2008 07:46 Doctorasul wrote:
It's a point that was made earlier but casual players can skip this feature and just use regular automine, since they have much bigger and more consequential areas to improve than this. It's very important to notice that this proposal has something that plain old BW does not: it doesn't alienate casual players; and it achieves this without taking anything away from the competitive player. Isn't this precisely what should be done?

That's pretty much what I was trying to achieve too, just more naturally. Except in this case automine is a given, it's the additional stuff that takes the place of the player going back and manually ordering his workers to the minerals.


Select all workers... Control 0... hit 0, hit hotkey... repeat


This problem is completely gone when you make it a one-time deal or energy-based action as I have suggested so many times now. Yes, if you can constantly do this then you just set it to a hotkey on every single one of your workers.

If it can only be done once or at least infrequently, it wouldn't matter that you could do them all at the same time, because the only main time you'd be doing it is as they come out of the gate, or just as you get the research done, or right as you're timing it for a burst of money for a timing push or something.
'life of lively to live to life of full life thx to shield battery'
how sad that sc2 has no shield battery :(
-orb-
Profile Blog Joined September 2007
United States5770 Posts
November 18 2008 01:12 GMT
#114
On November 18 2008 10:06 Dromar wrote:
Interesting idea. However...

1. Scouting SCVs would then be able to "speed boost" while scouting.


I don't see how this is a problem. If you can only use this ability once in a while, or even only once ever, then using it while scouting would probably be a bad decision, and not unbalanced since the scv would only be able to use it once in the amount of time the scv is going to be in the opponent's base.

2. I think it should be a decreased required time to mine for that worker, rather than a faster movement. This will still have the effect of faster mining, but without the tricky changing movement speed.


This idea has been raised and I completely disagree. Having the worker move faster creates a whole slew of opportunities to use this ability with worker rushes and drone drills. Making it only mine faster takes away a lot of the fun potential I see coming out of this idea.

3. It should last approx. 30 seconds and be a non-resetting boolean value.


Whoa whoa whoa, why are you declaring this like it's the best option? The amount of time it lasts is completely subject to balance, and it could be a one-time use, yes. Another possibility is having it energy-based, like a spell. Example, it takes 200 energy to do, and your units have max 250 energy. This would prevent you from being able to do it very often, and would make it very situational which would force players to really make it part of their strategy when they would activate this.

4. Also it should not be able to be reactivated. This clears up the problems Chill mentioned.


This is not necessarily necessary (lol). This is definitely a possibility (god it would save so much time if people just read through the first page of the thread before posting... so many duplicate ideas), though having it only be able to be done once in a blue moon so-to-speak would be feasable as well, of course with the time in between subject to balance. Probably soemthing long, like 3 minutes.

If it's reusable, it'll become way too important for any game that lasts longer than 10 minutes, even at pubbie level. If that's the case, they might as well just remove automine. With the ideas I've mentioned above, it's still important, similar to mining the closest minerals first, but with maybe greater effect. Get the bonus money sooner rather than later.


Maybe, only testing would tell if it would cause too much disruption with newbie players.
'life of lively to live to life of full life thx to shield battery'
how sad that sc2 has no shield battery :(
Osmoses
Profile Blog Joined October 2008
Sweden5302 Posts
November 18 2008 01:23 GMT
#115
On November 18 2008 10:02 -orb- wrote:
Show nested quote +
On November 18 2008 08:54 Osmoses wrote:
Sure, but I don't think nerfing automine is going to solve anything but that little "forcing you to glance at your base" thing, which really sounds kind of silly. Something more involved and less contrived than a nerfed ui to decide where your attention needs to be please.


Did you even read the suggestions here, or are you just trolling for the sake of trolling?

Going for a nerfed UI would be getting rid of automine, like we'd been fighting for the past who-knows-how-many-months.

This thread is to stop fighting that fight and instead go with an idea that is creative and adds something of strategy to the game... not nerf the UI.


Sorry if I came off as a troll, didn't mean to. I know this thread is about "revamping" the automine, but isn't that pretty much the same thing as nerfing it? Making it less good? I mean, that's the problem we're having right, it being too good, doing too much for the player without any work or thought put into it? Making the player work more for the same payoff sounds like a nerf to me, maybe I don't have my terminology straight.

I made a whole list of suggestions myself, but when I was done I started wondering if automine is really such a big issue, maybe we're blowing it way out of proportion, like we did with MBS (yes I know lots of people are still against MBS but at least people have stopped saying it will kill-the-game-the-end). The way I see it, Automine is not the problem, MBS+Automine+Únlimited unit selection+Smartcasting+building queueing+idle worker button+autosurround is the problem. Them together, not any single one.

Rather than changing automine, I would much rather see other areas in the game creating completely new and interesting/strategic things to spend your apm on. That's one way to go, and another is to make automine more interesting and provide a greater payoff for involved players. But it's gonna have to be one big revamp to fill the hole left by those things I just listed.
Excuse me hun, but what is your name? Vivian? I woke up next to you naked and, uh, did we, um?
-orb-
Profile Blog Joined September 2007
United States5770 Posts
November 18 2008 01:33 GMT
#116
On November 18 2008 10:23 Osmoses wrote:
Show nested quote +
On November 18 2008 10:02 -orb- wrote:
On November 18 2008 08:54 Osmoses wrote:
Sure, but I don't think nerfing automine is going to solve anything but that little "forcing you to glance at your base" thing, which really sounds kind of silly. Something more involved and less contrived than a nerfed ui to decide where your attention needs to be please.


Did you even read the suggestions here, or are you just trolling for the sake of trolling?

Going for a nerfed UI would be getting rid of automine, like we'd been fighting for the past who-knows-how-many-months.

This thread is to stop fighting that fight and instead go with an idea that is creative and adds something of strategy to the game... not nerf the UI.


Sorry if I came off as a troll, didn't mean to. I know this thread is about "revamping" the automine, but isn't that pretty much the same thing as nerfing it? Making it less good? I mean, that's the problem we're having right, it being too good, doing too much for the player without any work or thought put into it? Making the player work more for the same payoff sounds like a nerf to me, maybe I don't have my terminology straight.

I made a whole list of suggestions myself, but when I was done I started wondering if automine is really such a big issue, maybe we're blowing it way out of proportion, like we did with MBS (yes I know lots of people are still against MBS but at least people have stopped saying it will kill-the-game-the-end). The way I see it, Automine is not the problem, MBS+Automine+Únlimited unit selection+Smartcasting+building queueing+idle worker button+autosurround is the problem. Them together, not any single one.

Rather than changing automine, I would much rather see other areas in the game creating completely new and interesting/strategic things to spend your apm on. That's one way to go, and another is to make automine more interesting and provide a greater payoff for involved players. But it's gonna have to be one big revamp to fill the hole left by those things I just listed.


No, we're not trying to revamp automine at all, we're trying to add something else to give some macro to the game. We're not trying to make the player work more for the same payoff, we're trying to have a player have the option of working more for a better payoff. The point is the average player gets the normal payoff you'd get in brood war with perfect mining macro, whereas the competitive player would get a little bonus by speeding up his workers. The way you see it "automine is not the problem," ?????? Did you not see kennigit say above that 10 different TL staff members played starcraft 2 at blizzard events, and every single one of them individually believes that MBS isn't too big of a deal, but automine is the huge problem here.

Lol also what are you going to use idle worker button for? Your workers mine by themselves, what will you ever need that key for? I don't think that's part of the problem.

YET AGAIN YOU KEEP REITERATING, BUT WE ARE NOT TRYING TO CHANGE AUTOMINE!!! Fuck... you just keep spewing that we are dumbing down the UI and changing automine. Seriously I have to question whether you've read a word of the OP or the ideas people posted. We are NOT I REPEAT NOT trying to change automine, we are trying to create something new to add strategy and macro.
'life of lively to live to life of full life thx to shield battery'
how sad that sc2 has no shield battery :(
Osmoses
Profile Blog Joined October 2008
Sweden5302 Posts
November 18 2008 01:37 GMT
#117
Dammit I gotta work on my argumentative writing, either my arguments are stupid or I am incapable of expressing them in an easy-to-understand way.

+ Show Spoiler +
On November 18 2008 08:32 Osmoses wrote:
I wrote this:

+ Show Spoiler +
What will Jaedong spend his clicking on when he barely needs to macro his base? What the hell does automine matter, really, when the rest of the UI has become so simple compared to the original? If we use Kennigits idea and boost workers who are sent off manually, of course the progamers are going to do it, but what will they spend the remaining 300 APM on?

I think the idea of trying to nerf automine might be a bit redundant, what is needed is a game-mechanic that will require more than two clicks every 25 seconds. That, or a nerfed automine along with a BUNCH of other macro nerfs, like the peon damaging vespene, etc. Question is how many of those ideas won't be shot down by people saying that it's a ridiculously unintuitive, contrived and un-lorish mechanic only meant to force the player to click.


Then I thought: if Broodwar was played at a setting about 50% faster than the current fastest, having MBS and Automine would probably make the player performance about the same. Doesn't a whole lot of this debate stem from the fact that the game might be moving too slow in it's current build? Isn't this all just an issue of a slow game?

Edit: now that I think of it, wasn't the speed setting at Blizzcon, where the TL staff among others got their info from one step below fastest?

There are several things wrong with your post:
- this mechanic will require of the progamer to have exactly as much APM as in BW to have the strive for the best economy; just like in BW, each new worker is to be manually ordered to mine if you want to maximize your economy, the notion they'll have 300 APM to spare is simply wrong - if it were true progamers would be in that situation in BW as well


Not sure if I'm understanding you correctly (maybe neither of us are clear enough) but my point was that if BW had MBS and automine, it would take a huge load off the required APM (300 was just a throwaround number), but if the game speed was also increased then we would essentially have the same game pace with the same required APM to do the same things. Increasing the speed = increasing the difficulty, seems pretty clear to me, starcraft is hard because of the very fact that you have a limited amount of time to do what you need to do.


- this is not a click every 25 seconds, you need to go back every time a new worker is produced; if you have 2 bases it's hard, if you have 3 or more it's really hard to keep track of all of them - does any of this sound familiar?


I thought it took 25 seconds to produce a worker, judging from the previous posts in this thread (I never bothered to find out myself, but thinking about it that might be a tad too much :p) and that's what I meant with two clicks every 25 seconds (worker appears, select worker, click mineral). If you have 3 bases you got 6 (at the very least) clicks every 25 seconds. And yes, this is really hard, but like I was saying, the progamers are doing it, even with the SC1 outdated UI, and my point was that even if we remove automine, the fact that those same progamers will still have MBS among other things will make it very easy for them to manually send their workers to mine. They are spending all their APM in SC1 on doing things which the UI will pretty much do for them in SC2, so where will their excess APM go?

- you're missing the point why automine is a concern in the first place; the issue is the player doesn't have as many things to juggle, both in his head but crucially, on the screen; higher speed means sloppier micro and sloppier macro, but macro will still be marginally improvable and will still take too little attention away from other tasks; what we need is for the proportion to change, we need new macro tasks


I agree, we need new macro tasks, and I thought I had put that very sentence in that post, but I guess I erased it. But I couldn't think of any appropriate macro tasks, I made a whole list a few pages ago that all felt contrived and stupid to me, I'm just not that smart.

Right now we have less things to juggle in SC2, but if we were to increase the speed then maybe:

Starcraft2: less things to juggle + faster game speed = Starcraft: more things to juggle + slower game speed?

Maybe I don't understand the arguments you are making, but are you sure you understand mine?

No, sorry, you have not shown how it's contrived. We are forced to do everything we do to win in a game of BW. Why aren't you upset you are being forced to learn the tech tree? Or learn the map? Or learn the hotkeys?


Point taken. I guess I just have a pre-emptive disposition against this, but the whole "motivation" thing didn't seem to me to belong in Starcraft, and as has been said, it works for the scv but not for the probe or drone. I know Kennigit knows his idea is not perfect, he said so, that's why I'm asking for something better. I offered the best ideas I had, and I myself thought they sounded stupid and contrived, so I'm all out.

Saying "forcing you to glance at your base thing is silly" is missing a huge part of why BW is both popular and successful at a pro level. Without that frantic element that can never be perfectly mastered and that requires complete immersion and involvement from the player, the game will die. If it's fun and it's good for progaming, then we want it in SC2. It's not "little" or "uninvolved", that's simply an ignorant thing to say.


The frantic is fun, having to keep a good eye on your army and your base is good, but doing it solely to send workers to the mineral patch... I want something more involved, and more interesting. I want a more strategic reason for keeping an eye on my base. MBS and Automine and building queue took away three of the four reasons why people go back to their base in BW. They are all here to stay. We need something else to take their place.
Excuse me hun, but what is your name? Vivian? I woke up next to you naked and, uh, did we, um?
Savio
Profile Joined April 2008
United States1850 Posts
November 18 2008 01:52 GMT
#118
On November 18 2008 09:11 SlickR12345 wrote:
Since my thread was deleted I'll post my idea in a compact and full manner once again in this thread, so that people don't need to search for my 2 posts to find out how this really works:

What if workers don't immidiatly start mining minerals?
Say you build an SCV and that SCV will be idle for 5(subject to balance) seconds, you can order it to mine minerals and acchieve an advantage or after 5 seconds the SCV will start mining automaticly!

Game start potential problem (where casual players won't put workers to mine manually and immidiately start with a disadvantage)
There is an easy solution:
The actuall 6 starting workers can be made to mine immidiatly, but every worker that comes out of the nexus/CC/hatchery will have that 5 seconds idle mechanic!


Slick, your idea is very similar I think in its effect as the "slow units using rally".

However, I prefer the slow effect because it can be applied to all units, not just workers. So it is slightly better to personally move your marines rather than just rallying into a base on the other side of the map. You can still rally over there, but it would be slightly faster if you moved them.
The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of the blessings. The inherent blessing of socialism is the equal sharing of misery. – Winston Churchill
Osmoses
Profile Blog Joined October 2008
Sweden5302 Posts
November 18 2008 01:56 GMT
#119
On November 18 2008 10:33 -orb- wrote:
Show nested quote +
On November 18 2008 10:23 Osmoses wrote:
On November 18 2008 10:02 -orb- wrote:
On November 18 2008 08:54 Osmoses wrote:
Sure, but I don't think nerfing automine is going to solve anything but that little "forcing you to glance at your base" thing, which really sounds kind of silly. Something more involved and less contrived than a nerfed ui to decide where your attention needs to be please.


Did you even read the suggestions here, or are you just trolling for the sake of trolling?

Going for a nerfed UI would be getting rid of automine, like we'd been fighting for the past who-knows-how-many-months.

This thread is to stop fighting that fight and instead go with an idea that is creative and adds something of strategy to the game... not nerf the UI.


Sorry if I came off as a troll, didn't mean to. I know this thread is about "revamping" the automine, but isn't that pretty much the same thing as nerfing it? Making it less good? I mean, that's the problem we're having right, it being too good, doing too much for the player without any work or thought put into it? Making the player work more for the same payoff sounds like a nerf to me, maybe I don't have my terminology straight.

I made a whole list of suggestions myself, but when I was done I started wondering if automine is really such a big issue, maybe we're blowing it way out of proportion, like we did with MBS (yes I know lots of people are still against MBS but at least people have stopped saying it will kill-the-game-the-end). The way I see it, Automine is not the problem, MBS+Automine+Únlimited unit selection+Smartcasting+building queueing+idle worker button+autosurround is the problem. Them together, not any single one.

Rather than changing automine, I would much rather see other areas in the game creating completely new and interesting/strategic things to spend your apm on. That's one way to go, and another is to make automine more interesting and provide a greater payoff for involved players. But it's gonna have to be one big revamp to fill the hole left by those things I just listed.


No, we're not trying to revamp automine at all, we're trying to add something else to give some macro to the game. We're not trying to make the player work more for the same payoff, we're trying to have a player have the option of working more for a better payoff. The point is the average player gets the normal payoff you'd get in brood war with perfect mining macro, whereas the competitive player would get a little bonus by speeding up his workers. The way you see it "automine is not the problem," ?????? Did you not see kennigit say above that 10 different TL staff members played starcraft 2 at blizzard events, and every single one of them individually believes that MBS isn't too big of a deal, but automine is the huge problem here.

Lol also what are you going to use idle worker button for? Your workers mine by themselves, what will you ever need that key for? I don't think that's part of the problem.

YET AGAIN YOU KEEP REITERATING, BUT WE ARE NOT TRYING TO CHANGE AUTOMINE!!! Fuck... you just keep spewing that we are dumbing down the UI and changing automine. Seriously I have to question whether you've read a word of the OP or the ideas people posted. We are NOT I REPEAT NOT trying to change automine, we are trying to create something new to add strategy and macro.


I'm sorry, is the name of the thread not "[T] Potential Solutions to Automine"? The OP seems to be wholly about Automining to me, with a few wide statements about macro. I could read "come up with completely new macro ideas" from the OP if I tried really hard but... It really, really seems to be about Automine to me, along with Kennigits one possible tweak to it.

Am I being really illiterate here?

10 different TL staff members played starcraft 2 at blizzard events, and every single one of them individually believes that MBS isn't too big of a deal, but automine is the huge problem here.


But if there was no MBS or unlimited unit selection, etc, only automine, I doubt they would have raised a fuss about it. This is why I said that it's all of the improvements together that are the problem, not automine. As far as making the game too easy, I think automine is a pretty big player, but unlimited unit selection is imho way worse, and with the idle worker button, getting rid of automine would make little difference.
Excuse me hun, but what is your name? Vivian? I woke up next to you naked and, uh, did we, um?
Savio
Profile Joined April 2008
United States1850 Posts
November 18 2008 02:00 GMT
#120
Whoa, we have a lot of ideas coming out of this thread.

It would be nice if we could keep track of them. Maybe Kennigit should shorten his OP and include in the OP some of the ideas that have come out. The ones I see are:

1. Kennigit's--Speed boost to workers who were manually controlled. Can be done multiple times (or there could be a single time only version)
2. Savio's (I'm such a narcissist)--There should be a one time temporary speed penalty against ALL units under rally command--workers and soldiers.
3. Slick's--For workers under automine control, there should be a timed delay before workers will go to the mineral patch and mine.
4. EntSC--Crystal realignment idea.

People should argue the merits/problems with each model, pick sides, or propose more models.

This is an effort to organize the thoughts in the thread up to now.
The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of the blessings. The inherent blessing of socialism is the equal sharing of misery. – Winston Churchill
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