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On October 16 2012 07:25 CapnAmerica wrote:
Modern NA Zerg Metagame
by the Capn himself
ZvT:
10 Hatch
10 Overlord
Extractor Trick
13/14 Hatch or Pool (Hatch preferred, but you can secure a build advantage by going pool before 3rd hatch if you know your opponent won't CC first)
Reactive play transitioning into Lurker/Ling with low Hydra count. Speed before Lair, time Hydra Den to finish with Lair if you're going for a timing push.
ZvP
Exact same thing, though I 3 Hatch Before Pool every time.
Reacting to one base play:
Scout! If you have no information beyond lack of nexus, 4 spines (2 at natural, 2 at 3rd) and massing Zerglings after ~20 drones is safe play while you get Queens. If you face air play, a hydra den and spores is a good response -- push with the hydra/ling force you've got and spore up. Do damage and either win or secure more expansions.
Against cannon rushes, you auto-win by making hatcheries outside the contain. There is no excuse for losing your natural to cannons, though.
I found I could reliably crush 5 gates, 4gate +1, voidray + gateway builds, and anything that comes delayed off of nexus first (not my fast PvZ pressure builds) with ease, putting me far ahead of my opponent unless I made tactical errors like running all my stuff in on move command or not making enough hatcheries.
If I'm not heavily fucked with (and I don't respond optimally) I win every single ZvP and ZvT that I play without much effort, and ZvZ is all about establishing the same types of mineral and larva advantages.
EDIT: I posted this because I want to make sure we're "playing the same game" so to speak. I can't imagine anyone having issues with playing Zerg on either server and winning unless they're making big mistakes or playing in a way that doesn't work towards Zerg's strengths.
Capn, you realize you are the only one who prefers 10 hatch over anything else? It reduces the amount of workers you will have (by an average of 2) vs getting your command structure 10 seconds faster. It's not worth it. ZvZ you haven't played anyone who's good vs your style (stupidly greedy) or just anyone good overall. Arkuss is the only other decent zerg on NA and he isn't used to playing the good "greedy" style.
vs Protoss there are two good protosses. ImoLmantis and Horus. Horus's PvZ is terrible. He just hates PvZ, so he doesn't bother with it. Mantis has been on once in the past 1 1/2 weeks. So your not playing any decent protosses either.
No one on NA has bothered with being super serious and metagaming. You have a really good style vs Terran that I just can't seem to beat. I'm not sure if it's because I am playing bad/you're better, it's OP, or a bit of both.
So please, save the metagame comments until you play seriously vs someone your level.
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The damage point value in the editor seems to do no difference to the Zergling attack. If anyone has time, please experiment with the Zergling in the editor and see if something good can come from it.
Zerg seems to be very strong on EU too. Or Zerg wins A LOT, atleast from what I´ve seen. Its the race that has recieved least balance so far.. The race is not even "completed" in terms of units and spells.. But I will work to get it more playable and enjoyable : /
Good night.
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Freeze:
10 Hatch is better because you aren't getting blocked, you get larva faster, your workers are only slightly delayed, you have a second base to mine off of earlier for more income, and the only way to stop it is with a super early probe which has forced me into pool first (which does damage and puts me ahead as I double expand).
I've played Mantis, we had a bit of fun together and he showed me some cool all-ins.
As you know, I've beaten Horus multiple times and my losses are due to errors on my part (like cancelling 4 hatcheries that were delayed to begin with, lol).
I made this post to make sure that EU Zergs are playing the same (better) way that I am, so that we're all looking at this from the same standpoint in the matchup.
And if I've played you, Horus, Mantis, Arkuss, and everyone else in the starbow NA channel, there is no way that I can play someone "on my level" without being provided an EU account. So what's the problem? I can talk about metagame when I win, period.
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+ Show Spoiler +On October 16 2012 05:28 Barrin wrote:
You messed with the delicate terran/protoss worker creation rate / larva spawn rate / terran protoss unit building rate balance; that is why you are having balance problems.
By increasing worker creating time from 17 seconds to 22 seconds you created a sort of illusion of excess minerals. The illusion of excess minerals isn't from the mineral rate per worker being high (thus an illusion), it comes from a much lower % of your income being spent on workers in normal upkeep compared to both SC2 and BW.
This reduced worker creation rate makes it much easier to keep up with workers in terms of both APM and resources; too much easier. Even though the cost:benefit of workers is reduced, the increased time it takes to make them makes each one more valuable which makes it a bad idea to cut them, and the excess of minerals makes it unnecessary to cut them anyway. And the 9 mineral patches means you've got a ways to catch up. In other words, the tactic of cutting workers to make a stronger attack or expand earlier is not nearly as potent in this system.
To get more to the point, macro management is not nearly as interesting in this system, and you don't have impressive feats of fighting the UI (hard mechanics like in BW) to fall back on. To get even more to the point, the skill cap is lowered dramatically. I will admit your system does fine as far as putting emphasis on fighting unit interactions, but 'breadth of gameplay' has a lot more to do with economy management.
BTW the less than 2 workers per mineral cap is extremely limiting on these T's and P's that get stuck on 2 bases against a zerg player. The T's and P's in these situations should be able to continue making as many as 25 mineral workers on each of their 2 bases before they don't get any more benefit without expanding... but they are limited to just 18 workers per base (36) while A zerg with 3 bases can take those same 36 workers and get even more benefit from them.. on top of being able to make as many as 54 mineral workers. 3 full workers per mineral field is too much, but there needs to be a buffer zone so when you contain someone their actions aren't ridiculously predictable.
And finally the increased worker speed really makes scouting a LOT easier... which lowers the skill cap not only by virtue of easier scouting but also because less (riskier) builds are as viable.
A lot of this is what I was saying. In regards to Kabel's comments, a lot of them would be answered if you just went back through and applied what he said over the entire thing to each comment. I am not going to go through them all but one example was when you asked about "The illusion of excess minerals" and you asked to explain. In the quoted section just before this question, it was answered. It's like you didn't bother to read some of it thoroughly. Yes, some of the stuff he says was wrong, especially since he doesn't play the mod.
One of the parts mentioned in the front page post was "making a game harder then SC2". That's fine, it's a great idea. You wanted to make it harder similar to how BW was harder then SC2. There were 2 things that made it harder: 1) Micro/Smartcasting, you could only select 12 units at a time. That meant that spellcasters would use all of their spells and that you couldn't just 1amove your army to victory. 2) Macro. This is the biggest part. Since you can't hotkey all of your production to 1 hotkey, you had to constantly have high APM to deal with popping all around macroing. This was arguably the hardest part of Brood War. You got rid of that in Starbow. Suddenly you don't need this high APM to macro. Especially when you remove the most macro-apm intensive parts of some races. Zerg for example. If you had the APM to support injecting, you became a better player. The skill needed was obvious. The higher APM = a better player. You could succeed if you didn't have the same level of injecting, but you were at a serious disadvantage.
So suddenly, with being able to macro easily with hotkeys and not needing to inject. Zerg just got easymode, they can focus purely on micro. But oh wait! Micro is also super easy now without BW Smartcasting and unlimited selection. Suddenly zerg doesn't need that huge APM. They can just lounge around. They can worry about other things, basic things like basic not getting supply blocked and everything else.
The other races don't have this. They have almost exactly the same as regular SC2. So while it could be argued that Zerg's maco mechanics were harder with the need of injecting, the other races had their own problems. Mostly micro based (Think Terran's dependance on splitting, Protosses dependance on spellcasters). So suddenly Zerg has all this free time that the other races don't have. While they need to worry about regular stuff, zerg can make sure they have perfect macro. Not missing nearly as much as they might have to normally.
On a different portion, Economy. This is what I was trying to say over these posts, but put in a better sense. Terran/Protoss is generally contained to fewer bases. Why? Because they aren't nearly as mobile as the zerg. When they want to push, they better be sure they have the army lead to not get obliterated. They won't be able to harass as well, they have slow units. The zerg is able to expand and expand. Very little most races can do vs it except just try to macro. But then once they get one base up, two mine out. It's very hard to deal with. I don't know how to deal with this other than just increasing minerals and gas back to their original values. This might not deal with it hugely, but it should somewhat.
For the other things, just give something for zerg to do APM intensive-wise. Maybe you can't hotkey multiple hatcheries together. Just something making zerg harder than it is now.
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On October 16 2012 07:53 CapnAmerica wrote:
Freeze:
10 Hatch is better because you aren't getting blocked, you get larva faster, your workers are only slightly delayed, you have a second base to mine off of earlier for more income, and the only way to stop it is with a super early probe which has forced me into pool first (which does damage and puts me ahead as I double expand).
I've played Mantis, we had a bit of fun together and he showed me some cool all-ins.
As you know, I've beaten Horus multiple times and my losses are due to errors on my part (like cancelling 4 hatcheries that were delayed to begin with, lol).
I made this post to make sure that EU Zergs are playing the same (better) way that I am, so that we're all looking at this from the same standpoint in the matchup.
And if I've played you, Horus, Mantis, Arkuss, and everyone else in the starbow NA channel, there is no way that I can play someone "on my level" without being provided an EU account. So what's the problem? I can talk about metagame when I win, period.
First off, you've competly changed your tune about 10 hatch. It used to be "oh no, you get workers out faster don't worry". Also, you don't get more income if your other base isn't fully saturated. Most of the time your main base will have 8-10 workers by the time you finish. This is silly, you are losing more by the time it takes for the worker to travel base to base then what it gains from working at a new base, if anything.
You still haven't explained when you played Mantis as I have yet to see him.
Did you read what I said about Horus, what you are saying is just agreeing with me ;;
For your final point. Let's say we took MVP and a couple of diamond players. MVP decides to go a very silly build, but pulls it off because he is able to just outplay them anyway. If MVP didn't realize he is better then most of his opponents, he might just credit the build instead of himself. For losing to people, we played with me as Terran once, on a very bad map (Oakshire). Before that I had played Terran only a little. But yes, you should possibly beat me.
Instead of saying "Oh look my way which wins vs people who don't have a set thing to do vs me is better then you" you might say "Oh, people who might have good vZ opponents, how are you playing?"
I have to go for ~1 hour. Won't be able to respond.
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You do get workers out faster with a 10 hatch. The timing where it becomes more powerful is just slightly delayed from, say, a 12 hatch, where you're stuck waiting for a while before your drones become more useful on the second base.
Having one drone per mineral patch is mining more (and the bases last longer) than 1-2 drones per mineral patch due to bouncing and the mining AI -- you can put workers on close patches for higher income rates on the new bases as well.
Another huge benefit to earlier hatcheries is the fact that a hatchery is an investment. If you make it earlier, you don't have to decide later between more production and tech or defense -- you just have it and it transitions much more easily.
It's also a short distance between hatcheries.
Mantis and I played the other day... he showed me some cool 1-base all-ins and such. Not much more to say about that.
I didn't play Zerg first when I tried out Starbow, I played Terran (as that's what I main on ladder). For your MVP argument, while I'm better than some of our players, I shouldn't necessarily be that much better than you. You're a Masters league player and I am (literally) a Diamond league player. I think the strategy that I am playing is many times better than the strategies I have seen other Zergs play out (and a couple that I've tried myself), and that Zerg is simply meant to be played this way in the current iteration of the game.
And as to the last comment... my way wins. Consistently. I've seen posts about people saying Zergs can have it rough, and I simply haven't run up against a difficult scenario where this is the case when I understand how to react.
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On October 16 2012 04:45 Danko__ wrote:
Creep gives 10% movement speed. -10-20% Would be fine, i agree.
Creep gives 10% attack speed (not needed - just a thought). -Disagree. No need imho.
Queens, Spines and Spores have a special ability that increases movement on creep. -Sure, keep them as fast as now
Creep give +200% regen when out of combat (only applies to units) -Dunno. Can be fine. Would prefer % of max hps so they can heal in resonable time.
Units get -50% of their current regen. -Zerg regen is already quite low. Let it be like it is imho.
Zerglings gain a 10-30% increase in size (look at other units as well). -Not needed if you want to increase their damage point imho.
Zerglings have a delay of ~0.2 sec before their initial attack (look into this for zealots too). -Something like that.
Speedling (and perhaps slowling) speed is decreased. -Slowling speed cant be decreased. With delay on atack he will be already much weaker. I would even say slowling speed increased so they can surround (especially with creep bonus nerf). Speedling speed can be decreased, so flanking is bit harder. Overal: slowling 3.0, speedling 4,25-4,4 depending on bonus from creep.
Zergling damage is increased. -No chance. Completly disagree. This will screw all relations their atack/opponents damage. Fast upgrades for armor and maybe upgrade for planetary can be really effective vs lings.
Zergling attack speed is decreased. -Completly disagree. They are supposed to deal INSANE dps, but when they can atack. If they can atack constantly they will be very effective, not when they can stab and chase imho. Imho delay on damage point + faster atack speed + bit lower move speed.
Crackling upgrade gets a small buff. -Dunno. Its 0,11 right now. It should be about 25% if you ask me (22% now).
Word for word I completely support everything Danko said in this post, except where the 10% attack speed increase on creep is concerned, I still think that would be a good change (but lower all current attack speeds for Zerg by 5% except for Zerglings which need a DPS increase to go with their other proposed changes here).
As far as the movement speed creep bonus I would prefer 20% over 10% so it would be more visible.
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10 hatch is faster economy than 12 hatch and is 100% safe and pretty much unpunishable. The reason why Capn's silly builds of super greed work is because economy > production, thus making 1 base play pretty much useless. The only relatively good 1 base all in vs Zerg is the terran 11/11 proxy marine scv all-in. I 4gated Capn and hit at just over 7 minutes with a sizable force and was met with 2 expansions already up with 2 spines at each and a boatload of lings. At 7 minutes thats very early to have such a solid defence waiting and the reason is is that the economy is so fast that zerg can double expand AND get defense for it before a remotely scarey 1 base push hits. When we buffed the economy from the super slow to the relatively quick economy, we pushed economy too far and now Zerg is able to run wild with it.
In order to fix the problems we're having with Zerg running wild (the only "balancing" has been to infestors and Hydralisks so clearly balance isn't the issue) I think we need to look back at the economy of old and the economy of today and find a middle ground. Zerg itsself has not gotten stronger and prior to the economy boost Zergs were getting shit on and playing as greedy as Capn does wasn't possible because 1 base plays were viable and left killing blows. If we bring the economy back a bit and make 1 base plays viable again we may see a durastic change without having to temper with any of the races. If anyone is opposed to an economy nerf, I go back to my previous suggestion of increase Hatchery cost to 350 minerals.
@CapnAmerica and Freeze
10 Hatch is only > 12 hatch because of this current economy. Just like you can 8 pylon/ovie without any economical penalty :/ so you're both right. If we nerf economy 10 hatch would be a stupid build and only used to prevent that pesky probe from hatch blocking people who don't know how to deal with it.
A suggestion to look at economy.
I don't have the time with 7 classes but if someone can get the time on when a Brood War Hatch first (12 hatch) drops, An SC2 15 hatch drops, and a Starbow 10/12 hatch drops, we can look at the 3 different economies and compare them.
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On October 16 2012 03:17 Kabel wrote:
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Personally I dont think an increase in HP is the right way to go, since it messes up so many units interactions. (Zealots do not 2 shot Zerglings with +1 upg for example..) It also changes values we are all used to: workers have 40 life, zerglings 35 etc.
Instead I think a reduction of 10% in attack and move speed can be a way to go and it would archieve the same effect. Its not as obvious. Perhaps would many players not even notice it. What would the total effect be in combats? Without calculating, I would say the impact would be a few seconds longer larger combats, and those few seconds enable a little bit more micro. (Roblin, you wanna give it a go? ^^ )
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lets say every unit in the game have its movement speed reduced by 10% and every unit have its attack speed reduced by 10%
we have really just changed how the game works in respect to time, not power, so lets look at the factors affected by time.
projectile speed:
in relation to other things, the projectile speed will be increased. not really an issue, projectiles are mostly there for the sake of aestethics, though a projectile speed increase does make units with projectiles overkill sliiiiightly less than before on average.
worker speed:
scenario 1: worker speed is also decreased by 10%
no change in scouting, but mining will change a little bit, for example 2 workers might (might is the keyword) not be enough to fully saturate a mineral field, or the second worker will yield more income than it did before (the first worker currently generate more income than the 2nd on the same mineral field, a 10% decrease in speed would decrease the income of the first worker and let the second worker have less "waiting" time, thus pulling the two workers mining efficiency closer to each other)
note that a fully mining base might not give less income than it did before.
scenario 2: workers are unaffected.
no change in income, but workers will become better scouting units and have higher survivability compared to before, since the things that are supposed to "catch" it have become slower and thus less efficient at catching it.
micro:
easier in general, particularly stutter stepping.
combat:
lasts longer, no change in unit vs unit dynamic. (except if someone brings workers)
reinforcing/macro:
is now more powerful since combat lasts longer but unit build times stays the same.
teching:
now more powerful (barely noticeably) since buildings have had their build time lowered compared to combat speed.
spells:
DOT spells are in general slightly more powerful
On October 16 2012 07:28 CapnAmerica wrote:
Also, I think damage point modifications on Zerglings are 100% the way to go. Being able to out-micro them if they don't get a surround sounds fantastic, and would reward good micro even more (the way that it should be).
I very much agree about all of the damage point stuff, it will definitely increase the importance of surrounding with zerglings, thus also increasing the need to micro against zerglings to avoid a surround. (wish I knew about damage points before)
I also advocate the same thing be done with zealots. ultras already have a pretty long damage point as far as I know.
since it is an effective nerf to zerglings (and possibly zealots) they may need a buff at some point in the future however. that is something we will have to wait and see.
// Roblin
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A lot of this is what I was saying. In regards to Kabel's comments, a lot of them would be answered if you just went back through and applied what he said over the entire thing to each comment. I am not going to go through them all but one example was when you asked about "The illusion of excess minerals" and you asked to explain. In the quoted section just before this question, it was answered. It's like you didn't bother to read some of it thoroughly. Yes, some of the stuff he says was wrong, especially since he doesn't play the mod.
I read his post thoroughly many times before I replied. I am aware of his explanation for the "illusion of excess minerals". But I am not satisfied with the answear. He does not mention why that is a problem and why that have negative impacts on the gameplay. (As he indirectly mean) Thats why I asked him to elaborate his thoughts. (Cause I assume he means more negative effects than just that the need of cutting workers is reduced...)
+ Show Spoiler +One of the parts mentioned in the front page post was "making a game harder then SC2". That's fine, it's a great idea. You wanted to make it harder similar to how BW was harder then SC2. There were 2 things that made it harder: 1) Micro/Smartcasting, you could only select 12 units at a time. That meant that spellcasters would use all of their spells and that you couldn't just 1amove your army to victory. 2) Macro. This is the biggest part. Since you can't hotkey all of your production to 1 hotkey, you had to constantly have high APM to deal with popping all around macroing. This was arguably the hardest part of Brood War. You got rid of that in Starbow. Suddenly you don't need this high APM to macro. Especially when you remove the most macro-apm intensive parts of some races. Zerg for example. If you had the APM to support injecting, you became a better player. The skill needed was obvious. The higher APM = a better player. You could succeed if you didn't have the same level of injecting, but you were at a serious disadvantage.
So suddenly, with being able to macro easily with hotkeys and not needing to inject. Zerg just got easymode, they can focus purely on micro. But oh wait! Micro is also super easy now without BW Smartcasting and unlimited selection. Suddenly zerg doesn't need that huge APM. They can just lounge around. They can worry about other things, basic things like basic not getting supply blocked and everything else.
The other races don't have this. They have almost exactly the same as regular SC2. So while it could be argued that Zerg's maco mechanics were harder with the need of injecting, the other races had their own problems. Mostly micro based (Think Terran's dependance on splitting, Protosses dependance on spellcasters). So suddenly Zerg has all this free time that the other races don't have. While they need to worry about regular stuff, zerg can make sure they have perfect macro. Not missing nearly as much as they might have to normally.
On a different portion, Economy. This is what I was trying to say over these posts, but put in a better sense. Terran/Protoss is generally contained to fewer bases. Why? Because they aren't nearly as mobile as the zerg. When they want to push, they better be sure they have the army lead to not get obliterated. They won't be able to harass as well, they have slow units. The zerg is able to expand and expand. Very little most races can do vs it except just try to macro. But then once they get one base up, two mine out. It's very hard to deal with. I don't know how to deal with this other than just increasing minerals and gas back to their original values. This might not deal with it hugely, but it should somewhat.
For the other things, just give something for zerg to do APM intensive-wise. Maybe you can't hotkey multiple hatcheries together. Just something making zerg harder than it is now.
If I revert values on mineral patches to their originial value, the economy will be so strong that 3 bases will be enough to max out. Thats why I hesitate to do it. As far as I´ve seen from EU games, I don´t think there is a problem between TvP, PvP or TvT when it comes to bases with a low amount of resources. In fact, I´ve seen it leading to a lot more expanding. Its Z in its current form that is the party pooper and makes the equation burst.
I do think there are other ways to approach this problem: better ways for Protoss and Terran to defend an early third or forth base, more effective harassment/map control units to use vs Zerg. And maps matter a lot. The 3 and 4 base are so exposed on most maps, which makes it harder to defend them and easier to attack. And this rewards Zerg even more.
I am working on giving Zerg more stuff to do. Thats why I will try the new creep system (which rewards Zerg micro more), thats why I try to find methods to strengthen the benefits of flanking, and thats why I am curious to find out how even Zerglings can be rewarded by more control in combat. I am also looking at the Inject mechanic to see if something more challening and fun can be made of the Zerg macro.
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And on that note, I'll stop procrastinating and post my current Queen ideas.
Spells:
Nourish Embryos, 25 energy, Hotkey E
Targets a Hatchery, [Swarm Host] or Broodlord . Accelerates the cooldown speed of larvae/[locust]/broodling spawn by X% for X seconds.
+ Show Spoiler +This one is simple but would play dramatically better than Inject. Casting it will only have an effect while you are spending your larvae. It is not a routine chore that will increase potential production no matter what - it has to be made as a conscious decision when your Hatchery is below its maximum larvae count. Careful timing and resource management will allow more skilled players to make better use of this spell. It also removes overlap from Queens and Macro Hatches, as making Macro Hatches will now be the only way to stockpile more larvae all at one time. The potential for casting on Swarm Hosts (reserved for their possible inclusion in HotS) and Broodlords is for flavor purposes, and it does add just slightly more depth and versatility.
Spawn Creep Tumor, unchanged.
Incubation Cloud, 50 energy, Hotkey D
Places a radius 2 cloud of micro-organisms that provide warmth and protection for Zerg creatures undergoing metamorphosis. Any Zerg unit or building under the cloud will morph X% faster and take X% less damage from ranged attacks.
+ Show Spoiler +I SEE WHAT YOU DID THERE SMILEZERG, STILL TRYING TO SNEAK DARK SWARM ONTO THE QUEEN. Well yes  but let's ignore that for the moment and look at the other aspect of the spell. It is both similar and different to Chrono Boost and has some interesting applications. It is similar in that it accelerates build times and has a wide variety of uses, but the differences are in that: - It can't be used for research. - It is not a global spell and requires the Queen to be within casting range (probably the same as Transfuse). - It can be used to accelerate the speed of building construction. - It targets an area rather than a particular structure, which is appropriate for Zerg since they have a lot of units that want to morph out on the battlefield or morph together, such as Banelings, Lurkers, Broodlords and Larvae. This could potentially be the macro spell with the most depth in the game, and that's not even considering the potential for offensive uses.
Transfuse, unchanged.
Creep Tunnel, no energy, 20 second cooldown, requires Burrow research.
Instantly transports the Queen from any location on creep to any other part of the creep the Zerg player has vision. The entry and exit points must be connected by an unbroken path.
+ Show Spoiler +This should go some way towards letting players use Queens as a combat support unit more before Nydus tech. It nicely allows the Queen to synergize with her own Creep Tumor ability by increasing her effective domain the more she spreads them, and will let the unit be more omnipresent on the Zerg's home turf so long as they can keep their creep highways connected, without forcing her to stay next to the Hatcheries so she doesn't slip on her larvae macro.
Consume, no energy, channeled, requires Hive.
Drains X% HP per second from target biological unit or structure (friend or foe) and converts it to X energy. The Queen shares this ability with the Infestor and the Viper.
This brings her up to a total of six spells. Ridiculous, I know, but we are talking about the only unit in the game with a hard limit on how many you can make, so she should feel extra special... not to mention two of those spells are purely utility, without an energy cost. The Ghost has five abilities and seems to get away with it, I think we should be able to manage.
I meant to add more in-depth explanations on some of these but I am incredibly tired and surprised I got this far in the post already. Hoping for some good feedback tomorrow, signing out for now.
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Nice post, SmileZerg! These ideas have huge potential! But I have some small concerns:
Nourish Embryos: Lets say a Zerg player got 5 Hatceries in total, and he has them all seleced in the same hotkey. He has 15 larvas to work with. He uses 8 of them right now, cause he runs out of resources to use the rest. He then select his Queen to Nourish the Hatcheries. Unfortunatly, the larvas were not drained from the hatcheries where his Queen is. Instead, eggs at the new expansion were used, and eggs from the main base. Bad enough, he only had a Queen at the expansion, where he has 2 hatcheries, but the larvas were not used there.
This is obviously a minor concern. He could get Queens at each base to prevent this. But there is a random factor in it, since the Zerg player can´t determine from what hatcheries the larvas are used... Unless he splits them up on different hotkeys to control from which base larvas are drained..
Cntrl + 6 = Main base hatchery
Cntrl + 7 = Expansion and macro hatchery
Cntrl + 8 = Third base and macro hatchery
(Hm... And that might actually be a good thing)
It would also force a "constant" clicking on hatcherys, since you can´t determine when larvas will spawn. In normal SC2, if you use all larvas from all hatcheries, you know you have a window of 15 seconds before you need to click again. And you know roughly when the larvas will pop from Inject. This means that Zerg can focus on other stuff, go back and macro, then go back and focus on other stuff. Back and forth.
If the spawn rate for example is increased by 50% on a hatchery, and you don´t use it on all hatcheries, larvas there will pop at 7 seconds, which forces "constant" clicking to not miss a larva, since it will be an uneven spawn rate compared to other hatcheries.
Haha I sound like I need a drink :D
To get this novel short: How would this effect the practical aspect of playing Zerg? Would this allow for better control and more depth/fun in the macro?
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Incubation Cloud sounds really nice. I just came out of the shower and thought about an ability that targeted indivdual eggs or morphing units, to make them "pop" directly. The problem was that it was hard to determine what was in what egg, which would limit the precision of the spell. Your idea of making it an AoE-spell was a clever solution and a gift from the heaven :D
Making it build buildings faster is also a nice aspect. A Queen can be a supervisior of an important tech structure, and a good zerg player can use the Queen to speed up the production.
I am not sure that the damage reduction is necessary. If it speeds up both eggs and buildings sounds enough to give it great versatility.
One concern I have is that the two Queen spell overlaps. Why would one choose to speed up larva production over speeding up the production time of the eggs? Hmm.. I am just thinking loud now ^^
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Creep Tunnel and Consume seems a bit unncessary. There is nothing wrong with them, but I think the Queen will function well without them. I am actually experimanting with a Tunnel ability for Roaches right now. They can dig into the ground, disapear for a few seconds, then pop up at target location. (It is like teleportation. :p) Its limited to only work on creep too and have a long cooldown and long range. (Over the entire map?) If you are good with your creep spread, or have overlords with creep out on the map, you can "teleport" your roaches there. But this is just an experiment.
Anyways, great ideas you have!
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On October 16 2012 14:07 Danko__ wrote:
Yes, zerg is OP.
Hah i laugh at you but i have nothing better to say so i only laugh a little.
Well then... carry on
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On October 16 2012 19:44 Kabel wrote:
Nice post, SmileZerg! These ideas have huge potential! But I have some small concerns:
Nourish Embryos: Lets say a Zerg player got 5 Hatceries in total, and he has them all seleced in the same hotkey. He has 15 larvas to work with. He uses 8 of them right now, cause he runs out of resources to use the rest. He then select his Queen to Nourish the Hatcheries. Unfortunatly, the larvas were not drained from the hatcheries where his Queen is. Instead, eggs at the new expansion were used, and eggs from the main base. Bad enough, he only had a Queen at the expansion, where he has 2 hatcheries, but the larvas were not used there.
This is obviously a minor concern. He could get Queens at each base to prevent this. But there is a random factor in it, since the Zerg player can´t determine from what hatcheries the larvas are used... Unless he splits them up on different hotkeys to control from which base larvas are drained..
Cntrl + 6 = Main base hatchery
Cntrl + 7 = Expansion and macro hatchery
Cntrl + 8 = Third base and macro hatchery
(Hm... And that might actually be a good thing)
It would also force a "constant" clicking on hatcherys, since you can´t determine when larvas will spawn. In normal SC2, if you use all larvas from all hatcheries, you know you have a window of 15 seconds before you need to click again. And you know roughly when the larvas will pop from Inject. This means that Zerg can focus on other stuff, go back and macro, then go back and focus on other stuff. Back and forth.
If the spawn rate for example is increased by 50% on a hatchery, and you don´t use it on all hatcheries, larvas there will pop at 7 seconds, which forces "constant" clicking to not miss a larva, since it will be an uneven spawn rate compared to other hatcheries.
Haha I sound like I need a drink :D
To get this novel short: How would this effect the practical aspect of playing Zerg? Would this allow for better control and more depth/fun in the macro?
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Incubation Cloud sounds really nice. I just came out of the shower and thought about an ability that targeted indivdual eggs or morphing units, to make them "pop" directly. The problem was that it was hard to determine what was in what egg, which would limit the precision of the spell. Your idea of making it an AoE-spell was a clever solution and a gift from the heaven :D
Making it build buildings faster is also a nice aspect. A Queen can be a supervisior of an important tech structure, and a good zerg player can use the Queen to speed up the production.
I am not sure that the damage reduction is necessary. If it speeds up both eggs and buildings sounds enough to give it great versatility.
One concern I have is that the two Queen spell overlaps. Why would one choose to speed up larva production over speeding up the production time of the eggs? Hmm.. I am just thinking loud now ^^
...
Creep Tunnel and Consume seems a bit unncessary. There is nothing wrong with them, but I think the Queen will function well without them. I am actually experimanting with a Tunnel ability for Roaches right now. They can dig into the ground, disapear for a few seconds, then pop up at target location. (It is like teleportation. :p) Its limited to only work on creep too and have a long cooldown and long range. (Over the entire map?) If you are good with your creep spread, or have overlords with creep out on the map, you can "teleport" your roaches there. But this is just an experiment.
Anyways, great ideas you have!
how would this affect the practical aspect of playing zerg?
I do not know.
but I can state what I believe is closest to correct:
people in general like to make things easy for themselves, so people will probably continue the exact same way they used to. difference being nonexistant.
well, I guess larvae cannot stack higher than 3 now, but it shouldn't matter that much, zerg macro will stay largely the same, especially in lower skill levels.
One concern I have is that the two Queen spell overlaps. Why would one choose to speed up larva production over speeding up the production time of the eggs?
because the production time on the eggs is not related to be able to spend more of your money. only to getting your moneys worth faster.
in other words: use A when you have a lot of money, use B when you need units fast.
I am actually experimanting with a Tunnel ability for Roaches right now. They can dig into the ground, disapear for a few seconds, then pop up at target location. (It is like teleportation. :p) Its limited to only work on creep too and have a long cooldown and long range. (Over the entire map?) If you are good with your creep spread, or have overlords with creep out on the map, you can "teleport" your roaches there. But this is just an experiment.
seems very very powerful.
kind of like 0 second build time nydusworm anywhere that you have an overlord (such as in the enemy base) that has no limit on how fast you pop units out.
decreasing range helps a bit, but basicly imagine roaches with stalker-blink and you have an accurate representation.
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On October 16 2012 14:15 ArkussSC2 wrote:
@CapnAmerica and Freeze
10 Hatch is only > 12 hatch because of this current economy. Just like you can 8 pylon/ovie without any economical penalty :/ so you're both right. If we nerf economy 10 hatch would be a stupid build and only used to prevent that pesky probe from hatch blocking people who don't know how to deal with it.
A suggestion to look at economy.
I don't have the time with 7 classes but if someone can get the time on when a Brood War Hatch first (12 hatch) drops, An SC2 15 hatch drops, and a Starbow 10/12 hatch drops, we can look at the 3 different economies and compare them.
Don't know the exact timing, but from what I can remember about BW, 12 hatch go down slightly before (something like 10 sec) 13 Nexus from Protoss.
In SC2, 15 hatch go down at 2:10-2:15, slightly before 15 Nexus at 2:30.
In Starbow, 12 hatch go down at 1:45, 45 seconds before 13 Nexus at 2:30.
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Smilezerg`s Nourish Embryos sounds a lot like my idea to make inject spawn larva 75% faster for 40 seconds
I also like the idea of inbubation clound because it`s a macro mechanic that is alternative to Inject.
if balanced right you have a very versatile and supportive queen unit;
-Inject to pump faster drones and units
-Cloud for faster tech, smaller army but more punch (faster banelings, broodlords and lurkers)
-Creep tumor for map presence/vision/control
-Transfuse army support/defense
with limited queens and energy players will have to make decisions as to what abilities to use and when
as a suggestion, Incubation cloud could also increase armor of units/structures underneath it by 1 so you have more choices; do you use it on a pack of units to reduce damage from many fast attackers or transfuse your ultralisk? you could also use it over spine and spore crawlers to buffer your defense since the cloud hits buildings but has no benfit on crawlers, where tansfuse can save a single crawler the cloud can affect more then 1, again forcing decisions.
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On October 16 2012 19:51 Caas wrote:Hah i laugh at you but i have nothing better to say so i only laugh a little. Well then... carry on
Im glad i could make you laugh, but that doesnt change anything. Zerg is op right now in starbow. Economy and speed of growth. Toss and terran must out of zerg league to have equal chances.
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Back to income problems:
I think it will be very difficult to balance the game without taking BW or SC2 as a reference when it come to income per base. The current state of balance of Zerg is a good indication of how hard it is to balance the game in this regard. Since using SC2's income is a bad idea (because it allows players to quickly maxout on 3 bases), what about using BW as a reference for Starbow? For example, it might be possible to use Barrin's work for his mod "Fewer Ressource per Base": http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=335302
It would make Starbow more like BW but:
- It would be easier to balance the game (because BW economy is balanced)
- It would fix some of the problems raised by Barrin in his post.
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On October 16 2012 22:30 Danko__ wrote:Show nested quote +On October 16 2012 19:51 Caas wrote:On October 16 2012 14:07 Danko__ wrote:.
Yes, zerg is OP. Hah i laugh at you but i have nothing better to say so i only laugh a little. Well then... carry on Im glad i could make you laugh, but that doesnt change anything. Zerg is op right now in starbow. Economy and speed of growth. Toss and terran must out of zerg league to have equal chances.
We get the same exact thing on NA right now. You have to know exactly how to fight zerg, and even then, you have to rely on the zerg making incredibly bad mistakes to win.
You are forced to constant aggression vs zerg.
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EPT
