It's been a while since i've posted in the SC2 topic area, however there are things i think we need to talk about. First let me say that did play sc2 at blizzcon and i was quite impressed with it. This game definitely has the potential to be an incredibly successful RTS game. I enjoyed almost every aspect of the game except for the interface; and that's what i'm going to talk about now.
I want starcraft 2 to be the best rts game ever. I don't want another warcraft 3. I also don't want silly newbie shit that brings this game a step down from it's older brother. And at the same time i definitely want to keep the game progressive so that we can attract new players.
I'm afraid of MBS (multiple building selection) and automining. I played SC2 at blizzcon for over seven hours. I was allowed to play the game the day before it was showed off at at blizzcon and there were so many things i loved about it. However, the MBS and automining felt absolutely terrible. It made sc2 feel A LOT slower than sc and that's very disappointing.
Now i know I've said i thought MBS could be a good thing. I was definitely wrong. It felt awfully newbie--macroing just wasn't fun. Tie this in with auto mining and it got even worse. I hardly had to think at all about my base. I think this could have massive negative ramifications on the competitive scene. Do we really want Starcraft 2 to always be known as the more popular but easier RTS game in the series? I would like to see it step up on all levels.
But what the hell are we supposed to do with these players who would find SC2 too hard without MBS and auto mining? My solution is to keep MBS and auto mining a setting that can only be played in non competitive games.
We all know BGH right? This mode of play is for players who aren't interested in expanding, they aren't interested in teching in a very mathematical or precise way. To say the very least, BGH players play a different and more simple version of starcraft. I'm not by ANY means saying that's bad. BGH players make up a huge part of the sc population. But i think you all would be as frustrated as i am if blizzard hosted BGH ladders and ONLY bgh style ladders. In fact, we don't even see BGH ladders around because for the most part SC players who want to be the best try to master low money maps because it's more difficult and there fore more attractive.
Lets keep MBS and auto mining in SC2, but out of competitive ladder play and tournaments. By doing this the new players who pick up SC2 and want to use an easier interface and play for fun can do this while the hard core competitive players, like me, can still play on a ladder where it was as fun and challenging as the old SC.
Edit: i've posted a comic to help further exemplify my point. this was originally posted on page 10 but i'm going to bump it up here. I will compare starcraft to golf
now here's starcraft 2 turned into minature golf with mbs and automining, as you can see the player has to preform less actions
On September 04 2007 05:48 MyLostTemple wrote: It's been a while since i've posted in the SC2 topic area, however there are things i think we need to talk about. First let me say that did play sc2 at blizzcon and i was quite impressed with it. This game definitely has the potential to be an incredibly successful RTS game. I enjoyed almost every aspect of the game except for the interface; and that's what i'm going to talk about now.
I want starcraft 2 to be the best rts game ever. I don't want another warcraft 3. I also don't want silly newbie shit that brings this game a step down from it's older brother. And at the same time i definitely want to keep the game progressive so that we can attract new players.
I'm afraid of MBS (multiple building selection) and automining. I played SC2 at blizzcon for over seven hours. I was allowed to play the game the day before it was showed off at at blizzcon and there were so many things i loved about it. However, the MBS and automining felt absolutely terrible. It made sc2 feel A LOT slower than sc. And that's very disappointing.
Now i know I've said i thought MBS could be a good thing. I was definitely wrong. It felt awfully newbie--macroing just wasn't fun. Tie this in with auto mining and it got even worse. I hardly had to think at all about my base. I think this could have massive negative ramifications on the competitive scene. Do we really want Starcraft 2 to always be known as the more popular but easier RTS game in the series? I would like to see it step up on all levels. But what the hell are we supposed to do with these players who would find SC2 too hard without MBS and auto mining? My solution is to keep MBS and auto mining a setting that can only be played in non competitive games.
We all know BGH right? This mode of play is for players who aren't interested in expanding, they aren't interested in teching in a very mathematical or precise way. To say the very least, BGH players play a different and more simple version of starcraft. I'm not by ANY means saying that's bad. BGH players make up a huge part of the sc population. But i think you all would be as frustrated as i am if blizzard hosted BGH ladders and ONLY bgh style ladders. In fact, we don't even see BGH ladders around because for the most part SC players who want to be the best try to mastered low money maps because it's more difficult and there fore more attractive.
Lets keep MBS and auto mining in SC2, but out of competitive ladder play and tournaments. By doing this the new players who pick up SC2 and want to use an easier interface and play for fun can do this while the hard core competitive players, like me, can still play on a ladder where it was as fun and challenging as the old SC.
I've thought about this a very long time since i attended blizzcon. I believe we must keep MBS and auto mining, but separate them as features that can only be used in non ladder/tournament games.
Thanks for reading <3 --Tasteless
I've been advocating that for forever. Those options should be in user preferences, but disabled by the server for all ladder play
I havent played the game but I would guess that automining is fine but I am against MBS. If people could learn this in the original starcraft why cant they learn to macro in SC2? Especially since everyone i heard from who played SC2 says it makes macro too simple.
I dont like the ide with 2 types of the game though. I just think that blizzard have to balance how much MBS should be allowed (if any)
Here is a post I made a while ago that talks about MBS:
Multiple building selection isn't really that helpful for macro.
Firstly, making units is just one small aspect of macro. The more game-changing aspects of macro are timing expansions, proper timing of adding production facilities and making the proper amount of production facilities, proper timing and amount of peons, and creating the proper ratios of desired units. All of these things can easily have bigger impacts on BW games than making units perfectly.
Secondly, the biggest error most players commit when trying to make units is improper timing. The gaps between making each round of units are what kill most players' macro. Multiple building selection does not help with this at all. What multiple building selection does is reduce the amount of time it takes to perform the action when you finally realize that you need to do it. Depending on the stage of the game, a fast BW player can build units in about 1-5 seconds and a mediocre BW player in about 3-8 seconds. So multiple building selection will drop this time to a split second for fast players, and about 1-2++ for slow players (depending if they'll sacrifice proper unit ratios for convenience). But multiple building selection simply will not help with timing. The pros build units like clockwork. The speed required to build units in BW is not as difficult as the skill required to always be on time.
The skill of going 4z5z7d8d9t0t will still probably exist because players won't want to build all of the same unit at once. To 10 gateways you can devote 3-5 hotkeys and build units in small groups, assuring that you can achieve the proper ratio with each round of production.
So basically multiple building selection helps with the easier half of one small aspect of macro and it is not even helpful in all situations. Those who are saying that it kills macro are going to be blown away by professional SC2 players who understand the true underlying forces at work to make a massive army appear from nowhere.
I know you've played the game and actually got to feel it out, but I'm skeptical about how much info anyone could gather about what the game will be like at the highest level of competition from playing the game for the first time.
I think you wrote a good argument and because of the changes in macro the competitive scene might be hurt.
My only question is do you think Blizzard will give players/tournaments/koreans the option of turning off all those new macro additions? It would seem logical, but you never know.
On September 04 2007 05:59 lakrismamma wrote: I havent played the game but I would guess that automining is fine but I am against MBS. If people could learn this in the original starcraft why cant they learn to macro in SC2? Especially since everyone i heard from who played SC2 says it makes macro too simple.
I dont like the ide with 2 types of the game though. I just think that blizzard have to balance how much MBS should be allowed (if any)
But I'd also like to add that having sets of options that meet the needs of competitive players and other sets of options that meet the needs of casual players is a very good idea. I don't know how it fits into Blizzard's gameplan but it has the potential of solving a lot of the conflicts in community demands.
I'm not quite sure what's so wrong with automining all by itself. I can see your point that, when automining is combined with MBS, there's not as much incentive for a player to continually check on his base, but alone, I don't see the problem. It's a relatively minor fix.
MBS is an issue I've been flipping back and forth on in my mind. Sometimes, I see it how Nony sees it; a significant improvement for lower/middle level players, but won't make as much of a difference as some say. Other times, I find myself agreeing with the hardcore anti-mbs people. Right now, I'm thinking that along with small groups of buildings to get right unit proportions, you'll also need to readjust your hotkeys when you feel the battle going a certain way because you'll need to readjust your army's current proportions.
One idea concerning MBS that I liked a lot was the version of MBS where you select your buildings with a hotkey, but you'll have to tab and build to make your units. So, a build command for 3 zealots and 3 immortals would be like 5tabztabztabztabitabitabi. It seemed like a pretty cool idea.
As for the topic itself, I'm uncomfortable with several differnt "modes" of play of ladder vs non-ladder. To me, it seems more extreme than the split between BGH/FPM and non-money maps.
Oh and for the stubborn naysayers of MBS, I'd like to throw this idea out there...
The tell-tale sign of a bad macro player in BW is that he has too many units queued into his buildings. We all know it's much better to only have 1 unit queued at a time. But if MBS does anything for a player like that, it only screws him even worse, making it easier to queue multiple units in his buildings.
Oh and on the other topic... automining is much much more macro killing than MBS. I really really really don't want to see automining in SC2. The extra money a player receives for taking the time to tell his peons to mine is huge.
All these arguments come from a SC1 Point of View, and indeed, Multi building selection and automining would ruin SC if they were implented just like that via Patch.
Fortunately they will be in SC2 a new game that takes these Features into account. Competative play isn´t centered around ordering around Peons.
Competative play needs variety and equality of options, a nonexistance of the luckfactor and distiction in skill.
Skill is a wide field, it includes mechanical skill (micro, the ability to control your units), knowledge of your and the enemys units, knowledge of strategies and their counters, the ability to react to enemy strategies, if possible the ability to "guess" the enemys strategy or identify it before the enemy can react and a lot more what I didn´t think of.
How much impact will MBS and auto mining really have on skill distinction? And what impact will they have on competative play? Imho they remove little distinction but improve ergonomicaly control a lot wich makes it a worthy "exchange" though I would simply call it a improvement.
On September 04 2007 06:11 NonY[rC] wrote: Oh and for the stubborn naysayers of MBS, I'd like to throw this idea out there...
The tell-tale sign of a bad macro player in BW is that he has too many units queued into his buildings. We all know it's much better to only have 1 unit queued at a time. But if MBS does anything for a player like that, it only screws him even worse, making it easier to queue multiple units in his buildings.
Oh and on the other topic... automining is much much more macro killing than MBS. I really really really don't want to see automining in SC2. The extra money a player receives for taking the time to tell his peons to mine is huge.
If you can go 1z and have 20 gates producing 1 zealot each, isn't that a lot easier than having to click each gateway or go 5z6z7z8z9z? Its pretty much impossible to screw up the former, but not being able to the the latter perfectly often leads to massively queued buildings while others are idle (from personal experience).
On September 04 2007 06:15 Unentschieden wrote: Skill is a wide field, it includes mechanical skill (micro, the ability to control your units), knowledge of your and the enemys units, knowledge of strategies and their counters, the ability to react to enemy strategies, if possible the ability to "guess" the enemys strategy or identify it before the enemy can react and a lot more what I didn´t think of.
Knowledge of units and strategies are pretty much necessities for even competing. Its mechanics, game sense and timing that really are the major factors in pro competition. Reducing the mechanical aspect is huge.
It seems to me that this is more of a "feel" issue than anything else.
Spamming off combinations and manipulating the redundant items are a big part of BW and it probably doesn't feel right to not have to do it. I'm sceptical as to how much skill it takes from the game though. Auto mining probably has a much larger effect than MBS.
Lets say your maxed in a pvz, your done teching, your done upgrading. All that's left is to macro out of your 20 gates and fight over resource locations. Now what if i could just hit 4z and make 20 zealots... macroing like reach. Now what am i supposed to do?... Micro?... But i'm not a war3 player. I don't just want to micro. I love macroing because i'm a true sc player. This wasn't some silly obstacle that had to be overcome with a better interface... it's an awesome feature that made sc so great.
Now lets take that a step further. Lets say z only needs this three unit combination on map A to beat a protoss. Meanwhile the protoss needs a 10 unit type combination to beat the zerg. Guess what happens:
here's how z will play:
4z5h6m
here's how p will play:
1m2h3y4s5z6c7q8o9l0n
obviously these hotkeys are made up as well as the scenario. The point is that races that may require only a few different types of units may have a WAY easier time macroing than the opposing race who needs to produce a more diverse unit base. The beauty of not having MBS is that it comes as a great equalizer regardless of how your macroing. You still have to make one action for every unit you wish to produce, regardless of how diverse the unit base is.
Again i don't really care if MBS is in sc2 as long as it's not in the multiplayer competitive scene.
On September 04 2007 05:58 XythOs wrote: Automining is just fine, Macro has to be reworked but not taken out completly.
I disagree, mostly because the fundamental point of an RTS like StarCraft is unit control. Removing the necessity of controlling the unit all other gameplay features is based off I find...ridiculously stupid.
On September 04 2007 06:11 NonY[rC] wrote: Oh and for the stubborn naysayers of MBS, I'd like to throw this idea out there...
The tell-tale sign of a bad macro player in BW is that he has too many units queued into his buildings. We all know it's much better to only have 1 unit queued at a time. But if MBS does anything for a player like that, it only screws him even worse, making it easier to queue multiple units in his buildings.
Oh and on the other topic... automining is much much more macro killing than MBS. I really really really don't want to see automining in SC2. The extra money a player receives for taking the time to tell his peons to mine is huge.
You've made some really good points.
When I stopped trying to compare the two (BW's system of macro and MBS) systems to figure out which is better, I realized that each is different, and has its own advantages and disadvantages.
It will stay take proper timing, like you said, to make the proper units at the right time. So, whether or not hitting one hotkey queues up one or 12 units isn't really important.
They at the very least need to eliminate one of the two features. Think about how much the combination takes out of the game. In BW, with 3 bases, every 30 seconds (whatever probe build time is), you have to press 00p, select probe, mine, 99p select probe, mine, 88p select probe, mine. That's a minimum of 15 clicks every 30 seconds to make a new probe from each expo and send the newly made ones mining. With MBS and automine, you press 0p, and the screen never pans away from whatever else you were doing. Automine without MBS at least requires you to pres 0p9p8p. It's not 15 clicks, but 6 is still some work to do considering its frequency. MBS WITHOUT automine actually makes it harder than it was in BW, because there's no easy way to center on each nexus to select the new probes (that I know of - I'm not sure if 00 centers on the 1st nexus, or the center of all your nexuses on the map). I'd be ok with one but not both. I'd rather have none, because I really don't think BW was too macro-intensive, and that's what made amazing micro battles that much more amazing.
EPT
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