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I've heard all sorts of complaints about the map pool in SC2. I never played Brood War, but people have told me that after a few years no one even bothered using Blizzard maps in tournaments.
Why is this?
Is there anything wrong with the current map pool compared to BW maps (the ones used later on)? Do SC2 maps need to be bigger?
How do you feel about the maps in SC2? What about their longevity as the game, players, and strategies begin to evolve?
Edit: Just realized I posted this in the Strategy section by accident. If a Mod moves this, thanks.
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Well from what I know Kespa had professional map makers in Korea and they would sit down and have all their pros play test the new maps to make sure they were up to snuff. The maps blizzard provided were just nowhere near the quality of maps produced by Kespa.
In Sc2 the majority of maps feel incredibly small and cramped. For example in steppes, you walk outside your natural, into a valley and BAM you're at his natural. Take a look at BW maps they had a sense of scale and balanced perfectly between making aggression and economic openings viable. With the exception of a few maps, LT and Metal come to mind most of the maps in the current ladder tend to favor aggression because the distance between the bases is just so small.
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look at the blizzard maps from sc1 and youll see why no one was using blizz maps
the current maps are mostly lackluster cause
- they are too small like overall size and number of expos (bad for Z, promotes 1-2base allin play and rushes) - too narrow which makes flanking very hard - have lotsa gimmicks like rocks,weird layouts,cliffs etc - are mostly heavily matchup imbalanced for various reasons depending on the map and matchup - spawn randomness/imbalances
blizz sadly doesnt even try to improve em outside of "lol add more rocks!". but i dont udnerstand their "yeah we know X isnt working so good/is imbalanced. lets wait 6 months till we maybe do something" approach anyways..
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Blizzard map makers tried to throw as many gimmicks into a single map as much as they could.
If you compare it to bw map "gimmicks" (destructible temple, backdoor min, min jumping, etc) bw maps only had 1 or 2 maybe per map.
New maps keep competition fresh and strategies changing, w3 and cs (and quake used to be) were held back by playing the same maps for years. I can't imagine PL playing LT, blood bath, and island maps today and for the last 12 years.
Being against new maps is kind of assbackwards thinking for sc2 development, especially if you think 'herpaderp iccup maps are bad because they arent tested.' Do you really think blizzard's sc2 maps were tested? (hint: obviously not if they're pulling their maps from their list)
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Blizzard incorporated lots of map gimmicks like cliffs above natural, backdoors into mains, etc because it was their stated goal to promote "clever play" Unfortunately, they failed to realize that instead of "clever play" it actually produces very predictable map abuse which ruins matchups.
They failed to learn from the lessons of brood war. At least there are actually naturals and usually 3rds, unlike some of the blizzard BW ladder maps.
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Now Blizzard has experience at map making. I think we will see blizzard's maps in tournaments for a long time.
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I remember Blizz saying that they wanted to make maps smaller so that there would be more action. This is certainly true as on some large custom maps I feel like I can just sit back and macro, plus scouting takes forever, I think they need more smart maps like metalopolis that have many expansions but aren't too cliffy and stupid like Delta Quadrant.
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