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| GRIFFITH'S MAGIC BOX |
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I've written an iterative script in the map editor that accurately and precisely determined the size of the magic box. Note that the mutalisk magic box is only a special case of the general property of magic boxes, so for the sake of clarity, the general magic box will be referred to as "Griffith's Magic Box".
As long as your units are within Griffith's Magic Box, they will move in formation, so long as they avoid tight choke points like ramps. A bit of note for attack move on the bottom.
The following values are accurate to 0.02 precision decimals for pure unit compositions:
Mutalisk, Medivac, Phoenix, Banshee: 6.480
Overlord: 5.980
Carriers: 5.401
Zerglings, Marines, High Templars, Ghosts, Banelings: 5.241
Zealots, Roaches, Sentries: 4.990
Marauder: 4.862
Stalkers : 4.742
Hellion: 4.380
Tanks: 4.241
For example, so long as your marines are within a 5.241x5.241 box they will always move in formation. To provide you with a feeling of how big the 5.241x5.241 box is:
http://i.imgur.com/VQm8h.png
Mixed unit groups are rather complicated to deal with with varying results, but in general, the mixed magic box inherit the size of the smallest pure unit magic box.
Implications:
The Key Crux of the magic box is that you no longer have to split units a million ways during the fight. Instead, you can preparing your splitting long before the fight by assigning the setup groups to hotkeys.
TvZ
The marine magic box can roughly fit ~10 marines that are spread out. Meaning it is MUCH MUCH easier to deal with banelings and fungal growths because you can split marines way ahead of time.
PvT
The HT and Sentry magic box provides ample room for to spread out sentries and HTs. This will make it much harder for ghosts to roffle-EMP an entire group of spellcasters.
ZvT
Spread banelings will prove to be extremely useful against siege tanks.
TvP
Hard to say. For bio based play it will make storms and colossi splash less effective.
About Attack Move
I you attack move - the instant an enemy is within attack range, you will lose formation and units will arrange in a formation to attack the units. You can avoid this by M - moving to the ideal point then either A-move or Stop.
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OMG HE INVENTED THE MAGIC BOX I HOPE TASTOSIS USES THE TERM "GRIFFITHING" TOMORROW!!!
User was warned for this post
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The use I'm seeing is when the opponent has infestors and you need to stim ahead a small bundle of units in order to kill the infestors so they can't fungal you while you're moving.
Not at home at the moment so I can't test this, but pre-emptive high-five if this works, I'll give it a try later.
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that's pretty cool. in bw the only magic box size distinction is whether the unit is air or ground
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Seems solid... need to test it out. FG, storm and splash damage come to mind where this can be useful.
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On February 22 2011 05:58 Toxi78 wrote:
OMG HE INVENTED THE MAGIC BOX I HOPE TASTOSIS USES THE TERM "GRIFFITHING" TOMORROW!!!
Are you really born in 78?
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Although just a tad egotistical to just name something that's been known (in general; for one unit) for awhile now, having the exact size of the box is pretty good information.
Do speed upgrades affect the size of the Magic Box (For zerglings/banelings)?
You give the numbers for pure unit combinations- is this because mixed unit comps don't work, or did you just not test them?
Does going on/coming off creep affect the Magic Boxing of zerg units? (I would think it would break it- but you're the one with the tester.)
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On February 22 2011 06:12 Keifru wrote:
Although just a tad egotistical to just name something that's been known (in general; for one unit) for awhile now, having the exact size of the box is pretty good information.
Do speed upgrades affect the size of the Magic Box (For zerglings/banelings)?
You give the numbers for pure unit combinations- is this because mixed unit comps don't work, or did you just not test them?
Speed upgrades have no effect. The box sizes seem to be a function of Movement - Radius property. Unit comps will generally inherit the smallest pure magic box size. But there were some weird exceptions where it averages (like 1 marauder and 3 marines)
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so you just split up your army into different hotkeys..?
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This is also pretty useful for making staggard lines of zerglings/marines to engage colossi- you can arrange them so that only one zergling takes the alpha strike- just set them up in a zig-zag pattern.
Hrm.
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Holy shit. This is quite interesting... could be very useful knowledge for the early game.
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On February 22 2011 06:17 Ponyo wrote:
so you just split up your army into different hotkeys..?
Yes, my key is set up so I have 4 groups (1-4) for army control
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OMG it actually works! This is huge! Bye bye tanks splashing my banes
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This may seem like a noob question. But how do you magic box? I'm a 3.3K+ masters Zerg and don't know how to oO lol
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On February 22 2011 06:25 Phee wrote:
This may seem like a noob question. But how do you magic box? I'm a 3.3K+ masters Zerg and don't know how to oO lol
With mutas you press hold pos.
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this is actually huge, to keep units spread on ground properly!
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Griffith's Magic Box™ should be used in conjunction with Griffith's 4OC Pressure Push™. That way, when you build Grififth's Marines™ you can completely decimate ling/baneling until you have enough factories to produce Griffith's Tanks™. Eventually, I think Griffith's Magic Box™, and really Griffith's ZvT Strategy™ in general will revolutionize Griffith's Starcraft 2™.
Edit: all joking aside this is actually a pretty cool find.
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On February 22 2011 06:29 OmNomSpy wrote:
Griffith's Magic Box™ should be used in conjunction with Griffith's 4OC Pressure Push™. That way, when you build Grififth's Marines™ you can completely decimate ling/baneling until you have enough factories to produce Griffith's Tanks™. Eventually, I think Griffith's Magic Box™, and really Griffith's ZvT Strategy™ in general will revolutionize Griffith's Starcraft 2™.
Edit: all joking aside this is actually a pretty cool find.
Haha couldn't resist could you?
Anyway, this only seems practical in the early stages of the game where unit counts are low and they can fit in the box.
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On February 22 2011 06:28 iChau wrote:Show nested quote +On February 22 2011 06:25 Phee wrote:
This may seem like a noob question. But how do you magic box? I'm a 3.3K+ masters Zerg and don't know how to oO lol With mutas you press hold pos.
And is the hold button used with all of the other units as well?
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EPT
