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Alright, I am going to need to go off on a bit of a rant here, because it seems there is a lot of misinformation about Protoss, the KA change, Colossi and their builds.
I play Protoss exclusively, watch streams, read strategies and keep a close eye on the pro-gaming scene. I have written a guide or two in my day, and I consider myself pretty well versed in the game.
First, I will get this out of the way before people start freaking out. I don't mind the KA change in the next patch. While I don't believe KA was too powerful, I DO think that it allowed the Protoss race to accomplish something that was probably unintended by the developers: It allowed them to directly convert Vespene Gas into damage on demand. There was little skill involved, and no race had an even comparable ability. I am not here to discuss the suggested change (+15 energy or increased regen speed, etc), but rather here to discuss an issue with the Protoss Race that the removal of KA will amplify.
The problem I refer to is, of course, the Colossus. The Colossus is considered by many to be OP, simply because of it's nature... it is an a-move unit that does incredible splash damage with minimal micro or baby-sitting. Compare it to it's old counterpart, the Reaver, that required babysitting with shuttles, it was vulnerable and was able to create some wonderful and creative plays.
It's ease of use and it's incredible power has brought it to the point where it is almost b-lined in just about every game. Virtually every game requires Colossi to be acquired relatively quickly, and to be pushed out for just about the whole game, while Stalkers and occasionally Zealots are used for no purpose other than to keep shots off the Colossi.
However Zealots and Stalkers themselves are good for little else in the late game. In SC1, Zealots and Goons were able to be used well into the late game, because they complemented each other so well. They were able to eat a lot of hits, as well as pack a punch of damage.
In SC2, Zealots and Stalkers alone are useless. Unless they have backup of Colossus, HT or sometimes Void Rays, they are nothing but cannon fodder, and melt to almost any force a person can throw at them. Stalkers were supposed to replace Dragoons, but they gave up some of the range and firepower in exchange for increased mobility; a factor that doesn't affect play in giant 'ball vs ball' games. Zealots were capable of packing a punch in BW, but in SC2, even with Charge, Zealots get obliterated by Hydras, Roaches, MM&M and Helions. before they can do any damage. Gateway builds are now obsolete, and require "hero" units, otherwise they get rolled all over.
Because these units are so damn weak, they require a unit that is so damn powerful to balance out the Protoss forces, and in almost all cases, this unit is the Colossus. This makes it difficult to nerf the Colossus.
So would it make sense to nerf the Colossus in exchange for Gateway unit buffs? Well no, as it turns out. Gateway units are tricky to buff for two reasons: 4 Gate and Force Field.
4 Gate is an extremely powerful build as it is, and so, any power increase to Zealots and Stalkers (no matter how small) could, and would, throw the build way out of balance.
Force Field makes Gateway units powerful enough in the early game (by blocking retreats and splitting armies) to survive. It would be extremely difficult for Protoss to manage in the early game without Sentries, and a buff to Gateway units could be too powerful. However Sentries and Force Field are not enough to swing Zealots and Stalkers into a position of power in the late game, unless they are backed up by Colossi or sometimes HT.
It would seem that the only way to buff Zealots and Stalkers would need to be through Charge and Blink. These two abilities in their current state are unable to provide Gateway builds with any significant firepower in the late game. Blink becomes used as a harass tool, and a way of allowing Stalkers to occasionally frontload some damage or take some extra hits, but Charge is difficult to use effectively as much more than a timing attack, because Zealots die so quickly to stim and roaches or hydras in the late game.
Since Zealots and Stalkers do such little damage, Colossi need to do so much. Since Cols do so much damage, they are weak and can't take many hits, and are vulnerable to air, but Stalkers are good at that, and hit air. These facts lead to a painful conclusion:
The Colossus/Stalker Death Ball. You can mix other things in it, like HT or Void Rays, but when it comes down to it, the Colossus and Stalkers are core... with Colossus being the bottom line.
This comes down to Protoss being imbalanced at different times in the game.
Early game (past the 4 gate) they tend to be too weak. They need to abuse Force Field on their ramps or block off retreat paths in order to defend, and rarely are they able to push.
But in the late game, they are rolling in T3 power, throwing the balance in the other direction, often making them too powerful.
This is of course, leading to a very important point... Options.
Since the Protoss Death Ball is so damn powerful, Protoss players are forced to use it in just about every game. Every build transitions to Colossus at some point so that the Death Ball can be acquired. This leads to predictable and boring games. Wouldn't it be nice to see some late game Protoss plays involving Carriers, Chargelot flanks, and Archon play, Rather than just Death Ball every time?
Another potential build that is often disregarded are Gateway centric builds. These involve Gateway units, including the HT. But there are problems with the build in general. I already mentioned how Zealots and Stalkers are weak in the mid-late game. While Charge and Blink increase this lifespan to a degree, they cannot be reliably used for long. This means that it is important to get HT and Storm/KA before Zealots and Stalkers begin to fail and FF stops being effective. This is a very small window at best, and leaves the Protoss vulnerable to timing attacks. Another issue with the Gateway build is that it lacks detection, forcing a Robotics Facility... and once you are there, you may as well go all the way and get Colossi.
The loss of KA makes this option even less desirable than it already was, pushing yet more people into the already overused Colossus builds. It seems what is happening more and more, is that Protoss are being forced to play the same game (or a very similar one) every time.
Terran and Zerg have several options into the late game that are used in a variety of ways and gotten in a variety of orders. Not all may be viable, but since Beta the game has shifted to and away from numerous builds, while the Protoss has simply evolved more efficient ways of using the exact same unit.
Zerg use: Roach-Hydra-Infestor, Ling-Baneling-Muta, Broodlord-Hydra, etc...
Terran can use: Bioball, Marine-tank, Marine-Mech, Heavy Mech, Heavy Air, etc...
Protoss can use: Stalker Colossus, Blink Stalker Colossus, Voidray Colossus, Colossus HT... All colossus centric, leading to a similar Death Ball.
I have a few suggestions. I won't go into too many specifics or numbers, because specifics tend to cause balance issues, and I am no mathematician, but plz, bear with me. I am more trying to get across the ideas, rather than the specific buffs.
1. Colossus Nerfed. Simple. I am not sure how this would be done exactly, but they should be changed in some way. The Protoss need to stop relying on it as the core of every single build. Potentially reducing their AoE (in beta [EDIT] Alpha [/edit], they used to do strong sustained single target damage.
2. Charge readjusted to allow Zealots to put out some firepower before dieing. My suggestion would be for Charging Zealots to get an armor bonus, or a chance for ranged units to miss them, and/or adding a substantial cleave to the first hit after charging. This would allow Zealots to reach their targets without getting melted. But more importantly, it would allow for a little AoE to exist before HT or Cols. This would add micro to the game on both sides (spreads and specific targets)
3. Observers come available from the Nexus upon the construction of Robotics Facility, Stargate or Twilight Council. Zerg and Terran access to mobile detection (scan and overseer) becomes available at T2 regardless of the build you choose. Observers coming from the Robotics Facility is similar to Zerg having Overseer upgrade available when you build a Spire. It is only available if you work with a specific tech tree. This reduces the ability to have "build order defeats", that arise simply because you chose to go for early blink when a cloaked Banshee flies into your base.
4. Force Field costs 75 Energy, but Sentries spawn with 75 energy. This would give force field a longer pseudo-cooldown, but doesn't prevent you from warping in a Sentry for emergency defense. It also makes Force Field require more thought to use effectively, and makes it so baiting force fields is more effective. It also allows for Guardian Shield to be used on an emergency summon to boost Zealot and Stalker performance on defense.
5. Give Carriers and Interceptors some base armor on their shields, and make it so Interceptors do not get trapped in Vortex. Carriers are rarely used, because they are vulnerable to focus fire and interceptors are weak enough to be picked off. If you compare them to the Battlecruiser, the Carrier's ONLY advantage is it's speed. If it had some armor on it's shields it would make Carriers slightly more appealing. Also, a Mothership with Carriers is risky, because if you Vortex anywhere nearby, ALL your interceptors could be sucked into the Vortex. This makes them nothing more than sitting ducks, and unable attack and to take advantage of your own Vortex.
Long, I know :S
Here are some basic points.
1. KA removal is necessary, but unpopular because it forces Protoss players into the already overused Colossus builds.
2. Protoss is balanced around UP gateway units and the OP Colossus, making them weak in early game and strong in late game.
3. Because of this, Protoss has very few options in late game play. Other builds have some problems that need addressing so we have more options.
Thoughts?
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I love everything about this post. It admits the nature of the Colossus, which I as a Protoss user am perfectly willing to admit is too strong, but is also truthful in pointing out that the Protoss army needs the Colossus in order to deal with many things, because past a certain army size, gateway units rapidly lose efficiency.
I particularly liked your suggestion for adding a bonus to Charge, either a defensive bonus after using it (damage reduction) or an offensive bonus (cleave).
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I agree with alot of what you said. But i think its still to early to make any of these bigger changes to the Protoss race. Lets atleast first have a month of patch 1.3, trying it out.
I know some fear that the Collosi will be used even more often then it already is, but I'm not sure about that since I've seen quite alot of other strategies lately.
One thing to note tho is that the 2 Forge Chronoboost build getting 2/2 and then attacking seems to be quite effective. Toss atleast has the ability to get upgrades the fastest going for them...
Sure Terran can go for 2 Ebays, but they can't chronoboost them out, making for a time window where the gateway units become much stronger against bio.
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It doesn't seem to me like it will be used any more or less because of the KA change. It's not like anyone was foregoing colossi for HT. Usually, HT's just came after the fact to help clear up some bioballs. Good suggestions, I like your #4 sentry suggestion very much as well.
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very interesting read and I agree with you on all points, but I don't know if the changes you suggest would really balance out protoss even still. All these new mechanics and units are so cool but damn do they introduce so many problems. Warping in units is a neat feature but because of it the gateway units have to suck. Colossi is a cool unit, can walk over cliffs and has two laser beams that deal splash yet it's safe to say that it has to be used in every match up. I really don't know what blizzard can do but they have to do something that's for sure.
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Agree with what you said, but thing is, I almost never use colossi except in PvP. Reason is I don't like colossi and I do robo build to throw off zerg to make corruptors. My core build, most of the time, is blink+HT+immortal.
By removing KA, it pretty much kills my build, which requires a bit skill (Blinking, target firing roaches with immortal and HT storm. This upgrade is making me switch to colossi build ...
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Here is my problem with Colossus:
PvP: Stalker + Colossus death ball. War of the Worlds, Col vs Col. Yeah you can 4gate, yea you can get Blink or Void Rays, but almost invariably PvP turns into Col vs Col, best position wins. Forcefield means nothing here.
PvZ: Stalker + Colossus death ball. You can add Void Rays, or try to use Templar, but skipping Colossus (vs any ground-based build) is borderline suicidal. You can hold off with Gateway units for a while, but eventually the Zerg is able to produce so much stuff that you NEED the Col to deal with it!
PvT: Stalker + Colossus death ball. You can add in HT, maybe, in the late game. Maybe. But in the meantime, you need to get Colossus to hold off any bio push that comes before the 15 minute mark. Sure you can use Sentries to buy your Gateway army some time, but as soon as Medivacs are out, you better have Col ready to even the score.
So that means in all 3 match-ups, Protoss is looking to get the exact same army, which makes for bland and boring game play, both for the player and potential viewers.
The removal of KA, however justified, just furthers this issue. Playing BW for a while got me into the habit of keeping and HT or 2 at each expansion vs Zerg. It was a different dynamic then, but I certainly felt like bringing HTs with my army wasn't such a damn hindrance. In SC2, with the oh-so-common ball vs ball army fights, you can seriously give yourself a handicap trying to move your army and protect HT at the same time.
What KA offers right now is the ability to replace an expensive unit and get use out of it. Templars aren't durable, they don't regen energy any faster than other casters, and really are the kamakazis of the Protoss arsenal. You can morph them after use (or EMP), but at least for me, they tend to get merked while morphing before the Archon can do anything.
I'm sure players will adapt and find ways to make HT more usable, but the burden of protecting them is the real problem here. Compared to the other choice (Colossus), it's a no-brainer.
TL;DR:
Protoss is pigeon-holed into pretty much 1 build, in all match-ups.
Suggestions:
- Make Psi Storm deal bonus damage to Shields (PvP buff!)
- Decrease the morph time of Archons
- Make Warp Prisms more durable so that you can use them all game to set up flanks with Zealots, warp in Sentries to cut off retreats etc
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I try to stay as far as I can from a death ball, I have tried many things , dropping, gateway double forge and it is never enough.. I have tried phoenix play into zealot charge lifting there most dmging units... it forces me to go colossi no matter wat I want to do. I agree 100% with this post... maybe even buffing our upgrades just a lil so our units dont die so damn fast to stim / hydra and make the double forge a bit more useful so we can use our gateway units in late game. I dont know the nexus idea building the obs is a good idea I like that.
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On March 14 2011 16:45 Zanez.smarty wrote:
3. Observers come available from the Nexus upon the construction of Robotics Facility, Stargate or Twilight Council. Zerg and Terran access to mobile detection (scan and overseer) becomes available at T2 regardless of the build you choose. Observers coming from the Robotics Facility is similar to Zerg having Overseer upgrade available when you build a Spire. It is only available if you work with a specific tech tree. This reduces the ability to have "build order defeats", that arise simply because you chose to go for early blink when a cloaked Banshee flies into your base.
Thoughts?
I agree that this is something BLizzard should think about. I made a post solely about this problem back in the days the Terrans did nothing but rush cloaked banshees. It really narrows your BO when you always have to put that robo first no matter what.
I think you should also address the pheonix. It is a very strong harass unit and should get a nerf somewhere, but in the same time a small buff to balance it out again. Maybe 50% less damage on lifted units and a hp buff?
Or lifting costs more energy... I don't know.
But the pheonix is going to break the game soon, I have this feeling.
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Rather than adding in entirely new effects on charge/blink, there is another possible way to make gateway units better later on in the game: make weapon/armour upgrades have a larger effect on them. Current 3/x zealots do 22 damage per attack. Zealots with 8+2(x2) damage would be dealing 28, making them substantially scarier. Stalkers with 3/x upgrades at the moment do 13 damage (17 vs armoured). With, say, 10+2 damage and 4+1 bonus damage vs. armoured, they would do 16 (23 vs armoured). Armour upgrades are tricker to handle, since giving +2 armour per up would be kinda ridiculous (especially on units that already have base armour), but perhaps they could gain a slight HP buff with each upgrade, like that Protoss tech you can get in the campaign. It'd go against the standard weapon/armour upgrade system, but Starcraft races have always been asymmetrical. The only problem I can see occuring from this would be some nasty +x/+y timing pushes, using chronoboost to get out what would currently be 2/2 units very early on in the game, but numbers can be fiddled with if those end up being overpowered.
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As a Protoss player, I agree with most if not all of the Original Post. I think Colosus are the real problem with every match up for Protoss for the exact reasons you stated. On the 5 suggestions in particular:
1) I think Colossi should still retain their splash impact, as they are one of only two (HT) splash-attackers for the Protoss. However reducing perhaps the AoE (so damages less targets at a time at max range) might be a good way to nerf. I do agree with it needing some sort of slight debuff.
2) The guarenteed hit on charge I think will be a useful buff. What I would prefer to see honestly is for charge to be as useful in retreat as it is in attack. That way it might encourage protoss to branch off a collection of stalkers and zealots as a small attacking force in the same way marine + maruder break off as a small force to do damage.
3) This I like. Even if I go stargate builds, I tend to add in a robo because I find the observer essential. Trying to work with hallucionation more, but the observer is so useful. Still, perhaps not a necessary change?
4) I think perhaps a Sentry energy upgrade for +25 would be nice. It would be a worthwhile investment, almost regardless of cost. I think they are the only spellcaster in the game (well now HT as well) without a +25 energy upgrade? Correct me if I'm mistaken...
5) I think the carriers might be fine to be honest. Do like the "interceptors dont get caught in vortex" concept at least, but don't particularly think the armour is a necessity. As it is there is a certain mass of carriers that becomes very difficult to break, but I think carrier builds are often overlooked due to the combination of build time and power of void rays.
But yes, agree with Original Post. Some sort of update to the internal balance of the protoss tech tree would be good with actual particular focus on the collosus.
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I'm not sure your suggestions would balance out. Even with a(nother) buff to charge, nerfing forcefields and colossus would be pretty devestating.
The forcefield buff would weaken protoss ability to hold ramps in the early game and severely weaken the ability to hold the usual timing attacks that could hit when protoss wants to get up their expansion. I can't imagine holding my expansion against an aggressive zerg or terran if each sentry was limited to two forcefields. Further it would weaken the ability of protoss to move out on the map all game long. This is a huge problem a lot of players already have, particularly against zerg.
Any colossus nerf would leave protoss effectively dealing too little damage. And with your suggested forcefield nerf it would be a tall order to win any engagement in a reasonable manner. Colossi deal damage fast and they die fast. Colossus-based armies are already extremely vulnerable to mass-marauder/mass roach armies.
The fact of the matter is the 'deathballs' that protoss get up against zerg and terran are basically one of the only ways to fight cost-effectively against swarms of ling/roach/hydra or MMM. You simply can't engage with a decent ball of enemy units without it. Especially against zerg who is probably the only of the two races who is actually having any issues with it (if terrans are bored of playing against colossus believe me I am extremely frustrated about always playing MMM), but the matchup requires that protoss have better synergies at higher supply to be balanced as long as protoss is stuck with a) weak initital armies, b) a weaker economy c) the most gas heavy army.
Obviously there are issues. Issues at lower supply where protoss is having troubles and issues in 200/200 battles where protoss unit retention is too good. But the solutions are not outlined in this thread IMO. Its a far more complicated problem thanks to warpgates and forcefields necessitating weak yet expensive gateway units.
The proposed carrier change would be welcome against terran, but would require an unreasonable buff to be worthwhile against zerg (where corruptors are incredibly good counters).
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Nice ideas, but making so many changes at this stage of the game's life (we're what, half way to HoTS now?) is too late, and would be too punishing on Protoss players who would essentially need to relearn how to play the race [even if the result ends up more balanced, it's a disadvantage for months].
I think, keep it simple. Make upgrades more powerful for Gateway units, and make them less powerful for the colossus. If zealots got say +2 (stalkers maybe even +3) per upgrade instead of +1, and colossus got +1 instead of +2, and maybe a health and/or shield size upgrade for zealots, and even a +1 range upgrade to stalkers, and they'd become stronger in the mid/late game without strengthening the 4 gate. To ensure the stalker doesn't get too powerful, maybe double the cooldown time on blink.
Maybe an archon buff too, if the goal is to make all three trees equally represented. And yep, do something about the carrier! It's not that it's "weak", but it just takes forever to build and, once there, it's got no micro options. It's really hard to look at the carrier and choose it over pumping more colossi, regardless of what the opponent composition is.
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Some valid points are made in the OP, but under the assumption that colossi are necessary. In my opinion, this is only true once the game gets into the >2 bases or 200/200 army phase. Protoss has so many viable options early game and mid-game that players opt to cast aside beside they feel like they'll eventually want to tech to colossi for the deathball. I've seen plenty of deadly early builds (that aren't 4 gates) involving an early stargate for phoenix/voids (equally effective), or tossing in some immortals (mainly vZ or vP) to tank sick damage.
tl;dr: There are numerous other builds that a protoss can implement that are just as deadly as the late game deathball (that aren't 4gate). This still doesn't address the KA issue, but let's not skip ahead to late-game-only theory and say that colossi are an absolute necessity in every matchup.
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I do agree that the current Protoss is a stale race. All games will usually end up in a Stalker/Sentry/Colossus death ball with some void rays added in later.
Protoss T1 units are not strong by themselves. Zealots are slow and can be kited by ranged units. They hit decently hard for their cost but the fact that they are melee makes them hard to actually hit things until charge. And by the time you have charge your zealots will get a couple hits off before melting away to the opponent's huge army. Stalkers are fast but they have one of the worst dps in the game.
Protoss is balanced mainly around Force Fields. Good force fields can split up armies, cut off retreat paths so the Zealots can wail at their enemies (although while splitting an army such as roaches or marines, the zealots can still be shot and are killed anyway), and block chokes so reinforcements cannot come to help.
Protoss T1 work well in a small, balanced force of zeal/stalker/sentries, such as 4 gate or 3 gate pressure. Later in the game, with the huge balls of units they face, they do not even get the chance to do damage. Zealots are built just to die and Stalkers do not deal damage fast enough. Against terran who go heavy bio or zerg, they have no way to deal with mass numbers other than colossi or templar. People generally go Colossi because they are easy to use, they do a lot of damage, and are hard to kill once you get the range. Only when enemies make their anti-air (Vikings/Corruptors/Void Rays) do Protoss switch to adding in some High Templar. Heavy Stargate play like Carriers or Void Rays see little play because of their inability to area of effect damage.
Going back to T1, adding buffs or nerfs to them is tricky, because as mentioned, they work differently in early game with 4 gate than late game, plus they are still dependant on sentries to be effective. As Ezekyle mentioned, you can tinker with upgrades to make them more effective late game. Stalkers only get 1 point per upgrade which is the worst scaling of any unit. Giving them 1 point (+1 armored) would help them survive later game against things they supposedly are effective against like Roaches and other armored units.
Colossi are difficult to touch because Protoss are so heavily reliant on them to survive. Give them too big a nerf and Protoss will get run over by masses of t1 units. Buff them too much and Protoss will be too strong. I imagine developers are scared to do anything with them for this reason. I would like to see other tech trees given the attention they deserve and Protoss not pigeon-hold into going Robotics facility every matchup.
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I've seen somes protoss use a stalker immortal templars mix against Z pretty effectively, and stargate build ain't bad either. ( even if VoidRay are like the second lamest unit in the game after colossus =d )
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Italy12246 Posts
That is exactly what i think about p, well written (plat p). While we are there, i would also add "make archons massive" in the potential changes.
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Gateway units are good enough, what exactly is wrong about them ?
Stalker get demolished by marauders, but gateway + forcefield can take a heavy bio army.
The only thing I see is that zealot just lack some HP and die too fast late game.
And I don't think the Colossi needs a nerf, but it needs to change drastically. The whole unit design is flawed : a unit that negate any ground unit and that get hard countered by any flying unit.
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On March 14 2011 18:34 Noocta wrote:
I've seen somes protoss use a stalker immortal templars mix against Z pretty effectively, and stargate build ain't bad either. ( even if VoidRay are like the second lamest unit in the game after colossus =d )
Templar builds will become non-existent after the KA removal.
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So the problem is that massed gateway units become really inefficient really fast, as compared to say MMM or Roaches. You could buff the gateway units in the lategame somehow, but then I'm perfectly fine with protoss being a race more oriented toward higher tech as opposed to powerful basic units.
If you don't buff the gateway units then it looks like the best (if not easiest) option is trying to balance each tech path. That way you can go robotics and have observers, drop options, immortals and then ultimately your big splashy "power" unit in colossus. If you go twilight council you get mass upgrades for your gateway units, dark templar harass options and high templar as your "power" unit. If you go Stargate you get the option of phoenix harass, void rays, and ultimately carriers as your "power" unit.
Now people obviously still do get things like twilight council for upgrades and stargates for phoenix and void rays but ultimately you need a solid DPS unit to back-up your zealot/stalkers and these are colossi, high templar and carriers. Carriers straight up suck since, while strong, they're insanely expensive and take 2 minutes each. High Templar were getting popular in PvT but as soon as that happened they got whacked with a nerf, meaning while still useful they'll never overtake the colossus.
So after all is said and done why wouldn't you choose to build colossi every time? you need to back up your gateway units and it simply does it far better than anything else you can. Perhaps we buff gateways late-game so they don't need the help, maybe the answer is a direct buff to carriers, maybe its a direct nerf to colossi and just force protoss to play as the underpowered race for a while until we adapt (hell, zergs served their time, albeit with a fair bit of whining  ).
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EPT
