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To begin, I owe susySquark and his article "The Warp Mechanic and How It Broke Protoss" an acknowledgement: this was originally intended to be a post in that thread, but it grew into a much larger beast than that thread had room for.
PLEASE READ THIS THREAD FIRST
Here is the link:
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=263636
Allow me to argue my case. It will be long. There is no TLDR. I want people to read and understand. That is why it is long, and why I want you to read both threads. I have no doubt most will consider this too long and too dry to bother reading to its conclusion, and it will therefore die a quick death, but since I've already written it, I may as well post it.
Apologia: If a mod is reading this and they find it offensive, please close it. I personally believe that the balance aspect of this thread is merely pedestrian to the larger goal, which attempts to briefly explain my own design philosophy and what I think blizzard ought to work on. It also discusses flaws with suggestions that I see around all the time and attempts to discredit them. I realize that my original purpose, which has shifted several times, may have been enveloped by something close to a balance discussion, but that is not its intent.
Im glad someone decided to write a small article on this troubling mechanic from a design point of view. However, I found the amount of rash suggestions in that thread disturbing, and so I want to address some of them. In order to do so, I had to touch on other things.
Design, Balance and Warpgates
My original point was to pick apart bad suggestions for fixes, to debunk suggestions thrown around on the forums all too frequently and repeated in threads all the time. Then I realized that to do that, I had to explain how I felt about design and balance. Then I wanted to suggest what I thought were good ideas based on those beliefs. Now it is something much larger and more intimidating than I wanted it to be.
My purpose can be summarized as this:
1) To remind people that design influences balance, and that something may be balanced, though not well designed. Balance often takes precedence to design on these forums and its a problem.
2) To give my own conception of design and balance
3) To specifically apply them to warpgates, and what their problems are
4) To discredit bad ideas and suggest what I think are better ideas. More than anything, I want my discussion of design and balance to take paramount importance in the discussion. My specific "fixes" are not meant to be the final word on the subject.
Design and Balance
Most people in threads like this one and susySquark's automatically interpret them as a balance discussion, which it is, but only secondarily. Primarily, it is discussing the design of the warp gate mechanic. As the OP says, this mechanic is flawed, a realization that has been steadily growing within at least part of the community since SC2 beta, but which has suddenly emerged again as a result of poor Protoss performance. The design aspect of SC2 has often been overlooked, in my opinion, due to the constant question of balance.
I want to briefly differentiate between balance and design. A unit may be balanced, though it is poorly designed. If we look at something like the immortal as it is now (before the range buff in the upcoming patch), it is arguably quite balanced and no one really complains about it. It certainly is quite useful. But look at its range: 5 is less than 6, and since it is slower than the stalker, it gets caught behind, making it ineffective as both a tank (intended role), and a damage-dealer (actual role).
I just want to state my view that the game is fairly well balanced and will remain so as long as blizzard continues to patch, but its design, across the board, is weak. I personally attribute this to the huge amount of time and energy spent by blizzard on making only modestly elegant changes to various things. When something is broken, you fix it, but these fixes often do not have only the intended effect, no matter how careful the balance team studies it. I don't really have any data or anything to substantiate this claim, but I have the feeling that Blizzard as done an admirable job of creating balance through shear force of time and resources rather than studied ingenuity.
I know most first time SC2 players wont like this comparison, but if we look at Brood War, specifically the interactions between the first 6 fighting units, we notice that none have special abilities (besides stim and burrow).
Fast-forward to SC2 and zealots have charge, stalkers have blink, roaches have regeneration, marauders have conc shells, and zerg and terran still have burrow and stim. Whether this is "good" or "bad" we can debate, but i think that the simplicity of differentiating the units by size, range, attack speed/power, health, speed, cost and timing is a lot more subtle than admitting the numerous complicating x-factors introduced by individual abilities. The units are different and feel different, not because of an iconic ability, but by how they interact with one another through the same basic features. SC2 has this too, to a lesser extent than Broodwar, I would say, but the abilities really complicate these interactions too.
But let's not get bogged down here, that's just my opinion.
General Assumptions and Beliefs:
1) We assume the one with the least secondary effects will be best, in all parts of the game
2) We assume that the best fixes preserve the health of the rest of the game, not necessitating later hotfixes
3) We assume that the fix preserves and/or enables diversity of strategy while still remaining entertaining.
We have no interest in applying band-aids: we want a fix that will open the game up, preserving as many changes within the game as possible, but also allowing inchoate aspects to suddenly flourish: relationships and mechanics that previously existed in some intangible, potential or unrecognized form, but an aspect that players can now experiment with and develop. We seek to preserve the strengths of the game’s current interactions while also enriching them, or even creating new ones.
Neither should we be afraid of sweeping changes, even ones that require complete rebalancing. We ought to do what is best for the long-term stability of the game, and also more importantly, its future development.
The problem of the Warpgate Mechanic
The warpgate mechanic is flawed and it ought to be fixed. More specifically, it ought to have been fixed in alpha, or at least beta, had blizzard been doing their job properly. But it was not. I don't want that to sound like I'm blaming them, but I do want to put the point on the table: blizzard did not think this one through very well.
Now we are in a situation where people dont really know what the process will be: do they patch it directly? Patch many things all at once? Patch something that counters it? Wait until an expansion to seriously rework it? Ideally, an elegant fix would be best: a simple patch, well tested, that will solve the problem and the problem alone, without introducing others. However, it is possible something more radical may be needed: a redesign.
What do I specifically dislike about warpgates? Why do I think they are poorly designed?
Well, I agree with many points raised in the thread that I linked at the start:
1) How cheap it is vs how powerful it is
2) How it negates the need for gateways (but theres still an option to switch back)
3) How long it takes due to various nerfs
4) How it gives you two effective production cycles of units for one, allowing very powerful pushes (the article talks about this more)
5) How early it comes (early game is the most volatile part)
I will now attempt to explain myself.
1) Warpgate is too early in the game. By pushing it back, we can diminish some of the powerful early game pushes that happen because there is a lack of support units for the other team. If you give the other player a chance to get, for example, medevacs/vikings, mutas or colossi out, warpgate pushes are suddenly a lot less scary, just by changing the timing. This is what Blizzard has been trying to do by increasing the research time. Ive made this point a lot, but I should reiterate: warpgate hits at a particularly vulnerable part of the game.
2) Eliminates the need for gateways. The problem that particularly stands out to me here is that while some people insist that blizzard designed the game with the expectation that warpgates replace gateways, the troubling fact remains that warpgates are still allowed to switch back. If this is undesired, why is it still there? Blizzard has said that they are fine with some units not being used (akin to the scout in BW), but this is not a useless unit: it is a useless building, which is different because while there may be certain situations in which "useless" units, like the BW queen can be used to good effect, this has no utility whatsoever after warpgate research.
But why is this? Well, it is because warpgates are literally better in every way than gateways.
a) They give you the ability to turn minerals into units immediately
b) They do it faster overall, too (the cooldown + warp in time is still faster than a gateway)
c) They allow you to reinforce anywhere on the map, instantly, as long as there is a pylon there (pylons are cheap and build quickly)
d) There is no cost (besides a brief transformation) for transforming individual gateways into warpgates
Why is this a bad thing? Because it eliminates a fundamental aspect of RTS, which is rush distance/travel time. It was exceptionally bold to include this mechanic for that reason alone, not even taking into account the instantaneous nature of it and the buildtime discount. The fact that one race can instantly get reinforcements on the battlefield really influences the rest of the design of the game.
When you consider too the variety of units that can do this (two are basic warriors, one is a cloaked assassin with huge attack, and another is a frail caster with the ability to deal massive AoE damage or instakill other casters), the problems are compounded. You have to ensure that the base units arent so strong that instant reinforcements will overrun the enemy easily, that the cloaked assassin cannot appear *anywhere* too early or for too little cost, and that warp-in storms are not too powerful (which they probably were, but IMO, KA removal was a rushed decision).
In addition, the upgrade itself is cheap (50m/50g) and only really serves to make it so that it isn't present from the beginning of the game. This upgrade should objectively (as probably the best upgrade in the game) be harder to research. If you had never played this game, and I told you the points above, and then I told you the cost/accessibility of the upgrade, you would likely be skeptical and demand to know the downside.
3) With 2) in mind, we have to consider the effect on the rest of the race. Feel free to disagree here, but gateway armies have a lot of trouble engaging similar armies of Z and T at equal cost. Protoss really does rely on their forcefields and AoE to survive and come out evenly. This is the "deathball effect" and I dont really want to talk about it too much. Protoss tends to be very strong when they can get a good amount of sentries, templar/archons/voidrays and colossi supporting a big zealot/stalker ball. It is the powerful lategame units that allow the protoss to strike fear into the hearts of their adversaries, not the gateway units.
The commonly suggested Gateway/Warpgate split allows racial variety in that protoss will still have the ability to make strong pushes, but their overall production will be slowed down if they do so, whereas an all-gateway player will have faster unit producing structures, but will have to walk across the map. There is a lot of potential with this idea: warpgates dont necessarily have to be "second class citizens" to gateways; it would be better for them to be equally good, but for different situations, so that the player has a real and difficult choice to make. That is at the heart of a good macro mechanic, IMO.
Whatever the situation turns out to be, I will suggest what I think are beneficial changes because I value constructive criticism, but first I would like to address some points that I see tossed around too much and with too little thought.
Popular Ideas, Flawed Ideas
It doesnt make sense to heal one part of the game at the expense of others and likewise, it doesnt make sense to suggest blatantly flawed and needlessly complex design changes. I realize that some people will likely call me a hypocrite at this point because I am going to do exactly what I am railing against, but I think the real sin is parroting some idea without considering its effects at all, which many people do. I am aware that the ideas I suggest are flawed, and I am making this thread partly to unravel those flaws, but also to try and argue against some of the more popular ideas that have gained momentum despite their flaws.
1) Change the Warp gate mechanic so that warp in time (or cooldown or whatever) depends on distance from x (nexus, warpgate, whatever)
I really despise all variations of this idea. For starters, its inelegant. For this argument, I am going to assume that simpler changes are better, assuming they get the job done just as well as more complicated changes.
It requires some unintuitive tinkering to implement this fix: we should consider some changes.
a) How is this determined? By land distance? By air distance (straight line)? By hexes? By time it would take the unit to travel there?
b) More importantly, how does the player take this into account? Can it be easily calculated? Can a relatively new player understand this change and account for its effects?
c) This change takes options away from the player. Assuming you can't warp into their base immediately, why is warpgate even necessary at this time?
2) Change Pylons, either by making them lose shields, or be more expensive, or unable to warp units to them, or replacing them with something more expensive, or only allowing warp in to go to warp prisms etc etc.
The game has 2 units that provide power: this is simple and elegant. The interaction between warp prism and pylon is somewhat flawed, I would say, but that is not really important here. Creating a "dark pylon" that enables warp ins but is higher up the tech tree is not only inelegant, but unnecessary, since again, as in part c above, it takes options away from the player. One of the best parts of warp in is its flexibility and availability, and making it more expensive/time intensive/etc in this way is not simple or necessary. Making it so that you cannot warp in near enemy pylon power is also needlessly complicated.
3) Shield battery. While a nice idea, and certainly useful, my main problem with this idea is that it requires a new building, or at least ability. This is not at all elegant or simple and will cause numerous headaches based on calculation, possible interaction with chronoboost, and balance.
Suggestions, Ideas, Constructive Criticism
Let us turn our attention to what I consider good suggestions, but ones that we should explore more deeply.
Some changes will be too specific and will be easily picked apart. Some will be general. They are not meant to be a final draft of the changes I see necessary. They will, however, illustrate my own personal beliefs more specifically than if I had just tried to explain my thoughts without examples.
I do not attempt to trace all of these suggestions to their full conclusions, which would likely require a complete rework of the game. I think that is what it may need, but it is not my intent to enter that territory. compensation is assumed. I don't want to redesign the race myself (I am not blizzard, they wont listen to me anyways), hence why I did not get into that. I am not suggesting breaking the Protoss race (why bother even thinking Im saying that?)
We have to know what to fix first before we suggest changes. My suggestions are very general and not at all meant to be comprehensive or final in any way. I am suggesting ways of thinking about the problem, ones that I find useful and instructive instead of rashly thought out. As it turns out, I think this mechanic needs a major overhaul, which is why it looks like I'm tearing the walls down, but sometimes, it is best to start over from scratch, keeping as many positive aspects as you can (warpgate has several).
Its not really possible to know for sure how to redesign stuff after you make one change because it would require redesign/rebalancing on many many other things, perhaps of the entire game. It probably sounds more dramatic than it is: they are releasing two expansions, so there is an opportunity for radical change if that is what they want. I think it is easier to say what is a generally bad idea, and then try to come up with better ideas.
1) Timing is critical
What I mean by this is that when warpgates come out is essential. Because warpgates allow a player to not only effectively get two production cycles in one (after the research finishes, your gateway cycle ends, you switch to warpgates, you warp in instantly), but also allow instant reinforcements.
Changing the timing of the warpgate research is something to be considered: if you allowed it to come out at a later tech, it would allow more opportunities to stop it. This is actually what Blizzard has been trying to do by increasing the warp in research time repeatedly, but I would argue that it has been ineffective. They are walking a fine line between making it early enough to be interesting to casuals, while also long enough to be balanced. They need to do something different.
a) What they could consider is actually increasing the warp in upgrade research cost, but keeping it in the same tech location. There is no reason for this ability to be so cheap for what it does.
b) Another option is preserving its position on the cyber core, but only allowing it to unlock after a robo, twilight or stargate is built. This is somewhat inelegant, but I consider it more elegant than making the research time ridiculously long, but ridiculously cheap as it is now. By doing this, you enable a certain amount of variability with robo/SG/TC timings, and especially when combined with chronoboost, but you don’t restrict it to a certain tech branch (putting it on the twilight council, for example)
By increasing the time or cost of the warpgate research, you allow more units and more types of units to be out and able to defend. It also increases the ability of pressure to cripple the protoss who doesn’t scout properly. By taking it out of the early game, you are making it simpler to balance because you don’t have to worry as much about it landing a fatal blow too early, but you are also allowing it some versatility in when it can come into effect by not delaying it too much.
2) Warpgates vs Gateways
This is such an obvious mechanic I was shocked when they didn’t include it. There ought to be some kind of interaction between these two structures. Whether that be delaying warpgate tech to make gateways more valuable early game, or allowing for some strategies/reasons for shifting between them, the gateway is a totally useless building after warpgate research, which is terrible design.
Some examples of changes:
a) Make the warpgate cooldown longer and keep the warp-in time the same (5 sec), while keeping the gateway build-times the same
This allows gateways to be the most efficient way of producing units, (less clicks, but also faster in terms of build time) although they still have to walk to their locations. It means that an all-gateway player will always out-macro an all-warpgate player. But the a player with warpgates may be able to out-maneuver his opponent, or administer surgical strikes with a few warpgates while still macroing. It may also lead to delicate calculations about where the proxy pylon has to be in order for the bonus from warpgate to be beneficial and may provide an advantage on specific maps (large, lots of cliffs, etc).
b) Allow the switch from warpgates to gateways and vice-versa to be chrono-boosted, providing an opportunity for a player to differentiate his strategy based on his expenditure of chronoboosts. This will also add a useful element late-game.
c) Increase the time it takes for units to materialize on the battlefield, but keep the overall build time the same.
This allows the enemy greater opportunity to snipe your units as they warp in, providing a clearer defender’s advantage. It also makes scouting and micro more rewarding. This can be combined with any change that increases vulnerability (units take more damage, units have no shields, etc). By increasing the individual units’ vulnerability, gateways suddenly look better: your units aren’t as at risk while building.
Something that goes hand-in-hand with this change is the idea that chronoboost may be used on a warpgate to increase warp-in time, but not cooldown time, giving a player the chance of making their units less vulnerable.
d) This is along the same lines as c), but more extreme: cause the warpgate to not only lose its cooldown, but the player to lose some % of the units’ cost when the pylon warping them in is destroyed. This really punishes the player for messing up and may not be the best choice.
Conclusion:
Primarily, I wanted to address the misconception that people have, which is that balance matters more than balance. I want to draw people's attention to this fact of forum life. The fact that I have to defend this against those who perceive it as a balance whine thread attests to that poisonous mindset. My discussion of design and balance is meant to guide us as we discuss warpgates specifically.
The problems with Warpgate are many and far-reaching and I think that susySquark's article does a great job of explaining some of them. The real question is if blizzard addresses the real issue, and if they do, how they ultimately go about doing it. I am arguing for a solution that elegantly fixes the real problem instead of aggressively patching the perceived problem and causing damage to the rest of the game as a result. It doesn’t surprise me that the 1-1-1 came to prominence after the warpgate nerf: a clear example of a seemingly disastrous and unforeseen effect of one single change. Consider the numerous patches and all the other unintended changes introduced with each patch note. Ideally, a simple, elegant solution can be found (so far, various patches have been ineffective). The real question is, if not, is a more serious redesign necessary?
By really considering and following the best course of action for the game as a whole, you will undoubtedly cause a mess, but no more of a mess than what you will eventually end up with as a result of poorly thought-out patches. A temporary redesign period/beta/PTR in which balance is suspect is better than a game that will forever be flawed because it was patched too much, too quickly and with too little consideration for the health of the game design.
Edited OP with material to clarify my points. I fear it only made it longer 
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I don't know why these threads keep flaring up, but let me tell you something as a Master Protoss. Removing warpgate from the race would break us completely. You should say goodbye to any of our timings, because our ONLY and I repeat: ONLY offensive abilities early game come from forcefields, and our TIMELY reinforcements.
Making any more changes to the offensive capabilities of Protoss warpins would break not only PvP and the entire dynamic of the matchup, but also neuter us offensively versus all the races. There is a reason why Terrans don't really reinforce when doing something like a 2 medivac timing, because if they could reinforce instantly, their cost effectiveness would spiral COMPLETELY out of control. Theres a reason Zerg don't get warpins, because the race uses the larvae mechanic and creep spread for almost instantaneous reinforcement anyway.
If Protoss was to be nerfed in this fashion it would render 3 gate pressure and 4 gate rushes nonviable. As well as timings such as the 5 gate pressure off 2 bases versus Zerg as well as the 6gate. Any kind of early game pressure would be impossible. Essentially what I'm getting at is that ANY change to the offensive capabilities of Protoss would mean a completely disastrous metagame shift, we would be come the turtle race, because we were forced to, and we simply do not have the units and structures to do so.
The fact that the gateway is useless after warpgate is researched isn't a design flaw. Its the way our race works. You can't compare apples and oranges, every race is different, and I am absolutely STUNNED that posts like this are surfacing (and flourishing) in a time when Protoss is doing terribly.
All in all, nerfing warpgate and thereby Protoss is not the answer. There is nothing wrong with the mechanic, as it is a staple of the mechanics of our race. I would love to hear more specific criticism as to why it is actually overpowered (like what rush, for example). In my opinion, it is the only thing that makes Protoss even close to balanced.
Also a quick note: I say "remove" in the first part of this post. Let me clarify that. ANY change. I say again. ANY nerf to the warpgate mechanic will render the fragile Protoss early game units and timings impossible to use and execute, respectively. Warpgate doesn't have to be removed to destroy our race, it just has to be nerfed to destroy our race.
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On September 09 2011 10:47 xlava wrote:
I don't know why these threads keep flaring up, but let me tell you something as a Master Protoss. Removing warpgate from the race would break us completely. You should say goodbye to any of our timings, because our ONLY and I repeat: ONLY offensive abilities early game come from forcefields, and our TIMELY reinforcements.
Making any more changes to the offensive capabilities of Protoss warpins would break not only PvP and the entire dynamic of the matchup, but also neuter us offensively versus all the races. There is a reason why Terrans don't really reinforce when doing something like a 2 medivac timing, because if they could reinforce instantly, their cost effectiveness would spiral COMPLETELY out of control. Theres a reason Zerg don't get warpins, because the race uses the larvae mechanic and creep spread for almost instantaneous reinforcement anyway.
If Protoss was to be nerfed in this fashion it would render 3 gate pressure and 4 gate rushes nonviable. As well as timings such as the 5 gate pressure off 2 bases versus Zerg as well as the 6gate. Any kind of early game pressure would be impossible. Essentially what I'm getting at is that ANY change to the offensive capabilities of Protoss would mean a completely disastrous metagame shift, we would be come the turtle race, because we were forced to, and we simply do not have the units and structures to do so.
The fact that the gateway is useless after warpgate is researched isn't a design flaw. Its the way our race works. You can't compare apples and oranges, every race is different, and I am absolutely STUNNED that posts like this are surfacing (and flourishing) in a time when Protoss is doing terribly.
All in all, nerfing warpgate and thereby Protoss is not the answer. There is nothing wrong with the mechanic, as it is a staple of the mechanics of our race. I would love to hear more specific criticism as to why it is actually overpowered. In my opinion, it is the only thing that makes Protoss even close to balanced.
These threads always come up, people like to think they know something blizzard doesn't. its just a feeling they get from playing their little sample of games and they feel the need to express it. Forcefield is so annoying though, wish blizzard would buff protoss gateway, remove FF and warp and compensate toss with some ground harras unit,,, but what do I know.
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On September 09 2011 10:53 aka_star wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 10:47 xlava wrote:
I don't know why these threads keep flaring up, but let me tell you something as a Master Protoss. Removing warpgate from the race would break us completely. You should say goodbye to any of our timings, because our ONLY and I repeat: ONLY offensive abilities early game come from forcefields, and our TIMELY reinforcements.
Making any more changes to the offensive capabilities of Protoss warpins would break not only PvP and the entire dynamic of the matchup, but also neuter us offensively versus all the races. There is a reason why Terrans don't really reinforce when doing something like a 2 medivac timing, because if they could reinforce instantly, their cost effectiveness would spiral COMPLETELY out of control. Theres a reason Zerg don't get warpins, because the race uses the larvae mechanic and creep spread for almost instantaneous reinforcement anyway.
If Protoss was to be nerfed in this fashion it would render 3 gate pressure and 4 gate rushes nonviable. As well as timings such as the 5 gate pressure off 2 bases versus Zerg as well as the 6gate. Any kind of early game pressure would be impossible. Essentially what I'm getting at is that ANY change to the offensive capabilities of Protoss would mean a completely disastrous metagame shift, we would be come the turtle race, because we were forced to, and we simply do not have the units and structures to do so.
The fact that the gateway is useless after warpgate is researched isn't a design flaw. Its the way our race works. You can't compare apples and oranges, every race is different, and I am absolutely STUNNED that posts like this are surfacing (and flourishing) in a time when Protoss is doing terribly.
All in all, nerfing warpgate and thereby Protoss is not the answer. There is nothing wrong with the mechanic, as it is a staple of the mechanics of our race. I would love to hear more specific criticism as to why it is actually overpowered. In my opinion, it is the only thing that makes Protoss even close to balanced. These threads always come up, people like to think they know something blizzard doesn't. its just a feeling they get from playing their little sample of games and they feel the need to express it. Forcefield is so annoying though, wish blizzard would buff protoss gateway, remove FF and warp and compensate toss with some ground harras unit,,, but what do I know.
Nothing apparently. Excuse me for being curt, but really? Forcefield is annoying enough? Try playing a game as Protoss at the master level PvZ or PvT without forcefield. See if you last past the 8 minute mark. Add a Protoss ground based harass and remove warpgate? ...
Please stop. Once again excuse my extreme irritation. But these changes should never even be looked upon by anyone at Blizzard, for fear that they actually get an idea to change anything. Warp gate and forcefields must not be removed. Doing so removes all utility from the early-mid game Protoss and completely destroys any possibility of attacking before deathball status.
You need to at LEAST provide some hard evidence to support how your changes would actually work or nobody (no Protoss at least) will accept the changes.
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On September 09 2011 10:47 xlava wrote:
I don't know why these threads keep flaring up, but let me tell you something as a Master Protoss. Removing warpgate from the race would break us completely. You should say goodbye to any of our timings, because our ONLY and I repeat: ONLY offensive abilities early game come from forcefields, and our TIMELY reinforcements.
Making any more changes to the offensive capabilities of Protoss warpins would break not only PvP and the entire dynamic of the matchup, but also neuter us offensively versus all the races. There is a reason why Terrans don't really reinforce when doing something like a 2 medivac timing, because if they could reinforce instantly, their cost effectiveness would spiral COMPLETELY out of control. Theres a reason Zerg don't get warpins, because the race uses the larvae mechanic and creep spread for almost instantaneous reinforcement anyway.
If Protoss was to be nerfed in this fashion it would render 3 gate pressure and 4 gate rushes nonviable. As well as timings such as the 5 gate pressure off 2 bases versus Zerg as well as the 6gate. Any kind of early game pressure would be impossible. Essentially what I'm getting at is that ANY change to the offensive capabilities of Protoss would mean a completely disastrous metagame shift, we would be come the turtle race, because we were forced to, and we simply do not have the units and structures to do so.
The fact that the gateway is useless after warpgate is researched isn't a design flaw. Its the way our race works. You can't compare apples and oranges, every race is different, and I am absolutely STUNNED that posts like this are surfacing (and flourishing) in a time when Protoss is doing terribly.
All in all, nerfing warpgate and thereby Protoss is not the answer. There is nothing wrong with the mechanic, as it is a staple of the mechanics of our race. I would love to hear more specific criticism as to why it is actually overpowered (like what rush, for example). In my opinion, it is the only thing that makes Protoss even close to balanced.
Also a quick note: I say "remove" in the first part of this post. Let me clarify that. ANY change. I say again. ANY nerf to the warpgate mechanic will render the fragile Protoss early game units and timings impossible to use and execute, respectively. Warpgate doesn't have to be removed to destroy our race, it just has to be nerfed to destroy our race.
Well I dont blame you, it is a huge article, but you missed my point.
I am not suggesting that it is overpowered at all, or underpowered. This is the language of Balance, not Design. I want to move beyond that.
I am suggesting that it is poorly designed, one of the effects of which is that, as you put it, our "ONLY offensive abilities early game come from forcefields, and our TIMELY reinforcements," among other things. I am trying to indicate where I think they went wrong, but also what can be done to fix the problem.
I am not suggesting turning protoss into terran. I am not suggesting nerfing or even removing warpgate as you are accusing me.
I am assuming that any "nerf" as you call it (I would prefer to call it a design change), will be balanced by a "buff," such that if warpgates are moved up the tech tree, something would be done to compensate for that change in the early game.
Sorry to not be clear.
Please re-read and get back to me. :D
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I am also shocked that the Warpgate is faster at producing units than the Gateway and it can warp in, so there is no reason to have a gateway. That's just bad design- they might as well remove gateways and balance the game from that.
In my opinion, they need to make the Gateway have faster build times than warpgates (maybe by like 5-10 seconds) so that gateways are better but can't be used for harass or reinforcements, thus creating a much more interesting dynamic. They might need to do some adjustments to balance early game then, but I doubt it would be a whole lot.
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On September 09 2011 10:56 Knee_of_Justice wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 10:47 xlava wrote:
I don't know why these threads keep flaring up, but let me tell you something as a Master Protoss. Removing warpgate from the race would break us completely. You should say goodbye to any of our timings, because our ONLY and I repeat: ONLY offensive abilities early game come from forcefields, and our TIMELY reinforcements.
Making any more changes to the offensive capabilities of Protoss warpins would break not only PvP and the entire dynamic of the matchup, but also neuter us offensively versus all the races. There is a reason why Terrans don't really reinforce when doing something like a 2 medivac timing, because if they could reinforce instantly, their cost effectiveness would spiral COMPLETELY out of control. Theres a reason Zerg don't get warpins, because the race uses the larvae mechanic and creep spread for almost instantaneous reinforcement anyway.
If Protoss was to be nerfed in this fashion it would render 3 gate pressure and 4 gate rushes nonviable. As well as timings such as the 5 gate pressure off 2 bases versus Zerg as well as the 6gate. Any kind of early game pressure would be impossible. Essentially what I'm getting at is that ANY change to the offensive capabilities of Protoss would mean a completely disastrous metagame shift, we would be come the turtle race, because we were forced to, and we simply do not have the units and structures to do so.
The fact that the gateway is useless after warpgate is researched isn't a design flaw. Its the way our race works. You can't compare apples and oranges, every race is different, and I am absolutely STUNNED that posts like this are surfacing (and flourishing) in a time when Protoss is doing terribly.
All in all, nerfing warpgate and thereby Protoss is not the answer. There is nothing wrong with the mechanic, as it is a staple of the mechanics of our race. I would love to hear more specific criticism as to why it is actually overpowered (like what rush, for example). In my opinion, it is the only thing that makes Protoss even close to balanced.
Also a quick note: I say "remove" in the first part of this post. Let me clarify that. ANY change. I say again. ANY nerf to the warpgate mechanic will render the fragile Protoss early game units and timings impossible to use and execute, respectively. Warpgate doesn't have to be removed to destroy our race, it just has to be nerfed to destroy our race. Well I dont blame you, it is a huge article, but you missed my point. I am not suggesting that it is overpowered at all, or underpowered. This is the language of Balance, not Design. I want to move beyond that. I am suggesting that it is poorly designed, one of the effects of which is that, as you put it, our "ONLY offensive abilities early game come from forcefields, and our TIMELY reinforcements," among other things. I am trying to indicate where I think they went wrong, but also what can be done to fix the problem. I am not suggesting turning protoss into terran. I am not suggesting nerfing warpgate. I am assuming that any "nerf" as you call it (I would prefer to call it a design change), will be balanced by a "buff," such that if warpgates are moved up the tech tree, something would be done to compensate for that change in the early game. Sorry to not be clear. Please re-read and get back to me. :D
I'm not re-reading it for a reason, sir. My point is in the bold. I am saying that any change, and honestly I don't care what it is, will remove a huge amount of utility from Protoss... Warpgate is a staple of the race. I and no other Protoss wants it removed. The design is genius and very well designed. I don't want to take a chance with any change that could potentially screw up warpgate.
Please, if you don't think its overpowered, why do you think its badly designed? Because in most people's minds "badly designed" equivocates to either OP or UP.
On September 09 2011 10:58 monitor wrote:
I am also shocked that the Warpgate is faster at producing units than the Gateway and it can warp in, so there is no reason to have a gateway. That's just bad design- they might as well remove gateways and balance the game from that.
In my opinion, they need to make the Gateway have faster build times than warpgates (maybe by like 5-10 seconds) so that gateways are better but can't be used for harass or reinforcements, thus creating a much more interesting dynamic. They might need to do some adjustments to balance early game then, but I doubt it would be a whole lot.
What???
Warpgates produce in the same amount of time, roughly, as every other races' main production structures. Are you kidding me???
A more interesting dynamic? You're saying that standard reinforcements is "more dynamic" than warping units into the fray? :O seriously?
Can we please get some high level Protoss in here so that I'm not defending the entire race's sanctity by myself?
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The most annoying thing about these threads is how spur-of-the-moment they are, I remember when there were like 4 threads saying that FORCE FIELD was OP because Idra lost to 1 person because a bunch of roaches were out of position and trapped with force fields, really people if Blizzard listened every time someone was sure that an aspect of the game was totally broken then we probably wouldn't even have the same races from one week to the next.
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On September 09 2011 11:03 Navillus wrote:
The most annoying thing about these threads is how spur-of-the-moment they are, I remember when there were like 4 threads saying that FORCE FIELD was OP because Idra lost to 1 person because a bunch of roaches were out of position and trapped with force fields, really people if Blizzard listened every time someone was sure that an aspect of the game was totally broken then we probably wouldn't even have the same races from one week to the next.
Oh my god a voice of reason... Cruncher versus Idra TSL 3. Yeah I know that game. Everyone cried OP because Cruncher had some sick forcefields.
Are we going to cry op when Demuslim crushes a Protoss @ MLG with a nasty stim timing and nerf stim again?
Are we going to cry op when NesTea comes up with a devastating new ZvT build? Of course not, because this game is balanced. All crying op does is bring needless attention to something that should have never seen the light of day.
But these threads take it a step further, we're talking about changing a MACRO mechanic of a race, which would have HUGE and unfathomable repercussions. Think of Terran without mules (lol ok I could deal with that  jk) or Zerg without injects?
I'm afraid I'm going to get banned for all my ranting, but understand how serious this is that Protoss Warpgate is not nerfed OR changed. Its why most of us play Protoss, and its balanced. No change is necessary. And discussing it only scares the crap out of us.
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On September 09 2011 11:01 xlava wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 10:56 Knee_of_Justice wrote:On September 09 2011 10:47 xlava wrote:
I don't know why these threads keep flaring up, but let me tell you something as a Master Protoss. Removing warpgate from the race would break us completely. You should say goodbye to any of our timings, because our ONLY and I repeat: ONLY offensive abilities early game come from forcefields, and our TIMELY reinforcements.
Making any more changes to the offensive capabilities of Protoss warpins would break not only PvP and the entire dynamic of the matchup, but also neuter us offensively versus all the races. There is a reason why Terrans don't really reinforce when doing something like a 2 medivac timing, because if they could reinforce instantly, their cost effectiveness would spiral COMPLETELY out of control. Theres a reason Zerg don't get warpins, because the race uses the larvae mechanic and creep spread for almost instantaneous reinforcement anyway.
If Protoss was to be nerfed in this fashion it would render 3 gate pressure and 4 gate rushes nonviable. As well as timings such as the 5 gate pressure off 2 bases versus Zerg as well as the 6gate. Any kind of early game pressure would be impossible. Essentially what I'm getting at is that ANY change to the offensive capabilities of Protoss would mean a completely disastrous metagame shift, we would be come the turtle race, because we were forced to, and we simply do not have the units and structures to do so.
The fact that the gateway is useless after warpgate is researched isn't a design flaw. Its the way our race works. You can't compare apples and oranges, every race is different, and I am absolutely STUNNED that posts like this are surfacing (and flourishing) in a time when Protoss is doing terribly.
All in all, nerfing warpgate and thereby Protoss is not the answer. There is nothing wrong with the mechanic, as it is a staple of the mechanics of our race. I would love to hear more specific criticism as to why it is actually overpowered (like what rush, for example). In my opinion, it is the only thing that makes Protoss even close to balanced.
Also a quick note: I say "remove" in the first part of this post. Let me clarify that. ANY change. I say again. ANY nerf to the warpgate mechanic will render the fragile Protoss early game units and timings impossible to use and execute, respectively. Warpgate doesn't have to be removed to destroy our race, it just has to be nerfed to destroy our race. Well I dont blame you, it is a huge article, but you missed my point. I am not suggesting that it is overpowered at all, or underpowered. This is the language of Balance, not Design. I want to move beyond that. I am suggesting that it is poorly designed, one of the effects of which is that, as you put it, our "ONLY offensive abilities early game come from forcefields, and our TIMELY reinforcements," among other things. I am trying to indicate where I think they went wrong, but also what can be done to fix the problem. I am not suggesting turning protoss into terran. I am not suggesting nerfing warpgate. I am assuming that any "nerf" as you call it (I would prefer to call it a design change), will be balanced by a "buff," such that if warpgates are moved up the tech tree, something would be done to compensate for that change in the early game. Sorry to not be clear. Please re-read and get back to me. :D I'm not re-reading it for a reason, sir. My point is in the bold. b I am saying that any change, and honestly I don't care what it is, will remove a huge amount of utility from Protoss... Warpgate is a staple of the race. I and no other Protoss wants it removed. The design is genius and very well designed. I don't want to take a chance with any change that could potentially screw up warpgate. Please, if you don't think its overpowered, why do you think its badly designed? Because in most people's minds "badly designed" equivocates to either OP or UP. Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 10:58 monitor wrote:
I am also shocked that the Warpgate is faster at producing units than the Gateway and it can warp in, so there is no reason to have a gateway. That's just bad design- they might as well remove gateways and balance the game from that.
In my opinion, they need to make the Gateway have faster build times than warpgates (maybe by like 5-10 seconds) so that gateways are better but can't be used for harass or reinforcements, thus creating a much more interesting dynamic. They might need to do some adjustments to balance early game then, but I doubt it would be a whole lot. What??? Warpgates produce in the same amount of time, roughly, as every other races' main production structures. Are you kidding me??? A more interesting dynamic? You're saying that standard reinforcements is "more dynamic" than warping units into the fray? :O seriously? Can we please get some high level Protoss in here so that I'm not defending the entire race's sanctity by myself?
What? Me thinks she doth protest too much.
They have already changed warp in with the last patch; it didn't break shit.
I know you like to hide behind your "master's level" play excuse, but you are not making an accurate defense of "any" change possible.
Maybe your play is sub par? Maybe you are looking at it wrong? Maybe you can't explain "any" possible change by making blanket statements, I dunno.
Try to have an adult conversation here without throwing everything under the bus based on your "masters level play" (and not your pro level play).
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On September 09 2011 11:01 xlava wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 10:56 Knee_of_Justice wrote:On September 09 2011 10:47 xlava wrote:
I don't know why these threads keep flaring up, but let me tell you something as a Master Protoss. Removing warpgate from the race would break us completely. You should say goodbye to any of our timings, because our ONLY and I repeat: ONLY offensive abilities early game come from forcefields, and our TIMELY reinforcements.
Making any more changes to the offensive capabilities of Protoss warpins would break not only PvP and the entire dynamic of the matchup, but also neuter us offensively versus all the races. There is a reason why Terrans don't really reinforce when doing something like a 2 medivac timing, because if they could reinforce instantly, their cost effectiveness would spiral COMPLETELY out of control. Theres a reason Zerg don't get warpins, because the race uses the larvae mechanic and creep spread for almost instantaneous reinforcement anyway.
If Protoss was to be nerfed in this fashion it would render 3 gate pressure and 4 gate rushes nonviable. As well as timings such as the 5 gate pressure off 2 bases versus Zerg as well as the 6gate. Any kind of early game pressure would be impossible. Essentially what I'm getting at is that ANY change to the offensive capabilities of Protoss would mean a completely disastrous metagame shift, we would be come the turtle race, because we were forced to, and we simply do not have the units and structures to do so.
The fact that the gateway is useless after warpgate is researched isn't a design flaw. Its the way our race works. You can't compare apples and oranges, every race is different, and I am absolutely STUNNED that posts like this are surfacing (and flourishing) in a time when Protoss is doing terribly.
All in all, nerfing warpgate and thereby Protoss is not the answer. There is nothing wrong with the mechanic, as it is a staple of the mechanics of our race. I would love to hear more specific criticism as to why it is actually overpowered (like what rush, for example). In my opinion, it is the only thing that makes Protoss even close to balanced.
Also a quick note: I say "remove" in the first part of this post. Let me clarify that. ANY change. I say again. ANY nerf to the warpgate mechanic will render the fragile Protoss early game units and timings impossible to use and execute, respectively. Warpgate doesn't have to be removed to destroy our race, it just has to be nerfed to destroy our race. Well I dont blame you, it is a huge article, but you missed my point. I am not suggesting that it is overpowered at all, or underpowered. This is the language of Balance, not Design. I want to move beyond that. I am suggesting that it is poorly designed, one of the effects of which is that, as you put it, our "ONLY offensive abilities early game come from forcefields, and our TIMELY reinforcements," among other things. I am trying to indicate where I think they went wrong, but also what can be done to fix the problem. I am not suggesting turning protoss into terran. I am not suggesting nerfing warpgate. I am assuming that any "nerf" as you call it (I would prefer to call it a design change), will be balanced by a "buff," such that if warpgates are moved up the tech tree, something would be done to compensate for that change in the early game. Sorry to not be clear. Please re-read and get back to me. :D I'm not re-reading it for a reason, sir. My point is in the bold. I am saying that any change, and honestly I don't care what it is, will remove a huge amount of utility from Protoss... Warpgate is a staple of the race. I and no other Protoss wants it removed. The design is genius and very well designed. I don't want to take a chance with any change that could potentially screw up warpgate. Please, if you don't think its overpowered, why do you think its badly designed? Because in most people's minds "badly designed" equivocates to either OP or UP. Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 10:58 monitor wrote:
I am also shocked that the Warpgate is faster at producing units than the Gateway and it can warp in, so there is no reason to have a gateway. That's just bad design- they might as well remove gateways and balance the game from that.
In my opinion, they need to make the Gateway have faster build times than warpgates (maybe by like 5-10 seconds) so that gateways are better but can't be used for harass or reinforcements, thus creating a much more interesting dynamic. They might need to do some adjustments to balance early game then, but I doubt it would be a whole lot. What??? Warpgates produce in the same amount of time, roughly, as every other races' main production structures. Are you kidding me??? A more interesting dynamic? You're saying that standard reinforcements is "more dynamic" than warping units into the fray? :O seriously? Can we please get some high level Protoss in here so that I'm not defending the entire race's sanctity by myself?
That's fine, but I think that is a bit conservative. We have 2 expansions coming up with opportunities for SOME change and we have a PTR that has been very underused so far. There are ways to test changes before implementing them you know.
With regards to this:
Please, if you don't think its overpowered, why do you think its badly designed? Because in most people's minds "badly designed" equivocates to either OP or UP.
I think there are numerous reasons why it is badly designed, starting with the thread I linked to at the top. I can add a few points such as how cheap it is vs how powerful it is, how it negates the need for gateways (but theres still an option to switch back), how long it takes due to various nerfs, how it gives you two effective production cycles of units for one, allowing massive pushes (article talks about this more), how early it comes (volatile early game).
As I said, I think the balance is quite good overall, but the design clearly leaves something to be desired. The two dont have to necessarily be equated: as with the immortal, you can have good balance, but bad design.
There's no need to get upset. I have always played protoss and will never switch, but I think that there are some design flaws that can and should be addressed. If you please, explain why you think it is well designed, if that is what you think?
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On September 09 2011 11:07 xlava wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 11:03 Navillus wrote:
The most annoying thing about these threads is how spur-of-the-moment they are, I remember when there were like 4 threads saying that FORCE FIELD was OP because Idra lost to 1 person because a bunch of roaches were out of position and trapped with force fields, really people if Blizzard listened every time someone was sure that an aspect of the game was totally broken then we probably wouldn't even have the same races from one week to the next. Oh my god a voice of reason... Cruncher versus Idra TSL 3. Yeah I know that game. Everyone cried OP because Cruncher had some sick forcefields. Are we going to cry op when Demuslim crushes a Protoss @ MLG with a nasty stim timing and nerf stim again? Are we going to cry op when NesTea comes up with a devastating new ZvT build? Of course not, because this game is balanced. All crying op does is bring needless attention to something that should have never seen the light of day. I'm afraid I'm going to get banned for all my ranting, but understand how serious this is that Protoss Warpgate is not nerfed OR changed. Its why most of us play Protoss, and its balanced. No change is necessary.
You are just being shortsighted. The point is not about if it's balanced, but if it offers good game play. Balance is totally irrelevant to that, since Blizzard is actively seeking balance(and map makers too).
The question shouldn't be "Will toss be to weak if we change WG mechanic" but rather "Is there a reason to change WG mechanic, is it going to make the game better?"(and if so, is it going to make it better enough to warrant the change in the first place).
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On September 09 2011 11:14 Zarahtra wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 11:07 xlava wrote:On September 09 2011 11:03 Navillus wrote:
The most annoying thing about these threads is how spur-of-the-moment they are, I remember when there were like 4 threads saying that FORCE FIELD was OP because Idra lost to 1 person because a bunch of roaches were out of position and trapped with force fields, really people if Blizzard listened every time someone was sure that an aspect of the game was totally broken then we probably wouldn't even have the same races from one week to the next. Oh my god a voice of reason... Cruncher versus Idra TSL 3. Yeah I know that game. Everyone cried OP because Cruncher had some sick forcefields. Are we going to cry op when Demuslim crushes a Protoss @ MLG with a nasty stim timing and nerf stim again? Are we going to cry op when NesTea comes up with a devastating new ZvT build? Of course not, because this game is balanced. All crying op does is bring needless attention to something that should have never seen the light of day. I'm afraid I'm going to get banned for all my ranting, but understand how serious this is that Protoss Warpgate is not nerfed OR changed. Its why most of us play Protoss, and its balanced. No change is necessary. You are just being shortsighted. The point is not about if it's balanced, but if it offers good game play. Balance is totally irrelevant to that, since Blizzard is actively seeking balance(and map makers too). The question shouldn't be "Will toss be to weak if we change WG mechanic" but rather "Is there a reason to change WG mechanic, is it going to make the game better?"(and if so, is it going to make it better enough to warrant the change in the first place).
How does "it is why most of us play Protoss" not equivocate to "it offering good gameplay"? -_-
I was saying there is no reason to change it...
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On September 09 2011 10:58 monitor wrote:
I am also shocked that the Warpgate is faster at producing units than the Gateway and it can warp in, so there is no reason to have a gateway. That's just bad design- they might as well remove gateways and balance the game from that.
In my opinion, they need to make the Gateway have faster build times than warpgates (maybe by like 5-10 seconds) so that gateways are better but can't be used for harass or reinforcements, thus creating a much more interesting dynamic. They might need to do some adjustments to balance early game then, but I doubt it would be a whole lot.
seriously? remove gateways? :|
numerous people can continue to suggest things but without definite testing (eg numerous games etc) we can't effectively say without bias that these suggestions would work.
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On September 09 2011 11:14 Zarahtra wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 11:07 xlava wrote:On September 09 2011 11:03 Navillus wrote:
The most annoying thing about these threads is how spur-of-the-moment they are, I remember when there were like 4 threads saying that FORCE FIELD was OP because Idra lost to 1 person because a bunch of roaches were out of position and trapped with force fields, really people if Blizzard listened every time someone was sure that an aspect of the game was totally broken then we probably wouldn't even have the same races from one week to the next. Oh my god a voice of reason... Cruncher versus Idra TSL 3. Yeah I know that game. Everyone cried OP because Cruncher had some sick forcefields. Are we going to cry op when Demuslim crushes a Protoss @ MLG with a nasty stim timing and nerf stim again? Are we going to cry op when NesTea comes up with a devastating new ZvT build? Of course not, because this game is balanced. All crying op does is bring needless attention to something that should have never seen the light of day. I'm afraid I'm going to get banned for all my ranting, but understand how serious this is that Protoss Warpgate is not nerfed OR changed. Its why most of us play Protoss, and its balanced. No change is necessary. You are just being shortsighted. The point is not about if it's balanced, but if it offers good game play. Balance is totally irrelevant to that, since Blizzard is actively seeking balance(and map makers too). The question shouldn't be "Will toss be to weak if we change WG mechanic" but rather "Is there a reason to change WG mechanic, is it going to make the game better?"(and if so, is it going to make it better enough to warrant the change in the first place).
Right, balance is not the issue here. Balance is a mindset that has infected this forum, taking the discussion away from design, which is equally as important. It is what made Broodwar so successful: each unit fit into a larger puzzle, so effectively that with few balance patches, it was relatively "balanced." It has its flaws, to be sure, but it also allowed the game to remain decently balanced, even through accidental "tricks" like muta stacking. Of course there are other factors, like maps. SC2 has a difficult job of emulating the predecessor while also striking out on its own. I think theyve done quite well but not perfectly.
As Zarahtra says, design and balance combine to influence gameplay: we want to maintain balance, but change design so that it improves gameplay. People act like the way the game is *now* is the only way the game can or should be and that Blizzard is some omnipotent god who created SC2 from the swirling mists of chaos. They are a company composed of individuals who are just as flawed as everybody on these forums, including me.
They created the game, they can fix it. This thread will be quickly lost, but the game will not be, especially if they take care to improve the game where it stands to be improved.
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Read the OP guys, this is NOT a balance discussion. It's a design discussion, and one I agree with. What I think is that the way warpgates are implemented into the game isn't a good piece of design, and that Starcraft II would be a more dynamic game if changes were made to how it operates.
Personally I would like to see unit cooldowns slower in warpgates compared to building them in un-upgraded gateways, that way there's a trade-off between mobility and army size.
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On September 09 2011 11:18 xlava wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 11:14 Zarahtra wrote:On September 09 2011 11:07 xlava wrote:On September 09 2011 11:03 Navillus wrote:
The most annoying thing about these threads is how spur-of-the-moment they are, I remember when there were like 4 threads saying that FORCE FIELD was OP because Idra lost to 1 person because a bunch of roaches were out of position and trapped with force fields, really people if Blizzard listened every time someone was sure that an aspect of the game was totally broken then we probably wouldn't even have the same races from one week to the next. Oh my god a voice of reason... Cruncher versus Idra TSL 3. Yeah I know that game. Everyone cried OP because Cruncher had some sick forcefields. Are we going to cry op when Demuslim crushes a Protoss @ MLG with a nasty stim timing and nerf stim again? Are we going to cry op when NesTea comes up with a devastating new ZvT build? Of course not, because this game is balanced. All crying op does is bring needless attention to something that should have never seen the light of day. I'm afraid I'm going to get banned for all my ranting, but understand how serious this is that Protoss Warpgate is not nerfed OR changed. Its why most of us play Protoss, and its balanced. No change is necessary. You are just being shortsighted. The point is not about if it's balanced, but if it offers good game play. Balance is totally irrelevant to that, since Blizzard is actively seeking balance(and map makers too). The question shouldn't be "Will toss be to weak if we change WG mechanic" but rather "Is there a reason to change WG mechanic, is it going to make the game better?"(and if so, is it going to make it better enough to warrant the change in the first place). How does "it is why most of us play Protoss" not equivocate to "it offering good gameplay"? -_- I was saying there is no reason to change it...
Sorry I should've bolded the last sentence too. There are more than 1 view on this issue and saying "look me and my friends think its fun, no change needed" does make you come off pretty shortsighted. First thing to do would be to explain why you believe it creates good gameplay.
I personally think WG is one of the key parts of not making T/P to similar, so I'm iffy on changing it. It creates interesting dynamic for PvZ and PvT(and certainly frustrating as a T player), but PvP is pretty fucked up, like this guy explains a lot better than myself could ever do. I think a shield battery would be a pretty interesting change to combat the 4gate issue personally.
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Nerfing warpgates would totally break the protoss metagame in half, it would remove all early offensive capabilities and would only reinforce the 'turtle till deathball' mentality.
Most protoss units are slow, things like pheonix and blink stalker being the only real exceptions, what creates the illusion of speed and gives protoss effective mobility is being able to warp in units around the map on the fly. If it were significantly more efficient to produce units without warpgates, you'd get turtletoss everywhere, because all units would be created and left at home - in addition, due to the low cost efficiency, rarely would units be leaving home untill you were close to food capped.
If your talking about wanting warpgates fixed, (and really insinuating it being nerfed to make gateways more attractive) your suggesting a change that would destroy the race. I think you'll find the design philosophy from the beginning was to have the warpgate upgrade serve to increase the buildings utility, in the same way that terran has addons e.g. tech labs/reactors (keep in mind these dont take 160seconds to build), and zerg buildings can morph e.g. spire/greater spire. What i believe the design philosophy intends from this is to create a situation where players must determine the most efficient timing to have particular upgrades completed to that they can utilise those enabled unit mechanics at specific timings in their plays.
IMO the only thing really broken about warpgates is that the upgrade time increase really only served to force protoss to spend even more nexus energy chronoboosting it which harms the protoss economy because your chrono'ing fewer probes.
just my 2c. <3
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The problem is... I love the solution that you are giving... Gateway/warpgate would open up a whole new WORLD of possibilities and new things to figure out for Protoss.... However, the flaw in this is that Protoss will be so far behind the other races in terms of understanding their race, and so most likely until HotS where all the races have to restart or heavily tweak their knowledge of the game, Protoss will not be competitive. (Off topic, but I'm kinda scared for HotS, because I don't want to see a whole new lineup of pros take the top spots, but back to the topic).
Additionally, Gateway units still have the underlying problem of being too weak to have to account for WG... Timing pushes with 4 gate would be nigh impossible to stop if they were buffed to account for the Hybrid WG/gate play (because of the fact that 4 gate relies on that burst of production, not on continued production), but at the same time, not buffing them at all still puts us at the perennial Ghost/Viking V Protoss Splash stalemate that Protoss always seems to be on the losing end of.
TO address the "non-balance discussion" thing. Blizzard balances this game mainly because it wants it to be successful as an Esport (and keep player base, but that is less big here). If one race suddenly became extinct at the top levels of play because of this (Imo brilliant) design change, the esport would decline by so much. Additionally, they would lose playerbase, as dedicated Protoss player watched their league drop and quit. Blizzard gains nothing from changing game design until AT LEAST HotS if not LotV, and so unless we can think of a way that changes design without demolishing metagame, and making us stronger (at first) as we learn the new changes, Blizzard has no reason (and the esport has no motivation) to make a change.
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Ok. So, currently, toss is really struggling in GSL. Supposedly, it's the best of the best, the pinnacle of performance, the land of champions. Based on past results, Korean trends are always a few months ahead of the foreign trends.
Some of the "top" protoss players in GSL:
+ Show Spoiler +MC to code A, Huk 0-3 MVP, Alicia to code A
However, we cannot conclude that toss needs a buff or a design change just yet. Keep in mind that GSL is only ~2,3 weeks. This could very well just be a transitional period, and once the next awesome build/revolutionary usage comes out, it'll be Zerg/Terran whine about how toss op. Now, it could also just be the skill of the Korean Terrans, and how they outclass the Toss/Zerg competition and faceroll them most of the games.
Now, I won't say that any major changes are needed(on a KA/WG scale), but if this trend continues throughout GSL November, etc. then we have more solid proof that balance changes are needed. I urge you to refrain from balance whine about then, but we can all cry together as another top-tier protoss falls to 1/1/1.
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EPT
