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Starcraft 2 and the Philosophy of Design
Introduction:
Hello Teamliquid! Starcraft 2 is exiting its youth. Balance patches have slowed dramatically, the pro scene has had its kings emerge and the one-trick ponies have fallen from glory. All in all, the scene is developed, the game is well explored, and the players are pushing themselves to the limit of their abilities. However, I know exactly what's on the mind of thousands of players and viewers. Namely, something feels lacking.
RTS games are about more than just strategy. RTS combines speed and awareness, mechanical skill, tactical ability, and strategic decision making. RTS stands apart from games like chess, which do not have a mechanical component, and apart from many FPS genre games, which are far less about strategic decision making and more reliant on mechanics. Does Starcraft 2 really fill the role of a well designed RTS, one which balances the mechanical with the strategic? That's the big question we have to answer, and so I will attempt to shine a light on what I think are the most glaring problems for the game from a design perspective.
I also urge everyone who hasn't seen it to check out Day[9]'s video on design (he's got great insight): http://blip.tv/day9tv/day-9-s-musings-game-design-baseballs-vs-frisbees-5837982
IMPORANT: This is explicitly not a balance or game design suggestion post. I am merely providing some analysis as to why things are what they are. It's up to Blizzard to design their own game. If the community thinks these are legitimate problems, our voices can be heard by them.
I am going to break up this discussion into four sections, as there is too much to talk about in one post. They are: Mechanics, Macro Mechanics, Unit Design, and Map Design.
One last caveat before I embark: This is not supposed to be a Broodwar vs SC2 post, but unfortunately the comparisons are simply unavoidable, and so a lot of what I will talk about is contrasts between the games. Broodwar was an amazing game, and if we fail to understand why it was so great, it'll be impossible to reproduce that greatness. I refuse to accept that SC2 is incapable of living up to its predecessor. I want SC2 to be as good as possible. Unfortunately, simply dismissing all comparisons with “they're different games but neither is better” provides no useful feedback.
Part 1: Mechanics
![[image loading]](http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_1RwN9IQP4vM/TS-hbJVeQMI/AAAAAAAAACU/F8v6j8F9MqQ/s1600/The%2BMechanic%2BFilm.jpg)
Sorry, not that kind of mechanic.
Mechanics are the fundamental skills that all RTS players must have. Fast hands, good memorization of hotkeys, good use of rallies and unit groups, and general speed of execution are all components of mechanical skill. Without these, execution of your plan in an RTS is impossible. From a game design point of view, mechanics are primary components in the accessibility of the game. In addition, game mechanics provide the methods by which choices are generated for players. Every mechanic presents new options for each player on how to utilize it. The more mechanics there are, the more demanding the game is. A game that is too easy requires little practice and is both unexciting to play and unexciting to watch, from a visual entertainment perspective. While a game that is easy can be intellectually interesting, like chess, it is not “edge of your seat” excitement. On the other hand, if a game is too hard, it will be too difficult to carry out the strategic plans that the player has in mind, which makes the game both frustrating as well as “noob unfriendly.”
![[image loading]](http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2247/2498304690_fba5ded63f.jpg)
This is not simply Starcraft 2 at 0.2 APM.
The latter scenario is frequently a complaint about Starcraft: Broodwar. Simply put, the game is ridiculously hard, notoriously unforgiving, and sometimes it feels like you're fighting two battles – one vs your opponent and one vs the AI. It can be extremely daunting for new players, and so we saw the emergence of a large casual scene centered around money maps (Big Game Hunters, Fastest Map Ever, Zero Clutter), which often including “no rush” rules, and custom games. Blizzard clearly wanted people to actually play the game no matter how good they were, so they tried to lower the mechanics requirement to play the game. However, I think they went too far. By removing some of the mechanical barriers, they removed some of the complexity which separated good players from bad, and added depth to the game. Skills which were essential in Broodwar were trivialized, which I think is a major reason why gameplay can look and feel extremely stale at times.
A) Unit Clumping and Formation Movement
This isn't the first article addressing the “clumping” problem in SC2. Whether it's a design flaw that leads to bad gameplay, or simply something new we have to get used to – that's the debate. I believe that it is a critical design flaw, and for some very simple reasons.
Take two units. We can arrange them in one type of formation, a line. They can be close or far apart, but they're always in a line. Add a third unit, and now you have two types of formations, a line and a triangle. I am simply treating units like vertexes and the formations as resulting shapes. The number of possible formations increases dramatically as you add more units, or vertexes. The number of possible shapes a 20 vertex group can take is absolutely mindbogglingly high. This is how Broodwar units feel so organic. There are nearly infinite permutations of positions that units can be in, and no (large) army ever looks exactly the same.
![[image loading]](http://www.georgehart.com/virtual-polyhedra/figs/polygons.gif)
Look! Shapes!
Now, what if we make it so that instead, there is only one form the units can be arranged in? That's what SC2 does. There is only one formation in SC2, and it is the ball. You can use precious APM to break the ball up, as players do with marines vs banelings, but the default is always the same, a big blob of units.
Not only is this visually unappealing when every army looks the same, but it makes combat extremely deterministic. After all, if engagements only can arise out of one formation, it makes sense that units will behave in one way as they fight in that formation. This determinism takes away a large amount of excitement and thrill from fights, because often the winner is known before the battle even starts.
![[image loading]](http://sc2strat.net/img/deathball.png)
This is a familiar sight.
![[image loading]](http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/1161/flank1ne2.jpg)
But this... this looks much more interesting.
I won't even delve into the balance problems caused by extremely tight formations of units, since that's been beaten into the ground multiple times over. We all know that ranged units benefit, melee fares worse, and AOE is empowered astronomically, and the problems that causes for balance.
I think if we want more interesting combat and more decisions in fights, unit movement formations have to be changed. In addition, the way units move in large groups – with each unit pushing the others out of the way – could be changed. It seems to enable clumping. That, above all, may be the biggest offender.
EDIT (copied from a comment later in the thread):
I think people are misinterpreting what my point with unit clumping is, so I will reiterate again in a different way:
First, I do not say that clumped up units are always desirable. I just say that it is the default formation in the game. Clumped units are the best for dealing with melee (least surface area) and air (less stragglers and more ground able to hit any given air unit), and they are the best formation for moving around the map, since you have less chance of stragglers and wandering units getting picked off.
Balls are worse in range vs range than arcs/lines. They are bad vs splash damage.
Obviously some times you want a ball and some times you don't. There is certainly a great amount of skill involved in making the ball into not a ball, whether it's arcing stalkers or splitting marines vs banelings. However, most combat, or at least army movement, still takes place in the ball.
What nonuniform formations do for a game is allow multiple variations on the starting point for armies, so your micro is different every time, and unit movement is more dynamic. The reason clumping is so bad is not because it makes the game easier, but because it means every army micro using the same techniques, and every army function roughly the same in every situation so long as the army compositions on both sides are similar. You're going to arc and engage with marauders the same as roaches and the same as stalkers.
However, if you start from more random and chaotic formations, the micro does not play out the same in every situation, and as such players have to improvise and practice more than one type of army splitting. Yes, it is harder, but the real benefit is that it's more varied and more decisions are necessary.
B) Unlimited Unit Selection
This is something I don't see talked about much, but I think is the source of a great number of woes. Every Broodwar player remembers the horrors of having to move 80 zerglings into battle. It was damn near impossible to do in an orderly manner. Controlling large terran bio armies was a complete nightmare. 12 unit selection felt inadequate so often, and it so severely limited what you could do with micro that it defined mutalisk use (11 muta + an overlord in a group was the norm).
Fast forward to SC2, and we can now control unlimited flocks of mutas, entire screens full of zerglings, and a maxed army all with a single command. Sounds great, right? This will make the game much more accessible for new players, correct? It sure as hell makes army movement easier. But, we lose something very important when we let a player command unlimited units at once.
![[image loading]](http://www.sirlin.net/storage/articles/zerg_rush.png?__SQUARESPACE_CACHEVERSION=1225777374213)
That actually required 2000 APM to pull off.
As forces get bigger, and more units are on the battlefield, limited unit selection forces players to make more choices and increases the complexity of simple tasks like moving your army from point A to point B. This causes large armies to behave extraordinarily inefficiently as compared to small ones.
First, this means that small armies which are easier to control, and are well controlled, can do a lot of damage to much larger armies, and as such, there is an efficiency incentive to use multiple smaller forces rather than one giant blob of death.
Second, as the game progresses and more units enter the battlefield, it becomes harder and harder to push a small advantage for a win, because the very act of trying to do anything with your army causes you to make mistakes. This makes battles more forgiving and leads to more engagements and more opportunities, giving rise to this epic struggle for survival that makes Broodwar games so enjoyable to watch. Broodwar games end up being a lot closer, even when one side has a large advantage, because pressing that advantage actually has its own costs, and is much harder to do.
Now people might find the idea of 12 unit selection groups to be antiquated and ridiculous, but that doesn't mean we can't limit them to something. Selection limits should keep the game from being too unfriendly to newcomers, but still retain some level of increasing complexity with increasing force size. All I know is that, as of right now, SC2 is missing that dimension of control.
C) Defender's Advantage and High Ground Mechanics
Those of us who were present in beta remember the huge arguments that ensued about the implementation of Blizzard's new high ground mechanic. While I think SC2's high ground system leads to a lot of good strategic play and interesting micro, I also think it traded a solid defender's advantage that added another dimension to strategy and tactical combat for gimmicky mechanics.
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/flamewheel/SPL_LR/VerSaviorFE/savioririslong2.jpg)
And the lurker says, "Respect the high ground."
I think one of the most interesting aspects to Broodwar was the strength of the high ground. Controlling high ground areas was vital, and making pushes into high ground areas required fantastic effort and careful planning. This meant that the name of the game became about territory control, something SC2 greatly lacks. An army in SC2 is only as good as the units that comprise it, and position just does not seem to matter greatly, outside of camping in your main early on. Terrain should be there as an augmentation to the army controlling it. The lack of a terrain-based augmentation to the combat strength of units, makes map design less interesting, area control less important, and especially leads to more fights that are predetermined. Again, this is another dimension to gameplay that seems to have been completely cut. I think it's worth having the discussion on this issue some more.
In Conclusion:
I think the biggest problems with the game from a mechanical standpoint stem from a lack of dynamic position. As a spectator, it's uninteresting to see different players control their armies when they are always roaming around in the “one true formation to rule them all.” As a player, it's uninteresting to have every battle start from the same point, since I apply the same tactics every time, rather than having to improvise on the spot. I want combat to be fresh and dynamic, where every battle feels unique, visceral, and organic.
![[image loading]](http://starcraftmazter.net/images/4chan/tech_games/sc2/nasl/artosis.png)
Obligatory funny picture of Artosis.
Part 2 will focus on macro-mechanics and macro in general. I hope you all enjoyed this article and that it brings good discussion.
P.S.) I don't know how demonstrable these mechanical changes can be. I know that SC2BW custom maps include an attempt to limit unit selection and possibly change pathing, but the implementation is pretty imperfect (not that I can do better). I would love to see an implementation of limited unit selection and formation locking in Starcraft 2, if for no other purpose than to have directly comparable situations. If you feel up to the task, feel free to do it and let me know about it. It would be really nice to see. I know it's been done before for other mechanics.
Also, I know pros are hesitant to criticize the game they play for money, but their insight is far more valuable to the community and to Blizzard than legions of casual players. I strongly insist that everyone respect and take with heavy consideration any posts from the players at the top. No pro wants to be criticized by the hordes of derp, so please refrain from attacking them so we can actually hear their opinions on these issues. Thank you.
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very interesting read, dude. As a starcraft 2 player who only recently discovered the joys of broodwar from hdstarcrafts casts around christmas, I couldnt agree move with your points, as I find, even as a complete bw noobie, the games to be a lot more action packed and intense.
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"This is not meant to be a bw vs sc2 comparison post" oo?
In terms of clumping produces deterministic battles & reducing the complexity of the game - this is actually just wrong. A ball is almost not the optimal formation of your units. Try taking an army and moving it across the map in a line only 1-2 units at any given point. That actually requires a huge amount of apm as the units repeatedly cluster back into a ball.
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interesting read. could you explain how exactly the high ground mechanic worked in BW and how it differs from SC2? i've never played BW, i come from wc3 where positioning was important, but high ground practically irrelevant.
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On January 07 2012 21:19 Schelim wrote:
interesting read. could you explain how exactly the high ground mechanic worked in BW and how it differs from SC2? i've never played BW, i come from wc3 where positioning was important, but high ground practically irrelevant.
range units from low ground may miss shooting on high ground units. im pretty sure it existed in wc3 as well.
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On January 07 2012 21:23 OopsOopsBaby wrote:Show nested quote +On January 07 2012 21:19 Schelim wrote:
interesting read. could you explain how exactly the high ground mechanic worked in BW and how it differs from SC2? i've never played BW, i come from wc3 where positioning was important, but high ground practically irrelevant. range units from low ground may miss shooting on high ground units. im pretty sure it existed in wc3 as well.
ah, ok. thank you.
now that you say that, yes it did. but it hardly ever mattered cause many maps didn't even have high ground and no decent player would take a fight uphill lol
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Regarding your Unit Clumping and Formation Movement, just because you can select a vast amount of units at the same time does not prohibit you from moving your troops in 12 unit blocks.
In fact, if you feel it advantageous to spend your apm in such a manner, then there is nothing stopping you. I recall several instances, usually at the top of ramps, where players spread out units for defence or spread vs EMP or other AoE attacks.
The only difference is that BW forced you to move in 12 unit blocks. The option is not removed in SC2.
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I agree with some points and disagree with others, but I'm mostly posting to point out that 7-1, 7-2 and 7-3 all have exactly the same vertices.
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nothing new, nothing exciting, but i guess you presented it pretty with pictures and all.
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Lord_J
Kenya1085 Posts
How many times must we endure this exact same thread in the SC2 General forum?
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On January 07 2012 21:34 Daemonic-Force wrote:
Regarding your Unit Clumping and Formation Movement, just because you can select a vast amount of units at the same time does not prohibit you from moving your troops in 12 unit blocks.
In fact, if you feel it advantageous to spend your apm in such a manner, then there is nothing stopping you. I recall several instances, usually at the top of ramps, where players spread out units for defence or spread vs EMP or other AoE attacks.
The only difference is that BW forced you to move in 12 unit blocks. The option is not removed in SC2.
It is not advantageous to move units in groups of 12 as compared to 1 giant block. The point is that the constraint creates increasing complexity in army movements because it is not possible to keep all your units together in a big ball of doom as your army size grows. It's about creating a layer of decision making for the player.
On January 07 2012 21:16 qxc wrote:
"This is not meant to be a bw vs sc2 comparison post" oo?
In terms of clumping produces deterministic battles & reducing the complexity of the game - this is actually just wrong. A ball is almost not the optimal formation of your units. Try taking an army and moving it across the map in a line only 1-2 units at any given point. That actually requires a huge amount of apm as the units repeatedly cluster back into a ball.
Yah, I should say... this WAS not meant to be a BW vs SC2 post.
I do agree that balls aren't the optimal formation in all situations. However, vs melee units like zealots or zerglings, it is ideal to be in a tight ball formation. In terms of getting through narrow spaces and up ramps, a ball formation is ideal. When fighting vs air, being as compact as possible is optimal. While units exist in SC2 (as they did in BW as well) to punish clumped armies, and it requires a vast amount of APM to separate them, it's still the same army movement, which is from ball to arc or ball to rabble. If units did not automatically try to clump together for maximum tightness, we'd see more rabble to different rabble, and rabble to arc, and rabble to ball movement, which is far more complex and interesting, as rabbles can take many different forms.
I'm not saying that the ball formation makes the game EASY, though it can in some situations. I'm saying that it makes it predictable, and thus uninteresting from a tactical perspective.
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umm bw unit formations work because people actually abuse the mechanics from bw to get units into formation. Best example is probaly the line flank, where you use the horrible unit pathing to form a long line along the side of the opponents army and then move towards the opponent, getting a huge concave.
Play bw without an idea how to move your units correctly ... it will look terrible, feel horrible and ends in utter defeat. Now lets go over to sc2, looks horrible, feels horrible, will end in defeat. Result, in sc2 being a noob with your units isn't as bad.
Attack moves will make units solids, just like hold position. stop commands is liquid, where units flow into each other. Magic box breaks with attack move but stays with hold position. You see many people still attack move, when it would be more clever to hold posi move as it would retain your formation against aoe units.
Anyway clumpig is the most horrible thing that can happen to you in bw, because it really messes up unit movement, thats why you even take care of it with building rally points. So i like the sc2 approach, you still don't want to clump, but you aren't unfiddling your units for about 2 minutes or have to rally every building at another point to prevent clumping. That adds to game speed, which results in an higher difficult.
So the sc2 system is fine, easy to learn hard to master, just as wanted. Also its fully controllable if you wish so.
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Good post but I disagree with most of the points. The writer clearly wants "BW with updated graphics" (roughly at least) which blizz has clearly stated is not what they want to be SC2. Many of the challenging aspects of BW came from artificial limitations in the game engine that simply do not exist in SC2's engine. Unit clumping for instance arises mostly because you can select an unlimited number of units (which imo is a good way to "punish" this - e.g. if you ball up ur toss units ur lots will probably not hit anything, the game prioritizes sentries so you'll have a hard time blinking with stalkers, etc.). While its true that battles do feel stale and uninteresting if you just ball up and A-Move, there will be clear advantages if you don't do this (as almost all pro players now do very well) and so this becomes a way in which mechanics can shine through - to distinguish between good and very good players you can see how they use their APM to break clumps of units, position them around, etc. The "only select 12 units" is such an artificial limitation that I don't see how anyone can see this as good design at all. Again, if you clump up 100 lings into one control group and A-Move them, good luck having more than 20 or so actually hit anything....
People must eventually realize that BW and SC2 are very different games. The features of the BW engine naturally gave rise to mechanics that are key to good gameplay (regarding unit control, army movements, etc.). Similarly, the features of the SC2 engine naturally give rise to mechanics that are key to good gameplay, except they are different than those of BW! Instead of the distinction between players being the ability to actually move out with more than 12 units and control them appropriately, the distinction is now the ability to separate their 24 unit ball into the correct formation (simplistic example)! The ability of being able to select your entire army and A-moving it across the map does not mean that its the right thing to do! It adds mechanics to the game in order to do the right thing (splitting, controlling, moving units to the front line as they move, battling with the AI to make sure that your zealots don't get stuck behind ur stalkers, etc.). Its just a different approach to the same issue, it has advantages and disadvantages, but I would hardly call it poor design.
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On January 07 2012 22:10 Lord_J wrote:
How many times must we endure this exact same thread in the SC2 General forum?
I agree. I'm sorry OP and the effort is appreciated, but I see no point in bringing this same topic up again and again. The game is designed the way it's designed.
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4713 Posts
I disagree with a couple of points but I have an idea of how I can say it in a way that makes sense.
Mechanics
BW was hard a lot because of its very primitive interface and unit AI, it took thousands of hours fo training to learn to overcome these shortcomings and to trully master the game. However while it really does differenciate the good from the fantastic, this isn't the only method to make the game harder to master.
In SC2 Blizzard introduced 4 new and unique macro mechanics that have come to set apart the good from the excelent. These mechanics are Larva Inject, Creep Tumors, MULEs and Chrono Boost.
Now when you go into a game of Zerg vs X, think about what it is that makes you think, "This guy has monster mechanics". If you where to say, "he never misses an inject" you'd be correct. Such people are scarry because, they always have the maximum ammount of larva available to work with, they add a new meaning to the word swarm when they come at you with endless waves. Creep is the 2nd mechanic of a zerg you look at, when you see creep cover half the map by the 10 min mark you can not help but admire the player who did this.
Chrono is another tactical mechanic you need to keep track of this one is more interesting in the sense that, you need to plan on how to spend it, while with larva you always need to inject.
MULEs, you don't want to pool too much energy and use two at a time because, that is uneven resource production, you get a lot more at a time, then your unit production becomes uneven because you'll have too much resources at one time and too little at another.
While not all these mechanics are equally hard to pull of or important in an equal way, they are still very important to each race, and they are some of the defining ways to tell a good player from a bad player.
I believe that this is the way to go. The future of designing challenging strategy games is to add more of these dynamic mechanics. To dumb down the game just to make it harder is very poor and unimaginative design in my opinion. I'm glad Blizz chose to go downt his path, however maybe more of these mechanics could be added in the future.
Formations
Despite what a lot of people may thing, the ball formation is actually the one that makes most sense and is most organic for traveling from place to place. If you think about armies in real life soldiers don't fall into star shaped formations on the likes of that, its just dumb, they go into very tight formations because it allows the maximum number of people to cover a certain surface.
However, when fighting, a ball formation is terrible. Again if you look at armies in real life, when they are about to engage the form a line as long as possible to get as much surface area and to have the maximum ammount of people shooting.
This concept works in SC2 as well, only newbies engage in ball on ball fights, the experts usually micro their army to form an arc, this arc is designed to get maximum surface area and minimize aoe damage, it also requires micro to execute.
So I disagree with your assesment on formations, it is organic and it is efficient for traveling from place to place, but its still not effective for fighting. The experts will still need to micro their armies to be as spread out as possible and to get the best arc possible to win. In a sense this is almost like the dumbing down part from BW, since the engine always wants to put units into a ball the players need to fight to re-arange them, sometimes in the heat of battle.
High Ground
This one I kind of agree with, defenders advantage is still good because of the likes of ramps that provide favorable engagements due to concaves, but asuming equal vision (air units, Xel'Naga towers), range units and a particularly straight piece of cliff, then there isn't much advantage to holding a high ground.
However I don't agree with putting a 25% chance to miss against units on high ground, and the reason is, its RNG, is a chance based system and I feel those should have no place in RTS games, they should have as few random elements as possible.
However you could say, make it in such a way that units on low ground will always miss their first or 2nd shots (depending on attack speed). This way you still get an advantage for high ground, but it isn't random nor is it too large to be too ridiculous. Usually an engagement can be determined by the side that can fire the first shots, so I believe this could work.
Conclusions
The RTS genre is, like all other game genres, ever changing and evolving, we can take lessons from the past to make better games in the future. However I believe that Blizzard has done just that in SC2. They have modernized SC2 in the sense that the interface and AI are much more streamlined. However to compensate they have introduced new and dynamic mechanics to separate the best of the best from the rest.
And their formation improvements, while great for moving armies around is not optimal for engaments, players still need to micro and control their armies to obdain the best concaves.
Perhaps only the high ground mechanics could be improved. But overall while being of the same origin and genre, BW and SC2 are different, and in a good way.
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Interesting post, nice presentation, but I disagree with many points. For example
Not only is this visually unappealing when every army looks the same, but it makes combat extremely deterministic. After all, if engagements only can arise out of one formation, it makes sense that units will behave in one way as they fight in that formation. This determinism takes away a large amount of excitement and thrill from fights, because often the winner is known before the battle even starts.
First, visual appeal is a matter of taste, right? I mean for me a giant death ball is more appealing than the chaos in BW, watching the AI having a hard time moving the units around the map. Moreover, you speak of determinism as a bad thing, but I doubt that many people will agree that depending on sheer luck and hoping that your inits will be arranged properly is exactly 'excitment and thrill' (yeah, I know pros will (maybe) manage to arange their units properly, but still the AI in BW was terrible).
Still, all the points you made can be true or false for someone, depending on what one wants. I personally enjoy simply playing the game, I have no intention to prove my SC skill to anybody and/or compare epeen sizes, so to me all these mechanics look like simply artificial hurdles. To someone who likes another layers of complexity, your thoughts stand.
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On January 07 2012 21:34 Daemonic-Force wrote:
Regarding your Unit Clumping and Formation Movement, just because you can select a vast amount of units at the same time does not prohibit you from moving your troops in 12 unit blocks.
In fact, if you feel it advantageous to spend your apm in such a manner, then there is nothing stopping you. I recall several instances, usually at the top of ramps, where players spread out units for defence or spread vs EMP or other AoE attacks.
The only difference is that BW forced you to move in 12 unit blocks. The option is not removed in SC2.
while that is true about unit selection that has nothing to do with clumping and formation movement.
In bw you can spread out units and walk spaced out from point a to point b, whereas sc2 they will clump to a little ball automatically regardless if you have 12 units selected or 50.
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On January 07 2012 22:55 Lavi wrote:Show nested quote +On January 07 2012 21:34 Daemonic-Force wrote:
Regarding your Unit Clumping and Formation Movement, just because you can select a vast amount of units at the same time does not prohibit you from moving your troops in 12 unit blocks.
In fact, if you feel it advantageous to spend your apm in such a manner, then there is nothing stopping you. I recall several instances, usually at the top of ramps, where players spread out units for defence or spread vs EMP or other AoE attacks.
The only difference is that BW forced you to move in 12 unit blocks. The option is not removed in SC2. while that is true about unit selection that has nothing to do with clumping and formation movement. In bw you can spread out units and walk spaced out from point a to point b, whereas sc2 they will clump to a little ball automatically regardless if you have 12 units selected or 50.
Isn't that what magic boxing is for? Or am I missing something.
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On January 07 2012 22:58 norterrible wrote:Show nested quote +On January 07 2012 22:55 Lavi wrote:On January 07 2012 21:34 Daemonic-Force wrote:
Regarding your Unit Clumping and Formation Movement, just because you can select a vast amount of units at the same time does not prohibit you from moving your troops in 12 unit blocks.
In fact, if you feel it advantageous to spend your apm in such a manner, then there is nothing stopping you. I recall several instances, usually at the top of ramps, where players spread out units for defence or spread vs EMP or other AoE attacks.
The only difference is that BW forced you to move in 12 unit blocks. The option is not removed in SC2. while that is true about unit selection that has nothing to do with clumping and formation movement. In bw you can spread out units and walk spaced out from point a to point b, whereas sc2 they will clump to a little ball automatically regardless if you have 12 units selected or 50. Isn't that what magic boxing is for? Or am I missing something.
thats more noticeable for air units like mutas...
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EPT
