EPTPlease note that this is NOT a game change suggestion. I'm throwing out a hypothesis as to why SC2 falls back to deathball vs. deathball engagements so often and a possible solution based on the hypothesized cause. Now I am offering the idea to the community for feedback and criticism. Incidentally, if any mapmakers know how to make a map with increased unit collision (as a mapmaker, how much unit collision is increased is up to your discretion) for testing, I'd be much obliged (the map editor confuses me). If anyone were to do this though, I'd request it be done on Shakuras, Cloud Kingdom, and TDA. The reasoning behind these 3 is that Shakuras contains a lot of chokes and is pretty conducive to split map scenarios. TDA is a large, open map that still has various exploitable terrain advantages (think terrain at the watchtowers and the highground center). Cloud Kingdom is kind of a middleman; plus, I just like the map features personally and think it could lead to some interesting army movement. This is entirely voluntary, and if anyone out doesn't want to make the maps, but knows of a way to change unit collision and would be willing to share, I could work on them myself (although I have 0 mapmaking experience).
From the Modified Movement thread (spoilered because giant wall of text):
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What I think (and has been brought up a few times on TL to no avail) would suit the OP's purposes better is an increase in unit collision size. This naturally causes units to spread out a bit more and can possibly make the deathball's radius so large that there's no longer any incentive to do so, except in very specific circumstances. My two cents? The breaking up of deathballs is NOT the primary cause for smaller skirmishes all over the map (though it is a key component); area control is.
Think about the state of ZvT a few months ago (muta ling bling vs marine medi tank). I think there was even a poll on TL about the most dynamic and interesting match up and, if I remember correctly, ZvT was awarded the title. Most people attributed this to the area control that came with tanks. Even if Zerg had a superior army, a bad engagement angle could mean his superior army gets completely crushed by marine tank fire. Thus, the Z had to be active in scouting and proficient in maneuvering his army around so that he can get the right angle to engage. This also had the effect of making run-bys and muta harassment more viable (whether it's because attacking into the seige line would be suicide, or to bait the Terran into moving out of position and opening a window in an otherwise impenetrable defense). From the T side, the Terran had to be methodic and careful about pushing out of the map, and he had to be aware of the both player's army movements and position. This lead to some very dynamic army movements and made positioning just as important as army composition.
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All of this is due to the area control seige tanks gave. (This analogy also applies somewhat to TvT, but since both players get seige tanks it can sometimes turn into trench warfare essentially. Also, I don't play T so I have no clue about TvT other than it's heavily position based).
Going back to unit collision, let's say we have 11 min roach max PvZ Cloud Kingdom. Let's say hypothetically with the current unit collision, you have 60 roaches, 40 of which can fire at once (Ignore forcefields for this simplified example. Let's assume stalkers are just as cost effective per unit as roaches). What if roach unit collision was such that, instead of 40, you could only get 30 roaches firing at once? How about 20? If only 20 of your roaches can be attacking at that location at any given time, there would be much more incentive to split your army and attack multiple locations at once. This also applies to the Protoss, in that he will also be limited by an increase in his unit collision size and have the incentive to spread his army out to defend multiple locations at once.
What's stopping this from happening NOW is that, if I split my roaches into 30 and 30, the smaller unit collision size means that I basically have half my army against his entire army (it's like forcefielding yourself in half for him!). After he stomps half my roaches, he just has to march over and massacre the other half and I won't have enough time to do any real damage. If unit collision sizes were larger, however, he has less army fighting my 30 roaches (say, 60% or 70% of his army can attack at any given time), meaning not only do my roaches do more damage , it also takes longer for the protoss to kill the first 30 roaches. (Think 1 roach vs 1 marine 10x vs. 1 roach vs 10 marines 1x) This makes multi-pronged attacks more powerful and encourages more army movement, flanks, etc. This example can be extended to engagements in the middle of the map as well.
Let's say we find an increased unit collision size and change units/maps where everything balances. How might a mid-game ZvP engagement play out? Ideally, we might have the Z (with larger numbers of cheaper, lower range units) setting up a flank on the protoss. The protoss, having good map awareness, sees the flank coming before it's too late, and decides to warp in reinforcements BEHIND the group of Zerg units intended to flank; the Protoss is essentially flanking a flank. Now what determines who comes out of this engagement victorious is not only army composition and macro, but also maneuvering, preparation, and planning. Did the Zerg player anticipate the possibility of his flank being countered and leave an escape path? Did he foresee this, and decided pre-emptively to rally his reinforcements to a Protoss expansion, knowing that the Protoss would either have to warp in to save his mining probes or risk getting his army crushed by a flank? Did the Protoss pick an avenue of attack that will allow him to clean up the flank from a defensive position, or did the Zerg manage to bait the Protoss out of position and too far to clean up in time? There are so many extra positional and tactical factors that could go into an engagement like this that aren't present in the typical deathball vs deathball microfest/shitstorm (think typical PvT deathballs) that really should be in an RTS game like SC2 that are simply missing.
NOTE: I realize scenarios like the one I explained above do happen. However, I am hypothesizing that an increase in unit collision size (and a corresponding decrease in dps per area) will ENCOURAGE positional play and, instead of having the odd game where such factors become a major factor in an engagement, EVERY ENGAGEMENT will be planned out with such factors in mind. This also has an extra affect of adding depth to the game and giving more chance for the best players to separate themselves from the good players.
Think about the state of ZvT a few months ago (muta ling bling vs marine medi tank). I think there was even a poll on TL about the most dynamic and interesting match up and, if I remember correctly, ZvT was awarded the title. Most people attributed this to the area control that came with tanks. Even if Zerg had a superior army, a bad engagement angle could mean his superior army gets completely crushed by marine tank fire. Thus, the Z had to be active in scouting and proficient in maneuvering his army around so that he can get the right angle to engage. This also had the effect of making run-bys and muta harassment more viable (whether it's because attacking into the seige line would be suicide, or to bait the Terran into moving out of position and opening a window in an otherwise impenetrable defense). From the T side, the Terran had to be methodic and careful about pushing out of the map, and he had to be aware of the both player's army movements and position. This lead to some very dynamic army movements and made positioning just as important as army composition.
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I, personally, would say that too many match ups in SC2 are too focused solely on army composition and don't take any consideration into terrain and positioning save for how big the map is and how wide a choke is.
All of this is due to the area control seige tanks gave. (This analogy also applies somewhat to TvT, but since both players get seige tanks it can sometimes turn into trench warfare essentially. Also, I don't play T so I have no clue about TvT other than it's heavily position based).
Going back to unit collision, let's say we have 11 min roach max PvZ Cloud Kingdom. Let's say hypothetically with the current unit collision, you have 60 roaches, 40 of which can fire at once (Ignore forcefields for this simplified example. Let's assume stalkers are just as cost effective per unit as roaches). What if roach unit collision was such that, instead of 40, you could only get 30 roaches firing at once? How about 20? If only 20 of your roaches can be attacking at that location at any given time, there would be much more incentive to split your army and attack multiple locations at once. This also applies to the Protoss, in that he will also be limited by an increase in his unit collision size and have the incentive to spread his army out to defend multiple locations at once.
What's stopping this from happening NOW is that, if I split my roaches into 30 and 30, the smaller unit collision size means that I basically have half my army against his entire army (it's like forcefielding yourself in half for him!). After he stomps half my roaches, he just has to march over and massacre the other half and I won't have enough time to do any real damage. If unit collision sizes were larger, however, he has less army fighting my 30 roaches (say, 60% or 70% of his army can attack at any given time), meaning not only do my roaches do more damage , it also takes longer for the protoss to kill the first 30 roaches. (Think 1 roach vs 1 marine 10x vs. 1 roach vs 10 marines 1x) This makes multi-pronged attacks more powerful and encourages more army movement, flanks, etc. This example can be extended to engagements in the middle of the map as well.
Let's say we find an increased unit collision size and change units/maps where everything balances. How might a mid-game ZvP engagement play out? Ideally, we might have the Z (with larger numbers of cheaper, lower range units) setting up a flank on the protoss. The protoss, having good map awareness, sees the flank coming before it's too late, and decides to warp in reinforcements BEHIND the group of Zerg units intended to flank; the Protoss is essentially flanking a flank. Now what determines who comes out of this engagement victorious is not only army composition and macro, but also maneuvering, preparation, and planning. Did the Zerg player anticipate the possibility of his flank being countered and leave an escape path? Did he foresee this, and decided pre-emptively to rally his reinforcements to a Protoss expansion, knowing that the Protoss would either have to warp in to save his mining probes or risk getting his army crushed by a flank? Did the Protoss pick an avenue of attack that will allow him to clean up the flank from a defensive position, or did the Zerg manage to bait the Protoss out of position and too far to clean up in time? There are so many extra positional and tactical factors that could go into an engagement like this that aren't present in the typical deathball vs deathball microfest/shitstorm (think typical PvT deathballs) that really should be in an RTS game like SC2 that are simply missing.
NOTE: I realize scenarios like the one I explained above do happen. However, I am hypothesizing that an increase in unit collision size (and a corresponding decrease in dps per area) will ENCOURAGE positional play and, instead of having the odd game where such factors become a major factor in an engagement, EVERY ENGAGEMENT will be planned out with such factors in mind. This also has an extra affect of adding depth to the game and giving more chance for the best players to separate themselves from the good players.
I did a quick search on unit collision in TL and couldn't find anything substantial.
