I've posted a few times in various threads (not all that often though) about how I don't believe it's fair to compare SC2 to broodwar the way people have been doing since the game first came out.
There are a few different points I'd like to make on why this is a ridiculous comparison to be making right now.
Age
BW has been around for over a decade. In that time the game has DRASTICALLY changed. When people began playing competitively, before the professional scene existed, techniques like muta stacking and magic boxing didn't exist. Every micro trick had to be discovered individually. It wasn't until people saw Maynard transferring workers that they began to realize that it was more efficient to do so.
When Boxer first broke into his fame, Terran was considered the weakest race, and he revolutionized how the game was played. Bisu and Jaedong, among others, have had similar effects in dictating how their races were played.
The map pools changed drastically over the years. Remember those crazy island maps? Remember maps like 815, Neo Vertigo and Dire Straits? Pretty different from modern maps, and I doubt any of those would have had a chance in hell of making it into competitive play in recent years.
Look at the builds over the years. At one point in time, The Stove was actually a build someone came up with because they thought it would be good. That was years ago, but it still stands that someone came up with it thinking that it would be good enough to use for something other than taking your opponent off guard. There are too many revolutionary builds for me to list them here (and frankly, I haven't watched enough old BW to know them)...
All of these things have changed the landscape of competitive broodwar and served as stepping stones to what broodwar looked like in it's final days of professional play.
When it's all said and done, broodwar evolved over more than a decade of competitive gameplay, and there is NO substitute for the learning process. We've even see the process of this learning beginning in SC2. We've seen the evolution of builds and gameplay from 1-base cheese being basically standard back in the beta, to the 3-base play we see commonly today. Just go back and watch a few games from the older GSLs, and you can clearly see that the landscape of viable builds, build order execution, and micro evolved over time; and nothing says this evolution ends here.
The Expansions
When Starcraft came out, it was not the game that Broodwar is. Ask anyone, and they will say that Broodwar completed Starcraft. SC2 has 2 more expansions to be released over the next few years. This means that for each expansion we will have to relearn timings, create new builds entirely, and adapt older builds to work within the modified framework each expansion will provide. We absolutely cannot consider the gameplay in WoL or even HotS to be what SC2 will eventually become.
There's not much to say about this point other than what I've already said: you absolutely cannot compare BW and SC2 until SC2's expansions have been released.
Balance Patches
After broodwar came out, there were patches. But not very many. according to this thread 1.08 was the last balance patch, and was released in April 2001. This is about 2.5 years after broodwar was released. Now, assuming that it takes as long to release LotV after HotS as it took for HotS to come out after WoL we're looking at maybe 5+ years from now before the final expansion has come out and the final balance patches are applied. Hopefully by the time LotV comes out the game wil be at a point where blizzard is happy with the balance enough to leave it to the community and mappers to do the rest. The metagame shifts every time a balance patch comes out, and each time it happens, there tends to be a swing where everyone struggles to figure out how to work in the modified environment post-patch.
I consider this a big point because from 2001 until 2012 the game was left with essentially no changes from blizzard which affected balance. Remember 2001 is roughly when Boxer came onto the scene and showed us that Terran is far from the under powered race everyone felt it was. That is to say, even when the community consensus was that one race was under powered, one player was able to completely change how the race was played and in effect prove that that the game was far better balanced than people initially thought it was.
I believe that for SC2 to form a set of stable builds the way Broodwar did in the years following the final balance patch, SC2 also needs to have a point where blizzard says "that's it boys, no more balance patches, you're on your own".
Other Thoughts
If you look at the micro tricks and the overall skill level needed to play BW at a high professional level in the last year or so, I don't think anyone who knows the game well would say that it takes less skill than SC2. Macro is harder in BW, and there are so many micro tricks you need to be able to pull off during a battle along with the macro that the multitasking and overall skill required is still higher than SC2. However, I believe that because the interface for SC2 makes macro easier, players will be able to devote more APM, more multitasking and more overall skill into things such as army positioning, simultaneous drops/harass/battles, and micro in general. MBS and near unlimited unit selection means that it's easier to macro and to micro larger groups, but with this reduction in APM/multitasking requirement for macro it means that you ave more free APM/multitasking to do other things with your units. How often do you see players in the middle of a battle select small groups of units and target fire with them while simultaneously dropping someone? Not bloody often, but I have a feeling things like this will become more and more common as players begin to be forced to micro better either to counter their opponent's micro, or to gain even more of a lead by losing less in battle.
Now, there are certain topics people always seem to gravitate towards discussing in these BW/SC2 debates. Namely: unit movement, abilities which lock units down, and "the deathball".
I'll discuss each topic in turn here for a paragraph or so.
Unit Movement In BW, units did not clump together nearly as much as they do in SC2. This leads to armies being spread apart more than their SC2 counterparts. This reduces the efficiency of splash damage and causes the battles to be more drawn out affairs than what you currently see in SC2. However, I don't see the necessity to bring this mechanic back into SC2 at all. The way I see things, the benefits of spacing your units apart is still something you can achieve in SC2, it just takes (wait for it) more skill than BW. Yes, I said it. I think something in SC2 can take more skill than it's bW counterpart. What I mean is that it is still perfectly possible to spread your army out more and fight in much larger more spaced out battles in SC2. It just requires micro, positioning, and multiple army hotkeys. Since SC2 removed the need for multiple army hotkeys you see almost nobody using multiple hotkeys for their main army. They might use another kotkey for drops, maybe one for their spellcasters, but I don't recall ever being aware of anyone splitting their army into a few different hotkeys for the purpose of maneuvering it as separate groups like in BW, and I believe it's something players need to explore more.
"Anti-micro spells" Fungal growth and forcefields are often talked about as removing the ability to micro, and hence making it impossible for a player to use their possibly superior micro in order to win an engagement. The way I see this issue is that these abilities make the game more positional, and require the player who may be on the receiving end to be more careful about how they engage an army that has the potential to pin them down. I see these abilities as potentially forcing a player to employ more positional plays, such as flanking, counterattacks and drops/harass in order to force their opponent into a less favorable engagement, which can only be a good thing. It also takes skill to land clutch forcefields and fungals in the right places, and it's certainly possible to mess up. Just think about how many sentry/immortal plays have failed due to bad forcefielding, how many sentry drops failed due to not FFing the ramp properly, or how many times someone has lost battles due to bad fungals, or fungals wasted on less important things when they don't have enough infestors.
The Deathball As far as I'm concerned, the deathball is simply a side effect of the different unit movement coupled with nobody using multiple army hotkeys yet. I believe as the game matures, people will learn that there are plenty of engagements that would work out much better if they split their army up more and battled over a larger area. I honestly feel like for now, this is actually a non-issue that should be brought up again much later if for some reason it's still an issue 5 years or so from now.
Conclusions
Alright. I've laid out the three main reasons I believe that comparing SC2 to BW as far as play is concerned. Now let's try to some things up: The singlemost important reason you should not be comparing SC2 to broodwar is time. SC2 is incredibly new compared to BW. I'm not saying that SC2 should take as long as BW did after the final balance patch was released to get to a state similar in skill to BW, what I am saying is that we still aren't there yet, and until we are far closer, this debate is absolutely worthless.
If you've actually read all this, then you get +1 respect in my books. If you simply chime in that you read all this but actually haven't, -2. If you can legitimately make a counterpoint that makes me think about something I've said in another light, +5. I'm completely open to seeing what some of you guys think about these thoughts and I am willing to change my mind given a good well thought out argument against something I've said. These are just the opinions of someone who plays at maybe silver level on a good day. I've spent a good amount of time thinking about these things, reading threads where people do in depth discussion on various topics, and in general watching a LOT of SC2. I watched BW a little bit back in the day when tasteless first casted for GOM, but stopped when there was no more official english casting. Since then the only BW I've watched was both OSL grand finals, and nearly all of the hybrid proleague.
Nice post this is great just think there was not a very big pro scene for SC but for SCBW it broke out huge hot Legacy of The Void does that too! Now compare to a deathball movement....
Seriously sick of people analyzing Starcraft 2 vacuously. Starcraft 2 has had 13 years of BROODWAR + 2 years of itself to develop into a game, seeing as how it takes a lot of units, tactics, and builds straight from broodwar.
Clumping can only be mitigated a little by manual splitting...it still affects a lot of the balance and design of the game, and makes every battle very unforgiving for the player, which is arguably a bad thing.
Also your argument for anti-micro spells is silly. All those things you listed are already done to distinguish skill levels. The difference in BW is that you could still come back from a disadvantageous position, whereas in SC2 the game is usually over because of one mistake.
bw and sc2 are both rts. bw is largely considered the greatest competitive rts ever made and sc2 is a competitive rts. bw sets the standards for good competitive rts. there's nothing wrong with comparing them even when you consider the points you mentioned.
I like your thoughts on SC2 interface upgrade, I think alot of these things can actually lead to way more complex micro and cool battles(minus the unlimited section, its time that goes. people wonder why death balls are used so much compared to BW and there is one part of your anwser) I really love SC2 waypoints/custom hotkeys/multiple building select
However....
This isnt a brand new RTS, it is a sequel and it came with a lot of elements of BW like it or not. People bring up BW so much because SC2 is lacking real excitement even after 2 years of play(IMO). What's sad is that the money is there, and the player hype is there which is why people love watching. However, SC2 could honestly be a way better game. Theres just to many units that have major flaws that cause the game to be a one battle fail. Brood Lords/infestors/Collsi to mention a few. That plus the good old 15 minute bo5(thanks 2 base all in) is WAY to common in this game. I cant tell you how many times I watch tournaments and there is so much hype.... IDRA VS BOMBER OGMMGOGMG THIS IS SICK GET THE POPCORN!!. Only to have 3 5 minute matches of bunk rush.
SC2 has flaws. Ppl are going to point to the game that doesnt have flaws.
Actually if you count 1998 until 2012, BW had 14 years to develop because let's face it, BW sucked until last year.
But more seriously, while I was a big proponent of give SC2 time, I dislike the broader "BW had a decade to develop" argument as it presupposes that BW was a terrible game up until the last couple years. It also seems to assume that the pro's forgot absolutely everything they ever knew about RTS's and we're starting from scratch (Protoss suddenly forgot how to ht drop worker lines). We'll see what happens, but I'm inclined to think if Kespa players can't find the cool micro tricks analogs to vulture patrol and muta micro, then it just doesn't exist in SC2. Another half year and we can start comparing 2001 Boxer vods being that HotS should be out (1 expansion to 1 expansion), Kespa players should be up to form and both games will be out for three years. Three years is a very generous amount of time to evaluate a game.
And evaluating the quality of Beta units is kinda why they have Beta- or at least why they took out the Warhound, so I'm not sure why we ought to wait a decade before saying anything.
On September 27 2012 15:14 XXXSmOke wrote: I like your thoughts on SC2 interface upgrade, I think alot of these things can actually lead to way more complex micro and cool battles(minus the unlimited section, its time that goes. people wonder why death balls are used so much compared to BW and there is one part of your anwser) I really love SC2 waypoints/custom hotkeys/multiple building select
However....
This isnt a brand new RTS, it is a sequel and it came with a lot of elements of BW like it or not. People bring up BW so much because SC2 is lacking real excitement even after 2 years of play(IMO). What's sad is that the money is there, and the player hype is there which is why people love watching. However, SC2 could honestly be a way better game. Theres just to many units that have major flaws that cause the game to be a one battle fail. Brood Lords/infestors/Collsi to mention a few. That plus the good old 15 minute bo5(thanks 2 base all in) is WAY to common in this game. I cant tell you how many times I watch tournaments and there is so much hype.... IDRA VS BOMBER OGMMGOGMG THIS IS SICK GET THE POPCORN!!. Only to have 3 5 minute matches of bunk rush.
SC2 has flaws. Ppl are going to point to the game that doesnt have flaws.
To be honest, there were quite a few bunker rushes in BW, too. Flash was known for it and still JD 12 hatched every game -.- What really pisses me off are the base trades. Some people think they're sooo exciting but I find it dumb. That's not the point of the game to kill each other's base in some weird scenario but it's very often the only chance you have. Also there are almost no OMG-moments like Jangbi storms or a great plague because of the unit clumping. AOE had to be nerfed to joke level.
About your thoughts on anti-micro: BW did have anti-micro abilities as well as microable abilities. But a lot of them were late game (stasis for arbiters, irradiate for vessels), except for perhaps TvT midgame, where sieged tanks would evaporate unsieged tanks.
The thing about abilities like Dark Swarm in BW was that it creates a lot of tension, a lot of back and forth action. As exciting as vortexing 12 battlecruisers may be, the novelty wears off, and it does seem like there's any skill involved at all. The same thing with neuraling a mothership, the game is over in about 10 seconds. Abilties which force micro when the ability is being cast is way more interesting to watch and play against imo. It also adds a second layer of complexity, where the person casting Dark Swarm actually acts upon the fact that Terran is moving back.
There's no reason that SC2 can't have something like this. There should be a good mix imo.
I'll write some coherent responses when I get up tomorrow. But yes, I do agree that SC2 has it's flaws. The "neural mothership, win game"/"drop vortex, win game" situation as it stands now is horrible, among other things.
And we're obviously not starting from scratch... Although with that worker auto-mine feature in HotS it almost feels like blizzard thinks we are
My main point about "give it time" is that you can see quite obviously even a relatively small change to a stat on a unit, such as Queen range, can make a massive impact in the gameplay, and until we can get a good year or 2 without huge changes, the growth of the game will be far slower than it should be. By all rights I feel like the overall skill level of players should be higher than it is right now, but the constant patching tends to create large swings in playstyle as the players constantly adjust to the changes, rather than focus on figuring out how to deal with the problem as a player.
Anyway, I'll be back tomorrow to address some of your points directly. I'd considered making this a thread, but as a blog it's easier to actually respond to people, and i'm likely to get fewer inane responses and trolls.
LOL dude i love the ratings at the end, give me all ur +1s though
I agree with a lot of what you've said and I want to emphasize the fact that I think we are at a meta-game turning point in sc2. Players are starting to realize (with the exception of the elite, MKP, Teaja, Blink micro) that you actually _do_ need to work to be good. Stephano has kind of revolutionized the idea of "good play" outside of korea, and I think if we saw a series of good, interesting maps come out, it could really drive the development of the international sc2 pro scene.
hi ediT: teamliquid is so truthy!!! wtf and you're text is exactly the same length as when you post it.
On September 27 2012 15:14 XXXSmOke wrote: I like your thoughts on SC2 interface upgrade, I think alot of these things can actually lead to way more complex micro and cool battles(minus the unlimited section, its time that goes. people wonder why death balls are used so much compared to BW and there is one part of your anwser) I really love SC2 waypoints/custom hotkeys/multiple building select
However....
This isnt a brand new RTS, it is a sequel and it came with a lot of elements of BW like it or not. People bring up BW so much because SC2 is lacking real excitement even after 2 years of play(IMO). What's sad is that the money is there, and the player hype is there which is why people love watching. However, SC2 could honestly be a way better game. Theres just to many units that have major flaws that cause the game to be a one battle fail. Brood Lords/infestors/Collsi to mention a few. That plus the good old 15 minute bo5(thanks 2 base all in) is WAY to common in this game. I cant tell you how many times I watch tournaments and there is so much hype.... IDRA VS BOMBER OGMMGOGMG THIS IS SICK GET THE POPCORN!!. Only to have 3 5 minute matches of bunk rush.
SC2 has flaws. Ppl are going to point to the game that doesnt have flaws.
Every game has flaws, even BW. It only up to each person to think whether each feature/flaw is really good or bad.
There are many people (and I really mean many) outside of TL community and pro-scene who feel that BW has a lot of flaws and is inferior to the other RTS in that generation (Total Annihilation and Age of Empire, for example). No game is good for every person. And there could be a lot of reasons why people might like SC2 more than BW.
On September 27 2012 15:14 XXXSmOke wrote: I like your thoughts on SC2 interface upgrade, I think alot of these things can actually lead to way more complex micro and cool battles(minus the unlimited section, its time that goes. people wonder why death balls are used so much compared to BW and there is one part of your anwser) I really love SC2 waypoints/custom hotkeys/multiple building select
However....
This isnt a brand new RTS, it is a sequel and it came with a lot of elements of BW like it or not. People bring up BW so much because SC2 is lacking real excitement even after 2 years of play(IMO). What's sad is that the money is there, and the player hype is there which is why people love watching. However, SC2 could honestly be a way better game. Theres just to many units that have major flaws that cause the game to be a one battle fail. Brood Lords/infestors/Collsi to mention a few. That plus the good old 15 minute bo5(thanks 2 base all in) is WAY to common in this game. I cant tell you how many times I watch tournaments and there is so much hype.... IDRA VS BOMBER OGMMGOGMG THIS IS SICK GET THE POPCORN!!. Only to have 3 5 minute matches of bunk rush.
SC2 has flaws. Ppl are going to point to the game that doesnt have flaws.
Every game has flaws, even BW. It only up to each person to think whether each feature/flaw is really good or bad.
There are many people (and I really mean many) outside of TL community and pro-scene who feel that BW has a lot of flaws and is inferior to the other RTS in that generation (Total Annihilation and Age of Empire, for example). No game is good for every person. And there could be a lot of reasons why people might like SC2 more than BW.
That's because they have not truly played it- I was an Age of Empires guy until 2007 But I do agree that not every RTS is good for everyone so your mileage will vary. From what I've read, SupCom2 fans think SC2 is a spamfest and have little interest in it. Nonetheless, I still think it's possible to analyze what creates depth in a game and where a game is lacking.
Since the game is updated regularly it makes all the sense in the world to compare it to BW. It's a lost cause for me at this point though, given the way the development has been going so far. If you see a game going in the wrong direction I don't see why you should take time into account at all.. if anything, it's going to get worse.
On September 27 2012 15:06 heyoka wrote: The Stove predates Chef by many years, Rekrul played it in WCG once.
... and created by Proct.
sKy.Proct [P] vs eNr.HellGhost [T]
When The Stove was widely released to the public on StarCraft Legacy in the 16th of October, it opened to mixed opinions on its effectiveness. Some people hated it, while many others loved it. The Stove consists of three stages. The strategy opens up with a Protoss Scout rush. This accomplishes two things: it serves as a...um...scout and it also forces the Terran to rush to ebay/turrets decreasing his unit count. The second phase is Dark Templar harrassment which can frustrate the opponent and increase the time it will take for him to expand. The last stage is the Arbiter with stasis ability. The entire point of The Stove is to confuse and frustrate the opponent...because come on...who the hell goes Scouts five minutes into the game?
The origins of The Stove is sketchy. Proct is the generally accepted inventor of the strategy. Proct played a person by the Battle.net name TheStove, who used the first two stages of the strat. He then added on the Arbiter part and named the strat The Stove. A NoHunter player by the name of Nate claims to be TheStove.
Regardless of whether you think this strategy is particulary effective or not, it is interesting and different to say the least. The Stove is number thirteen in our Pimpest Plays 2002.
I recently thought about something... SC2 balance isn't all that much about what the developers do and don't concerning balance changes, or at least it doesn't have to be. The maps are what truly determine how well each race will perform. Each race having it's own key strengths and weaknesses is one part of the job, and the rest can mostly be left to maps. I mean, I played brood war at a very high level, and it was largely about the maps. That's what made the game balanced throughout the years. Several maps would be terrible for a specific race, and it would show in progames.
However, to achieve that, there must not be hard counters. If roaches are too good against ground so that they're always used, then no map can fix this problem. However to change this would require a massive overhaul, which is simply out of the question. The SC2 team is doing a decent job of weakening overused units, buffing the weak ones and with HOTS, it seems that they are trying to provide units that require skill, thought, and give access to different gameplay styles. They're not doing a bad job at it. And it's not like they can go back and make a copy of BW with SC2 graphics.
However, even if the debate of SC2 vs BW may feel meaningless, it provides excellent discussion, thoughts, and ways to improve the game. A lot of things have been changed for the better just because of this discussion, and a lot more may. (such as the carrier micro)
On September 27 2012 15:14 XXXSmOke wrote: I like your thoughts on SC2 interface upgrade, I think alot of these things can actually lead to way more complex micro and cool battles(minus the unlimited section, its time that goes. people wonder why death balls are used so much compared to BW and there is one part of your anwser) I really love SC2 waypoints/custom hotkeys/multiple building select
However....
This isnt a brand new RTS, it is a sequel and it came with a lot of elements of BW like it or not. People bring up BW so much because SC2 is lacking real excitement even after 2 years of play(IMO). What's sad is that the money is there, and the player hype is there which is why people love watching. However, SC2 could honestly be a way better game. Theres just to many units that have major flaws that cause the game to be a one battle fail. Brood Lords/infestors/Collsi to mention a few. That plus the good old 15 minute bo5(thanks 2 base all in) is WAY to common in this game. I cant tell you how many times I watch tournaments and there is so much hype.... IDRA VS BOMBER OGMMGOGMG THIS IS SICK GET THE POPCORN!!. Only to have 3 5 minute matches of bunk rush.
SC2 has flaws. Ppl are going to point to the game that doesnt have flaws.
Every game has flaws, even BW. It only up to each person to think whether each feature/flaw is really good or bad.
There are many people (and I really mean many) outside of TL community and pro-scene who feel that BW has a lot of flaws and is inferior to the other RTS in that generation (Total Annihilation and Age of Empire, for example). No game is good for every person. And there could be a lot of reasons why people might like SC2 more than BW.
That's because they have not truly played it- I was an Age of Empires guy until 2007 But I do agree that not every RTS is good for everyone so your mileage will vary. From what I've read, SupCom2 fans think SC2 is a spamfest and have little interest in it. Nonetheless, I still think it's possible to analyze what creates depth in a game and where a game is lacking.
Yeah, it boils down to person's taste/preference. I really loved (and still love) Starcraft and Brood War when they came out more than any other RTS. But I still kinda see why people might not like it. But I'm pretty sure that most people who plays RTS at that age would have tried SC once or twice.
And I do agree that there is still a lot of room for improvement of SC2 that is needed to be done. But for me, I still find the game enjoyable to watch.
On September 27 2012 18:14 Stratos wrote: Since the game is updated regularly it makes all the sense in the world to compare it to BW. It's a lost cause for me at this point though, given the way the development has been going so far. If you see a game going in the wrong direction I don't see why you should take time into account at all.. if anything, it's going to get worse.
I would say that it is hard to tell that the game (HOTS) is going into a wrong direction or not. But there's one thing I am pretty sure is that SC2 is one of the most difficult game to design or balance at this point.
Why? Because it has to both adapt to the current design trend of RTS to a certain extent, and also conform to what BW did. And they are very far apart in a lot of areas.
One problem I recognize or feel is that many BW fans tend to play only BW and ignore other RTS almost completely. So they kinda don't see how the trend of game design change over time, such as no resource gathering by workers (capture/holding points for resource). And this change how RTS is designed in the modern time (Dawn of War, for example). Furthermore, RTS players kinda fall into two groups right now. For example, if you frequent gaming websites a lot, you might recognize that there is a very vocal opinion among some (or many) RTS players say that RTS should shift away from demanding a lot of mechanical control (as they believe it turn the game into "who can click faster" game) and emphasize more on "strategy" part. This group of players tend to dislike SC2 (and BW) but from an opposite reason of why BW fans hate SC2.
So Blizz kinda has to design a game that somehow balance the new trend of game design and old-school style RTS to a certain extent, because they still need to sell the game and at the same point don't piss-off the old fanbase too much. If they make the game too mechanical demanding like putting restriction into unit per control group selection (which goes against modern game design), then they are going to detract a lot of modern RTS players.
So to say the game goes toward a wrong direction might only be true from our perspective (TL community), which, let's face it, is a minority in gaming community right now.
It's easy to say if the game is going in the wrong or the right direction (and support it with good arguments), because it's a matter of one's opinion - as you point out yourself. This is true for any discussion about the state of the game. Our opinions are all we've got. Personally I think a problem only arises when someone thinks their opinion is the only single truth in the world.
I agree, you can't really make a comparison between them outside of the fact that they are both rts games and have a large gaming scene.
SC2 has at the very least, concepts of strategy, tactics and mechanics that can be taken from its predecessor. Just in that, BW and SC2 are already very different. BW players back during 1998-2001 also did not have the mechanics to pull of the kind games we see today. Even BoxeR's micro looks sloppy compared to his micro in his later years. Ask BoxeR and YellOw, they both said they improved a lot mechanically over the years. And to top that of, before 2001, there is a portion of players that don't even use hotkeys.
Personally I think a problem only arises when someone thinks their opinion is the only single truth in the world.
EPT
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