Since WoL, the strenght of bio terran (called also bio ball) has decreased because of many extansions. Indeed, the addition of many new units (with different features) which mustn t overlap with marines, has made them less powerfull.
Without entenring in details (and note all units which can counter/handicap marines), it s possible to consider a slight balance inside the specificities of a marine (without dramatic changes on stimpack). Then you are invited to argue why you doesn t agree with this idea, or if i ve missed some unexpected consequences.
To explain how i get this idea, i remembered some times ago a post (made by ...) warning about the weakness of a marines without stimpack. It s actually a very good comment cause it s pointing what Blizzard can or not do for balance, i.e makes stimpack changes without avoid a reduction of the skill gap of professionnal players. Marines also suffers from many lethal damage (storm, banes, colossus, tanks, lurkers,.. etc..) and are vulnerable in the hands of Casuals Players.
Since WoL, i think we have also seen a reduction in medivacs proportion (because of Banshee rotors, Viking Buff, Liberators as new units, BC ...) and it seems to be a good thing. After all these explication, a legitimate case to balance Marine could be to increase slightly hits points and reduce DPS. The objective is to balance the critical mass of a bio ball in relation with medivacs, in order to gain more sustain and help casual Terran (and also Pro Terran) to keep their marines alive longer. The question is more about a revision than a modification of marines, and it could promotes Terran to play safer, without being too aggressive. As i said before, it s not designed because Marines are weak but because the place of marines has changed since 10 years.
Details:
- Shield Upgrades : +10 hp increases to +15 hp
The overall amount of marines life will be increased by 9%. It helps marines to survive in the end game / It helps casual players.
- Reduction Cooldown : 0.61 to 0.66 (-7.5%)
Marines scale upgrades LoTV : 9.8 to 14.6 Marines new scale : 9.1 to 13.6
Reduction Scale Percentage : -7%
Of course, it can t work in theory and this kind of changes has to be adjust with the tester scenario against zerglings. Probably the DPS of the marines may have to be reduced a little bit more.. But who knows ?
Adding a little health on marines isn't going to help against banelings. And reducing the base damage of marines sounds like it might cause issues with defending early pre-shield timings and rushes.
Additionally I don't think marines particularly need fixing right now.
Marines are fine really. If anything were to change I'd like to see stim and combat shield combined together, since banelings now get +hp from centrifugal hooks and other upgrades have gotten a lot better. Would be really nice for Terran to have strong, respectable early game timings again that can influence / shape meta build order decisions from the other races. This would most likely be too strong so it will never happen. Byun will come back and absolutely break the game and it'd be reverted immediately
On April 05 2020 00:46 LHK wrote: Marines are fine really. If anything were to change I'd like to see stim and combat shield combined together, since banelings now get +hp from centrifugal hooks and other upgrades have gotten a lot better. Would be really nice for Terran to have strong, respectable early game timings again that can influence / shape meta build order decisions from the other races. This would most likely be too strong so it will never happen. Byun will come back and absolutely break the game and it'd be reverted immediately
On April 05 2020 00:31 ZigguratOfUr wrote: Adding a little health on marines isn't going to help against banelings. And reducing the base damage of marines sounds like it might cause issues with defending early pre-shield timings and rushes.
Additionally I don't think marines particularly need fixing right now.
Can you talk me more about which timing are defended by marines before shield ? I don t see any for Pro players or Casual Players..
I ve done the tests for 1000 minerals in the units testers of LoTV (made by Existor / Soul Fisher / Brandon), thanks to them (20 marines against 40 zerglings)
The result surprises me a lot.... Guess what ?
Against Zerglings and without moving (no use of stimpack) : It decreases a little bit the strenght of marines, i.e marines in LoTV are stronger with 55 hp and a little bit faster cooldown on Gauss rifle (by the way, it s harder for casual players..) (The reduction i ve done on CD : 0.61 increases to 0.66, -7.5%) Result after fight : +475 average minerals Bonus for Zerg LoTV (19 zerglings alive), +400 average minerals Bonus for Zerg with revision (16 zerglings alive).
But... With stimpack, the result is really the same !!! i have the same median, my max is the same too !!!! I ve checked two times my modification cause the first time i ve done a mistake in the test map : stimpack goes above 45 hit points when pressed (60 - 10 = 50) and when done, the max hit points forced to 45 hit points...
In definitive the game is really well done, this small modification proves that Marines units can be slightly revised especially against lethal damage ( I could add some videos tomorrow..)
On April 05 2020 00:31 ZigguratOfUr wrote: Adding a little health on marines isn't going to help against banelings. And reducing the base damage of marines sounds like it might cause issues with defending early pre-shield timings and rushes.
Additionally I don't think marines particularly need fixing right now.
Can you talk me more about which timing are defended by marines before shield ? I don t see any for Pro players or Casual Players..
I ve done the tests for 1000 minerals in the units testers of LoTV (made by Existor / Soul Fisher / Brandon), thanks to them (20 marines against 40 zerglings)
The result surprises me a lot.... Guess what ?
Against Zerglings and without moving (no use of stimpack) : It decreases a little bit the strenght of marines, i.e marines in LoTV are stronger with 55 hp and a little bit faster cooldown on Gauss rifle (by the way, it s harder for casual players..) (The reduction i ve done on CD : 0.86 increases to 0.93, -7.5%) Result after fight : +475 average minerals Bonus for Zerg LoTV (19 zerglings alive), +400 average minerals Bonus for Zerg with revision (16 zerglings alive).
But... With stimpack, the result is really the same !!! i have the same median, my max is the same too !!!! I ve checked two times my modification cause the first time i ve done a mistake in the test map : stimpack goes above 45 hit points when pressed (60 - 10 = 50) and when done, the max hit points forced to 45 hit points...
In definitive the game is really well done, this small modification proves that Marines units can be slightly revised especially against lethal damage ( I could add some videos tomorrow..)
Maybe you wouldn't term it a timing, but terran often have to defend heavy stalker pressure with mainly marines before shield are done. For instance this very typical game on Nightshade: .
And testing things against zerglings is a bit missing the point, since it's usually splash damage (especially banelings) that's the big problem for marines.
I ve checked videos, to me the timing of blink stalker allow to Terran to have a larger population army (in proportion comparing to protoss).. I don t think Cure has been afraid by these pushes and If it was the case, he would add some bunkers.
Regarding the balance method, it s mandatory to balance against zerglings as it s a core unit and a T1 unit. It s only what marines are for Terran and what Zerglings are for Zergs (iconic units)
changing something to marines ist the worst way. marines are the most impactful units in sc2 so changing something means sc2 is going to be a very different game and in all matchups.
On April 05 2020 02:54 Dingodile wrote: changing something to marines ist the worst way. marines are the most impactful units in sc2 so changing something means sc2 is going to be a very different game and in all matchups.
It makes me wonder if you have read something in this thread... besides you don t give arguments, you re saying an unit like the "squishy" marines is able to change the game. You re doing the opposite of what we need to discuss here, i.e balance one representative unit among others..
The subject is to balance the critical mass of marines relatively to medivacs and his ability of sustaining after battle. There was a long time ago when Players have too many medivacs...
I dare say that marines are one of the biggest reasons SC2 has been an atrocious mess of balancing issues.
Terran bio has always been absurdly strong and so many aspects of this game have been modified to compensate for that, all the way back to 2010 where they nerfed siege tanks in the beta.
On April 05 2020 05:12 Mjolnir wrote: I dare say that marines are one of the biggest reasons SC2 has been an atrocious mess of balancing issues.
Terran bio has always been absurdly strong and so many aspects of this game have been modified to compensate for that, all the way back to 2010 where they nerfed siege tanks in the beta.
Marines are fine.
I don t propose changes / buff / nerf... Already someone speaks about marines as impactfull, for you they are strong, i agree with you.
My revision of marines units consist to add a little bit health in exchange of little bit less DPS to help them "against INSANE amount of damage", against lethal damage .. With this stuff, Marines doesn t deal more damage, by the way it helps Terran player to increase his critical mass (with medivacs) if he has made some previous great fights.
Until now, nobody have arguments against the sustain power of a bio-ball.. Nobody argued against the fact that Bio Terran mainly have troubles against INSANE damage.. Nobody weighs the pros and cons of the two version between lotv and my revision, people are claiming what they feel true but could i have one example which plays in your favor ?
Don t take that personally, people aren t idiots, they know SC2 couldn t have worked since 10 years with too strong marines. Then If i read your comments until end, i could understand you are unhappy of the strenght of tanks ?! Do you ? Cause for now it s probably a master piece in the Terran army.
Firstly, the "since WoL" mentality is a bad starting point because the game had changed a lot, with 2 expansions and various patches, the balance have been designed with the "current" marine characteristics in mind. If you change the basic unit (marine in this case) without considering what specific problem in mind, you are more likely mess up the whole balance than fix whatever needed to be fixed.
Then the post state a increase of 5 hp and reduce of DPS, without explaining the rational behind the change, or what it aim to achieve.
When the problem stated is marine weakness against AOE damage,his 5 HP increase will do almost nothing against any of the AOE listed in the post. for example, colossus almost always 2 shot marine with 55 hp or 60 hp (exception is +0 colossus against marine with armor upgrade, which is almost never happen in non-noob game). Storm do 80 damage in 2.6s, which kill 60 hp marine in 1 cast, the only difference is that there will be a split second more for the marine to pull out. Baneling always 2 shot marine, irrespective of 55 or 60 hp, or any weapon / armor upgrade, again, this change does nothing for the terran.
the added hp into shield do not help terran to fight off early rushes, which oftern arrive before the terran can get the tech lab on the barrack. With the decreased DPS, it means that terran is more likely worse off in defend against rushes.
On April 05 2020 12:34 Azushi wrote: Marine are well balanced, no need to change them
I agree..
Here's the thing: If you're talking straight army engagements, that's one thing, but there's also all the harass opportunities that get dulled down. Not willing to sacrifice that, since the brutal speed and efficiency of two medivacs full of marines is a source of much needed severity if you don't know it's coming. (As a diamond 3 Protoss Player.)
If you're trying to make the game more sensible, consider splitting centrifugal hooks into two upgrades. Moving the hydra den to hatchery tech but keeping their upgrades at lair tech, and removing the ability for non active creep tumors to give vision.
When the problem stated is marine weakness against AOE damage,his 5 HP increase will do almost nothing against any of the AOE listed in the post. for example, colossus almost always 2 shot marine with 55 hp or 60 hp (exception is +0 colossus against marine with armor upgrade, which is almost never happen in non-noob game). Storm do 80 damage in 2.6s, which kill 60 hp marine in 1 cast, the only difference is that there will be a split second more for the marine to pull out. Baneling always 2 shot marine, irrespective of 55 or 60 hp, or any weapon / armor upgrade, again, this change does nothing for the terran. .
It seems the only AOE which doesn t have a proportional reduction is banelings.. (purification Nova also)
Storm hits 10 damage to the target area every 0.41 seconds : so it can helps
It will also helps against : Ultralisks, mutalisks and archon
On April 05 2020 13:30 ThunderJunk wrote: Here's the thing: If you're talking straight army engagements, that's one thing, but there's also all the harass opportunities that get dulled down. Not willing to sacrifice that, since the brutal speed and efficiency of two medivacs full of marines is a source of much needed severity if you don't know it's coming. (As a diamond 3 Protoss Player.)
From a perspective of pro player, the 2 medivacs drop is really weak (Heromarine / Clem doesn t do it no more..).
From a perspective of casual players, it s a good comment cause i need to add this set up with support of two medivacs in unit tester...
I transfer this "Marines revision" document into a "Banelings tests"...
Explosion Parameters are like in LoTV, orange = 50 %, yellow = 25 %
Group 1 : 20 Marines + shield + stimpack Cost Group 1 = 1000 Minerals Supply cost = 20
Group 2 : 20 Banelings + centrifugal hooks Cost Group 2 = 1000 Minerals + 500 Gas Supply cost = 10 !!!!
Results
1) Standard LoTV Banelings Burst = +450 M +225 G +9 Banelings
2) Drastic Revision = +0 M +0 G +0 Banelings (In most case all Marines died except in this video : Unit Tester says DOUBLE KO !!)
3) First Revision = +400 M +200 G +8 Banelings
4) Last Revision = +350 M +175 G +7 Banelings
The difference between case 3 and case 4 shows that the radius is much more important than the fraction (50% regarding to 25%). During the process, the objective was to find extrem cases but the fourth case hadn t expected consequences and was really smooth,... by the way, i was satisfied about the balance test.
Conclusion
Despite modifications in case n°3 and case n°4 seems to be big at first sight, i ve been surprised about the unsignificant impact of this revision. Indeed, the size of new ring (yellow or orange rings) is only equal to 33% of the original shape and results aren t heavily changed (only two Banelings difference with the last revision and LoTV).
Are you surprised ? Comments are welcome
PS : Banelings are one of the most expensive units in the game - (more expensive than an ultralisk proportionally to the supply cost). Banelings are "probably the most efficient units" in regarding of the risk of failure and supply cost.
There's no need to change baneling-bio interaction. If anything banelings have been buffed over time so they can counter bio as intended. Bio with good micro can decisively counter banelings.
As for everything else marine, if you want to be taken seriously, you should try to type more professionally. Run your post through a word processor beforehand, as your grammer is atrocious and it's difficult to understand what you are trying to say. I know in French they don't capitalise their equivalent of "i", but things like apostrophe shouldn't be unfamiliar to you. If you want to learn English better, google translate is excellent to see how you should be writing.
Anyways, what does "Marines scale upgrades LoTV : 9.8 to 14.6" mean? Do you mean damage per second or DPS?
You don't seem to have understanding of the game, but anything that messes with the cooldown of a micro intensive unit is unpreferable. Marines often stutterstep and changing the cooldown will change the micro needed.
Also anything that can make marines sustain damage for longer is dangerous as bio also have a cascading deathball syndrome due to being able to recover quickly from low health units.