|
I don't blame him - he lost multiple years from his peak period due to the horrendous queen patch back in 2012. Blizzard increased the range of queens by 2 AND increased overlord speed. As a result, Zerg was significantly stronger in the early game, allowing them to more easily transition to BL-infestor compositions.
Blizzard never bothered fixing it ever. They just waited until HotS, leaving countless non-Zerg progamers to languish while undeserving patchzergs like JohnnyRecco, Sniper, benefited.
Anecdotally speaking, this really hurt the eSports scene. I had a group of friends who I used to watch tournaments with back in 2011, and I saw the group numbers dramatically dwindle because none of us wanted to watch a bunch of ZvZs in the semis and finals of every tournament
|
this can give the impression of starcraft 2 not being the ultimate fairness reality for competitions into a just a game.
|
People keep saying RTS cant be patched as often, but I don't agree. Look at AOE2 DE its being patched once a month and people love that it's keeping the meta fresh.
|
On July 01 2020 17:47 MarianoSC2 wrote:Show nested quote +On July 01 2020 16:38 SC-Shield wrote: Has he stopped playing SC2? I've not come across an article yet. Yes he quit SC2. And can we really blame him? The game has been dying for years now, and soon there will be no one to play because the pros are retiring without any replacements, Blizz does not care about SC2 anymore
3/10
|
On July 01 2020 20:04 Zealously wrote:Show nested quote +On July 01 2020 17:47 MarianoSC2 wrote:On July 01 2020 16:38 SC-Shield wrote: Has he stopped playing SC2? I've not come across an article yet. Yes he quit SC2. And can we really blame him? The game has been dying for years now, and soon there will be no one to play because the pros are retiring without any replacements, Blizz does not care about SC2 anymore The game has been dying for 80% of its lifespan, kind of tragic actually But it literally is dying.... Well the Korean scene is. Soon the next GSL is going to start with round of 16. Look how bad the round of 24 games are already.
|
On July 02 2020 01:09 geokilla wrote:Show nested quote +On July 01 2020 20:04 Zealously wrote:On July 01 2020 17:47 MarianoSC2 wrote:On July 01 2020 16:38 SC-Shield wrote: Has he stopped playing SC2? I've not come across an article yet. Yes he quit SC2. And can we really blame him? The game has been dying for years now, and soon there will be no one to play because the pros are retiring without any replacements, Blizz does not care about SC2 anymore The game has been dying for 80% of its lifespan, kind of tragic actually But it literally is dying.... Well the Korean scene is. Soon the next GSL is going to start with round of 16. Look how bad the round of 24 games are already.
Having some poor games is a shame, but its not the best way to know if a game is dying is it? The number of sc2 games being played per day atm is double of what it was in 2016-2017 which is partly due to corona I admit.
Online there are more tournaments being organised than ever. (Big) teams are still picking up players left right and centre. Tons of pro's are still able to play the game fulltime while the GSL viewership has been great. Wardiii has now overtaken Basetradetv in the online department and just pretty much everything sc2 he shows on his stream gets atleast 3000 viewers while his channel is still groing rapidly.
Hell after 10 years multiple pro's are even producing content for youtube and Harstem is the most recent succes that shows tons of people still love to consume sc2 content with Lowko and SC2HL being some of the top channels raking in tens of thousands of views per video. The game and the scene in general is in a very stable place, and it looks like it will remain so for atleast the next couple of years.
|
I see that there are a few variables to consider when talking about how often the game can be patched and how influential each patch can be.
- Total amount of different possible units
- Average amount of different units used in a game
- Amount of the same unit in a game at any moment
If the first variable is high then there are likely units that aren't used and can be changed while affecting current meta to a lesser degree. If the second variable is low, then the subset of units that need to be considered at the same time for a meta is smaller allowing experimentation with units knowing that all of them will not be played at the same time. If the third variable is high then there are units, that are part of the core of the game and really impactful to the game, and any change to them is easily massive to the game.
For SC2 the first variable is not that high while the second is relatively high and third is high. This leads to a situation were most changes can impact the game greatly. Other games that have any draft or mechanism, that limits the second variable, leads easily to a meta, which is only about a certain subset of units, allowing trying to only change things outside of it if wanted. Also, if the meta gets bad, changes to the current subset easily force totally different subset.
|
On July 02 2020 02:09 Legan wrote:I see that there are a few variables to consider when talking about how often the game can be patched and how influential each patch can be. - Total amount of different possible units
- Average amount of different units used in a game
- Amount of the same unit in a game at any moment
If the first variable is high then there are likely units that aren't used and can be changed while affecting current meta to a lesser degree. If the second variable is low, then the subset of units that need to be considered at the same time for a meta is smaller allowing experimentation with units knowing that all of them will not be played at the same time. If the third variable is high then there are units, that are part of the core of the game and really impactful to the game, and any change to them is easily massive to the game. For SC2 the first variable is not that high while the second is relatively high and third is high. This leads to a situation were most changes can impact the game greatly. Other games that have any draft or mechanism, that limits the second variable, leads easily to a meta, which is only about a certain subset of units, allowing trying to only change things outside of it if wanted. Also, if the meta gets bad, changes to the current subset easily force totally different subset. very interesting analysis
|
On July 02 2020 02:00 ilax30 wrote:Show nested quote +On July 02 2020 01:09 geokilla wrote:On July 01 2020 20:04 Zealously wrote:On July 01 2020 17:47 MarianoSC2 wrote:On July 01 2020 16:38 SC-Shield wrote: Has he stopped playing SC2? I've not come across an article yet. Yes he quit SC2. And can we really blame him? The game has been dying for years now, and soon there will be no one to play because the pros are retiring without any replacements, Blizz does not care about SC2 anymore The game has been dying for 80% of its lifespan, kind of tragic actually But it literally is dying.... Well the Korean scene is. Soon the next GSL is going to start with round of 16. Look how bad the round of 24 games are already. Having some poor games is a shame, but its not the best way to know if a game is dying is it? The number of sc2 games being played per day atm is double of what it was in 2016-2017 which is partly due to corona I admit. Online there are more tournaments being organised than ever. (Big) teams are still picking up players left right and centre. Tons of pro's are still able to play the game fulltime while the GSL viewership has been great. Wardiii has now overtaken Basetradetv in the online department and just pretty much everything sc2 he shows on his stream gets atleast 3000 viewers while his channel is still groing rapidly. Hell after 10 years multiple pro's are even producing content for youtube and Harstem is the most recent succes that shows tons of people still love to consume sc2 content with Lowko and SC2HL being some of the top channels raking in tens of thousands of views per video. The game and the scene in general is in a very stable place, and it looks like it will remain so for atleast the next couple of years.
Who are these big teams that you're talking about? I don't see any of the CS:GO or LoL teams picking up progamers. Mad Lions is out of the game. Fnatic, G2, Vitality, 100T, Complexity, and EG for example are all big e-sports organizations but they don't have any SC2 progamers.
I don't think we can use Wardii as an example of SC2 viewership either. A lot of people watch streams because that specific person is entertaining, not necessarily because of the game being alive. I've been watching a lot of CS:GO and while we have the same teams playing against each other at the highest level, some streams are more popular than others for reasons I cannot explain. The viewership numbers for CS Summit has honestly been disappointing compared to anything hosted by ESL or Dreamhack in my opinion. Don't think I've ever seen it past 50k viewers on the main stream.
|
happy for polt, but its kinda sad you guys wanna talk about how starcraft 2 is a dead game in this thread.
its a great game with a passionate fanbase. i dont see that changing anytime soon, in fact it seems to just be getting better this year so far!
|
United States32525 Posts
Looking at the patch cadence from his best years in 2013~2015, it's true that there were more frequent patches. But they tended to be more small changes and tweaks, not really comparable to the constant big changes we see in Riot games like LoL, Runeterra, TFT. So while I think he has an interesting point, im not sure that it's based in an entirely accurate recollection of the past.
Patches
|
I don't like the idea of frequent patches but I also think Blizzard takes that mindset to too much of an extreme sometimes. Last year it was a joke that Zerg wasn't nerfed months earlier. Swarmhosts during HotS and BL/Investor during WoL also took too long to fix. I guess it's mostly Zerg that they don't nerf quickly enough. When T/P is overpowered they usually get nerfed fast.
|
On July 02 2020 11:44 JJH777 wrote: I don't like the idea of frequent patches but I also think Blizzard takes that mindset to too much of an extreme sometimes. Last year it was a joke that Zerg wasn't nerfed months earlier. Swarmhosts during HotS and BL/Investor during WoL also took too long to fix. I guess it's mostly Zerg that they don't nerf quickly enough. When T/P is overpowered they usually get nerfed fast. It's really wired how balance patches often come after terran and protoss's domination, and never really after zerg's. zergs often got something big nerfed at the end of the year while protoss and terran could have something big changed in the middle of the year. Maybe zerg is mostly a defensive race take part in this, but I think there're also other reasons beside this.
|
On July 01 2020 15:21 shadow4723 wrote: Blizzard's mishandling of their esports products is notorious. I just like SC2 too much to leave. I just hope the next big esports RTS is made by a different company
Imagine if Riot did this :O
|
On July 02 2020 08:31 joon wrote: happy for polt, but its kinda sad you guys wanna talk about how starcraft 2 is a dead game in this thread.
its a great game with a passionate fanbase. i dont see that changing anytime soon, in fact it seems to just be getting better this year so far!
Amen brotha!
|
Mexico2170 Posts
The balance of Starcraft is very different from Team Fight Tactics and similar games.
Simply look at the ammount of units that can be at play at any point in time in an starcraft match, all the different stats they have like all the abilities, atack speed, range, IA. Then their relationships with other units from both allies and enemies, taking into accout that it all happens in real time and not in turns, and then multiply that for 3 races.
Then, add the impact of macro, if you fast expand, if you tech, if you rush and their consequences. Then the maps, some big some small, very different pathways that favor different team comps.
Starcraft simply has too many variables. If they start patching for the sake of mixing things up they could end up with something terrible really quickly.
Though to be fair, Blizzard has taken too much time to take action in some cases. I'll never forget all the time BL-Infestor was left rampant and how it hurt the game,
|
It is true that Blizzard doesn't patch SC2 as much, but you can't really compare it to the frequency of patch of TFT. Completely different genre.
Outscar mentioned already Polt is too old for SC2, so it makes sense he moved to a calmer game. What he has done in SC2 is undeniable anyway
|
I’ve not been keeping up with the scene - can someone explain what’s happening? I understand that Polt is seriously involved with a new game now. Has he said that he’s no longer going to be involved in professional sc2?
|
|
|
|