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On November 23 2020 11:08 hiro protagonist wrote:Show nested quote +On November 23 2020 09:03 M3t4PhYzX wrote:On November 23 2020 07:16 Djabanete wrote: The holy grail is not changing unit balance. The holy grail is developing a much wider variety of balanced maps. This. I’ll second this as well. I’d settle for any map that is somehow Protoss favoured In PvZ, as well as being Zerg Favoured in ZvT.
You've never heard of Sparkle?
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On November 23 2020 10:48 oxKnu wrote:Show nested quote +On November 23 2020 09:56 Jealous wrote:On November 23 2020 09:49 oxKnu wrote:On November 23 2020 09:41 Jealous wrote:On November 23 2020 09:35 oxKnu wrote: I love how on the previous page of this thread people are actually agreeing that the scout is a niche unit and it could actually be inserted into some pro builds.
Guys...if a protoss builds a scout out of a Stargate today in the first 10 minutes of the game against any good Zerg he loses 100%. Unless that Zerg is drunk or his monitor is dead.
Again, Movie had a specific Scout build for Jaedong for a specific map. You think your take is better than Snow/Movie? I think you should stop referencing 10+ year old anecdotes as some sort of valid argument in this discussion. I'll take Movie 2010 anecdotes over oxKnu anecdotes in 2020 or 3020 for that matter. Very cool. Also consider letting other people have a more data-driven/statistical approach to understanding matters as opposed to your choice. Where's your data/statistics? You just pulled a random minute mark and percentage out of your ass as a likely-to-be mid-level player at best and act like it holds more water than actual progamers' opinions and actual approach to the game.
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I am fully against any changes, simply because there is and never will be a trustworthy and competent authority to implement them.
I am open to the idea of modified UMS tournaments with different changes but I will rage against the dying of the light at the prospect of blizzard or someone they deputize doing it.
Nobody ever talks about it, but changes and patches completely ruin the history and continuity of the game. Every 12 months or so sc2 patches do enough that they previous years of games are all meaningless. Then with it's own history relegated to the wastebin, the champions of yesterday are now, 'patch-champions'. And with all the artificial community turmoil it introduces, the game still ends up imbalanced at all the different skill groups and a certain race in that game seems unable to rise to the top despite years of earnest attempts at balancing.
I would like to see a concerted effort to build a seasons worth of maps, where protoss hits 55%+ on each map v T/Z. If protoss are given a slight edge that is born out by data, and they still lose, fair enough.
It might be as simple as 2 extra mineral patches at each base and it might be as dramatic as Dire Straights, Polaris Prime and Island hop.
I do not believe there is an disadvantage for Protoss, even on the current map pools, at any but the highest levels. But, I am open to listening and learning otherwise.
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Russian Federation16 Posts
- lurker/scarab splash don't hit allies (why ever they do splash damage to allies if they don't do splash damage to your own units ?) - add destructable rocks/building that affect unit pathing (so we don't need to invent terrain layout hacks and we just place a pile of rocks and units move around it properly) - forbid using mind control on workers in FFA - add no-fly zones. We have un-wallkable terrain (like water), so why can't we have un-flyable zones?
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Remove scout range upgrade and give it by default, this won't hurt.
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Bulgaria750 Posts
On November 23 2020 03:02 Garrl wrote:
ghosts - there was that nuke sunken bust build a couple of ASLs ago, and I think they have a lot of potential in tvp because hitting the lockdown on arbs is easier and cleaner than EMP.
The vessel also provides detection and is a flying caster, so easier to control. Plus even if you miss an arbiter, you might still at least get the shields on some of the ground units. And it works against other spellcasters, too, like HTs.
If lockdown removes passive abilities like detection and cloaking like stasis does, it might have some use against arbiters. Come to think of it, I never knew if it actually did, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't. But my point is that ghosts require way more babysitting besides the tech investment (which isn't that much larger compared to vessels) in big hectic fights. Maybe they can be used for recall defense like vessels are, like you say, you can't dodge a lockdown missile. But in a big fight? Vessels just float around, providing detection, and you have to painfully select your tiny ghosts that bump into the huge mech army before you can reach the arbiter(s) and lock it/them down. They have more utility against carriers, like if you manage to lock 2 or more this is a big hit to Protoss, but it's still a pain in the ass to manage. Enough that successful lockdown plays are pimpest play worthy (was it Boxer against DIDI8?)
I'm not even gonna start about nukes, losing scanners for silos is an extremely high price to pay even before the significant min/gas/supply cost.
But whoever said the ghost is the elephant in the room is right. Without mechanical limitations Terran has really nice spellcasting power - the vessels are good enough as they are, ghosts would be really powerful for locking down stuff, even the medic optical flare could be useful (but it costs a bit). The ghost is one of the conceptually coolest units in the game, like some special ops super elite trooper and it has a special place in SC:BW lore (like Kerrigan, duh), but is relegated to be a cheese-of-cheeses in competitive play. There is so much stuff that you have to take care of that the most used abilities are AoE (EMP and irradiate, when it's used in a proper battle rather than assassination/softening raids) and auto-cast (heal). Dmatrix is really cool, but more tactical/specialized, for like drops and stuff.
Same with the other two races, really - queens have gained popularity, but they're pretty tough to use and the most effective way for everyone but the absolute top pros is in lulls in the battle against a somewhat static enemy. Defilers own. Protoss use one spellcaster for one of its (AoE) spells in PvZ, the DA is insanely cool and all but the HT is so important for bare survival against Z in the hydra print metagame that the DA just not worth it most of the time. Arbs are good because they 1) have a passive AoE ability 2) have an AoE disabler 3) have a fkin mass teleport 4) fly 5) are pretty sturdy. All of those mean they are somewhat user-friendly.
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Bulgaria750 Posts
Here's a hilarious balance suggestion: give probes a speed upgrade (when moving, not mining) researchable at the nexusb(like burrow is) so a probe can survive longer to scout against Z.
It would also break TvP probably 😂
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I genuinely think there should be adjustments that only apply to mirror matchups.
You can't break the balance of mirror matchups, and it would add spice to what are usually the least popular matchups.
The adjustments could be tied to maps. There should still be maps where mirror matchups are "traditional" (unmodified).
I remember a long time ago there was a TL mirror match tournament where you could only make one Factory in TvT. There were similar tweaks to the other matchups. I think in PvP, you weren't allowed to make Dragoons or something. No spire ZvZ would also be interesting, as would changing it so you can't build Mutas, but if you get Greater Spire, you can directly build a Guardian or Devourer Cocoon (a Muta that immediately morphs into a Cocoon upon hatching).
- Imagine starting with two or three Hatcheries on some maps in ZvZ?
- Or multiple Hatcheries and a Hydra Den.
- Or a Queen's Nest (to make going Hive slightly easier).
- Or if Lurker aspect came pre-upgraded (so you could turn Hydras into Lurkers even at tier 1, and do so without paying the cost of the upgrade).
- Or just Hydra speed and/or range came pre-upgraded.
- Imagine starting with an Academy on some maps in TvT? Games would still transition to mech eventually, but there would be an infantry phase that could be interesting.
- Or starting with a Science Facility with an attached Covert Ops? Perhaps players should also start with an Academy so games don't reduce to rushing to Cloak. Even with a free Science Facility and Covert Ops, I'm not sure Ghosts would be worth making. This also makes +2 much easier to reach, and that might end up being the real effect of such a starting condition. But it would be interesting to find out what happens.
- What if you started with an Arbiter Tribunal on some maps in PvP? Or various spells that don't see much usage in the match-up, such as Maelstrom, Hallucination, Disruption Web, were pre-researched?
Overall, unit stats and costs would remain the same to reduce confusion. It's just starting conditions or restrictions (such as not being able to make certain units, or not being able to build more than some number of certain units or buildings) that might change from map to map.
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Any change will corrupt the entire Starcraft history. Please don't!
UMS maps can be used to switch things around. Heck, we might even get some ASL UMS tournement some day (maybe in 20+ years) for the fun sake.
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On November 22 2020 15:16 Jealous wrote:Show nested quote +On November 22 2020 15:06 Kanil wrote: I wouldn't mind seeing a change to make hive tech ZvZ more viable without screwing up the rest of the game. I couldn't possibly tell you how to do such a thing, though. Each ZvZ starts with both players already having the buildings necessary to force a Hive Tech scenario - I forget what they were from the great era of ZvZ, but there was a definite "formula" whereby two people pursuing different builds resulted in a nearly-forced Hive scenario. It's like starting in Castle Age in AoE2.
Hydra damage increase vs Mutas and/or Spore damage increase vs Mutas (both, however, are not in line with BW damage system). Seriously, if you are going to change one thing in the game, it would be trying to fix ZvZ (and yes, the mirror is broken).
Other things: no reason to touch Queens, they are actually great vs mech. They might also be used vs HTs, but Mutas are simply better there. If you would buff DA a bit, you might actually Queens with broodling vs HTs.
Scout, Ghost: great care needed with any changes whatsoever. It is a wasted opporunity for the game, that I admit.
Some other proposals in this thread are actually completely bonkers - just no
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I agree with the sentiment that if there should be anything new, it should be with the maps. For me, BW would never be the same if the races were different. Their identities, and the decades of memories built on that, gives the game an appeal like a time-honored tradition that would be ruined if it were changed. If novelty and variety are needed, then I think new maps have always been able to provide for that. But maybe we can take it a step further and give mapmakers access to the sort of things we've seen in newer RTS since, like destructible terrain, modifiable terrain, etc. If not, I think the use of more creative maps would help keep interest strong. I think there's still a good amount left to explore with certain features, like the vision-blocking bushes we saw in Cross Game, or the D-Webs of Inner Coven. There were some awesome games on that map.
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Allow Zerglings to mine minerals.
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Who would trust the Blizzard of today to make any changes anyway? I surely not. For real, they even break things and introduce new bugs by only changing maps for the next ladder season. The only way for improvements in the future (not talking about gameplay tho) is to open source SCR cause Blizz won't invest a single cent into SCR anymore. But tbh, open sourcing SCR won't happen either. It's either "stick with it" or "go play smth else" - imho.
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TLADT24917 Posts
No thanks. While I'm sure that some tiny tweaks here and there might be good, trying to pinpoint what those needed tweaks are AND expecting blizzard to actually implement them is next to impossible. You'd have a hard time getting a consensus on what the issues are in the first place as well so a double whammy.
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No, just no. This is the best game ever made. You can't improve on the best so leave it like that. By some chance BW turned out so addictive and fun and impossible to master that even Flash can improve. I don't see any change making it more fun. It's seriously great as it is. Mess all you want with maps and that's about it, imo.
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Ignoring my joke-y suggestions earlier in this thread, and to mirror what was said by many people here about balancing by maps... What if we made different races spawn with different "maps?" Fixed spawn locations on a 3 person map, with something like... 2 Gasses in the main for Zerg, 2 extra mineral patches for Protoss main, ramped nat for Terran, stuff like that? Not necessarily those exact options, but perhaps a mix of some that could be used to re-balance the map in a race/mu-specific way. Can even be implemented on maps which already exist which are currently considered to be favored for one race over another - having a PvT or TvZ version of the same 2 player map, for instance.
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Northern Ireland20731 Posts
On November 24 2020 06:45 Jealous wrote: Ignoring my joke-y suggestions earlier in this thread, and to mirror what was said by many people here about balancing by maps... What if we made different races spawn with different "maps?" Fixed spawn locations on a 3 person map, with something like... 2 Gasses in the main for Zerg, 2 extra mineral patches for Protoss main, ramped nat for Terran, stuff like that? Not necessarily those exact options, but perhaps a mix of some that could be used to re-balance the map in a race/mu-specific way. Can even be implemented on maps which already exist which are currently considered to be favored for one race over another - having a PvT or TvZ version of the same 2 player map, for instance. That’s quite an interesting idea. As someone who is rather irked with the monotonous nature of SC2 map design and finds some of the interesting ideas in BW really interesting, I think that’s a pretty sensible extension to enable further experimentation while not completely gimping one particular matchup.
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They can't even deliver on half the shit they promised for remastered, they'd would fuck up BW so hard if they tried to touch balance. Rather keep the scout a meme for all eternity.
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On November 24 2020 09:50 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On November 24 2020 06:45 Jealous wrote: Ignoring my joke-y suggestions earlier in this thread, and to mirror what was said by many people here about balancing by maps... What if we made different races spawn with different "maps?" Fixed spawn locations on a 3 person map, with something like... 2 Gasses in the main for Zerg, 2 extra mineral patches for Protoss main, ramped nat for Terran, stuff like that? Not necessarily those exact options, but perhaps a mix of some that could be used to re-balance the map in a race/mu-specific way. Can even be implemented on maps which already exist which are currently considered to be favored for one race over another - having a PvT or TvZ version of the same 2 player map, for instance. That’s quite an interesting idea. As someone who is rather irked with the monotonous nature of SC2 map design and finds some of the interesting ideas in BW really interesting, I think that’s a pretty sensible extension to enable further experimentation while not completely gimping one particular matchup. I feel like having 6 versions of Eclipse would be a modern and prime example. Not saying the map is necessarily imbalanced/bad of course. But imagine a TvZ, PvZ, and PvT version of that map + PvP, TvT, ZvZ.
If spawn location knowledge is an issue, what about a forced 1v1 6 player map? Radial symmetry of 6 mains, 2 of which follow those rules per race, and limited expansions in the middle to make sure games don't go overboard. So, going from 12 o clock, it could be TZPTZP spawns, with a X race player spawning randomly on one of those two locations that are designated for it. I am not sure how exactly that would work but I am sure it is possible with UMS.
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Bisutopia19033 Posts
I’m totally for a small things patch. I think there are a couple changes that most could agree on. I’d like to volunteer myself to the balance committee. I think I can handle 90% of the BW community calling me names and sending me hate mail.
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