StarCraft 2 is still very much a new game, in both its balance and design. There are still two expansion packs yet to come out, which will fundamentally change both of the aforementioned attributes. Blizzard has shown it's not afraid to consider pulling a unit out of the game and replacing it with something (supposedly) better in an upcoming expansion if it will help fix glaring problems. Both the Thor and the Carrier sit on the chopping block, at least in terms of their current design in SC2.
The unit I'm going to be talking about is neither of those, however, and yet I feel it should be the most prominent on the list of units that need to see a timely removal from competitive play. That unit is the baneling. In this rambling, I am going to try to explain why the baneling's presence ruins the game for both non-Zerg and Zerg players alike.
The Design Concept
Everyone knows how the baneling works. It waddles -- or rolls -- around the map looking cute until it explodes, (hopefully) taking plenty down with it. This concept isn't new to StarCraft, where we saw the Swarm utilize both the scourge and infested Terran in Brood War, both of which were a unit that did damage by suiciding into things. "What's the problem, then?" you may ask.
The problem is this little guy is a game-breaking devil.
The scourge was a flying unit, only able to deal damage to fellow air units. It also came from the spire, a second tier tech building.
The infested Terran, while a ground unit like the baneling, was almost never seen in competitive play, due to the excruciating difficulty it took to actually infest a Terran opponent's Command Center. They weren't the absolute cheapest, either, sitting at a cool 100 minerals, 50 vespene a pop. That's the same price as a Hydralisk in SC2, for a unit you could only use once. To top it all off, its splash damage injured ally and enemy alike, making them very dangerous to simply dump in with your main army.
Compare either of those with the baneling, a unit you can simply 1-a with the rest of your army to wipe your opponent's forces off the map, with no negative repercussions such as friendly fire. You never saw players like Jaedong make over 100 scourge and simply win the game shortly after, because the unit's design didn't allow for it. Yet here we are in SC2, with players like NesTea doing that very thing with the baneling to win important tournament matches.
Oh, you wiped the map clean by a-moving your banelings and took another base? You must be so skillful.
No matter how you slice it, the baneling is little more than an overpowered Brood War infested Terran, made far more easily accessible -- it's first tech tier, for God's sake! You couldn't even get scourge or infested Terrans until the second tech tier, and infested Terrans took a lot of additional leg work to even start producing them. While there are many reasons people consider Brood War to be a wonderfully designed and balanced game, I can tell you right now one of them is because the infested Terran wasn't competitively viable.
Why Should Zerg Players Also Care?
If you've read up until now and are thinking to yourself, "This guy is just a whiner that probably has bad marine splitting," bear with me for a little longer. The baneling hurts you guys too.
Now that I've covered how the baneling is little more than an imbalanced Brood War port, I am going to go into specific cases where the Baneling breaks SC2 -- to both the detriment of Zerg and non-Zerg players. To start, let's talk about every Zerg's favourite matchup.
ZvZ, AKA The High-speed Knife Fight
All right, Zergs, raise your hands. How many of you really detest your mirror? I can tell you what the problem is right now: the baneling. ZvZ feels like a knife fight because almost every game revolves around keeping your zerglings alive against your opponent's banelings while trying to get a good baneling hit off of your own. Given how fast speedlings are, it's a lot to handle, and a single slip can see you losing your entire zergling force, with no danger to your opponent's zerglings (no friendly splash damage, remember).
Assuming you and your opponent both manage to avoid dying (a very rare thing in comparison), then the matchup evolves into something more entertaining. Roach/infestor seems to be the composition of choice, but we have seen muta-based builds as well. We could even see something more amazing, if only nearly every ZvZ didn't end before they really get started. As a result, anything past early game is essentially experimental territory -- much like PvP past the 4gate (but that's a rant for another time).
Never Lose A Game Again -- Make Banelings
Zerg likes to expand. It's like a fetish that you can't help but indulge in. There's just one problem: Protoss and Terran don't like Zerg expanding. They come in with their armies and try to take down the Swarm. If only those armies simply didn't exist… I know! Wipe them off the map with a tonne of banelings, then you're free to expand as much as you want; they won't be pressuring you any time soon.
This is actually one of the silliest things I've every had the displeasure to watch in professional tournaments. Get a fast second base, make a large amount of banelings, a-move through the opponent's army, expand, drone, repeat.
Never Lose A Game Again? Stupid Banelings.
The complete opposite of the above, there's nothing more annoying to a Zerg when it's simply impossible to make those banelings connect. It's a do-or-die kind of thing, where if you do, you win the game, and if you don't, you lose the game. This isn't the same as the more vague, "Well, if you lose your army without doing damage, you should lose the game, right?". That makes sense, banelings don't.
Why don't banelings make sense? There's no micro to them. You attack, cross your fingers, and hope for the best, because that baneling is dying one way or another. The only question is if other things die with it. There's no such thing as saving a baneling with sick baneling micro -- we leave that sort of thing to the baneling's targets, such as marines with their marine splitting.
The baneling leaves the Zerg with either a sense of relief or helplessness, depending on how much of the opponent's army remains after your sick 1a skills. That sounds like I'm insulting the skill of Zergs everywhere, but it's actually just the more depressing truth that there's nothing else you can do. The utility of the baneling ends at an excruciatingly low skill cap.
What Could Have Been -- The Death Of The Lurker
Hey guys, remember that awesome positional unit in Brood War that you could use to zone out portions of the map and protect chokes, and even had some awesome micro tricks? Yeah, sorry, it was eventually scrapped from the development of SC2, with the cited reason being its "role" overlapped with another unit.
What other unit? The baneling, of course.
That's right Zergs, you can thank the baneling for the lack of lurkers. Really, though, when you look at the baneling as it is, there's no way a true zoning unit like the lurker could exist in the Zerg arsenal as long as the baneling's there. Seriously, how would anyone be able to touch a Zerg, ever? Air units? Whoops, sorry, hydralisks are already on the field, since they're what morphs into the lurker. That's what we call a blind hard counter. It simply wouldn't work, which is why Blizzard ultimately had to scrap one -- except they scrapped the wrong unit, in my opinion.
The Lurker's Replacement -- The Swarm Host
Ah yes, the new unit revealed in the Heart of the Swarm preview, meant to fill the gap left behind by the lurker, and unfillable as long as the baneling is around. I call this gap unfillable despite the swarm host's presence, because seriously, if you think the swarm host is a real zoning unit, I have to pray for you.
Hey guys! I make a pair of locusts in 25 second intervals! Aren't I useful?
The swarm host is nothing more than a lower-tier, ground-based, impotent brood lord. It is a mediocre sieging unit, not a zoning unit, plain and simple. If a Terran wants to break through a line of swarm hosts with only a bunch of marines and a scan, he will do that without even having to worry about casualties. All the swarm host provides is a way of forcing a clock on a turtling player to come out and play, or his defenses will slowly get eroded. That is not a solution to Zerg's map zoning issues.
Do What Needs To Be Done
Blizzard needs to scrap the baneling and revamp the swarm host into a zoning unit that can truely replace the lurker. I can sympathize with Blizzard's desire to not simply cop out and hand us the lurker again. They already did that in Brood War, and asking for money to receive the exact same thing in 3D feels pretty cheap. Nevertheless, Heart of the Swarm needs to see that zoning unit for Zerg, and it's just not going to happen until the Baneling is gone.
In conclusion, there are too many aspects of SC2 that get seriously messed up because of how the baneling works, and its continued presence also prevents the inclusion of units to properly fill the gaps in the overall Zerg design. As far as I'm aware, there are only positives in removing the baneling from competitive play, including the possibility for far more entertaining and skillful professional ZvX matches in ESPORTS.
ADDENDUM: What about "SOOOO MANY BANELINGS!"?
I say, if your only reason for keeping the baneling lay with preserving the novelty of a cute one-liner popularized by a professional SC2 caster, please reconsider. I'm sure Artosis wouldn't mind either, if it means he gets to cast better games in the future.
The one thing I'd like to see the baneling do is at least cause a baneling "impotent explosion" reaction to one hex over. It would discourage clumps of banelings by killing one of them in a group to make the other half impotent as well as keep 100 banelings from being able to clean the face of any ground army in seconds. Screw friendly fire (even as a terran player) because ling/bling has to go hand in hand (or ling/infestor...beside the point) especially to keep early terran marine rushes from destroying a zerg because no zerg tier one/two really handles marines cost effectively. (Roaches sorta, hydras get lol'd at DPS to cost, and mutas also are worse dps for cost with even less HP, lings are so larva inefficient that a good stutter stepper will make you starved for larva while killing your drones).
That's just my opinion, so take it or leave it. Banes are powerful but very crucial to early defenses in ZvT otherwise every game would be a marine allin by T and require a balance change to happen.
On February 29 2012 16:51 TG Manny wrote: The one thing I'd like to see the baneling do is at least cause a baneling "impotent explosion" reaction to one hex over. It would discourage clumps of banelings by killing one of them in a group to make the other half impotent as well as keep 100 banelings from being able to clean the face of any ground army in seconds. Screw friendly fire (even as a terran player) because ling/bling has to go hand in hand (or ling/infestor...beside the point) especially to keep early terran marine rushes from destroying a zerg because no zerg tier one/two really handles marines cost effectively. (Roaches sorta, hydras get lol'd at DPS to cost, and mutas also are worse dps for cost with even less HP, lings are so larva inefficient that a good stutter stepper will make you starved for larva while killing your drones).
That's just my opinion, so take it or leave it. Banes are powerful but very crucial to early defenses in ZvT otherwise every game would be a marine allin by T and require a balance change to happen.
Naturally, when speaking of the removal of a unit, especially such an early tier unit, we're talking big changes to a race's design. The Heart of the Swarm expansion creates a unique opportunity for Blizzard to try out a lot of wild things, and I wouldn't expect them to simply pull out the baneling without creating an adequate way to still defend against things like early bio pushes, whether that answer would lie in something like reverting hydralisk/roach tiers and costs (where hydras were T1 and 75/25 like in Brood War, while roaches were T2 and more expensive), or with the inclusion of a new unit -- or even a different solution entirely.
I actually like it. Sure there are sucky moments where so many banelings syndrome can ruin a game, but it's a good and early zone control unit. I feel like the lurker would have a place in the Zerg arsenal alongside it given more time than it had.
OP, Do you really think Roach/Infestor is better ZvZ than the action packed ling/bling?
hmmm. i'm all for losing the baneling in TvZ or TvP given other AOE alternatives, but ZvZ ling baneling wars are the only reason i enjoy zvz at all. i'd much rather lose roaches than lose banelings in ZvZ.
On February 29 2012 17:10 Cyber_Cheese wrote: I actually like it. Sure there are sucky moments where so many banelings syndrome can ruin a game, but it's a good and early zone control unit. I feel like the lurker would have a place in the Zerg arsenal alongside it given more time than it had.
OP, Do you really think Roach/Infestor is better ZvZ than the action packed ling/bling?
I don't necessarily think roach/infestor is superior to watch, if you can even grade them on a scale, but rather I feel roach/infestor is the result of a largely unexplored later-game ZvZ, caused by ling/bane ending ZvZ matches before they really get to kick off. In the OP I was more trying to make the point that we start to see some diversity in ZvZ in the rare occurrence it gets past ling/bane, which leads me to believe there's potential there for ZvZ to be really entertaining if the knife fight syndrome could be fixed.
I compare ZvZ a lot with PvP, albeit less coin-flippy. I think they're both potentially great match ups that get absolutely wrecked by a flawed design concept. In ZvZ it's the baneling that ends things early, while in PvP it's the ability to warp in via pylons.
On February 29 2012 17:25 Fishgle wrote: hmmm. i'm all for losing the baneling in TvZ or TvP given other AOE alternatives, but ZvZ ling baneling wars are the only reason i enjoy zvz at all. i'd much rather lose roaches than lose banelings in ZvZ.
I don't really like the idea of focusing the discussion on only the removal of the baneling, i.e. imagining scenarios where Zerg design is identical to its current state, sans baneling. Half of my blog talks up adding a true positional unit to the Zerg arsenal, and doesn't touch on other changes coming to Zerg in Heart of the Swarm.
Making my point, you discuss ZvZ in its current state (ling/bane into mass roaches), but I argue ZvZ would look fundamentally different if you had a lurker-type unit in place of the baneling, on top of some of the new changes coming down the pipeline that Blizzard has teased. However, as long as the baneling remains, I'm willing to bet the majority of ZvZ matches won't change in HotS, since ling/bane will still dominate and end the match before any of the new toys can be played with, so to speak. It's the same as why even current ZvZ is so under-developed in the mid and late game, to the point where simply massing roaches with some infestor support seems like the "best" strategy to do.
I mostly agree with this. I am terran though so Banelings are the well..Well bane of my existance. Have them able to burrow move in HoTS will be a complete nightmare of epic proportions.
Hmmm, can't really make an indepth argument in my part, sadly.
But I do wan't to know; you mention we need a zoning unit that truly took the role of the lurker, which I agree. But what is your suggestion for this? i.e. for the Swarm Host; Increased locusts? Faster producing locus and decreasing its attack? Or a whole new different unit
On February 29 2012 17:50 RogerX wrote: Hmmm, can't really make an indepth argument in my part, sadly.
But I do wan't to know; you mention we need a zoning unit that truly took the role of the lurker, which I agree. But what is your suggestion for this? i.e. for the Swarm Host; Increased locusts? Faster producing locus and decreasing its attack? Or a whole new different unit
I really don't like the concept of the swarm host. It's just taking the idea behind the Brood Lord and applying it to another unit. If all Blizzard is going to do is half ass it and clone something like that, they may as well just clone how the lurker works.
At the end of the day, it's about giving a Zerg a unit that can not only effectively deal with bio (like the lurker and baneling), but also has versatility in holding positions against many different ground-based compositions (which the baneling doesn't do -- it's more like an eraser, where you hope to erase everything before you run out). It's that later portion that's missing from Zerg design, and where Blizzard is missing the mark with the swarm host.
I'm sorry, but this is just silly. The baneling isn't a problem in the game. I'm sorry if you or other people lose because your micro is shit or w/e, but you should never lose your whole army to banelings if you know what your doing. To look at your points:
ZvZ: I don't hate my mirror, because hardly ever do you lose to banelings. If a guy wants to go offensive banelings, I'm going to go defensive banelings and get a few more drones. You're not going to lose to banelings unless you control very poorly or he transitions from an early pool and you had poor scouting.
A-move through the army: Ok, how do you amove banelings through an army? What race are we talking about? Protoss should never lose to banelings on the ground, and if you do your forcefields are bad. If it's a terran you're being greedy and sieging too late or keeping everything into a ball and not splitting. You shouldn't lose to this kind of thing if you're a competent player at all. I understand if you're a lower level player it's frustrating when you lose to banelings because you're not fast enough, but the're not a problem to people who know how to play.
All or nothing - Yeah, it's hard to make banelings connect versus someone who knows what they're doing, but it's nowhere as bad as you're making it out. IF you amove into a siege line from one angle, yeah, you're probably pretty bad and deserve to lose the game. You shouldn't be putting all your eggs into the baneling basket, that's why banelings are used with infestors or mutas/lings/ultras.
Would I rather have a lurker? Of course, but I don't. If they want to give me a lurker, great, if not the baneling is fine. The baneling works very well in the game, and while it's probably pretty frustrating to low level players, it's a fine unit at higher levels of play.
I do have one counter argument for you.... Baneling Drops and Baneling landmines.
I do agree with you for the most part that the presence of the baneling especially as a tier 1.5 unit stagnates what tech could possibly be added to the Zerg arsenal, but to oversimplify them as an a-move unit is simply not 100% true.
Your point about ZvZ though I could not agree with more, but unfortunately with the notable exception of TvT the mirrors suffer because of units or tech that are vital in other match ups, the other prime suspect being Warp Tech.
StarCraft 2 is still very much a new game, in both its balance and design.
We've been playing it for 2 years. I don't think it's really that new (but certainly not that old). Also considering the tiny changes in the last balance patch and the figures currently it's pretty damn well balanced. Banelings also have nothing to do with this.
Compare either of those with the baneling, a unit you can simply 1-a with the rest of your army to wipe your opponent's forces off the map, with no negative repercussions such as friendly fire. You never saw players like Jaedong make over 100 scourge and simply win the game shortly after, because the unit's design didn't allow for it. Yet here we are in SC2, with players like NesTea doing that very thing with the baneling to win important tournament matches.
If you 1a your banes they all run into a tank or thor inefficiently and you deal fuck all damage. Good job. Really good zergs position their banes so they don't get splatted by 1 tank round and split them up mid fight to engage separate clumps of marines. It's really fucking hard you don't know what you're talking about.
The nestea vs NaDa video is Nestea punishing Nada for having no tanks and poorly spread thors. If a bane splashes on 3-4 things (even thors) then it lived a good life.
No matter how you slice it, the baneling is little more than an overpowered Brood War infested Terran, made far more easily accessible -- it's first tech tier, for God's sake! You couldn't even get scourge or infested Terrans until the second tech tier, and infested Terrans took a lot of additional leg work to even start producing them. While there are many reasons people consider Brood War to be a wonderfully designed and balanced game, I can tell you right now one of them is because the infested Terran wasn't competitively viable.
Referencing the infested Terran is silly because the damn thing was only used like once (some ZvP on that map which had a neutral CC in the middle). The unit may as well have never existed in the first place, it was incredibly difficult to obtain and use effectively. It's an extremely poorly designed aspect of Broodwar, and a comparison to the baneling is laughable. Banelings are useful, banelings are exciting, banelings are balanced.
ZvZ
Plenty of ZvZ's get past the baneling stage, but they more struggle with the basic Rock paper scissors game of 15 hatch > 10pool > 14/14 > 15 hatch (with 6 pool thrown in there too for jollies) and weird things involving speed timings, spines, queens and all sorts of little niggly bits. A good zerg can deal with banes.
ling/bane wars in ZvZ are extremely challenging for both players and the better player gets to win them. Isn't this something a Broodwar fan would like? Shit have you seen quality zergs split their drones vs banes?
Zerg likes to expand. It's like a fetish that you can't help but indulge in. There's just one problem: Protoss and Terran don't like Zerg expanding. They come in with their armies and try to take down the Swarm. If only those armies simply didn't exist… I know! Wipe them off the map with a tonne of banelings, then you're free to expand as much as you want; they won't be pressuring you any time soon.
This is actually one of the silliest things I've every had the displeasure to watch in professional tournaments. Get a fast second base, make a large amount of banelings, a-move through the opponent's army, expand, drone, repeat.
... What point is this making? Baneling timings are usually shitty and rely on your opponent being too greedy or just plain awful. They provide a good way for Zerg to punish sloppy opponents and crucially banelings are something zerg has that has a chance of getting through a wall. Do you even play this game?
God I can't be bothered going through the rest of this. It's so poorly thought out and the point the op is trying to make is confusing. Banelings are overpowered! Banelings are underpowered! Banelings require no skill to use! SC2 is totally not BW!
Banelings are a great part of the game. They're exciting (he's fucking downplaying this video for fucks sake, this), they create a wondrous tension with an instant explosive payoff and they reward players who have better mechanics (ZvZ) and who can position and control well during fights. We can't remove this unit because it would make Zerg far too weak early game and why would we anyway?
Conversly, banelings increase the skill required for the other player. Explain to me how this has no place in the game. Splitting marines, focusing tank fire, dodging burrowed banes and maintaining map awareness so these little shits don't blow up my whole army. Goddamn sounds challenging, sounds well designed, sounds fun.
Try and convince anyone that a trio of burrowed banes in SC2 aren't as exciting as hold position lurkers in BW.
Yeah, you're not going to have just banelings. They're strong, no doubt, but they're manageable. What would I do versus ling/bane/muta? Slow push with tank/marine and keep my stuff spread or turtle and move out with a big army. Why do you think almost every zerg is going infestor/ling instead of muta/ling right now? Do you think it's because muta ling is wrecking people left and right and zergs just decided, fuck it we don't want to use this style that wins all the time? No, it's becuase people can deal with that style so well in most cases that it's prompting pro players to move to a different style.
You have to right click them behind the terrans retreating bio, or they'll explode on tanks and you'll lose the game 20s later when a stimmed marine ball rapes the expansion behind the fight.
Same in ZvZ, you're right clicking into mineral lines and have 3-4 control groups worth of blings so they don't explode on queens after they arrive.
tldr you state there is no baneling micro and it's pure a-move, not true at all.
On February 29 2012 18:00 Arisen wrote: I'm sorry, but this is just silly. The baneling isn't a problem in the game. I'm sorry if you or other people lose because your micro is shit or w/e, but you should never lose your whole army to banelings if you know what your doing.
I can't say this kind of remark was unexpected, even if disappointing when I go out of my way to pre-empt this kind of nonsense:
On February 29 2012 16:31 stormfoxSC wrote: If you've read up until now and are thinking to yourself, "This guy is just a whiner that probably has bad marine splitting," bear with me for a little longer.
On February 29 2012 18:00 Arisen wrote: ZvZ: I don't hate my mirror, because hardly ever do you lose to banelings. If a guy wants to go offensive banelings, I'm going to go defensive banelings and get a few more drones. You're not going to lose to banelings unless you control very poorly or he transitions from an early pool and you had poor scouting.
I wasn't expecting every Zerg to raise their hand, since I'm sure some people (including yourself, it seems) probably like ZvZ, but simply trivializing the early-game ling/bane issue like you have is an absurd counter-argument. When there are plenty of professional Zerg players to quote regarding the abysmal state of ZvZ, on top of the matchup having its notorious reputation, your approach is easier said than done.
On February 29 2012 18:00 Arisen wrote: A-move through the army: Ok, how do you amove banelings through an army? What race are we talking about? Protoss should never lose to banelings on the ground, and if you do your forcefields are bad. If it's a terran you're being greedy and sieging too late or keeping everything into a ball and not splitting. You shouldn't lose to this kind of thing if you're a competent player at all. I understand if you're a lower level player it's frustrating when you lose to banelings because you're not fast enough, but the're not a problem to people who know how to play.
You must be kidding me. The number of times I've seen players like Liquid`Jinro or oGsForGG (amongst many other Terran streams I watch) losing games on their streams from many baneling-related a-move scenarios is beyond count. Acting like it's a simple matter of competency is beyond ignorant to me, not to mention quite condescending.
On February 29 2012 18:00 Arisen wrote: All or nothing - Yeah, it's hard to make banelings connect versus someone who knows what they're doing, but it's nowhere as bad as you're making it out. IF you amove into a siege line from one angle, yeah, you're probably pretty bad and deserve to lose the game. You shouldn't be putting all your eggs into the baneling basket, that's why banelings are used with infestors or mutas/lings/ultras.
You're theory crafting scenarios that fallaciously take my lack of specificity too literally. I know of no realistic scenario where a Zerg will have an army comprised of nothing but banelings. Focusing specifically on the utilization of a single unit isn't the same as saying that unit is the only one being used.
I don't mind if people want to disagree with the OP, but don't do it by insulting other people's skill at this game and reinforcing your points with grossly incorrect assumptions. You've said nothing here except that either people should never die to anything or they're bad at this game. That's not a valid argument.
On February 29 2012 18:00 Arisen wrote: Would I rather have a lurker? Of course, but I don't. If they want to give me a lurker, great, if not the baneling is fine. The baneling works very well in the game, and while it's probably pretty frustrating to low level players, it's a fine unit at higher levels of play.
This entire blog was inspired by my frustration at watching banelings essentially ruin professional tournament games, both in favour and against the Zerg player. That I wrote it in a way that people of many different levels of skill can relate to doesn't magically make what I wrote disappear at a pro level. You might notice I made no mention of baneling landmines -- a favourite for lower level players to complain about -- since I don't feel it's a fundamentally broken concept and, in fact, is one of the extremely few situations where banelings are actually entertaining or skillful (i.e. the decision making behind it, baiting armies onto the mines, etc.).
On February 29 2012 18:33 Gryffes wrote: One does not simply a-move banelings.
You have to right click them behind the terrans retreating bio, or they'll explode on tanks and you'll lose the game 20s later when a stimmed marine ball rapes the expansion behind the fight.
Same in ZvZ, you're right clicking into mineral lines and have 3-4 control groups worth of blings so they don't explode on queens after they arrive.
tldr you state there is no baneling micro and it's pure a-move, not true at all.
You're right that I oversimplified a bit, but at the end of the day it's still only a matter of when you a-move to suicide. Right-clicking past tanks and waiting until after you've passed them to a-move the bio, for example, isn't exactly a big micro move. ZvZ is micro-intensive (hence its "knife fight" reputation), but most of that revolves around avoiding losing all your zerglings in ling/bane battles. Simply moving banelings into mineral lines isn't intensive, sorry to say.
On February 29 2012 18:00 Arisen wrote: I'm sorry, but this is just silly. The baneling isn't a problem in the game. I'm sorry if you or other people lose because your micro is shit or w/e, but you should never lose your whole army to banelings if you know what your doing.
I can't say this kind of remark was unexpected, even if disappointing when I go out of my way to pre-empt this kind of nonsense:
On February 29 2012 16:31 stormfoxSC wrote: If you've read up until now and are thinking to yourself, "This guy is just a whiner that probably has bad marine splitting," bear with me for a little longer.
On February 29 2012 18:00 Arisen wrote: ZvZ: I don't hate my mirror, because hardly ever do you lose to banelings. If a guy wants to go offensive banelings, I'm going to go defensive banelings and get a few more drones. You're not going to lose to banelings unless you control very poorly or he transitions from an early pool and you had poor scouting.
I wasn't expecting every Zerg to raise their hand, since I'm sure some people (including yourself, it seems) probably like ZvZ, but simply trivializing the early-game ling/bane issue like you have is an absurd counter-argument. When there are plenty of professional Zerg players to quote regarding the abysmal state of ZvZ, on top of the matchup having its notorious reputation, your approach is easier said than done.
On February 29 2012 18:00 Arisen wrote: A-move through the army: Ok, how do you amove banelings through an army? What race are we talking about? Protoss should never lose to banelings on the ground, and if you do your forcefields are bad. If it's a terran you're being greedy and sieging too late or keeping everything into a ball and not splitting. You shouldn't lose to this kind of thing if you're a competent player at all. I understand if you're a lower level player it's frustrating when you lose to banelings because you're not fast enough, but the're not a problem to people who know how to play.
You must be kidding me. The number of times I've seen players like Liquid`Jinro or oGsForGG (amongst many other Terran streams I watch) losing games on their streams from many baneling-related a-move scenarios is beyond count. Acting like it's a simple matter of competency is beyond ignorant to me, not to mention quite condescending.
On February 29 2012 18:00 Arisen wrote: All or nothing - Yeah, it's hard to make banelings connect versus someone who knows what they're doing, but it's nowhere as bad as you're making it out. IF you amove into a siege line from one angle, yeah, you're probably pretty bad and deserve to lose the game. You shouldn't be putting all your eggs into the baneling basket, that's why banelings are used with infestors or mutas/lings/ultras.
You're theory crafting scenarios that fallaciously take my lack of specificity too literally. I know of no realistic scenario where a Zerg will have an army comprised of nothing but banelings. Focusing specifically on the utilization of a single unit isn't the same as saying that unit is the only one being used.
I don't mind if people want to disagree with the OP, but don't do it by insulting other people's skill at this game and reinforcing your points with grossly incorrect assumptions. You've said nothing here except that either people should never die to anything or they're bad at this game. That's not a valid argument.
On February 29 2012 18:00 Arisen wrote: Would I rather have a lurker? Of course, but I don't. If they want to give me a lurker, great, if not the baneling is fine. The baneling works very well in the game, and while it's probably pretty frustrating to low level players, it's a fine unit at higher levels of play.
This entire blog was inspired by my frustration at watching banelings essentially ruin professional tournament games, both in favour and against the Zerg player. That I wrote it in a way that people of many different levels of skill can relate to doesn't magically make what I wrote disappear at a pro level. You might notice I made no mention of baneling landmines -- a favourite for lower level players to complain about -- since I don't feel it's a fundamentally broken concept and, in fact, is one of the extremely few situations where banelings are actually entertaining or skillful (i.e. the decision making behind it, baiting armies onto the mines, etc.).
You can't be for real.
So for ZvZ you read posts from the beta saying ZvZ is fucking stupid because of ling bane; guess what, they're not a problem anymore. How many games to dyou see banelings end on a high level now? Very few. Aggressive ling/bane play is a high risk/high reward probability where youre counting on someone being greedy. As I've said, it's probably frustrating at lower levels where your multitask or decision making or micro isn't great, but that's just starcraft. Certain things are strong if you dont have the skills to deal with it.
For ZvT you say you see jinro or forGG lose to banes. Of course. Because that's how you beat terrans. But those zerg players aren't just making 50 banelings at their natural and moving into their army. They're spreading groups of lings making banes and flanking the army from 4 or 5 sides. Should those players not be punished for moving into a shitty position? No. If you move into a big flank you deserve to lose, weather you're joe blow bronze or IMMVP.
I'm sorry that you dont like me attacking your post, but I'm attacking it because it's full of points based around sub optimal play and in general aren't good points. Can banelings kill you? Yes, the same as any other units. Are they a broken unit that ruins games? No. Zerg needs a big splash damage unit early in the game or every terran would lol and make a ton of marines and thow them at you and you'd lose games. You can say that's bad game design or whatever, but it is what it is. 10 banelings can ruin an entire terran game if you made a positioning mistake and while that may feel shitty, so does losing a game because 4 hellions (which cost 0 gas and can be made 2 at a time) run past your queens/spines and kill 20 workers and you lose the game. Does that make the hellion a bad unit? No. It means I made a mistake in how I handled the situation and I deserved to lose.
Here's a thought, rather than making a post about why a unit that kills you is dumb, spend the time you would have used writing the post actually trying to get better at the game, that's something a lot of people in this community could/should learn.
On February 29 2012 18:07 iaguz wrote: We've been playing it for 2 years. I don't think it's really that new (but certainly not that old). Also considering the tiny changes in the last balance patch and the figures currently it's pretty damn well balanced. Banelings also have nothing to do with this.
It doesn't have anything specifically to do with banelings. It was simply a precursor, to talk about the idea of removing units from the game. You're right that the current design of the game is rather balanced, but you're completely ignoring that there are a number of design issues in WoL, and the inevitable design and balance changes upcoming with two expansion packs on the horizon.
On February 29 2012 18:07 iaguz wrote: If you 1a your banes they all run into a tank or thor inefficiently and you deal fuck all damage. Good job. Really good zergs position their banes so they don't get splatted by 1 tank round and split them up mid fight to engage separate clumps of marines. It's really fucking hard you don't know what you're talking about.
Okay, seriously, guys? Is it the case that someone has to pull out one of these and draw out the intricacies of every possible scenario as a form of disclaimer in order to make any kind of generalized point?
The only difficult thing about sending banelings after a Terran army is accepting the fact that there was nothing you could do to stop a Terran with good micro from making your banelings practically worthless.
On February 29 2012 18:07 iaguz wrote: The nestea vs NaDa video is Nestea punishing Nada for having no tanks and poorly spread thors. If a bane splashes on 3-4 things (even thors) then it lived a good life.
Oh yeah, I forgot about that game game. I was thinking more like this when referring to over 100 banelings and a-moving:
On February 29 2012 18:07 iaguz wrote: Referencing the infested Terran is silly because the damn thing was only used like once (some ZvP on that map which had a neutral CC in the middle). The unit may as well have never existed in the first place, it was incredibly difficult to obtain and use effectively. It's an extremely poorly designed aspect of Broodwar, and a comparison to the baneling is laughable. Banelings are useful, banelings are exciting, banelings are balanced.
I'm not sure if you noticed, but I've been advocating the removal of the baneling. That would be quite similar to how often we saw the infested Terran. You might also notice I've been saying that the baneling is a poorly designed aspect of SC2. Quite a coincidence, no?
If you find banelings useful, exciting, and balanced, I'd like to see a counter-argument with that view-point, and showing why the OP isn't a superior solution. I don't mind alternative arguments, but an actual argument needs to exist here. All you've done is highlight the points that lead me to compare the infested Terran and the baneling in the first place (beyond just their similar function) and declare a one-line opinion that contrasts with mine, but with no reasoning as to why.
On February 29 2012 18:07 iaguz wrote: Plenty of ZvZ's get past the baneling stage, but they more struggle with the basic Rock paper scissors game of 15 hatch > 10pool > 14/14 > 15 hatch (with 6 pool thrown in there too for jollies) and weird things involving speed timings, spines, queens and all sorts of little niggly bits. A good zerg can deal with banes.
ling/bane wars in ZvZ are extremely challenging for both players and the better player gets to win them. Isn't this something a Broodwar fan would like? Shit have you seen quality zergs split their drones vs banes?
You cite different builds but all (except for perhaps the 6 pool, unless the game drags on for some reason) tend to see a ling/bane composition. Different opening BOs don't generally change what spectators end up seeing (ling/bane wars all day erry day, yo), except the outcome gains a rock/paper/scissors feel to it.
Ling/bane wars are challenging for both players. So was/is 4-gate vs 4-gate. That doesn't make it good design.
Leenock did have a sick split there, but only focusing on that misses the other half of the picture: there wasn't anything DRG could do. I clearly mentioned in my OP the whole finger-crossing aspect to banelings, and that video highlights it perfectly.
On February 29 2012 18:07 iaguz wrote: ... What point is this making? Baneling timings are usually shitty and rely on your opponent being too greedy or just plain awful. They provide a good way for Zerg to punish sloppy opponents and crucially banelings are something zerg has that has a chance of getting through a wall. Do you even play this game?
I have to ask what point you're trying to make, here. You took the first half of a two-part point (if the similar section titles weren't obvious; "Never lose a game again..." and "Never lose a game again?...") that talks about the silly boolean nature of the baneling -- as in, do massive damage or do no damage -- and respond to it with a bunch of irrelevant, random things the baneling can do before questioning whether I actually play the game. Which, by the way, is an absurd question, though I know you're only saying it as an insult. Classy.
Since that seems to keep coming up, I'll tell you guys my ladder status. I'm Diamond on the NA server, as I've been every season, and my MMR pairs me with high-Diamond and low-Masters players. So, yes, I play the game.
On February 29 2012 18:07 iaguz wrote: God I can't be bothered going through the rest of this.
Then why did you bother posting?
On February 29 2012 18:07 iaguz wrote: It's so poorly thought out and the point the op is trying to make is confusing. Banelings are overpowered! Banelings are underpowered! Banelings require no skill to use! SC2 is totally not BW!
Considering, by your own admission, that you didn't finish going through the OP, I'm not surprised you're confused. I've used two words relating to balance when discussing the baneling: overpowered and imbalanced. I said "overpowered" when comparing it directly with the BW infested Terran, as in, they took the infested Terran, gave it some major buffs, and added it to Zerg T1. Afterward, I used the word "imbalanced" to both reference my "overpowered" statement, and to foreshadow my later explanation of the baneling's lop-sided nature when it comes to doing damage (massive damage/no damage).
Perhaps that's too high-level of writing for TL without immediately accompanying it with a flat explanation, but there you go.
Banelings do require some skill to use (ever seen a Bronze player try to utilize banelings?), but the skill ceiling is incredibly low, hurting both lower-level players trying to fight against the banelings and pros trying to utilize them. I thought I was quite clear about that.
On February 29 2012 18:07 iaguz wrote: Banelings are a great part of the game. They're exciting (he's fucking downplaying this video for fucks sake, this), they create a wondrous tension with an instant explosive payoff and they reward players who have better mechanics (ZvZ) and who can position and control well during fights. We can't remove this unit because it would make Zerg far too weak early game and why would we anyway?
I disagree with them being a great part of the game, per my OP. That video you link to is only "exciting" in the sense that usually you want to avoid running banelings into Thors, so seeing a pro deliberately do the opposite is a rare sight (almost as rare as seeing infested Terrans in professional Brood War, wink nudge). Well, that and Tastosis are amping up the excitement with their excellent casting. When you pull that away, though, what you have is a lot of banelings quite literally a-moving into a bunch of Thors. Oh yes, quite exciting, I'm sure.
Pulling the "Zerg would be too weak if you remove it" card deliberately ignores the huge section I dedicated about replacing the baneling with something better, as well as some of the responses I made earlier in the comments. When people do something like that, I feel pretty confident that you're not actually here to have a reasonable argument, but rather just want to cherry-pick certain parts to make a condescending post and act smugly superior.
On February 29 2012 18:07 iaguz wrote:Conversly, banelings increase the skill required for the other player. Explain to me how this has no place in the game. Splitting marines, focusing tank fire, dodging burrowed banes and maintaining map awareness so these little shits don't blow up my whole army. Goddamn sounds challenging, sounds well designed, sounds fun.
The baneling isn't the only unit design that can force sick micro.
On February 29 2012 18:07 iaguz wrote:Try and convince anyone that a trio of burrowed banes in SC2 aren't as exciting as hold position lurkers in BW.
Now this is true. I mention baneling land mines in one of my previous comments, as well. It's one of the extremely few good things that come out of the baneling, but again, isn't anything a unit like the lurker didn't provide.
I'm afraid your way off the mark here for two reasons:
In BW early game TvZ, static defense worked totally different. Z would make creep colonies and in case a timing was scouted, would morph them into sunkens right as soon as T moves out. SC2 has spines which take longer to build but can uproot, so banelings fill a similar role in emergency early game defense. They also have similar effects on overall strategy - in BW T can fail their timing attack and still be okay, because it forces them to dump resources that would have otherwise went to mutalisks, the major difference being in BW the limiter to muta play is larva and in SC2 the limiter is gas. If you beeline them, lurkers hit the field earlier than mutas but way too late to deal with something like that.
The role that lurkers actually overlap with is the infestor, and the timing infestors hit the field is similar. TvZ flow is starting to become very similar to in BW, where the Z muta harasses while securing expos and banking gas into an lurker/infestor switch. Sometimes the Z goes straight to infestor but sometimes there were periods in BW where the Z would go straight into a lurker contain if they got a good scout of their turret placement (turret placement to defend lurkers is completely different than from mutas). Both lurkers and infestors essentially punish the exact same thing - large chunks of poorly positioned marines, of which the numbers will inevitably increase at the battles approach max.
I think banelings and lurkers could co-exist, but lurkers and infestors really couldn't, because the whole thing that made lurkers cool is that T could dodge the spines and work some serious cost-effectiveness miracles. In SC2 if you just dropped lurkers in as-is Fungal+Lurker would be infinitely more bad and would probably force T to go into TvT mech style every single game. It would be cool in HOTS if infestors needed to burrow to cast a fungal that got some further buffs in exchange. I suppose the bigger question is why they don't get rid of the marauder and rejigger the colossus so marines can dodge the beams.
As far as it currently stands I think banes are cool, because they are one of the few units that wildly swing in cost effectiveness. But really the only overlap they have with lurkers at all is that they both raze worker lines quickly. SC2 has a serious lack of miracle workers like the psi storm of old and spider mines so I don't why you hate the one unit that can really swing battles so much.
i'm not so sure why i wrote you a constructive response anymore, considering your evidence against banelings is two games from early GSL when all zergs except nestea were bad, and your evidence for lurkers is a game from '04 by some kid playing on useast vs. some complete idiot
Lol. "Too high level writing" for TL. No, you see, people are pointing out that your assertions are fucking stupid and you think that because they're disagreeing they can't possibly comprehend your writing because you try to make yourself sound more intelligent by using large words
You keep harping that banelings either kill everything or someone micros and they do nothing. Perhaps you think that's the case, but it's not. In a case where a micro move (like a drone split) completely nullifies your strategy, you're using a shitty strategy that relies on someone else microing poorly. In the case of banelings versus marine tank, there are situations where you can guarantee a favorable trade, and you need to force those scenarios; don't trivialize all the work pro zerg players put into their play by dismissing it as luck. Terran can't marine split his way out of a well setup flank or marinekingprime would never lose to zergs; just because the players YOU play are basing there baneling use around luck doesn't mean everyone does.
Also, you can't link videos of banelings raping armies as proof of your points without also mentioning that thewind was so ridiculously far ahead in his game that he could have done anything to win and Min was way ahead of his opponent as well. I could show you a video of me amoving pure zerglings to kill someone, does that mean that zerglings are designed poorly? No.
As another point, saying that lurkers also forced you to micro your marines isn't an argument for banelings being poorly designed. I could use your same points on why the lurker was poorly designed, because with superb micro you could kill them without taking damage.
Had a post going but arisen hit the nail on the head. Only part I wanna post is this
The problem with your "make banelings and win(?)" paragraphs is that they are fucking retarded and don't explain anything. You can win by making banes! You can lose by making banes! You can say this about literally any unit in the game what the fuck are you trying to say. That you can attack with them and sometimes win and sometimes lose is not a feature exclusive to banelings. Don't you know how all ins work?
On February 29 2012 19:45 Arisen wrote: You can't be for real.
I can't be for real? You can't be for real, man. Every single one of your paragraphs contains at least one major thing that I neither stated nor implied. You're making things up in your head and spewing it out as some sort of fact you're trying to pin on me. I'll bold each of these to highlight them, and address them immediately afterward.
On February 29 2012 19:45 Arisen wrote: So for ZvZ you read posts from the beta saying ZvZ is fucking stupid because of ling bane; guess what, they're not a problem anymore. How many games to dyou see banelings end on a high level now? Very few. Aggressive ling/bane play is a high risk/high reward probability where youre counting on someone being greedy. As I've said, it's probably frustrating at lower levels where your multitask or decision making or micro isn't great, but that's just starcraft. Certain things are strong if you dont have the skills to deal with it.
Bold: What the hell? Since when are late 2011 and 2012 interviews from the beta?
As for how many ZvZs end from banelings, that depends on what you mean by the question. If you mean a person GGs prior to any tech beyond baneling, then I'll have to agree there are not many. If you mean a match is essentially decided by banelings, where the player who's way ahead will finish it off quickly after adding some roaches, then I'd say plenty. Granted, I don't generally watch European tournaments, as I focus on GSL with a sprinkle of NA tournaments like IPL TAC, NASTL, and MLG.
On February 29 2012 19:45 Arisen wrote: For ZvT you say you see jinro or forGG lose to banes. Of course. Because that's how you beat terrans. But those zerg players aren't just making 50 banelings at their natural and moving into their army. They're spreading groups of lings making banes and flanking the army from 4 or 5 sides. Should those players not be punished for moving into a shitty position? No. If you move into a big flank you deserve to lose, weather you're joe blow bronze or IMMVP.
Bold: What the hell? Where did the whole 50 banelings at the natural thing come from? Where was this scenario mentioned before? How do you even make something like that up to refute what I said -- and how do you actually think that refutes my argument?
On the note of making things up as you go, why are you describing what you think these Zergs are doing, such as flanks and spreading, when I just straight told you that I've watched guys like Jinro and fOrGG straight lose to a-move zerg compositions that include banelings? A-move, as in, from one angle, no spread, just sent forward. There are other times when they lose to sick flanks too, but I'm not talking about that. My point was that making a condescending post about how bad someone must be if they lose to something like that is rude and untrue.
On February 29 2012 19:45 Arisen wrote: I'm sorry that you dont like me attacking your post, but I'm attacking it because it's full of points based around sub optimal play and in general aren't good points. Can banelings kill you? Yes, the same as any other units. Are they a broken unit that ruins games? No. Zerg needs a big splash damage unit early in the game or every terran would lol and make a ton of marines and thow them at you and you'd lose games. You can say that's bad game design or whatever, but it is what it is. 10 banelings can ruin an entire terran game if you made a positioning mistake and while that may feel shitty, so does losing a game because 4 hellions (which cost 0 gas and can be made 2 at a time) run past your queens/spines and kill 20 workers and you lose the game. Does that make the hellion a bad unit? No. It means I made a mistake in how I handled the situation and I deserved to lose.
Bold #1: What the hell? My blog was based around my observations of tournament play, particularly tournaments like the GSL and recently MLG Winter Arena. Sub-optimal. I don't think that word means what you think it means.
Bold #2: What the hell? Did you not read the second half of my blog, or some of my earlier responses in the comments? Nobody's saying "just remove the baneling and Zerg will be perfectly designed", and the OP makes the case for adding a real zoning unit to SC2 Zerg to both replace the baneling's current role of defending Zerg in the early game, and providing the currently missing ability for Zerg to hold territory.
On February 29 2012 19:45 Arisen wrote: Here's a thought, rather than making a post about why a unit that kills you is dumb, spend the time you would have used writing the post actually trying to get better at the game, that's something a lot of people in this community could/should learn.
Bold: What the hell? I already told you directly that the frustrations leading me to write this blog stemmed from watching tournament play, and how stupid the baneling is at that professional level. The OP talks about a mix of both tournament and casual misgivings to paint the picture why I think the baneling is bad for competitive SC2 -- AKA, professional play. I'm not sure how I can make that more obvious.
At this point it feels like you're stuck in your own fantasy world where you're reading this blog like it's a battle.net thread made by some gold league Terran, talking about how the baneling is OP because he hasn't learned how to marine split yet. I really don't know how to respond to that.
Hey look, someone's got an opinion about game balance, well, lets blogs that shit up and make sure everyone reads about it!
If only Blizzard employed people to specifically work on game balance. Oh they do. But this guy knows better obviously.
Banelings are specifically designed to do damage against early big balls of T & P ranged units, which cost effieciently destroy zerglings and roaches. Banelings are the deterrent for T to not make only marines every goddamn game.
Well stop watching SC2 and go back to watching BW you seem to like it so much. Baneling is never going to leave SC2 and good luck finding any significant number of people who agree with you.
On February 29 2012 21:11 Zanno wrote: I'm afraid your way off the mark here for two reasons:
In BW early game TvZ, static defense worked totally different. Z would make creep colonies and in case a timing was scouted, would morph them into sunkens right as soon as T moves out. SC2 has spines which take longer to build but can uproot, so banelings fill a similar role in emergency early game defense. They also have similar effects on overall strategy - in BW T can fail their timing attack and still be okay, because it forces them to dump resources that would have otherwise went to mutalisks, the major difference being in BW the limiter to muta play is larva and in SC2 the limiter is gas. If you beeline them, lurkers hit the field earlier than mutas but way too late to deal with something like that.
I agree with this based on the assumption that the zoning unit I suggest Zerg receives is the lurker. However, I pointed out that I don't think simply adding the lurker back in is what should be done. One thing that I perhaps didn't touch on well enough is that Zerg would have to undergo some redesign for balance purposes -- but that's okay since it's happening anyway in Heart of the Swarm, with the addition of new units and abilities.
Blizzard could do something like directly replace the baneling with some T1 unit that's effective against bio and morphs into a strong zoning unit at T2, or something else entirely. I don't have "the" answer for that.
On February 29 2012 21:11 Zanno wrote:The role that lurkers actually overlap with is the infestor, and the timing infestors hit the field is similar. TvZ flow is starting to become very similar to in BW, where the Z muta harasses while securing expos and banking gas into an lurker/infestor switch. Sometimes the Z goes straight to infestor but sometimes there were periods in BW where the Z would go straight into a lurker contain if they got a good scout of their turret placement (turret placement to defend lurkers is completely different than from mutas). Both lurkers and infestors essentially punish the exact same thing - large chunks of poorly positioned marines, of which the numbers will inevitably increase at the battles approach max.
I actually see the infestor as more of a love child between the BW queen and the defiler. It's a spell caster, not a positional unit, even though fungal growth can stem an oncoming force temporarily.
On February 29 2012 21:11 Zanno wrote: I think banelings and lurkers could co-exist, but lurkers and infestors really couldn't, because the whole thing that made lurkers cool is that T could dodge the spines and work some serious cost-effectiveness miracles. In SC2 if you just dropped lurkers in as-is Fungal+Lurker would be infinitely more bad and would probably force T to go into TvT mech style every single game. It would be cool in HOTS if infestors needed to burrow to cast a fungal that got some further buffs in exchange. I suppose the bigger question is why they don't get rid of the marauder and rejigger the colossus so marines can dodge the beams.
That's an interesting perspective. I feel that fungal + baneling is worse than fungal + lurker, though like I said, I don't think the lurker is the answer for SC2 Zerg's zoning.
On February 29 2012 21:11 Zanno wrote: As far as it currently stands I think banes are cool, because they are one of the few units that wildly swing in cost effectiveness. But really the only overlap they have with lurkers at all is that they both raze worker lines quickly. SC2 has a serious lack of miracle workers like the psi storm of old and spider mines so I don't why you hate the one unit that can really swing battles so much.
That's fair. I suppose the best I can break it down is like this:
I do like "land mine" concepts like spider mines, hold-position lurkers, and yes, even burrowed banelings. I've mentioned it a few times now, but baneling land mines are one of the very few things I do like about banelings.
I don't think spells like psi storm, EMP, and fungal growth are "miracle workers", so to speak. There's a decent degree of consistency with them, with any inconsistency resulting from the actions of both players (e.g. poor spell caster control from you, or awesome sniping from the opponent, etc.). Banelings, by contrast, just move to their target. Their rate of success is reliant entirely on the one trying to avoid them, making it a one-sided micro battle, with the baneling user being able to do nothing more but cross his or her fingers.
I don't mind wild swings in cost effectiveness, so long as those swings can be affected by both players; basically what I just finished describing in the previous bullet point.
i'm not so sure why i wrote you a constructive response anymore, considering your evidence against banelings is two games from early GSL when all zergs except nestea were bad, and your evidence for lurkers is a game from '04 by some kid playing on useast vs. some complete idiot
Sorry, I grabbed fast examples because there are a lot of comments to respond to, and Brood War is an old game, man. Here's something of NaDa attacking a Zerg expo while avoiding the lurker spines:
Divided my post into two arguments for ease of response:
Banelings are a necessary component of the ZvT and ZvZ matchups The issue is relatively simple: If you remove Banelings, large, early bio pushes in ZvT become insanely strong. Honestly, I'm not sure how one would even hold a fast bio push (hitting at ~6:00) sans banes. Unless you go for hyper fast upgrades and throw down a ton of spines, which Zerg can't honestly afford to do that early on without getting horribly behind, I actually don't think it's possible.
Terran can just produce units constantly, mass up a bio ball and a-move into the Zerg's base. Is that honestly a better outcome?
You keep throwing out all of these rebuttals claiming that "that's a weak counter-argument", but most of your responses are(and in fact, your core argument is) about how we need to get rid of the Baneling because it's imba/boring. If you're going to make either claim (imba and/or boring) you do kind of need to provide a reasonable alternative so that the game doesn't become imba/boring against the Zerg's favor.
So what unit do you propose is introduced to replace the Baneling in order to make ZvT something more interesting than "Oh. He's sending bio at me before I could conceivably have Infestors or any unit that could reasonably deal with it at this point in time. GG"?
What unit do you propose is introduced to replace the Baneling in order to make ZvZ something more interesting than "Oh. Oh man guys. Zerglings. Zerglings are fighting! Lot's of them! Man those Zerglings are fighting."? As much as I hate actually taking part in ling/bling wars, I much prefer it to the world where ZvZ is 6 minutes of Zerglings fighting while both players try to get upgrades to turn the battle in their favor. You can't, in all honesty, tell me that ling/bling is to be lost for this.
And how will this supposed unit alter the ZvP match-up? Remember, it'll have to be a tier 1.5 unit like the Baneling, but it can't be the Baneling because the Baneling is imbalanced and leads to stagnant games.
In the OP you talk about revamping the swarm host into a fitting zoning unit; that won't really cut it. Swarm host is Lair tech level, and AFAIK it requires burrow. Not exactly a great solution to the ZvT/ZvZ issues above.
This is the difficulty involved in arguing "Banelings need to be removed/replaced". You need something that can perform the exact same job, at the exact same time, for roughly the same cost, without breaking any of the match-ups.
I realize you've already touched on this topic extensively in your earlier responses, but you don't seem to have any interest in explaining what Banelings should be replaced with. Without that, I really can't justify agreeing with you on any of your points, because I just don't see how you can fill the Baneling's role in a way that doesn't break other matchups.
Positional units don't fit with the Zerg playstyle Zerg is all about fast, cheap, throwaway units. Zerglings are the very definition of "what a Zerg unit should be". Super fast, great for in-your-face aggression and great for defense if need be. Roaches, commonly touted as the Zerg "tank", are pretty damn squishy compared to other "tanky" units, but the key is they can be (and nearly always are) massed to draw fire for higher damage, but lower health Zerg units. Sure, Roaches have their regen upgrade, but that really doesn't see enough use to really call Roaches a hard-to-kill unit. They're a disposable damage soaking line.
Banelings, by their very nature (morphing from the quintessential Zerg unit, the Zergling) are very much a "Zerg" unit. Fast, disposable, and easily mass produced.
Positional units, in any form, are counter to these core Zerg "philosophies" if you will. Positional units aren't disposable; they're expensive, slow, and they really aren't supposed to move all that much, except to change where they're going to stand still and defend. They require teching and time and resources, none of which meshes well with the other Zerg units.
To be clear; you can have slower, more expensive, and less disposable units in the Zerg arsenal. That's kind of self evident just by looking at Hydras, Infestors, and Brood-lords. These are units that are balanced out for their slowness or generally non-disposable nature by being really fucking strong, and in general, you don't see these units until late in the game, when Zerg's overall focus shifts from the early game concerns (taking lot's of bases and abusing the mobile units available to an early game Zerg to prevent the player's opponent from taking bases) into the late game concern of "how do I kill this deathball?".
You're more or less asking for something that is completely counter to the Zerg's ideal approach to the early and mid game scenarios. Zerg shouldn't be turtling or trying to defend positions. That's the Terran philosophy. Zerg wants to be aggressive; positional units on face value are not conducive to this playstyle.
Edit:
the OP makes the case for adding a real zoning unit to SC2 Zerg to both replace the baneling's current role of defending Zerg in the early game, and providing the currently missing ability for Zerg to hold territory.
See, the role of Banelings in defending Zerg in the early game is more or less to defend against early pushes with a lot of bio units (or Zerglings). After that, the Banelings are there to give the Zerg some kind of edge to allow for aggression. If I send a mass of lings to attack a Terran player's third, they'll get torn apart by nothing but Marines. At this point, Terran controls the map, simply because he has Marines. The Zerg no longer has any fast units to take advantage of the slowness of Mech, because all of the units that *could* do this (Speedling/Mutalisk) are very much countered by stimmed Marines with some Medevacs.
The idea that Zerg needs to "hold territory" in what is implied to be a defensive manner is beyond false. Zerg as a race "holds territory" by containing the player's opponent with heavy aggression. We don't defend by setting up a perimeter and holding the line, we defend by killing drops, having map awareness, and exploiting the speed of our units to force a base race or to force our opponent to pull back his forces to defend against our attack. "Holding territory" is a core component of Terran play in SC II, but it's not even close to a style that most competent Zergs would be willing to adopt.
I seriously have to do another "what the hell?" series in response to you?
On February 29 2012 21:31 Arisen wrote: Lol. "Too high level writing" for TL. No, you see, people are pointing out that your assertions are fucking stupid and you think that because they're disagreeing they can't possibly comprehend your writing because you try to make yourself sound more intelligent by using large words
What the hell? Why would you extrapolate my (admittedly) facetious comment regarding my dual use of "imbalanced" to the entirety of my post, as well as my use of "large words"? Are you legitimately bored and just want to mess with someone on their blog, or something?
I get disagreeing. Zanno was disagreeing, though I think he misunderstood those quick video examples to mean more than I meant them to. They were just supposed to be examples of the concept, not hard evidence.
Anyway, what I don't get is you. Simple disagreeing is fair and expected, but you tack on so much irrelevant and nonsensical hostility for the sake of it, to the point where half the time your posts don't actually address the blog or anything said therein.
On February 29 2012 21:31 Arisen wrote: You keep harping that banelings either kill everything or someone micros and they do nothing. Perhaps you think that's the case, but it's not. In a case where a micro move (like a drone split) completely nullifies your strategy, you're using a shitty strategy that relies on someone else microing poorly. In the case of banelings versus marine tank, there are situations where you can guarantee a favorable trade, and you need to force those scenarios; don't trivialize all the work pro zerg players put into their play by dismissing it as luck. Terran can't marine split his way out of a well setup flank or marinekingprime would never lose to zergs; just because the players YOU play are basing there baneling use around luck doesn't mean everyone does.
Bold #1: What the hell? Wait a second. That was iaguz that posted those examples of things like drone splitting vs. banelings, and hyped them up as being supposedly amazing. I said they were stupid, because it's up to the defender to react or not, while the baneling user just crosses his fingers and hopes for the best. I'll accept your argument that those kinds of things amount to shitty strategy, but the fact is banelings are often used in professional games to deal damage to mineral lines, either by running them in like that, through baneling drops (this one's more rare, naturally), etc.
Bold #2: What the hell? How many times do I have to tell you that I'm talking about pro matches, not ladder? Not only that, but no where did I deny that professional Zergs do the best they can to ensure their banelings connect; what the hell else would they do? It's still a fact that the Zerg has to get a bit lucky and hope their opponent walks into their trap, otherwise it's a coin game whether the banelings do the damage they need to. If the trap does get sprung, though, then yeah, their hard work pays off.
On February 29 2012 21:31 Arisen wrote: Also, you can't link videos of banelings raping armies as proof of your points without also mentioning that thewind was so ridiculously far ahead in his game that he could have done anything to win and Min was way ahead of his opponent as well. I could show you a video of me amoving pure zerglings to kill someone, does that mean that zerglings are designed poorly? No.
I was going to "what the hell?" this one too, but I realized my explanation about those videos is earlier in this post. Those videos aren't "proof", because they're too old to prove anything. There's no "proof" to even be had; what exactly is trying to be proven with those? An exaggeration I made about pros making a lot of banelings, and how it's silly? You can't "prove" an exaggeration, since the exaggeration makes the point through overstatement, which is inherently false when taken literally. The core idea was about pros utilizing lots of banelings as a crutch to gain advantages and win games with, IMHO, relatively less skill -- not by their own choice, but by its very design lowering the skill ceiling for Zerg.
I think we're already clear you disagree with that point, though.
On February 29 2012 21:31 Arisen wrote: As another point, saying that lurkers also forced you to micro your marines isn't an argument for banelings being poorly designed. I could use your same points on why the lurker was poorly designed, because with superb micro you could kill them without taking damage.
Oh! There's finally a good point. My only argument there is that I really don't think you can compare marine splitting vs. banelings with the back-and-forth positioning dance between the lurker and marine/medic.
On February 29 2012 22:30 Kasha_Not_Kesha wrote: Divided my post into two arguments for ease of response:
Thanks man.
On February 29 2012 22:30 Kasha_Not_Kesha wrote: Banelings are a necessary component of the ZvT and ZvZ matchups The issue is relatively simple: If you remove Banelings, large, early bio pushes in ZvT become insanely strong. Honestly, I'm not sure how one would even hold a fast bio push (hitting at ~6:00) sans banes. Unless you go for hyper fast upgrades and throw down a ton of spines, which Zerg can't honestly afford to do that early on without getting horribly behind, I actually don't think it's possible.
Terran can just produce units constantly, mass up a bio ball and a-move into the Zerg's base. Is that honestly a better outcome?
This sort of response seems to be the biggest one I've noticed, but seems to ignore a big part of my OP. If I were saying "Hey guys, let's take WoL and make it WoL, but without banelings", then yeah, I'd completely agree with you. That would be absurd, and early bio pushes from Terran would be too hard to hold.
However, my OP revolves heavily around the idea that Blizzard is making design changes in the two upcoming expansion packs, HotS and LotV. Blizzard has already stated their intentions to remove some units and replace them with something better. My blog revolves around making the case why the baneling should also be considered for replacement.
On February 29 2012 22:30 Kasha_Not_Kesha wrote: You keep throwing out all of these rebuttals claiming that "that's a weak counter-argument", but most of your responses are(and in fact, your core argument is) about how we need to get rid of the Baneling because it's imba/boring. If you're going to make either claim (imba and/or boring) you do kind of need to provide a reasonable alternative so that the game doesn't become imba/boring against the Zerg's favour.
So what unit do you propose is introduced to replace the Baneling in order to make ZvT something more interesting than "Oh. He's sending bio at me before I could conceivably have Infestors or any unit that could reasonably deal with it at this point in time. GG"?
My reasonable alternative involved providing Zerg with a good positional unit that can fill the role the baneling currently does, as well as the role gap left behind from the removal of the lurker -- zoning out areas of the map. Perhaps my blog wasn't clear enough that I was expecting the zoning unit to replace the baneling?
If you're asking for a specific unit design (like attack type, appearance, abilities, stats, etc.), I'll admit I don't have "the" answer.
On February 29 2012 22:30 Kasha_Not_Kesha wrote: What unit do you propose is introduced to replace the Baneling in order to make ZvZ something more interesting than "Oh. Oh man guys. Zerglings. Zerglings are fighting! Lot's of them! Man those Zerglings are fighting."? As much as I hate actually taking part in ling/bling wars, I much prefer it to the world where ZvZ is 6 minutes of Zerglings fighting while both players try to get upgrades to turn the battle in their favor. You can't, in all honesty, tell me that ling/bling is to be lost for this.
Wouldn't a good zoning unit that's effective against bio timings also be effective against zerglings?
On February 29 2012 22:30 Kasha_Not_Kesha wrote: And how will this supposed unit alter the ZvP match-up? Remember, it'll have to be a tier 1.5 unit like the Baneling, but it can't be the Baneling because the Baneling is imbalanced and leads to stagnant games.
Lots of things will be affecting all the match ups in Heart of the Swarm. I can't say how a zoning unit would affect ZvP in an environment where we don't know what ZvP will look like, though you can still take away the same basic concepts: it should provide Zerg with early defence and good map zoning.
On February 29 2012 22:30 Kasha_Not_Kesha wrote: In the OP you talk about revamping the swarm host into a fitting zoning unit; that won't really cut it. Swarm host is Lair tech level, and AFAIK it requires burrow. Not exactly a great solution to the ZvT/ZvZ issues above.
And how is adjusting those issues off-limits to the swarm host? When I say revamp the swarm host, I mean turn it into a useful unit, as opposed to creating this useful unit I'm imagining alongside the swarm host.
On February 29 2012 22:30 Kasha_Not_Kesha wrote: This is the difficulty involved in arguing "Banelings need to be removed/replaced". You need something that can perform the exact same job, at the exact same time, for roughly the same cost, without breaking any of the match-ups.
I think that's rather rigid thinking. I can guarantee that units like the viper and oracle will break the match ups in certain ways when Heart of the Swarm is first released; if you don't think there will be balance patching after the upcoming design changes, you have another thing coming. My argument is that, with these things getting broken and tweaked anyway, why not deal with the baneling while we're at it?
On February 29 2012 22:30 Kasha_Not_Kesha wrote: I realize you've already touched on this topic extensively in your earlier responses, but you don't seem to have any interest in explaining what Banelings should be replaced with. Without that, I really can't justify agreeing with you on any of your points, because I just don't see how you can fill the Baneling's role in a way that doesn't break other match ups.
It's not that I don't have interest, but rather I don't have delusions of grandeur in assuming I have "the solution", so to speak. Zerg's lack of a zoning unit is both extensively voiced by many professional Zerg players, and is being addressed (in a way) by Blizzard in Heart of the Swarm via the Swarm Host, so that's a straight admission that there's a clear design gap there. I just don't think the Swarm Host will actually fill the role, for the reasons I state in my OP.
On February 29 2012 22:30 Kasha_Not_Kesha wrote: Positional units don't fit with the Zerg playstyle Zerg is all about fast, cheap, throwaway units. Zerglings are the very definition of "what a Zerg unit should be". Super fast, great for in-your-face aggression and great for defense if need be. Roaches, commonly touted as the Zerg "tank", are pretty damn squishy compared to other "tanky" units, but the key is they can be (and nearly always are) massed to draw fire for higher damage, but lower health Zerg units. Sure, Roaches have their regen upgrade, but that really doesn't see enough use to really call Roaches a hard-to-kill unit. They're a disposable damage soaking line.
Banelings, by their very nature (morphing from the quintessential Zerg unit, the Zergling) are very much a "Zerg" unit. Fast, disposable, and easily mass produced.
Positional units, in any form, are counter to these core Zerg "philosophies" if you will. Positional units aren't disposable; they're expensive, slow, and they really aren't supposed to move all that much, except to change where they're going to stand still and defend. They require teching and time and resources, none of which meshes well with the other Zerg units.
To be clear; you can have slower, more expensive, and less disposable units in the Zerg arsenal. That's kind of self evident just by looking at Hydras, Infestors, and Brood-lords. These are units that are balanced out for their slowness or generally non-disposable nature by being really fucking strong, and in general, you don't see these units until late in the game, when Zerg's overall focus shifts from the early game concerns (taking lot's of bases and abusing the mobile units available to an early game Zerg to prevent the player's opponent from taking bases) into the late game concern of "how do I kill this deathball?".
You're more or less asking for something that is completely counter to the Zerg's ideal approach to the early and mid game scenarios. Zerg shouldn't be turtling or trying to defend positions. That's the Terran philosophy. Zerg wants to be aggressive; positional units on face value are not conducive to this play style.
I disagree with this for a few reasons.
1. While Zerg has always been the "scary, aggressive race", they still had a positional unit in the lurker in Brood War 2. Swarm Host is coming in Heart of the Swarm, so even if nothing is said, Zerg's still getting their positional unit (albeit a rather poor one, in my opinion) 3. There's nothing stopping anyone from using a zoning unit to zone out an offensive position
Lurker pushes are a common thing in Brood War. The thing about a zoning unit is that it's not just about being defensive; it's about holding a position. I'd compare the concept more closely with a siege tank; it can be both defensive and offensive at any given notice, but is made useful by planting itself down somewhere and saying "this is my territory".
On February 29 2012 22:30 Kasha_Not_Kesha wrote: Edit:
the OP makes the case for adding a real zoning unit to SC2 Zerg to both replace the baneling's current role of defending Zerg in the early game, and providing the currently missing ability for Zerg to hold territory.
See, the role of Banelings in defending Zerg in the early game is more or less to defend against early pushes with a lot of bio units (or Zerglings). After that, the Banelings are there to give the Zerg some kind of edge to allow for aggression. If I send a mass of lings to attack a Terran player's third, they'll get torn apart by nothing but Marines. At this point, Terran controls the map, simply because he has Marines. The Zerg no longer has any fast units to take advantage of the slowness of Mech, because all of the units that *could* do this (Speedling/Mutalisk) are very much countered by stimmed Marines with some Medevacs.
The idea that Zerg needs to "hold territory" in what is implied to be a defensive manner is beyond false. Zerg as a race "holds territory" by containing the player's opponent with heavy aggression. We don't defend by setting up a perimeter and holding the line, we defend by killing drops, having map awareness, and exploiting the speed of our units to force a base race or to force our opponent to pull back his forces to defend against our attack. "Holding territory" is a core component of Terran play in SC II, but it's not even close to a style that most competent Zergs would be willing to adopt.
Like I mentioned above, there's no implication that a zoning unit is just a defensive unit. However, I disagree with your assessment that a Zerg's need to hold territory is false. Right now it's done by pro Zergs by making a tonne of spine crawlers, either to defend bases or hold an open area. It's a messy solution, however, and one borne from the fact that Zerg doesn't have any effective unit to hold ground like that.
On February 29 2012 23:17 stormfoxSC wrote: Bold #1: What the hell? Wait a second. That was iaguz that posted those examples of things like drone splitting vs. banelings, and hyped them up as being supposedly amazing. I said they were stupid, because it's up to the defender to react or not, while the baneling user just crosses his fingers and hopes for the best. I'll accept your argument that those kinds of things amount to shitty strategy, but the fact is banelings are often used in professional games to deal damage to mineral lines, either by running them in like that, through baneling drops (this one's more rare, naturally), etc.
There are plenty of Brood War units that you send out and hope they do what you want - this isn't new. With scourge you split the scourge and hoped they worked. In PvT, you would spread your zealots and run them towards the tanks during an attack and hope that they dragged enough mines / drew fire. Even something like sending zealots into a mineral line is of the same effect because you're sending them in to do damage and then you're focusing on something else in the meantime, it's up to the defender to do something about it. It's a good strategy because you can split your opponents attention and tax their multitasking. A units worth being dependent on the defenders ability does not make it a shitty unit.
edited in: Like someone else said, banelings are one of the few units remaining in SC2 that can swing a battle immensely relative to their cost. You said you didn't like that because it's success isn't dependent on both players - uh, yes it is lmao. You don't just A-move a pile of banelings, if you do it's far less likely to succeed. You're increasing your chances of success if you draw fire with other units, spread banelings, attack from multiple angles - these are all things the attacking player can do. In fact, the spider is more of a 'I hope this works' kind of unit/attack because they're planted somewhere and that's it, until they're activated or destroyed they're immobile and if they're detected they're next to completely clueless. A terran would plant spider mines in the path of units and hope it worked - that was one of their uses, it meant exciting games because anything could happen.
If you want to argue banelings suck go right ahead, but don't act like it's the breaking the perfect balance that Brood War built because there were a lot of units in Brood War that could be used to great effect that relied on luck or little-skill, it didn't necessarily mean they were bad.
However, my OP revolves heavily around the idea that Blizzard is making design changes in the two upcoming expansion packs, HotS and LotV. Blizzard has already stated their intentions to remove some units and replace them with something better. My blog revolves around making the case why the baneling should also be considered for replacement.
It seems to me that discussing how Blizzard should alter HOTS further is a fruitless endeavor, as so much about the game is going to change with all of the new units. It might turn out that Banelings become completely useless and are never seen again. I really doubt this will happen, but honestly, who knows? I feel like we should just limit our discussion to WOL, since it's the most understood game at the moment, and we can make meaningful claims about it's metagame where we can't with HOTS.
tl;dr: Let's limit this discussion to whether or not Banelings should be replaced by some sort of nebulous zoning unit in WOL. I don't really see you trying to argue that all of the units introduced in HOTS are going to suddenly lead to Banelings becoming massively imba; in fact you seem to be claiming that Banelings are already massively imba, so we may as well just simplify the discussion by focusing on the game we know the most about, unless you have any objections?
If you're asking for a specific unit design (like attack type, appearance, abilities, stats, etc.), I'll admit I don't have "the" answer.
That's more or less what I was asking, as without something to base a comparison off of, it's kind of hard to say whether or not the Baneling should get replaced.
Wouldn't a good zoning unit that's effective against bio timings also be effective against zerglings?
Sure, but your primary complaint with Banelings in ZvZ is that it's too volatile and it's not exciting to watch. Ling/Bling wars. Having a good zoning unit that is effective against Zerglings is even less interesting to watch. It also takes 0 skill for the user of the zoning unit, because of how zoning units fundamentally work. At least with Banelings there's a tiny bit of micro involved. The impact of this is simply that when discussing Banelings, I don't think ZvZ should be considered a case where replacing Banelings with some kind of zoning unit would be a positive change.
Lots of things will be affecting all the match ups in Heart of the Swarm. I can't say how a zoning unit would affect ZvP in an environment where we don't know what ZvP will look like, though you can still take away the same basic concepts: it should provide Zerg with early defence and good map zoning.
Hence my suggestion that we limit the discussion to WOL =P Assuming you accept this proposition; current ZvP is more or less dominated by early Protoss aggression or the more standard early Protoss macro. Both of those metagames would, in my opinion, be completely broken by the addition of a ground-based, early-game zoning unit. Currently we (or maybe just me?) almost never see Banelings used against Protoss, and thus any replacement of the Baneling can only have negative results for the Protoss.
I think that's rather rigid thinking. I can guarantee that units like the viper and oracle will break the match ups in certain ways when Heart of the Swarm is first released; if you don't think there will be balance patching after the upcoming design changes, you have another thing coming. My argument is that, with these things getting broken and tweaked anyway, why not deal with the baneling while we're at it?
Because it doesn't appear to be broken, mostly. Maybe I'm super out of the current SC2 news, but I haven't heard any pros complaining about Baneling imba. If it isn't broken, don't fix it; right? So I guess the real thing we need to discuss is "is the Baneling broken", before we move on to questions like "can the Baneling/Swarm Host be fixed?"
It's not that I don't have interest, but rather I don't have delusions of grandeur in assuming I have "the solution", so to speak. Zerg's lack of a zoning unit is both extensively voiced by many professional Zerg players, and is being addressed (in a way) by Blizzard in Heart of the Swarm via the Swarm Host, so that's a straight admission that there's a clear design gap there. I just don't think the Swarm Host will actually fill the role, for the reasons I state in my OP.
I don't think it will fill the role of zoning either but the important question is: does Blizzard? I feel like the game designers at Blizzard are a *bit* more aware of the overall game mechanics than to think that the Swarm Host, as it has been presented to us, is going to be anything more than a sustained threat to an enemy expansion, or a more inconvenient way to block expansions altogether. I don't think we can really construe the existence of the Swarm Host, a unit almost universally agreed to be useless in the zoning department, as an indication from Blizzard that Zerg needs a zoning unit of some kind.
Positional units don't fit with the Zerg playstyle
1. While Zerg has always been the "scary, aggressive race", they still had a positional unit in the lurker in Brood War
To be fair, I really know nothing about the meta-game of BW, so I can't really make an argument. If I were more knowledgeable, I'd probably look towards the early-game units that Zerg had in BW, as well as the early-game aggression potential of the other races. The Lurker might have just been a necessity because Zerg lacked any other way to accomplish certain goals. This is 100% uninformed theory-crafting though =P
Although I don't know for sure, again because I never really got into BW, I feel like it's safe to say that Zerg in BW was vastly different from how Zerg is in SC II. Correct me if I'm wrong =P
2. Swarm Host is coming in Heart of the Swarm, so even if nothing is said, Zerg's still getting their positional unit (albeit a rather poor one, in my opinion)
See my responses a few sections up about HOTS and the Swarm Host =P
Lurker pushes are a common thing in Brood War. The thing about a zoning unit is that it's not just about being defensive; it's about holding a position. I'd compare the concept more closely with a siege tank; it can be both defensive and offensive at any given notice, but is made useful by planting itself down somewhere and saying "this is my territory".
Sure, but the idea of a zoning unit is still fundamentally to sit still and attack whatever comes nearby. That's something that makes sense for the Terran arsenal, since they are focused on slow and/or low HP, super high DPS units, but it makes less sense for Zerg because Zerg units are fast, low HP low DPS units. Terran has a tier 1 AA unit that can keep Siege tanks safe from air attacks; Zerg's tier 1 massable unit is a fast fairly strong but easily killed melee unit. Terran's army is very complimentary; a Zerg army with positional control units would be incredibly confused.
Also, in BW Lurkers could deal with ground while the vastly superior and more quickly acquired (compared to the SC II equivalent) Hydralisks could defend from air and push in to do some major damage. The Zerg units in SC II are just too different from the ones in BW to be able to make that kind of 1-1 comparison, as the overall race has, in my opinion, changed drastically from BW.
Like I mentioned above, there's no implication that a zoning unit is just a defensive unit. However, I disagree with your assessment that a Zerg's need to hold territory is false. Right now it's done by pro Zergs by making a tonne of spine crawlers, either to defend bases or hold an open area. It's a messy solution, however, and one borne from the fact that Zerg doesn't have any effective unit to hold ground like that.
The highest league I've gotten to is Gold, and regardless of where my skill level might actually be, the quality of opponents that I've faced, and thus, the actual game knowledge I have in this area, is almost definitely lacking.
That said, Spine crawlers to hold open areas or defend bases usually works just fine. I've only got my own anecdotes to prove my point, but the manner in which I play Zerg I more or less wait until my opponent moves out and then I rush in from multiple angles and tear his base apart, usually forcing an attempted base-race. Throwing up all of those spines has always delayed my opponent enough to let me completely kill him off before he even hits my natural.
So I'll admit that there very well may be instances where a zoning unit might be needed, I just haven't seen one that couldn't be covered by Spines (or in the case of bio, Banelings =P)
I think the key justification behind my steadfast belief that Spines will always be enough is that Zerg, on face value, shouldn't really be able to defend some huge end-game push from a Protoss or a Terran. If they could, I don't know how Zerg could possibly be considered balanced as a race. With this positional unit you're proposing, Zerg would either gain the ability to hold off end-game pushes and thus, in my opinion, be completely imbalanced, or Zerg would gain nothing, and the positional unit wouldn't be needed. Either way I dislike the idea of a positional unit =P
I think that the Baneling is one the most exciting units in SC2. Games are often won or lost on baneling micro, burrowed banes, tank target fire on banes, forcefielding banes, dropping banes on sentries. The baneling drop is also one of Zerg's useful econ harassment options (since turrets seem much stronger than in BW). Very versatile unit.
Oh, you wiped the map clean by a-moving your banelings and took another base? You must be so skillful.
What are you talking about Charlie....what army are you wiping off the map with pure banelings (what a waste of money), and what are you supposed to do with no units leftover!?!
I for one liked lurkers in BW, but I have no interest in adding them into SC2. They would slow the game down and completely alter the feel of Zerg (which I prefer in SC2 over BW).
Also, lets not revamp the swarm host until we've all had a chance to try it, k?
the baneling benefits among the HIGHEST from micro. at one point in your OP you said "you probably think i'm a whiny player with bad micro". you are. the baneling is an excellent unit (one of the few new excellent units at that), that can be devastating in the hands of a skilled and aware player, but can also be stopped by your opponents with excellent forcefields, splitting, awareness, etc.
how you could argue that the baneling needs to be removed over other units (although i dont think anything needs to be removed/added at that) is beyond me.
On March 01 2012 05:23 SeRenExZerg wrote: low skill cap on the baneling? LOL
the baneling benefits among the HIGHEST from micro. at one point in your OP you said "you probably think i'm a whiny player with bad micro". you are. the baneling is an excellent unit (one of the few new excellent units at that), that can be devastating in the hands of a skilled and aware player, but can also be stopped by your opponents with excellent forcefields, splitting, awareness, etc.
how you could argue that the baneling needs to be removed over other units (although i dont think anything needs to be removed/added at that) is beyond me.
Microable? Yes. Benefits most from micro? I believe every ranged unit gains more from micro than the Baneling (IE focus firing, stutter stepping, blinking, mutaballing in and out to snipe stuff, Marines, mauraders. The only ones that don't really are siege units...).
On a related note, I've been thinking about the baneling myself too.
I think when the skill level increases to a certain point, banelings will just be ineffective. Mainly because they rely on your opponent being bad, rather than you being good.
I obviously didn't read the whole thread, but I'd just like to chime in and say that the marine x baneling interaction is one of the most interesting things in sc2. I also really like the unit design, whereas most of the new units don't really hold a candle to their BW "counterparts" imo (ie hellion x vulture, wraith x viking, science vessel x raven, stalker x dragoon, immortal x reaver, etc)
The constant use of ``1A`` even when attempting to not cause offense still shows ignorance of the Baneling`s versatility. I consider myself to be a ZvZ specialist and I don`t rely on Banelings for early game shenanigans and seldom suffer from my opponents employment of them.
Oh another thing, people need to stop comparing SC2 to Broodwar, get over it. Let`s move forward SC2 is a new game perhaps we should treat it like one.