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Disclaimer: This is not complaining about warpgates - this is examining how warpgates by design have lead to a smaller defenders advantage for Protoss, which makes safe, economic openers difficult to pull off.
Each race in SC2 has its own mechanical quirks quite separate from individual unit balance. Terrans have their addon swapping and mules, Zergs have larvae injects and creep, Protoss have warpgates and chrono. The most profound effect of the warpgate mechanic is not defensive in nature, but offensive. To find out why, we must examine the concept of the defenders advantage.
A primer of defenders advantage
When playing as a Terran or Zerg, you naturally have several advantages as a defender before you even build a unit. First, your ramp - the narrow choke allows your units to have a concave against a bunched up pack trying to push its way up the ramp. Second, your production - your rally distances are much, much shorter than if you were out in the middle of the map, so you can produce less units and still defend, because your second wave comes quickly.
Also, both Terrans and Zergs have access to a defensive structure after building their first basic unit production structure. The spine crawler only requires a spawning pool, and the bunker only requires a barracks. These structures can be produced as a reaction to a scouted push in order to provide you with an additional advantage as a defender, which can help mitigating the loss of the ramp advantage when you expand.
Defending against a push
Consider what happens when defending - assuming perfect balance, the only way to survive a push with an inferior army is to abuse your defenders advantages: your quick reinforcements, your ramp, and any defensive structures. This is why as a fast expanding Terran (no ramp advantage) you construct bunkers against a Protoss gateway timing. Same goes for spines as a Zerg.
But what about Protoss?
Leveling offense and defense
The warp mechanic, by its very nature, crosses "short rally" off of the defender's advantage list for Protoss. An attacking Protoss army and a defending Protoss army will be reinforced just as quickly.
And here comes problem number one: in a PvP, the defender has essentially NO advantage besides the ramp (and on Tal Darim Altar, there is no ramp!). The only way to survive a gateway push is to match your opponents unit count or abuse the crap out of your ramp (sentries, hooo).
This is how the 4gate v 4gate metagame evolved, especially on TD Altar. Cannons represent an absurd deviation from normal tech in order to provide a defender advantage, since there is no defensive structure after gateway. Scouting a forge + 2 cannons (450 minerals) can be responded to with a free expansion (400 minerals), since the cannoning player theoretically cannot attack with more units than the expanding one.
But PvP, as a mirror matchup, is inherently balanced no matter the design flaws, so I'll ignore it for now. Still, there are other implications of the Protoss equivalency of offense and defense.
The three types of engagements
There are three fundamental types of engagements in SC2. It's basically common sense, but it'll help to give them names. When you do a (1) timing push, you have usually sacrificed a small amount of economy for a stronger army at a specific time in the game. Therefore, when you push and engage, you have a stronger army then your opponent. This is the first type of engagement. If you are (2) defending a timing push, your goal is usually to use your smaller army together with a defenders advantage to defend and later capitalize on your stronger economy. This is the second type of engagement. Finally, in the lategame, midmap engagements are commonplace, where both players have relatively evenly matched armies. We'll call this an (3) even fight.
As mentioned before, Protoss has a natural advantage in timing pushes because of the warp mechanic. I feel that if a Protoss is engaging in a timing push, game feels well balanced - extremely strong Protoss timing pushes can punish greedy Terran or Zerg play, and well executed defenses can hold in safe play.
A pushing Protoss, with a stronger army and a short rally, is meant to have a fair shake at attacking a smaller, but defensive structure and rally fortified Terran or Zerg.
As a defender, Protosses have cannons for defense, a rally advantage, and a ramp / choke advantage. Cannons, because of their sometimes inconvenient tech, are missing from a Protoss defense in a lot of earlygame scenarios (4gate, 2 or 3rax, roach+ling aggression on expo). This reduces Protoss defensive options to a ramp or choke advantage, and a rally advantage. Protosses can defend using the choke advantage very well, by using forcefields. However, on maps with open expansions, this becomes extremely difficult. This is why Protosses prefer maps with narrowly choked off naturals, like Shakuras, or Anitga. On open maps, the choke advantage disappears almost completely.
So what about the rally advantage? Here's the problem. Because of the warp mechanic, Protoss is balanced as if they have the rally advantage for a timing push engagement. In a defensive sense, the warpin mechanic provides no additional benefit compared to an offensive one. As the Protoss is playing defensively, they have a smaller army compared to the pushing player. The choke advantage is missing at the natural on many maps. Cannons are absent because of tech inconvenience. All that's left is the rally - which is designed to be fair for a PUSHING Protoss!
A defending Protoss, with a weaker army at home, has no significant defender's advantage over a timing push from the opponent, making the battle favor the pushing player.
The differences in the races amounts to basic units and their defenders advantage. A Zealot, Stalker, Sentry army is equally good on offense and on defense. A Marine, Marauder force is good on offense, but BETTER on defense, because of bunkers and a shorter rally compared to their offense. Same goes for Zerg - a force at home is BETTER than an attacking force because of creep, spines, and relatively short rally. This lets you open economically and defend with a smaller, but advantaged army. A defending Protoss army has no advantage compared to an attacking one, no edge to capitalize on. So, if a Protoss early expands, their weaker army cannot make up for their lack of size with any external forces like a Terran or Zerg one can, and is vulnerable to timing pushes from the enemy.
It just comes down that unit efficiency. In a defensive context, a Protoss gateway army is weaker than a Terran or Zerg army. I'm not saying that gateway armies are weaker in general! Just in a defensive context, in terms of efficiency. As an example, if you were trying to hold your natural expansion on Xel Naga Caverns against light pressure, which would you prefer - 1 sentry, or a bunker with 2 marines in it? 2 sentries and a stalker, or 2 full bunkers? The options cost the same (1 gas = 1.5 min), require the same tech (actually toss requires more tech - gas and cybercore). I think its clear that the Terran options are extremely superior.
As a result of this, Protoss expansion builds, in order to be safe to strong early timing attacks, must have one of the following characteristics to provide the necessary missing defenders advantage:- An early forge (FFE v Z, delays tech because of forge tech being out of the way... imagine expanding as Terran by going ebay+turrets... tech and units for your own offense are going to be slow!)
- A map with a choke for sentries to use (Shak, Antiga, this is by far the best option)
- A lot of units (3gate exp, sacs econ compared to other races expo builds)
TL;DR:
- An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance.
- Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing, but there is potential to do damage against a greedy opponent).
- Because of these two points, a defensive Protoss with an small unit count and economic opener is weak because what is normally a defenders advantage is not a defenders advantage for them, it's a given in both offense and defense.
- The lack of a defensive structure after gateway adds to this problem.
- Therefore, the lack of a strong defenders advantage means Protoss has no safe, economic openers.
As an aside (not to be taken too seriously), To fix this: Add additional defensive building. A buffed shield battery could be awesome as a defensive tool if it were available after gateway. Not necessarily a clone of the BW one, maybe something more like a stationary medivac for shields only.
ADDENDUM: + Show Spoiler +Ok here, look at it this way - Expand vs Pressure builds.
A) Look at a Protoss timing push vs a Terran expand build. Protoss 3gate pressure (into expand), vs a Terran 1rax gasless expand into 3 rax.
Terran expands, scouts the 3gate pressure, and bunkers up. Would you say this is a fair fight? Protoss is probably going to get repelled, but theres a chance that they can break it if the Terran is sloppy. It can go both ways, theres tension in the matchup, and it feels balanced. If the attack fails, Protoss is behind, and Terran has defended well. If the attack does damage, the attack has succeeded, and the Terran is behind.
What's actually happening in this example is that the Terran is compensating for their smaller army (since they expanded first) by using a defenders advantage - the bunker with repair. The salient features are: Protoss has a larger army (expanded later, pumped units early) Protoss has a short rally (warpin) Terran has a small army (expanded first, units later) Terran has bunkers (defenders advantage) Terran has a short rally (home base)
And this SET of features creates a fair fight.
B) Now flip the roles. Terran's doing a 2rax pressure (12 + 16 rax, 1 tech 1 reactor, concussive researched) vs a Protoss 1gate expand into 4gates.
These are more or less equivalent builds to the previous example, except its 2rax+addons which is slightly cheaper than 3gates + cyber. Anyways, Protoss scouts the 2rax. The Protoss, on 1 base with a nexus building and 4gates on their way, cannot get cannons up in time. No defensive structure is available, and the natural is wide open. The Protoss expanded off 1 gate, so they have at most, 3 units when the push hits (Stalker Sentry x2 usually), with no repaired bunker to fall back on.
I think we're all familiar with this situation. MC lost in this exact situation to Polt. This fight is NOT fair, its almost a build order loss. You either sac your nexus and abuse your defenders advantage (ramp + sentry), or SEVERELY outmicro your opponent. (Or you could be on Shakuras and you can FF your natural. Which is why I stated in the OP that these maps are good)
Again, examining the salient features: Protoss has a smaller army (expanded first) Protoss has a short rally (home base) Protoss has no defensive structure after gate Terran has a larger army (units first) Terran has a LONG rally (attacking)
And this SET of conditions results in a Terran gaining an advantage the majority of the time.
My argument is that an economically focused, defending Protoss, when they engage, has essentially the same characteristics as a Protoss doing a timing attack with a small army... which is, of course, a terrible idea, and results in losses.
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I think its fine, you just have to get used to scouting and defending accordingly.
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Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something?
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On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something?
No specific idea. The one I put in the OP was that units should take longer to warp in if they're further from a gateway/nexus or something. That's the first thing that popped into my head anyways.
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The solution is: -Make Gateways start with warpgate -Gateways now have a warp in radius for the early game. Pylons cannot be used to warp in at this point. -Proxy pylon warp-in is a mid or late game upgrade
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On September 08 2011 19:13 RodYan wrote: The solution is: -Make Gateways start with warpgate -Gateways now have a warp in radius for the early game. Pylons cannot be used to warp in at this point. -Proxy pylon warp-in is a mid or late game upgrade
I fail to see how this changes anything other than timing.
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Good article. Logically it makes sense and it's interesing. Though i don't know what would be the best way to deal with it. Buffing warpgate units would make toss deathball even scarier and i can't even imagine buffing stalkers with blink as they are now (in PvZ).
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I had never thought about Protoss in this way before, nice post and valid points.
All I have to say though, is "Chrono boost, Guardian Sheild, Forcefields" Also protoss have the cheapest expand. I know hatcheries are cheaper, but you lose a drone, and need a queen for it to function effectively. And an Orbital is 550 mins.
No other race gets spell casters at the lowest tier, and I don't think they need fixed. I'm no balance tester though, I just play for fun But I certainly agree that PvP needs to be more dynamic, instead of being a game of chicken to see who expands first.
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The solution is this, warpgate should be a tier 2-2.5 upgrade and decrease gateway unit build times to match warpgate times. It should not be the first thing you get with a cybernetics core, having such an advantage so quickly in the game is silly and the equivalent of zerg getting ovie speed + ventral sacs off of hatchery tech. If it cost 200/200 and didn't speed up unit build times I think it would be perfectly positioned for the mid-late game as a sensible upgrade rather than a game-breaking one.
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On September 08 2011 19:19 Detri wrote:I had never thought about Protoss in this way before, nice post and valid points. All I have to say though, is "Chrono boost, Guardian Sheild, Forcefields" Also protoss have the cheapest expand. I know hatcheries are cheaper, but you lose a drone, and need a queen for it to function effectively. And an Orbital is 550 mins. No other race gets spell casters at the lowest tier, and I don't think they need fixed. I'm no balance tester though, I just play for fun But I certainly agree that PvP needs to be more dynamic, instead of being a game of chicken to see who expands first.
Yup. As I said, sentries and chokes on naturals are the only thing keeping toss on an even footing with the other races.
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It's funny because I was just thinking about this. To balance the game around the warp gate protoss have to have an innately weaker defender's advantage outside of force fields.
I don't see blizzard changing it in the future though. Warp gate is unique and actually a pretty cool mechanic as a whole. They'd have to drastically change the game for better balance, but no drastic change like that has ever been implemented in the year.
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Saying that warpgate "broke" protoss is a bit sensationalist but your post makes some good points. Warpgate is conceptually really cool but in practice creates a lot of problems.
As a protoss player I think I would be happier without warpgate, provided that balance would be adjusted accordingly. I really doubt that blizzard will ever do such a thing though so we may as well get used to it.
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Be pretty cool if warpin time was dependant on the distance from the nearest nexus. Would allow a clearer defenders advantage in both PvP and other matchups at home (let's say very short ~0.5 - 1 second warp in) while at a longer distance (capped at a certain amount so maps don't effect it as much) ~7/8 seconds at the extreme.
Times could be played with for balance, but the main idea (gaining a defenders advantage) is achieved, while the unique race trait of protoss is maintained as they could still warp in anywhere on the map (and still pool up significant forces).
P.s. I'm just suggesting that warpin times are extended; cool downs will remain the same for the same net production capability.
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The shield battery could actually revolutionize PvP. Did Blizzard ever comment on why it never made it into SC2? If not It was probably removed because they were rarely used, but PvP could probably have FE builds if the shield battery was in the game.
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On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something?
Well, jus thinking out loud here, but I never understood why warpgates allowed for higher production throughput than gateways.
It made more sense to me that you should be giving up -something- (resources or time) to gain the front-loaded anywhere there's a power field style of unit creation. Especially given that you can convert warpgates back to gateways.
Plus it'd be cool to see gateways<->warpgates happening as protoss move between defensive and offensive =P
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On September 08 2011 19:13 RodYan wrote: The solution is: -Make Gateways start with warpgate -Gateways now have a warp in radius for the early game. Pylons cannot be used to warp in at this point. -Proxy pylon warp-in is a mid or late game upgrade
This would make me quit playing Protoss in an instant.
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Blizzard isnt going to remove warpgates. It has been in the game for over a year already. They are not going to remove something that the entire game so far has been balanced around.
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On September 08 2011 19:26 dbddbddb wrote: Blizzard isnt going to remove warpgates. It has been in the game for over a year already. They are not going to remove something that the entire game so far has been balanced around.
I never suggested they remove it. I was just showing how it's the nature of the warpgate to give the protoss a smaller defenders advantage than the other races, and something needs to be done about it.
You either rebalance the warpgate, or provide a new defensive option. I'd love a shield battery. Please, Blizzard? We need something!
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I agree with most your sentiments on the matter, and also agree on the inferred undertone that Protoss in general can be tricky to balance due to the Warp-in mechanic.
Half the time playing Protoss Warping in feels like a fantastic advantage, as you've also outlined, but for the other half there is always that niggling after-thought in my mind that Protoss gateway units can never be deemed strong due to the way in which Blizzard has devised the system which directly influences their power in certain situations.
It's a blessing and a curse all wrapped into one
Personally I would rather the defenders advantage over the attackers "advantage". A lot of the time I feel pressured to go for some kind of ridiculous timing attack off the back of many factors, but a major one is the fear of being attacked in a position where I am not able to hold my front because our defensive mechanics are pretty poor. At least with a proper defenders advantage early/mid game then I can feel more comfortable going into the longer macro games against the likes of Z and T.
Of course we have a slight defender advantage once our Stargates and Robos go up, in terms of rally, but as any sane player knows, that is only a small portion of our army in those opening moments.
As a brief side note, it's really weird that (I play random a lot) when i'm playing Z and T, I feel a lot more comfortable expanding than I do with my own bloody race : / I don't know if anyone else gets that so maybe it's just me.
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On September 08 2011 19:23 Immaterial wrote: Saying that warpgate "broke" protoss is a bit sensationalist but your post makes some good points. Warpgate is conceptually really cool but in practice creates a lot of problems.
This is also why the warpgate change, while small, in the last patch, and was intended mainly for PvP, changed the game a lot because of all the timing changes for the pushes protoss can do.
Essentially, the way to fight protoss is to guess which push they are going for, and either attack before they are ready with their wanted mix / procution buildings, or get ready to defend at that time, while outmacroing before the push.
A lot of the defenders advantage is removed against AND for protoss, and that makes it very hard to balance the race compared to the others.
Which is why a small change, which makes all the pushes slightly slower, makes everything easier to defend and attack against.
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i freaking hate warpgate mechanic, such a strange thing to put into RTS game idea: make warpgates the worse option opposed to gateway. - gateways makes unit faster or cheaper or whatever, that means you want warpgates only in lategame scenario and in some kind of specific timing attack. f.e. you have 20 gateways and 4 warpgates, so you're able to warpin some DTs for harass if you want or warpin couple HTs at far away base, but you use 20 gateways to produce your core army
but i believe it's too late already to make such a massive change, would need to rebalance a lot of units
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You make it sound like getting an early forge is such a burden but most builds will start very early upgrades out of it and coupled with chrono boost you will have an upgrade advantage all game long. Defense, detection and upgrades, pretty good investment if you ask me.
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On September 08 2011 19:30 CSN_Kaelaris wrote: As a brief side note, it's really weird that (I play random a lot) when i'm playing Z and T, I feel a lot more comfortable expanding than I do with my own bloody race : / I don't know if anyone else gets that so maybe it's just me.
Its not just you! In fact, I think, that was the whole point of my post lol. Expos as Protoss always sacrifice something, unless you get a good map you can defend with sentries to abuse the ramp advantage.
On September 08 2011 19:32 vol_ wrote: You make it sound like getting an early forge is such a burden but most builds will start very early upgrades out of it and coupled with chrono boost you will have an upgrade advantage all game long. Defense, detection and upgrades, pretty good investment if you ask me.
Defense, detection, and upgrades are all passive investments. Which is why we've seen the fast 4 hatch no gas Ret style completely dominate FFE's.
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this has been around for a year, this is the sort of post you'd expect during the beta. Its like saying that the terran race has changed because we can now make 2 marines at one barracks, you are simply stating the obvious. Protoss units that come from the gateway are kind of rubbish but they are quite fast and you can warp them anywhere - that is their advantage.
the issue with PvP is not 4gate which you can hold - its a lack of scouting options after 4 gate.
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On September 08 2011 19:32 vol_ wrote: You make it sound like getting an early forge is such a burden but most builds will start very early upgrades out of it and coupled with chrono boost you will have an upgrade advantage all game long. Defense, detection and upgrades, pretty good investment if you ask me.
I think your use of "Defense" and "Detection" need to have the word "Static" added somewhere before them. Exploitable on multiple levels if Z and T know what they're doing.
I'm not saying that's the case for every single game every conceived, just something to consider and most definitely should not be overlooked.
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On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something?
Eh, Protoss macro is not harder than Terran. As Protoss you have less units because they take more supply, you have less hoykeys for macro and you can see the cooldown progress on your warpgates without checking your base.
On topic though I mostly agree with OP.
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On September 08 2011 19:32 PredY wrote: i freaking hate warpgate mechanic, such a strange thing to put into RTS game idea: make warpgates the worse option opposed to gateway. - gateways makes unit faster or cheaper or whatever, that means you want warpgates only in lategame scenario and in some kind of specific timing attack. f.e. you have 20 gateways and 4 warpgates, so you're able to warpin some DTs for harass if you want or warpin couple HTs at far away base, but you use 20 gateways to produce your core army
but i believe it's too late already to make such a massive change, would need to rebalance a lot of units
I echo these ideas. It makes no sense to have a mechanic that has absolutely no downside. They both negate distance AND make stuff faster. It just makes no sense. It's like if stim didn't remove hp, that would just be incredibly overpowered and the whole race would have to be readjusted(weakened) in order to compensate for it. Or if reactors didn't limit to mineral only units.
It just feels like protoss has been nerfed because of Forcefields and Warpgates far too much. I'd much rather see a more dynamic gateway protoss without these overpowering abilities than the current fragile ball.
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On September 08 2011 19:36 hugman wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something? Eh, Protoss macro is not harder than Terran. As Protoss you have less units because they take more supply, you have less hoykeys for macro and you can see the cooldown progress on your warpgates without checking your base. On topic though I mostly agree with OP.
I find all macro to be more or less even, but I get more straight up sensory feedback when macroing as P and Z - the feeling of planting down warp-ins and the sound of larvae injects just feel... satisfying and significant. Macroing as terran is so mundane and theres no feedback, I often forget that I've made units, or forget to make units.
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I think the OP is right, but let's face it : Blizzard is not gonna touch something as core as warpgate mechanic probably until the protoss expansion. It is a sad thing they didn't realize warpgate had such an offensive power. 3 months into beta warpgate pushes were discovered and since then they have been increasing its research time and toying with the building time of gateway units, but they didn't address the issue properly.
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Why does it matter if protoss timings are balanced on a short rally distance? as long as it is balanced.
Also you have to remember that you are warping in gateway units only, so no colossus or other tech is going to warp into your base.
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I think the only thing truly missing is a "choice" between Warpgates and Gateways.
Why do Gateways even exist? Except for Blizzard rather having a "Warpgate research" instead of a "Warpgate range research".
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You make some good points. However I'd argue that WG gives a (slight?) defender's advantage too, as you can reinforce more quickly at home as well (5 seconds for units to become functional) and respond more quickly to the incoming enemy composition than the build times of Terran and Zerg.
But probably a lot of these issues would be non-existent without warp, although warp makes Protoss what it is in SC2, so I don't know if Blizzard will make big changes to it.
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On September 08 2011 19:25 Pzar wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something? Well, jus thinking out loud here, but I never understood why warpgates allowed for higher production throughput than gateways. It made more sense to me that you should be giving up -something- (resources or time) to gain the front-loaded anywhere there's a power field style of unit creation. Especially given that you can convert warpgates back to gateways. Plus it'd be cool to see gateways<->warpgates happening as protoss move between defensive and offensive =P I definitely agree with this, sounds awesome
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On September 08 2011 19:42 Scythe90 wrote: Why does it matter if protoss timings are balanced on a short rally distance? as long as it is balanced.
Also you have to remember that you are warping in gateway units only, so no colossus or other tech is going to warp into your base.
Because Protoss timings are balanced on short rally, Protoss defenses have what is normally an advantage balanced away. So defensive play as Protoss is difficult, cannon tech being shitty notwithstanding
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On September 08 2011 19:40 NormandyBoy wrote: I think the OP is right, but let's face it : Blizzard is not gonna touch something as core as warpgate mechanic probably until the protoss expansion. It is a sad thing they didn't realize warpgate had such an offensive power. 3 months into beta warpgate pushes were discovered and since then they have been increasing its research time and toying with the building time of gateway units, but they didn't address the issue properly.
When the most recent Warpgate tweak was announced, the one that increased it's research time by like 40 seconds and then down to a 20 second increase, but also they wanted to decrease the time units made from standard Gateways, I was excited about the possibilities.
It's been stated a few times in this thread already but I think it would have been an amazing dynamic to actually have Gateways have a small defensive advantage over Warpgates (i.e. units trained slightly faster from them than Warpgates), creating the choice there for Protoss players given certain situations.
Alas as I said before, they decreased the change to 20 seconds and removed all the build decrease times from Gateway units, so my excitement was taken away from me lol.
EDIT: I understand the implications of slightly decreased build times for things like 2gate Zealots etc so please don't try to counter my opinion in such fashion It's manageable for Z as long as they don't play like as greedily as the World's banking system.
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On September 08 2011 19:42 Scythe90 wrote: Why does it matter if protoss timings are balanced on a short rally distance? as long as it is balanced.
Also you have to remember that you are warping in gateway units only, so no colossus or other tech is going to warp into your base.
It makes it so gateway units can't be isolated and work well. So you get all these "Balls" when playing protoss.
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I still don't see why bringing back shield batteries isn't an answer to this.
They add nothing to attacking armies (although I suppose technically Protoss could use them offensively as part of a push) and provide the missing defender's advantage.
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On September 08 2011 19:54 FuRong wrote: I still don't see why bringing back shield batteries isn't an answer to this.
They add nothing to attacking armies (although I suppose technically Protoss could use them offensively as part of a push) and provide the missing defender's advantage.
Thats why I offered them as a possible solution? I'd love to see them. Who said they wouldn't help?
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On September 08 2011 19:44 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 19:42 Scythe90 wrote: Why does it matter if protoss timings are balanced on a short rally distance? as long as it is balanced.
Also you have to remember that you are warping in gateway units only, so no colossus or other tech is going to warp into your base. Because Protoss timings are balanced on short rally, Protoss defenses have what is normally an advantage balanced away. So defensive play as Protoss is difficult, cannon tech being shitty notwithstanding
Protoss also have sentries which can be used to delay pushes, and buy time to warp in more units, in addition with chrono boost on gateways you can increase production. I think there are defensive capabilities to deal with timings if they are scouted.
I wouldn't assume balance on protoss timing attacks strictly assumes no rally distance. Keep in mind if T/Z don't have bunkers/spines they will fall to a lot of gateway attacks, T/Z have to respond to scouting with defence capabilities, which just happen to be buildings, while protoss have other methods.
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Make warp-ins only possible near a Nexus or under a warp-prism.
Problem solved?
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warpgate sure is a blessing in other matchups and a curse in pvp (for example, if you get lucky with a production cycle, you have the get-out-of-drop-free-card)
here is what i have problems with in your nice writeup:
Terrans have their addon swapping and mules, Zergs have larvae injects and creep, Protoss have warpgates where is chrono boost? i consider it sometimes even better than mule drop, since you cannot speed up your weapon/armor upgrades with a mule. Chrono boost can give you so much of an edge in the upgrade war
the units of Terran and Zerg have to naturally trade slightly more efficiently with Protoss units it really is so rare if a zerg manages to ever trade more efficiently with protoss units. And in those instances, i feel like being able to point out half a dozent mistakes the protoss did that led to this
To fix this: Make warpin weaker offensively and buff units slightly i don't think to buff units sligthy would work in the favour of the other matchups. Protoss units benefit from additional abilties. Sure, the sentry will never be on par with 6 zerglings damage-wise. But some good forcefields can screw up the AI in a way that your opponents roaches are trapped and cannot even shoot back (and if you have 3-5 sentries, you can trap 40+ roaches in a spot of the size of a zergling^^). Stalker are deadly if you have blink and can use it, and zealots already have really strong basic stats (and for getting to the target, they get an upgrade, just like zerglings).
Ramps and sentries help mitigate these factors, but open natural maps suck. that is a design problem for every race. Open naturals are as deadly for you in a pvp as they are for a zerg vs everything (since you have to get so many spines against a timing push, your opponent could double expand on that money according to your theory) and a terran always has to fear a runby (except for terrans buildings walls and some clever tanks. But then again, terran is the master of defenders advantage). Think about Xel Naga caverns: i dare claim that there is a defenders disadvantage on this map if you take your natural expansion. Speaking of my zvz's on this map, the player threatening the opponent is usually the one being able to expand. In zvz with baneling wars, you have a reinforcement time of what? 10 seconds? Lings are so fast, even faster on creep. And the defender has always the risk of 1/2 banelings blowing up in the right spot, killing his entire army and/or worker line. But this also means that if you are the defending player and you can sneak up few zerglings to your opponents base, you can win the game in an instant if those hit. This is what i think can be done in a pvp more often - use a few units to get some economy damage and force your opponent to warp in at home.
Last but not least, i think you underestimate the defenders advantage sentries give you. Their strengh does not lie within being able to forcefield your ramp for 2 minutes, it is that they can cut your opponents army in half, so you can fight having the upper hand. This requires you to have Stalker, since Zealots running in get hit by units behind the forcefields, taking full damage and therefore nullifying your forcefields. And relying on too many sentries is a double-edged sword: they can forcefield forever, but they cannot fight at all, therefore not allowing you to cut your opponents army in half (and reducing your stalker count by taking up all the gas)
so i guess bottom line is: dont overbuild sentries, focus on getting stalkers, micro your stalkers, split your opponents army in half (you should be able to do this at least one time on larger openings/ramps)
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On September 08 2011 20:03 Scythe90 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 19:44 susySquark wrote:On September 08 2011 19:42 Scythe90 wrote: Why does it matter if protoss timings are balanced on a short rally distance? as long as it is balanced.
Also you have to remember that you are warping in gateway units only, so no colossus or other tech is going to warp into your base. Because Protoss timings are balanced on short rally, Protoss defenses have what is normally an advantage balanced away. So defensive play as Protoss is difficult, cannon tech being shitty notwithstanding Keep in mind if T/Z don't have bunkers/spines they will fall to a lot of gateway attacks, T/Z have to respond to scouting with defence capabilities, which just happen to be buildings, while protoss have other methods.
If T/Z doesnt have bunkers/spines they fall to a lot of barracks/ling/roach pushes too. The point is, if you think Protoss timing pushes are fair, then Protoss defense is automatically bad. Its my opinion that yes, P timings are fair - they break greedy opponents and fail against safe play, just like T and Z timings. So, for the reasons stated in the OP, defense is weakened for the P, with no easy structure like the bunker/shield battery to make up for it.
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you are wrong about warp gate not being good at defending
the strength of warpgates is equally strong offensively and defensibly. Its even more noticeable at defending!
example: terran to do a timing push needs to have minerals at time X to start production. now lets say terran needs 30 seconds to build the army and the distance from his base to the target is 30 seconds.
That means a delay of 1 minutes the moment you collect minerals to the moment your army built from those minerals hit the target. While protoss only has the delay of 5 seconds.
Which also means that a 8minutes timing attack from terran is a 7minutes army against a 8minutes protoss army which if you take the account that your productions only really starts to kick in at about 4/5 minutes in to the game, early timings the protoss can have 1/3 more army than terran and still lose because to balance this gateway units need to be weaker compared to t1 units from other races.
conclusion: WP is the most BROKEN mechanic in the game (2º is forcefield) and still protoss is very vulnerable to all ins because how weaker gateway units need to be. Honestly I dream one day WP be only upgradable on a fleet beacon.
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On September 08 2011 20:05 Cirqueenflex wrote: where is chrono boost? i consider it sometimes even better than mule drop, since you cannot speed up your weapon/armor upgrades with a mule. Chrono boost can give you so much of an edge in the upgrade war Added in chrono, it really doesnt change my argument.
i don't think to buff units sligthy would work in the favour of the other matchups. Protoss units benefit from additional abilties. Sure, the sentry will never be on par with 6 zerglings damage-wise. But some good forcefields can screw up the AI in a way that your opponents roaches are trapped and cannot even shoot back (and if you have 3-5 sentries, you can trap 40+ roaches in a spot of the size of a zergling^^). Stalker are deadly if you have blink and can use it, and zealots already have really strong basic stats (and for getting to the target, they get an upgrade, just like zerglings). My "fixes" were an afterthought, its really not to be taken too seriously.
that is a design problem for every race. Open naturals are as deadly for you in a pvp as they are for a zerg vs everything (since you have to get so many spines against a timing push, your opponent could double expand on that money according to your theory) and a terran always has to fear a runby (except for terrans buildings walls and some clever tanks. But then again, terran is the master of defenders advantage). Think about Xel Naga caverns: i dare claim that there is a defenders disadvantage on this map if you take your natural expansion. Speaking of my zvz's on this map, the player threatening the opponent is usually the one being able to expand. In zvz with baneling wars, you have a reinforcement time of what? 10 seconds? Lings are so fast, even faster on creep. And the defender has always the risk of 1/2 banelings blowing up in the right spot, killing his entire army and/or worker line. But this also means that if you are the defending player and you can sneak up few zerglings to your opponents base, you can win the game in an instant if those hit. This is what i think can be done in a pvp more often - use a few units to get some economy damage and force your opponent to warp in at home. I know its a problem for every race, I addressed that. The problem with toss is, you don't have something to help you with the openness. Bunkers with ranged units in it go a long way towards defending an open natural. All Protoss has is its small army up against a larger pushing army. There is no appropriate defensive structure to help. Spines can be moved, and are at spawning pool tech. Cannons are static and require a forge
Last but not least, i think you underestimate the defenders advantage sentries give you. Their strengh does not lie within being able to forcefield your ramp for 2 minutes, it is that they can cut your opponents army in half, so you can fight having the upper hand. This requires you to have Stalker, since Zealots running in get hit by units behind the forcefields, taking full damage and therefore nullifying your forcefields. And relying on too many sentries is a double-edged sword: they can forcefield forever, but they cannot fight at all, therefore not allowing you to cut your opponents army in half (and reducing your stalker count by taking up all the gas) Again, I addressed this. I said that sentries with good chokes is the best defensive option. Wide open nats like metal make sentries pretty bad though. I'm talking 1, 2 gate expand here. 3 gate expo is significantly slower than any other safe expansion from the other races. You dont have enough sentries to effectively cut an army in half on a big map without 3gates.
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all i read is, that you want to remove protoss already crapy early/mid game offensive possibilities without being some kind of semi/allin. prevent a zerg from droning hard in the early stage comes near wizardry nowadays...i recommend playing some protoss before writing such things in forum
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On September 08 2011 20:09 siri wrote: you are wrong about warp gate not being good at defending
the strength of warpgates is equally strong offensively and defensibly. Its even more noticeable at defending!
example: terran to do a timing push needs to have minerals at time X to start production. now lets say terran needs 30 seconds to build the army and the distance from his base to the target is 30 seconds.
That means a delay of 1 minutes the moment you collect minerals to the moment your army built from those minerals hit the target. While protoss only has the delay of 5 seconds.
Which also means that a 8minutes timing attack from terran is a 7minutes army against a 8minutes protoss army which if you take the account that your productions only really starts to kick in at about 4/5 minutes in to the game, early timings the protoss can have 1/3 more army than terran and still lose because to balance this gateway units need to be weaker compared to t1 units from other races.
conclusion: WP is the most BROKEN mechanic in the game (2º is forcefield) and still protoss is very vulnerable to all ins because how weaker gateway units need to be. Honestly I dream one day WP be only upgradable on a fleet beacon.
I assume you're not factoring in the fact that Warpgates have a cooldown? : /
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another problem with warp gates is that a intense fight or micro situation may take more than a wg cooldown,so you will have overminerals. in this case and most protosses work against that by adding more warpgates everytime they have overmins having 10 gates on 2 base is not economy base. you can queue up or stack larvae as terran/zerg, swap addons(even though i think i've never seen someone do this) or just EXPANDING which protoss hates,except FFE.
little question aside: do you have to be with the camera where you warp in or is it possible via minimap? i feel it would be a disadvantage to focus camera on unit production.
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Honestly I've been discussing this with my buddies and I have been suggesting giving protoss a more defensive buff as well, such as giving protoss units constant 50% regeneration of shield when under allied pylon power, even when attacked.
This would help protosses when defending, especially in PvP.
There were other suggestions too like giving Nexus a shield battery like ability.
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I think a good way to solve the problem would be if Warp Gate warpins have a longer cooldown than Gateway. As it is right now, Gateways are totally redundant as soon as warpgate research is finished. If gateway has a shorter training time than warpgate, this will bring back the defenders advantage. e.g. if gateway has 33s training for a zealot whereas warpin has a 38s cooldown for zealot, the defender would tend to stick with gateways for longer and theoretically be able to have more units. This will also make it into an interesting choice as the protoss player will need to decide between Gateways and Warpgates more strategically, instead of immediately going warpgate every time
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Good analysis. Hopes this turns heads.
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On September 08 2011 20:23 CSN_Kaelaris wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 20:09 siri wrote: you are wrong about warp gate not being good at defending
the strength of warpgates is equally strong offensively and defensibly. Its even more noticeable at defending!
example: terran to do a timing push needs to have minerals at time X to start production. now lets say terran needs 30 seconds to build the army and the distance from his base to the target is 30 seconds.
That means a delay of 1 minutes the moment you collect minerals to the moment your army built from those minerals hit the target. While protoss only has the delay of 5 seconds.
Which also means that a 8minutes timing attack from terran is a 7minutes army against a 8minutes protoss army which if you take the account that your productions only really starts to kick in at about 4/5 minutes in to the game, early timings the protoss can have 1/3 more army than terran and still lose because to balance this gateway units need to be weaker compared to t1 units from other races.
conclusion: WP is the most BROKEN mechanic in the game (2º is forcefield) and still protoss is very vulnerable to all ins because how weaker gateway units need to be. Honestly I dream one day WP be only upgradable on a fleet beacon.
I assume you're not factoring in the fact that Warpgates have a cooldown? : /
I assume you dont understand how WG works, or maybe you dont play protoss. its ok I explain.
If you collect minerals at a given time and want to use those minerals to build a army, WP allows you to build a unit in just 5 seconds using those minerals. While a barracks you have a 25 seconds to build a marine.
this means that if you build a a wg and a barracks in 30 seconds you can have 2 stalkers with the wg while only 1 marine with barracks
WG allows you to have always 1 more cycle of production than your opponent wich is huge boom early game (like 4gate) but not so noticeable advantage late game
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On September 08 2011 20:32 fuzzy_panda wrote: I think a good way to solve the problem would be if Warp Gate warpins have a longer cooldown than Gateway. As it is right now, Gateways are totally redundant as soon as warpgate research is finished. If gateway has a shorter training time than warpgate, this will bring back the defenders advantage. e.g. if gateway has 33s training for a zealot whereas warpin has a 38s cooldown for zealot, the defender would tend to stick with gateways for longer and theoretically be able to have more units.
Gateways will never have the defensive advantage over warpgates as the unit from the warpgate is provided up front (before the cooldown) whereas the gateway 'builds' the unit first, then it pops out at the end.
Unless the build time for gateway units is so much shorter than the warp-in cooldown that you can get a second wave in you will always end up with more warp in units for any reasonable 'defenders advantage' timing.
In your example the warpages will provide units at 5 seconds and at 43 seconds, the gateway will provide units at 33 seconds and 66 seconds. I know which I would rather be defending with..
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Doesn't the new ramp change solve this issue?
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On September 08 2011 19:20 XenoX101 wrote: The solution is this, warpgate should be a tier 2-2.5 upgrade and decrease gateway unit build times to match warpgate times. It should not be the first thing you get with a cybernetics core, having such an advantage so quickly in the game is silly and the equivalent of zerg getting ovie speed + ventral sacs off of hatchery tech. If it cost 200/200 and didn't speed up unit build times I think it would be perfectly positioned for the mid-late game as a sensible upgrade rather than a game-breaking one.
Veeery good point, but I think it would require some kinda new tech structure as the templar tech doesnt quite fit imo. They could add something around 100/100 that provides the wg research ( 100/100 if not 50/50 maybe?) and something like a sentry energy upgrade (+25) or maybe enable shield batteries or w/e. Just brainstorming tho but I liked the basic idea of making it an abiity that opens up new possibilities, such as strong timing pushes early - midgame. But it should be still affordable along with other tech routes after the early midgame.
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I agree with this, warpgate is a pretty big design flaw.
Warpgate cool down should be based on the distance from the warpgate. The further you warp a unit from the warpgate the more cool down there is.
This solution will keep defenders advantage while making attacking warp-ins a riskier play.
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On September 08 2011 20:40 siri wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 20:23 CSN_Kaelaris wrote:On September 08 2011 20:09 siri wrote: you are wrong about warp gate not being good at defending
the strength of warpgates is equally strong offensively and defensibly. Its even more noticeable at defending!
example: terran to do a timing push needs to have minerals at time X to start production. now lets say terran needs 30 seconds to build the army and the distance from his base to the target is 30 seconds.
That means a delay of 1 minutes the moment you collect minerals to the moment your army built from those minerals hit the target. While protoss only has the delay of 5 seconds.
Which also means that a 8minutes timing attack from terran is a 7minutes army against a 8minutes protoss army which if you take the account that your productions only really starts to kick in at about 4/5 minutes in to the game, early timings the protoss can have 1/3 more army than terran and still lose because to balance this gateway units need to be weaker compared to t1 units from other races.
conclusion: WP is the most BROKEN mechanic in the game (2º is forcefield) and still protoss is very vulnerable to all ins because how weaker gateway units need to be. Honestly I dream one day WP be only upgradable on a fleet beacon.
I assume you're not factoring in the fact that Warpgates have a cooldown? : / I assume you dont understand how WG works, or maybe you dont play protoss. its ok I explain. If you collect minerals at a given time and want to use those minerals to build a army, WP allows you to build a unit in just 5 seconds using those minerals. While a barracks you have a 25 seconds to build a marine. this means that if you build a a wg and a barracks in 30 seconds you can have 2 stalkers with the wg while only 1 marine with barracks WG allows you to have always 1 more cycle of production than your opponent wich is huge boom early game (like 4gate) but not so noticeable advantage late game
I'm Masters Protoss on EU and NA, I know how Warp-in works thank you Generally I'm keeping on top of my macro and my Warp-in is on Cooldown, so yes, it has a Cooldown.
EDIT: Unless of course i'm trying to power, but that covers rather specific circumstances. Also your explanation requires timings to line up perfectly, and it rarely happens like that.
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On September 08 2011 20:32 fuzzy_panda wrote: I think a good way to solve the problem would be if Warp Gate warpins have a longer cooldown than Gateway. As it is right now, Gateways are totally redundant as soon as warpgate research is finished. If gateway has a shorter training time than warpgate, this will bring back the defenders advantage. e.g. if gateway has 33s training for a zealot whereas warpin has a 38s cooldown for zealot, the defender would tend to stick with gateways for longer and theoretically be able to have more units. This will also make it into an interesting choice as the protoss player will need to decide between Gateways and Warpgates more strategically, instead of immediately going warpgate every time
i think such a shorter build time wouldnt even make protoss players (like me) prefer gateway over gateways because u still have to consider the time the zealot/stalker/sentry has to run to the ramp/choke
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I REALLY like your idea of adding the shield battery I think that is the only defensive tool the gives defenders advantage in pvp and doesn't ruin any other match ups
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Increased warp-in time dependent upon distance from nearest nexus = Infamous 6 gate proxy nexus/"ninja" expo?
Shield batteries sound like what's up.
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Very old info. It's been widely known since beta that wg 'removes defender's advantage'. So why hasn't protoss been dominating? Is there some key that all protoss players have been missing in order to abuse this huge advantage?
Your main point of contention is that timing attacks are different, rather stronger for a protoss. This really isn't true. Any race can build a ton of units, get some upgrades, and then move out right at a certain point to hit an opponent. All races just have to move out before an important upgrade is done, and then atttack. The reinforcing units are usually negligible, since you are either all-in or have a reliable follow up that does not involve committing reinforcements. A timing attack is the first hit on the opponent, not the repeated hitting over and over from reinforcements. Warpgate doesn't make a timing push stronger, it just makes reinforcing a little easier.
+ Show Spoiler +On September 08 2011 20:09 siri wrote: you are wrong about warp gate not being good at defending
the strength of warpgates is equally strong offensively and defensibly. Its even more noticeable at defending!
example: terran to do a timing push needs to have minerals at time X to start production. now lets say terran needs 30 seconds to build the army and the distance from his base to the target is 30 seconds.
That means a delay of 1 minutes the moment you collect minerals to the moment your army built from those minerals hit the target. While protoss only has the delay of 5 seconds.
Which also means that a 8minutes timing attack from terran is a 7minutes army against a 8minutes protoss army which if you take the account that your productions only really starts to kick in at about 4/5 minutes in to the game, early timings the protoss can have 1/3 more army than terran and still lose because to balance this gateway units need to be weaker compared to t1 units from other races.
conclusion: WP is the most BROKEN mechanic in the game (2º is forcefield) and still protoss is very vulnerable to all ins because how weaker gateway units need to be. Honestly I dream one day WP be only upgradable on a fleet beacon.
This is the same for every race... If zerg moves out at 7:00 to attack a terran and takes 60 seconds to move about, it's a 7:00 zerg army attacking a 8:00 terran army.
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It would be hard to do balance-wise, but I think it would be awesome if gateways produced faster than warpgates. Then protoss have to choose between efficiency and distance, and that "morph back to gateway" button is no longer completely useless.
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On September 08 2011 20:45 Highways wrote: I agree with this, warpgate is a pretty big design flaw.
Warpgate cool down should be based on the distance from the warpgate. The further you warp a unit from the warpgate the more cool down there is.
This solution will keep defenders advantage while making attacking warp-ins a riskier play. i was basically thinking the same except i was thinking of making the cooldown time dependent on how far the warp-ins are from the starting nexus.... but i like your idea better. the only problem would be figuring out different cooldowns for different size maps.
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yes, yes, yes, maybe, yes, yes, SHIELD BATTERY...? that's how this article went for me
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Isn't this negated somehow seeing as how Protosses aren't winning majority of their matches with this broken mechanic?
I feel like the larva injects and add-ons play some part in this...
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United Kingdom12010 Posts
On September 08 2011 19:12 susySquark wrote: No specific idea. The one I put in the OP was that units should take longer to warp in if they're further from a gateway/nexus or something. That's the first thing that popped into my head anyways.
I actually really love this idea. It doesn't really change 4gate other than the player defending will be able to warp in units quicker to give him more of an advantage. That's a really cool idea actually.
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My opinion is to remove warpgate tech and buff gateway units accordingly. At best leave warpgate to work only with warpprism and that it costs energy to do so (warpprism would have energy).
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What if each Nexus would work as a shield battery, have a Pylon force field and Warp Gate units Spawned with 0 shield?
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Thats what I was talking about all these days: NO DEFENDER'S ADVANTAGE in RTS is complete nonsense. Glad to see someone managing to put this together in a nice way so that everyone understands (i hope David and Dustin will read it).
But shield battery is not a solution. Bring Lurkers and reavers back plz!
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On September 08 2011 20:56 mizU wrote: Isn't this negated somehow seeing as how Protosses aren't winning majority of their matches with this broken mechanic?
I feel like the larva injects and add-ons play some part in this...
Well some line of thinking is that Protoss are weak BECAUSE of the broken mechanic. They have to balance against this constantly. They can't buff gateway units too much because warp gate negates any defenders advantage so if you make them good then they become too strong offensively. Without this concern they can still be strong but because there's a defenders advantage they won't become to o strong offensively.
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don't think its broken :3. But maybe enable warpin if the energy fields are connected to a nexus only , would be quiet cool and you can still proxy with warp prism . (i like if you have to watch for 100 things)
And from playing all races i have the most problem with terran macro tbh. Addon mechanic and the cost for production facilities are a big factor when it comes to terran macro, also the space x3. At the end i think terran macro costs the most actions, while the other races have timings they have to stick too. And by the way i guess using normal gates is still cheaper then terran production. (even though you need 50% more)
So at the end nothing wrong with warpin it will never go away anyway, and whats wrong with forcing the opponent to go probe and pylon hunting early game. Just be happy that toss units can't jump into one pylon and appear at another one. (but it would be a funny reaperish unit for one of the expansions.)
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Starcraft 2 is designed so that each race is different on a fundamental level. It is one of the things that make the game interesting to play, however as long as they are different discussions such as this will always be possible. The meta-game is still swinging violently so that its difficult to see what the situation will be in the next month, never mind what the effect of balance changes will be.
The other thing is that your point is that P need a defensive buff, but P often turtle better than any other race and come out with a game ending deathball. This is in contradiction to the buff you want to implement.
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On September 08 2011 20:56 mizU wrote: Isn't this negated somehow seeing as how Protosses aren't winning majority of their matches with this broken mechanic? It's not just a balance issue, but a gameplay issue.
Current warpgate makes gameplay boring as well. Right now Protoss is forced into early timing attacks, because the longer the game goes on unless Protoss has a massive lead from early game they lose alot of the time.
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seems like alot of people are reading this wrong,hes not saying protoss is OP hes saying its UP if anything
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On September 08 2011 20:49 Comprissent wrote:Very old info. It's been widely known since beta that wg 'removes defender's advantage'. So why hasn't protoss been dominating? Is there some key that all protoss players have been missing in order to abuse this huge advantage? Your main point of contention is that timing attacks are different, rather stronger for a protoss. This really isn't true. Any race can build a ton of units, get some upgrades, and then move out right at a certain point to hit an opponent. All races just have to move out before an important upgrade is done, and then atttack. The reinforcing units are usually negligible, since you are either all-in or have a reliable follow up that does not involve committing reinforcements. A timing attack is the first hit on the opponent, not the repeated hitting over and over from reinforcements. Warpgate doesn't make a timing push stronger, it just makes reinforcing a little easier. + Show Spoiler +On September 08 2011 20:09 siri wrote: you are wrong about warp gate not being good at defending
the strength of warpgates is equally strong offensively and defensibly. Its even more noticeable at defending!
example: terran to do a timing push needs to have minerals at time X to start production. now lets say terran needs 30 seconds to build the army and the distance from his base to the target is 30 seconds.
That means a delay of 1 minutes the moment you collect minerals to the moment your army built from those minerals hit the target. While protoss only has the delay of 5 seconds.
Which also means that a 8minutes timing attack from terran is a 7minutes army against a 8minutes protoss army which if you take the account that your productions only really starts to kick in at about 4/5 minutes in to the game, early timings the protoss can have 1/3 more army than terran and still lose because to balance this gateway units need to be weaker compared to t1 units from other races.
conclusion: WP is the most BROKEN mechanic in the game (2º is forcefield) and still protoss is very vulnerable to all ins because how weaker gateway units need to be. Honestly I dream one day WP be only upgradable on a fleet beacon.
This is the same for every race... If zerg moves out at 7:00 to attack a terran and takes 60 seconds to move about, it's a 7:00 zerg army attacking a 8:00 terran army.
notice how the OP talks about defensive structures for T and Z that is streamlined with unit production buildings (Barracks and Spawning pool respectively). That's why the OP talks mainly about the "defender's advantage" situation in PvP since Protoss's defensive structure, the cannon, requires a different techtree at the start of the game.
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On September 08 2011 20:09 siri wrote: you are wrong about warp gate not being good at defending
the strength of warpgates is equally strong offensively and defensibly. Its even more noticeable at defending!
example: terran to do a timing push needs to have minerals at time X to start production. now lets say terran needs 30 seconds to build the army and the distance from his base to the target is 30 seconds.
That means a delay of 1 minutes the moment you collect minerals to the moment your army built from those minerals hit the target. While protoss only has the delay of 5 seconds.
Which also means that a 8minutes timing attack from terran is a 7minutes army against a 8minutes protoss army which if you take the account that your productions only really starts to kick in at about 4/5 minutes in to the game, early timings the protoss can have 1/3 more army than terran and still lose because to balance this gateway units need to be weaker compared to t1 units from other races.
conclusion: WP is the most BROKEN mechanic in the game (2º is forcefield) and still protoss is very vulnerable to all ins because how weaker gateway units need to be. Honestly I dream one day WP be only upgradable on a fleet beacon.
You are totally missing the OP's point.
Warpgates are front-loaded in terms of cooldown (or build time), so in theory there could be one additional cycle of units before the push as compared to the same build with gateways (if one assumed the same build-time as WG cooldown).
Your 5 second example is not going to work when your warpgate cooldown is still active (you won't be able to warp in any units). Also your 8min army vs 7min army does not take into account Protoss met-game which has meant that, since WG allows for shorter cooldown as compared to gateway build time, protoss generally rush to WG and don't build out of gateways much and line up their gateway production to matchup with WG research time. Therefore a Protoss army pre-WG is usually very small.
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In theory yes, it is broken due to the reinforcement travel time. But this is a factor that makes protoss what it is and makes it unique as a race, gives it unlimited pushing potential and creates interesting play.
Broken, not broken, it doesnt matter. The warp in mechanic is a beautiful creation unique not only to protoss but any other RTS ever made, and i love it
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I think there should be a warp range, then you had to build proxy gates to do 4 gate, it would "buff" warp prism a lot if it could warp everywhere, and not being a flying pylon costing two times it, being more fragile and more expensive
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I think reducing the "build" time of the units the gateway pushes out with the amount of time it takes to warp in using the warpgates.
Assuming zealots normally take 40 seconds to train. And that converting from warpgate takes 5 seconds to finish then if you are on gateway mode, it should take 5 seconds less to train each unit every cycle and back to +5 seconds for warping in battle.
It ends up giving gateway mode a defensive advantage and warpgate an offensive advantage at least.
This might be a bit tricky though when it comes to the issue of cooldown wherein you train units out, to defend and convert to warpgate and warpin units immediately using a proxy pylon or warp prism to counter attack while defending the enemy's push.
I also never got to play beta so I don't know how the teleportation of the cannons worked backed then. It was interesting though as it removed the 'static' limitation of the cannons as defense.
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On September 08 2011 21:21 BuddhaMonk wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 20:09 siri wrote: you are wrong about warp gate not being good at defending
the strength of warpgates is equally strong offensively and defensibly. Its even more noticeable at defending!
example: terran to do a timing push needs to have minerals at time X to start production. now lets say terran needs 30 seconds to build the army and the distance from his base to the target is 30 seconds.
That means a delay of 1 minutes the moment you collect minerals to the moment your army built from those minerals hit the target. While protoss only has the delay of 5 seconds.
Which also means that a 8minutes timing attack from terran is a 7minutes army against a 8minutes protoss army which if you take the account that your productions only really starts to kick in at about 4/5 minutes in to the game, early timings the protoss can have 1/3 more army than terran and still lose because to balance this gateway units need to be weaker compared to t1 units from other races.
conclusion: WP is the most BROKEN mechanic in the game (2º is forcefield) and still protoss is very vulnerable to all ins because how weaker gateway units need to be. Honestly I dream one day WP be only upgradable on a fleet beacon.
You are totally missing the OP's point. Warpgates are front-loaded in terms of cooldown (or build time), so in theory there could be one additional cycle of units before the push as compared to the same build with gateways (if one assumed the same build-time as WG cooldown). Your 5 second example is not going to work when your warpgate cooldown is still active (you won't be able to warp in any units). Also your 8min army vs 7min army does not take into account Protoss met-game which has meant that, since WG allows for shorter cooldown as compared to gateway build time, protoss generally rush to WG and don't build out of gateways much and line up their gateway production to matchup with WG research time. Therefore a Protoss army pre-WG is usually very small.
oh you gotta remember warpgate production is not even near to broken, its a 140 research that we "mule" it a lot, it should have any advantage, didn't it?
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If you made units faster without warpgates........ Then it would help balance them, but I think this has only been mentioned like 155,785,334 times in the History of Sc2.
Edit: One hundred and fifty five million seven hundred and eighty five thousand three hundred thirty four times.
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On September 08 2011 21:11 deathly rat wrote: Starcraft 2 is designed so that each race is different on a fundamental level. It is one of the things that make the game interesting to play, however as long as they are different discussions such as this will always be possible. The meta-game is still swinging violently so that its difficult to see what the situation will be in the next month, never mind what the effect of balance changes will be.
The other thing is that your point is that P need a defensive buff, but P often turtle better than any other race and come out with a game ending deathball. This is in contradiction to the buff you want to implement.
Also, Protoss early game circle around either you go for early timing (all-in) or you macro. Terran and Zerg have a stronger early game without being all-in (at least in my opinion) wich leads to if you decide to play a macro game as Protoss you are stuck being defensive and with little map control... Most Protoss learn to either camp untill they have a clear timing, or go for an early attack... All this leads up to most protoss play their games defensive until they have an army worthy moving out on the map with... If you play most of your games defensive, you will get good at defending.
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good read.... i liked it.... would have to be tested and might be to much of a change to even happen might change the game so much...
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On September 08 2011 21:26 VPVash wrote: you all play toss i see
Actually I play random predominantly. It's quite noticeable in this thread that people are having proper discussions with formulated opinions and in a nice manner. Don't come in here and taint actual well constructed banter with your narrow-minded one liners.
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Interesting read, however i dont quite get what is the point of this article. Do you just want shield battery to be introduced in expansion or you claim that protoss is underpowered? Forcefields are such a good defensive tool that i cant see a reason to buff warpgate units.
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United Kingdom14464 Posts
I agree with a lot of what you said, and yes a Gateway tech defensive building would be cool. However, you often just state absolutes and expect them not to be doubted. I disagree with the whole bit about gateway units, just categorically stating units to be bad seems silly.
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On September 08 2011 21:39 syriuszonito wrote: Interesting read, however i dont quite get what is the point of this article. Do you just want shield battery to be introduced in expansion or you claim that protoss is underpowered? Forcefields are such a good defensive tool that i cant see a reason to buff warpgate units.
Protoss would make more Motherships if we had shield battery. Archons would be stronger as well. And FF is pretty easy to deal with in the midgame for both Terran and Protoss. I don't think his post was particularly one-sided; but analytical, then he purposed an idea and a small change. Pretty Good Op, though I don't agree to all his conclusions.
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I've been talking about how warp gate is broken, and terrible mechanic for a while now. The point of warpgate was originally to be specifically defensive, yet be able to quickly be on the offensive as well.
I've also repeatedly explained to people I would fix the current warp gate problems:
Increase the amount of time it takes to WARP in a Warpgate - changing from gate -> WG.
From there, you decrease the amount of time each unit takes to make from regular gates (Excluding zealots, for obvious reasons - Stalker timings are already the same regardless - if a zerg is not greedy they will have a spine crawler in time.) Therefore, like terran, protoss can resume unit production in a qued status, the only race which cannot do this to any extent with regular t1-1.5 units is protoss. This would also then allow WG to be used more strategically as when you want to be offensive, you then switch over to WG and use a proxy pylon instead if this always being the case like it is now - it's too free formed.
This solution of decreasing unit build time in regular gateways also promotes better multi tasking for protoss players as they can macro/micro at the same time without always having to look at their base, which in my opinion is a major flaw of the race. Arguably the same for zerg, however hatchery do have regular larvae regen, so at least they don't have to do this as seriously.
It also allows for a defensive protoss player to crank units out of regular gateways, while the other protoss warpgate rushing can still pressure, but in total misses one round of units because of the gate->WG conversion and therefore it balances out incredibly heavy aggression.
And finally, it allows for protoss to have more utility. There are too many builds as protoss where if you, like zerg, do something slightly wrong(against 1-1-1 for example) you just simply lose(I'm not saying it's imba, I'm saying it's hard to defend, there is a difference.)
This has always been my solution to Warpgate and I don't see in any way how it wouldn't improve protoss mechanics. It makes the race require more constant production rather than always relying on some sort of aggression, and also allows for a (in my eyes) good fix to PvP dynamics even disregarding the latest patch notes.
Yes, I know there are other timings that reducing the normal gateway timings would then present, however, it encourages a longer game to get to this point - and more time for other builds to come into play instead of everything being purely aggressive like how this game is built right now, which is what separates BW and SC2 in my eyes. There needs to be certain timings still in the game for aggression, but at the same time it can't all revolve around it. There needs to be skill boundaries between players rather than it sometimes being build boundaries.
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Wait, so you make an inflammatory thread title about warpgate, poorly analyze the concept of defender's advantage, ignore the defensive aspects of warpgate (warp in to defend far away locations like a 4th), ignore the defensive aspects of cannons because they require an 150 forge investment, ignore the advantage of sentries (which are designed to close off those open spaces you say are a problem and are more useful in the mid and endgame than early game), and then draw the same conclusion your inflammatory title stated. Way to go. Rally distance is not the only incarnation of defenders advantage.
Oh and you got the definition of a timing push wrong. It's not " Usually sacrificing economy for a stronger army at a certain point in time" it's "timing your push to line up right when an advantage swings in your favor, like a +1 or Stim".
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in my opinion if they make warp gate have a significantly longer cool time you'd get defender's advantage back and would let you get away with buffing protoss units a bit to deal with other kinds of attacks protoss has :p
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On September 08 2011 21:39 syriuszonito wrote: Interesting read, however i dont quite get what is the point of this article. Do you just want shield battery to be introduced in expansion or you claim that protoss is underpowered? Forcefields are such a good defensive tool that i cant see a reason to buff warpgate units.
In terms of units? I would already prove that Protoss gateway units are underpowered without micro.
But the interesting article does provide a point into probably why Protoss units are so bad (and it's just to balance warp in mechanics)
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On September 08 2011 19:24 BearStorm wrote: The shield battery could actually revolutionize PvP. Did Blizzard ever comment on why it never made it into SC2? If not It was probably removed because they were rarely used, but PvP could probably have FE builds if the shield battery was in the game. This. I think Protoss needs this. A shield battery that costs only minerals and is powered by nexus energy.
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I have known this major flaw in protoss design since the end of beta where I really started playing Protoss and Zerg off and on.
It is sad for the protoss players around us. The truly mechanical players get punished for the race while the weak players ride on the strengths of timing pushes. I've always imagined Protoss as a broken race, not balance wise but design wise. And it breaks my heart that they can't do multi pronged attacks or small pokes at an enemy without getting swamped. The biggest appearance of the design flaw is PvP, where it still hasn't breached past the one base phase.
I thank you for this post. And as a Master zerg player I can see that I fully agree with it. Protoss just can't be balanced well if offense and defence is so much intwined. Because nerfing one will nerf the other and vice versa. It is sad, but I truly hope that Blizzard revamps the warp gate mechanic with gateways. And give warp gates a trade off when compared to gateways. I don't think this is feasable in a patch however, only in HotS could such an enormous feat be implemented since the metagame then will be slightly in shambles allowing protoss to relearn timings more easily.
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I would say that it does seem a bit imba early game for the proxy pylon. Maybe it should be an upgrade on the cycore or twilight council to warp in on pylons, and have them standard warp in around gates, but then that would just mean protoss can make an offensive proxy pylon+gate instead. I like the idea of a defensive structure after a gateway for protoss, but then what is stopping that getting abused and used as an offensive structure in their timing pushes? The issues are basically the way the protoss mechanics are done. I am sure if there was a different field around a nexus where only defensive structures can be placed might be ok. However if they were to introduce these, then cannons should have a small shield or damage nerf as any drops or runbys would be much weaker as a result of a new protoss defensive structure.
The majority of the community would argue that sentries provide that early game defence, because you cant just put spines everywhere, nor can you put bunkers everywhere, not all bunkers or spines would be in range of the protoss army, depending on where they are attacking from. So the idea of FF is to split the aggressive army in half, while your superior army kills off the trapped units, the rest of the offensive army will have to walk around the FF or wait.
But in the end, anything new you give to protoss to help in defence is definatly going to be used to boost their offensive abilities.
I dont know why protoss are seen as weak right now, I know the results of tournies seem to suggest they are weak and terran is imba or whatever, but I still get rolled by protoss on ladder half the time. If they make changes to help high level protoss then they have to be certain that those changes are not going to make lower level protoss way more imba, as this will put terran and zerg players off the game if they are losing all the time at lower levels to P
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I like the analysis. I always felt like either warpgate or forcefield (or a combination of the 2) were the reason that stalkers felt relatively weak until you get a huge mass of them. I'm not sure what the 'solution' is (assuming it's something that requires solving) for HotS.
From a personal standpoint, I'd prefer reaver over colossus, as it seems like it would be so much better defensively. Adding in the shield battery is an interesting solution, and could potentially make for very interesting plays. I think they may be concerned about immortal or blink stalker + battery combination, but as quickly as shields come back (relative to bw), it may not be that huge a concern.
Another possible approach would be to have protoss units warp in without shields...though my brain hurts thinking of all the possible alterations that could make both offensively and defensively, heh.
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On September 08 2011 21:33 CSN_Kaelaris wrote:Actually I play random predominantly. It's quite noticeable in this thread that people are having proper discussions with formulated opinions and in a nice manner. Don't come in here and taint actual well constructed banter with your narrow-minded one liners. I don't know what protoss players are complaining about. go watch huk and mc then you win ez pz
User was banned for this post.
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I find it kinda funny, that all of you are saying "warpgate is imba", but if you look at the current winrates of all races Terran is the most "overpowered" race in and outside of Korea... Protoss has the least wins of all 3 races!
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On September 08 2011 19:13 RodYan wrote: The solution is: -Make Gateways start with warpgate -Gateways now have a warp in radius for the early game. Pylons cannot be used to warp in at this point. -Proxy pylon warp-in is a mid or late game upgrade
one very big problem with this is when toss is late game 3+ bases and he has gate spread out we cant go back and find all our gates and warp them there, if we did that we would lose micro war sicne we are wasting so much time find our gates location ...
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On September 08 2011 19:24 Peleus wrote: Be pretty cool if warpin time was dependant on the distance from the nearest nexus. Would allow a clearer defenders advantage in both PvP and other matchups at home (let's say very short ~0.5 - 1 second warp in) while at a longer distance (capped at a certain amount so maps don't effect it as much) ~7/8 seconds at the extreme.
Times could be played with for balance, but the main idea (gaining a defenders advantage) is achieved, while the unique race trait of protoss is maintained as they could still warp in anywhere on the map (and still pool up significant forces).
P.s. I'm just suggesting that warpin times are extended; cool downs will remain the same for the same net production capability.
That would create pretty cool dynamics in blink stalker based PvP with spread out expansions xD Expanding towards your opponent to create more aggression would be a hilarious change!
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Shield batteries would make PvP much better if they were strong enough. I seriously think they should add shield batteries in HotS. They should be quite cheap - 75 - 200 minerals.
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I've thought for a long time that the solution would be to make protoss units cost more when warped in remotely.
Have the warpgate upgrade immediately affect both the standard gateway and its morphed form.
When in "gateway" mode, units spawn instantly at the building, which then goes on cd. Analogous to warping units into your base. When in "warpgate" mode, units cost 25% more, but can be warped in wherever you have power.
Easy. Different costs for each mode allows the designer/balance team to separate the inherent advantage of forward reinforcement from the actual power of the units themselves. You make protoss units cheaper at the gateway, improving P's defensive efficacy, but to go on the attack P has to take the cost-efficiency hit - a hit which Protoss is currently wearing regardless of whether they plan to abuse it or not.
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It's not just the defender's advantage. As other people have pointed out, Protoss warp-in times are very fast.
As an example, that means that while a Terran with three raxes with add-ons (say two techlabs and a reactor) making two maurauders and 2 marines has 300 minerals and 50 gas invested but not included in the army's actual present value. Meanwhile the Protoss knocking on the front door has all their spent money immediately in the army.
A 4-gate versus a 3-rax (or even two hatch roach/ling) both spend all the income off one base, but Protoss has an army that is ~350 resources larger at all times.
That's the main reason Protoss units can't be allowed to trade very evenly in the early game or they will be horribly overpowered. That's why roach/ling has to be better than gateway armies, and why Terrans get mules and the excellent marine/maurauder composition.
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This is a nice and pretty well thought-out article. I agree with your basic point that toss by design lacks the strong defender's advantage enjoyed by the other two races, and I'd love to see your suggestion implemented in HotS of the shield battery returning as a post-GW (or cybercore) option. It would need to have a fairly long build time, though, because a 4-gate backed up by an in-base shield battery or two would be ridiculous.
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On September 08 2011 22:01 NuclearStar wrote: I dont know why protoss are seen as weak right now, I know the results of tournies seem to suggest they are weak and terran is imba or whatever, but I still get rolled by protoss on ladder half the time. If they make changes to help high level protoss then they have to be certain that those changes are not going to make lower level protoss way more imba, as this will put terran and zerg players off the game if they are losing all the time at lower levels to P
1. You get rolled by Protosses not because they are Protoss but because they are better players than you. When you get rolled, it's not imba, it's skill difference.
2. Game is balanced for the level of play that you see in GSL and other highly regarded tournaments, not for the platinum players.
3. As the meta game is right now similar skilled level PvZ/T matches tend to favor the Z & T. If P is rolling every other race in bronze league and is getting rolled by other races in GM league it points to that perhaps that P mechanics are easier to use, not that P has more powerful units or strats.
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On September 08 2011 22:18 Belisarius wrote: I've thought for a long time that the solution would be to make protoss units cost more when warped in remotely.
Have the warpgate upgrade immediately affect both the standard gateway and its morphed form.
When in "gateway" mode, units spawn instantly at the building, which then goes on CD. Analogous to warping units into your base. When in "warpgate" mode, units cost 25% more, but can be warped in wherever you have power.
Easy. You can make protoss units cheaper at the gateway, improving your defensive efficacy, but to go on the attack you have to take the cost-efficiency hit.
The problem with this is that that will kill protoss. Right now protoss rely on that extra wave of units that we get from the warpgate to kill Terran timing pushes (either MM or Hellion marine) or zerg rushes (7RR) where I know I have lost games because of a delayed warp gate research (I was trying a zealot heavy 2 gate before cyber core against zerg for a while) being able to get those 3 units extra is vital and if the warped units cost 25% more it will be impossible to defend those pushes.
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On September 08 2011 21:55 Milkis wrote: in my opinion if they make warp gate have a significantly longer cool time you'd get defender's advantage back and would let you get away with buffing protoss units a bit to deal with other kinds of attacks protoss has :p
How is that suppose to work out exactly? whetever you have 4 stalkers, or one stalker as strong as 4 that takes 4 times as long to build, it doesn't matter. The fact is that you can still warpin everywhere, and if protoss had defenders advantage, timing attacks would be too strong =|
I rather like the idea of units either costing more, or take longer to warp in, depending on the distance you warp in from the warpgate.
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On September 08 2011 22:23 NoobieOne wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 22:18 Belisarius wrote: I've thought for a long time that the solution would be to make protoss units cost more when warped in remotely.
Have the warpgate upgrade immediately affect both the standard gateway and its morphed form.
When in "gateway" mode, units spawn instantly at the building, which then goes on CD. Analogous to warping units into your base. When in "warpgate" mode, units cost 25% more, but can be warped in wherever you have power.
Easy. You can make protoss units cheaper at the gateway, improving your defensive efficacy, but to go on the attack you have to take the cost-efficiency hit. The problem with this is that that will kill protoss. Right now protoss rely on that extra wave of units that we get from the warpgate to kill Terran timing pushes (either MM or Hellion marine) or zerg rushes (7RR) where I know I have lost games because of a delayed warp gate research (I was trying a zealot heavy 2 gate before cyber core against zerg for a while) being able to get those 3 units extra is vital and if the warped units cost 25% more it will be impossible to defend those pushes.
No that's my point. I'm toss by the way, I know how important that wave is. That's why I said warpgate should upgrade both gateway mode and its warp in mode.
I'd have the standard gateway train time mode disappear (because it's useless once you have wg), replaced with a mode where the units spawn instantly as with warpgate but do so at the gateway, as if they'd been trained. So you still get the extra round of units when WG comes online.
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On September 08 2011 22:25 Excludos wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 21:55 Milkis wrote: in my opinion if they make warp gate have a significantly longer cool time you'd get defender's advantage back and would let you get away with buffing protoss units a bit to deal with other kinds of attacks protoss has :p How is that suppose to work out exactly? whetever you have 4 stalkers, or one stalker as strong as 4 that takes 4 times as long to build, it doesn't matter. The fact is that you can still warpin everywhere, and if protoss had defenders advantage, timing attacks would be too strong =| I rather like the idea of units either costing more, or take longer to warp in, depending on the distance you warp in from the warpgate.
The defender wouldn't use warpgates, so they can reinforce faster (in PvP), so early aggression plays are discouraged a bit. You can then buff gateway units on top of that to make them more workable against pushes like 1/1/1
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I think a shield battery would be great.
But, the great idea of making gateways have slightly less cooldown than warpgates would be a good fix too. Defenders advantage, and more strategic variety in all matchups.
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I honestly wish they would remove warp gates all together and give Toss something else in return. I believe Protoss is balanced right now, but in a really terrible way.
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They should move it into other tier and they should NOT balance the game around it, there should be advantages of using both warp in and rally point. Basically I think it shouldn't be so important mechanic in the whole game.
For example I play zerg and I do drop. I can do this drop, but I don't have to. I might be completely fine without the drop, but I can do it. Can you imagine not doing warp gate upgrade as a toss? Warp in upgrade is more important, but you get my point. Do you remember last patch? They already tried to do something about it, but it ended up with sentry build time being reduced by 5 seconds.
I'm offracing with protoss as I started with it, but protoss gateway units always melt when rines marauder fire at them and I always felt that you can do something with zerg when metagames unfavored zerg, now it's protoss having hard time, but there are not many options visible for me, maybe that's why I play zerg (cus I see more options, not cus it's stronger t.T)
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On September 08 2011 22:14 BottleSafti wrote: I find it kinda funny, that all of you are saying "warpgate is imba", but if you look at the current winrates of all races Terran is the most "overpowered" race in and outside of Korea... Protoss has the least wins of all 3 races!
No one is saying it is imba. You obviously haven't read the OP or any of the other part of this thread. Anyways, this has bothered me since I first became aware of starcraft. I always though it was weird to completely remove defender's advantage. I think the best solution would to make WG higher in the tech tree with faster gateway build times. I also lover the idea of the shield battery in the nexus.
What sucks is that I doubt Blizzard would never even think of changing something that is so integrated into the game. I wish they had the guts and time to actually rethink some things entirely and just see what happens in the hands of the pros.
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I've talked about warpgates as a broken mechanic months ago. Protoss is the gimmick race that relies on their wg's. Thus, I agree with this article
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Nice insightful write up, looks like protoss may be innately flawed due to this mechanic, I don't really see an easy solution to this, no way are they going to reduce the range of warpins, they are just synonymous w SC2 protoss
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Yeah I agree that it's a decent read. I really struggle late game vs Protoss players that go templar tech and 20 warp gates. M&M simply don't kill chargelots I don't care what anyone says. It's so frustrating when we fight in the middle, go even, however he warps in 20 chargelots and I have to wait 15 seconds for my units to walk. Plus another thing is that when you warp it you can pick the positioning.
It's 250 food vs 200 food armies. Zerg with instant tech switch and possible 50+larva just sitting around on 3 hatch...
Terran can't reproduce at the levels of these other races. They just die if the bulk of the army is dead. I can't wait for HotS to see how Terran is "complete". It better involve a tech-reactor upgrade.
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I've always thought that Pylons should have a cooldown on warp ins so you restrict the number of units that can be warped in on a single pylon. Make it 1 or 2 gates worth per pylon or something. This would at least force Protoss to build more pylons, and protect them, and killing the probe / pylons would be even more important.
Also give the Nexus a reasonable warp in radius to compensate. And have a Warp Prism able to warp in 4 gates worth of units.
If Protoss is too weak then because of this, which it would be, then buff the gateway units to compensate.
I strongly dislike the idea of having the rally points in the first place. I don't even like that Warp Gate is researchable at all. I reckon a complete overhaul is required, including making warp gates warp by default. Pylon management could become a much greater aspect of the race with respect to warp ins, bringing the Nexus and Warp Prism into greater prominence. You could even chrono the pylons to make the warp in cooldown quicker.
Combined this would completely change early offensive protoss gateway 'all ins' by forcing some more investment by the Protoss player. It would restore defender's advantage, which i really think this game lacks. It would promote the Warp Prism. It would make Gateway units feel less foddery, less gimmicky, and basically more legit units like i feel the other races early units are.
I reckons Blizzard have to be ballsy on this warp in issue, because i can't convince myself that it isn't having a major affect on the game. Gateway units just feel wrong to me and i blame it on the current Warp Gate mechanics.
Haven't really thought the shield battery thing through, except perhaps to put it on the Warp Prism when its in warp mode or something. Portable shield charge etc.
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Warp gate has always seemed like one of Dustin's many "totally cool ideas" that suggest a lack of understanding of basic RTS design mechanics but by the time beta rolled around the game was more or less feature complete. It doesn't ruin the game for me but it's something I'll probably never like in its current form.
I'd love a complete redesign where it stops just being something Protoss get 3 minutes into the game. Maybe get rid of chronoboost and make warp gate use nexus energy and otherwise focus on gate production, so it's more of an oh shit or army supplementation tool rather than the derp thing it is right now. Retune gateways and research times as necessary. I honestly think that would make the game better. Not that it will ever happen
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I thought we were all over the ¨I want to design the game¨ phase.
It seems not. Warpgate didn´t break protoss, just a few months ago Protoss were doign well, it may have been the WG nerf or the Metagame changing but can we stop blaming game design just because a race is having a hard time atm?
Every single time that a race is having a hard time, everybody claims that it was badly designed, broken, that it needs to be redesigned(and all the redesigns are just hey lets copy paste BW!).
Even with no warpgates Zealots and Dragoons would be ¨bad¨ in SC2, due to the new units the other races have, the improved controls. Warpgate is a really interesting and Novel concept, yeah its different but I have always been on the side of developers trying new things instead of being hindered by tradition.
Its not like its unreasonable that the game would feel imbalanced, the best testing is the playtesting. I am sure that for the expansions new units and abilities will be added to fill the holes in each races arsenal(like what happened from SC1 to BW).
Hey, but I guess its easier to say the game is broken and scream bad design everytime a race is in trouble. Although, with the new engine and units I can see how the Shield battery would be better in SC2 than it ever was in BW.
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A poll would be nice, one to see whether or not it's a good idea, and a second to see the races voting in the poll and see if there's a correlation (non protoss players voting against a chance for example)
I for one think a change in the way photon cannons are teched too would be nice, I like the idea of them not requiring a forge but being much more expensive, preventing a surge in cannon related cheese.
On September 08 2011 22:23 BeyondCtrL wrote:
2. Game is balanced for the level of play that you see in GSL and other highly regarded tournaments, not for the platinum players.
I think the reaper nerf proves that that's a load of nonsense.
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Edit: nevermind. Kind of not pertinent to the discussion.
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On September 08 2011 22:50 Nizzy wrote:Yeah I agree that it's a decent read. I really struggle late game vs Protoss players that go templar tech and 20 warp gates. M&M simply don't kill chargelots I don't care what anyone says. It's so frustrating when we fight in the middle, go even, however he warps in 20 chargelots and I have to wait 15 seconds for my units to walk. Plus another thing is that when you warp it you can pick the positioning. It's 250 food vs 200 food armies. Zerg with instant tech switch and possible 50+larva just sitting around on 3 hatch... Terran can't reproduce at the levels of these other races. They just die if the bulk of the army is dead. I can't wait for HotS to see how Terran is "complete". It better involve a tech-reactor upgrade. Late game.. you should have ghosts.. in which case the protoss is gonna melt in 2 seconds, reinforcements or not. :S
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The solution is simple. Remove the weaksauce, cost inefficient stalker (atleast till you get blink but even after that its only due to mobility) , and bring back the dragoon. Remove warpgates as well if you want.
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On September 08 2011 22:53 windsupernova wrote: I thought we were all over the ¨I want to design the game¨ phase.
It seems not. Warpgate didn´t break protoss, just a few months ago Protoss were doign well, it may have been the WG nerf or the Metagame changing but can we stop blaming game design just because a race is having a hard time atm?
Every single time that a race is having a hard time, everybody claims that it was badly designed, broken, that it needs to be redesigned(and all the redesigns are just hey lets copy paste BW!).
Even with no warpgates Zealots and Dragoons would be ¨bad¨ in SC2, due to the new units the other races have, the improved controls. Warpgate is a really interesting and Novel concept, yeah its different but I have always been on the side of developers trying new things instead of being hindered by tradition.
Its not like its unreasonable that the game would feel imbalanced, the best testing is the playtesting. I am sure that for the expansions new units and abilities will be added to fill the holes in each races arsenal(like what happened from SC1 to BW).
Hey, but I guess its easier to say the game is broken and scream bad design everytime a race is in trouble. Although, with the new engine and units I can see how the Shield battery would be better in SC2 than it ever was in BW. Thank you for some common sense in the discussion
Totally agree with you. Weekend designers are the best.
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Im amazed by how many people in this thread auctually think this is about Protoss Warpins being OP.
i see so many nerf protoss comments, that im thinking not many people read the OP or even thought about it.
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On September 08 2011 22:52 Goibon wrote: I've always thought that Pylons should have a cooldown on warp ins so you restrict the number of units that can be warped in on a single pylon.
The only problem I can see with that is that it's basting a game already containing way too many variables for a player to handle with even more variables. It'd be the end of all Protoss non-air early aggression too, which at the moment is where most Protoss wins seem to be coming from.
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On September 08 2011 19:23 Immaterial wrote: Saying that warpgate "broke" protoss is a bit sensationalist but your post makes some good points. Warpgate is conceptually really cool but in practice creates a lot of problems.
Agreed with OP and this post. I was expecting flame and imbalance ranting but this is actually very well thought-out.
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I was about to say, "Bolded, enumerated points and three pictures do not an in-depth analysis make." But that was actually a very interesting illustration of the design obstacles that Protoss face, and why they're problematic.
I dunno 'bout that shield battery, though.
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What an absurd OP. You basically under rate sentries and claim toss can't defend. T and z would flat out die without bunkers/spines, whereas toss have the single best defensive unit in the game. How about slicing up an army to your liking as a defenders advantage?
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I dont believe the Shield battery would help. I think it might even be worst. Consider a PvP, 1 person is going 4 gate and the other person going 3 gate blink stalker. Obviously, the 3 gater will use the shield battery and ramp to defend. But, the 4 gater will attack and put a offensive pylon and with this offensive pylon, he can also put a shield battery down as well. Since both player has shield battery, this will pretty much negates the point of having a shield battery in the first place.
Obviously, the shield battery does provide a way a strategic control of a certain area too but once again, it come down to the ramp. So I dont believe it would change much honestly.
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seeing people after 1 year writing about it BROKE a race makes me feel this whole good read is absolute moved in trollmode
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On September 08 2011 23:13 f0rzaa wrote: What an absurd OP. You basically under rate sentries and claim toss can't defend. T and z would flat out die without bunkers/spines, whereas toss have the single best defensive unit in the game. How about slicing up an army to your liking as a defenders advantage?
You clearly didnt read the whole OP before responding.
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You forget that the main reason for doing a timing attack is an important tech or tech unit, both of which you can't get via WarpGate.
So everything's fine as long as you can't warp in Colossus or VoidRays. The timing where your OP seems to be true is between 6:00 and 7:00 -> not that huge
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here is what i always wonder about: Protoss saves up and spends a TON of chrono boost for warpgate. Your problem seemed to be that you miss that extra wave of units that you get when WG finishes for crucial timings. But what if you would spend your whole chrono boosts on chronoing out units instead of WG research? Wouldn't you have more units out than your opponent has until his WG research is finished, so you could clear the area around your base from warpin pylons? You can still get WG research in the long run, you just don't have to rush it that hard i think (at least if you want to be on the defending side)
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Awesome article You really understand the game and have a good knowlege of meta-game Also I like ur conclusion =) Still toss are OP
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Make it so the further away you are from a Nexus you control, the longer it takes to warp in. Just my $0.02.
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On September 08 2011 23:18 RealQ wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 23:13 f0rzaa wrote: What an absurd OP. You basically under rate sentries and claim toss can't defend. T and z would flat out die without bunkers/spines, whereas toss have the single best defensive unit in the game. How about slicing up an army to your liking as a defenders advantage? You clearly didnt read the whole OP before responding. I did read the whole OP and all his/her suggestions are absurd, it wouldn't be a slight buff, it would be just dumb how much of a gain something like his suggestion of a shield battery or whatever would be. While his "analysis" is great, fine, detailed w/e his suggestions aren't even close.
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Man, protoss defense is crazy good.
You dont need to spend a dime in it, and the moment you see the ling runby you just warp 6 zealots in the probe line. If there is no runby, you warp them with the attack.
A drop? spawn 2 stalkers to kill the medvac and 4 zealots to kill the units.
Got the money? just warp some cannons at each expo, which are the best static defense in the game. Detection, anti ground and antiair all in one.
If that is not enough, well, either your army should have been there to fight or making an equivalent damage to the opponent.
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Well stated and interesting food for thought. I've always thought that the balance of the relative strengths of Gateway vs Stargate/Robo units was very strange. But you're right on the assumption of short rallies, which is why 4gate is scary.
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I don't like any of your options both of those will broke the game complety. I think now its balanced if they add battery well expect some warp prism+proxy battery into infinity shield 3gate robo builds lulz.
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I have to agree with you, however i don't know how to easily fix this. One thing that used to be in the game was that protoss units during warp-in take extra damage, a mechanic that i really rather liked, however at this point now, even if it was reimplemented alongside with a gateway unit buff, it probably wouldnt work out.
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I don't know why everyone is so damn sure that Blizzard won't make any big changes in HotS. Just see what happened to Warcraft III with the expansion. They almost remade the entire game ffs. Judging from that, I would say that Blizzard can change almost anything in HotS, as long as they feel it would make the game better.
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On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something?
if you're bad at warp in, then that's your own problem, but if you're warp ins are bad to the point that you're missing a full 10 seconds, you might as well just not make them warpgates and just queue from gateways yourself.
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Some good points. I really hope that Blizzard will think about some of this stuff when they release HotS. Maybe we can see some warpgate changes. Would be really nice.
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i think what u say is quite logic in itself... with one exeption : the missing defensive structure after gateway for protoss gets compensated by forcefields..forcefields enable the protoss to defend against bigger armies with a smaller one of their own, exactly what a defensive structure would do. so i dont see a problem for protoss in defending early timing pushes but rather in the so called "even fight". in earlier sc2 the strong non gateway units made protoss the strongest lategame-race..but now i feel like thats changing because i.e a terran can benefit A LOT more from microing very good in a big fight (kiting,dogding) and as the terrans mechanics get better the protoss's chances to win an even fight get smaller (i think thats a general problem with terran, also against zerg). in PvZ tough, i think its very even, there are strong timing pushes for each side and the "even fights" in lategame need an equaly big amount of unitcontroll and depend alot on unitcomposition .
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My thoughts:
Shield battery is a good idea, it satisfies the much needed "healer" role for protoss. If other races want to cry about that, tough break... It's not even mobile, stop being such babies. How would terran like it if medivacs were just drop ships? They wouldn't. How would zerg like it if they didn't auto heal? They wouldn't. Toss only half auto-heal, lose half health to EMPs, and require two upgrades for their armor rather than just the one. I've always said shields are a liability, not an asset. Batteries would fix that.
As for warp-ins, I like the notion of penalizing the further away you warp in, but benefitting the closer you warp in. I propose this: make all gates warpgates by default. If the rally point is set at or next to the gate, then the build is instant, like any other unit producing building (I know you don't need to wait out a build time with warps, but you do need to wait out a cooldown, so instead of having the wait on the front end, you have it on the back end... it's still waiting for units either way). For proxy warps, have the warpgate send out a signal that travels across the map at a certain speed, and then warps the units there. The further it is, the longer the signal takes to reach its destination.
I dunno, my suggestion anyways.
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On September 08 2011 19:43 Velr wrote: I think the only thing truly missing is a "choice" between Warpgates and Gateways.
Why do Gateways even exist? Except for Blizzard rather having a "Warpgate research" instead of a "Warpgate range research".
I was thinking, the advantage to having warpgates is that you can warp in anywhere, so how about the warpgate cooldown being slightly longer than the gateway buildtimes? This way, if you wanted to use them offensively you would have to deal with fewer units over time, but you could get them anywhere you wanted. This would also more or less completely fix all the PvP silliness, since the defender building his units out of gateways would simply have more units than the guy on offense.
That would also give you an actual choice, and a mix of the two sorts of buildings would be viable. If you played a defensive kind of play you'd have mostly gateways, where as an aggressive player would have more warpgates.
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It's a really good explanation and analysis of the Warp mechanic. And I also agree that the shield battery or a Pylon-powered shield recharge ability would be a cool and good addition for protoss.
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I don't think there's any way to make Warpgate reasonable. For every solution I can come up with, there's a way to abuse it in order to do some imbalanced timing attack.
The only one where I haven't done this yet, is where there's no Warpgate Research, and you can change a Gateway into a Warpgate for 50/50 and a 30 second morph time, if you have a Core up. It would still run into the Khaydarin Amulet problem a bit, but it wouldn't be anything insanely broken.
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Warp in times determined by distance from Nexus is a terrible idea.
So who ever builds their warpgates closest to a Nexus builds units fastest? Please no.
I think they should decrease gateway build times by 5 seconds and increase the warp in length of a unit by 5 seconds. Still builds in the same amount of time but now 5 seconds of that build time goes towards a longer warp in.
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I like the idea of shield battery also warped in units could start with 0 shields so if you try to use them offensively they would be slightly weaker initially but used in base would get quickly recharged
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On September 08 2011 23:50 Rob28 wrote:
As for warp-ins, I like the notion of penalizing the further away you warp in, but benefitting the closer you warp in. I propose this: make all gates warpgates by default. If the rally point is set at or next to the gate, then the build is instant, like any other unit producing building (I know you don't need to wait out a build time with warps, but you do need to wait out a cooldown, so instead of having the wait on the front end, you have it on the back end... it's still waiting for units either way). For proxy warps, have the warpgate send out a signal that travels across the map at a certain speed, and then warps the units there. The further it is, the longer the signal takes to reach its destination.
I dunno, my suggestion anyways.
Nice ideas. Another might be to have each pylon have a "warp-in limit." IE, you can only warp in 4zealot/sentry - 3 stalkers or something for each pylon. I dunno what that would do to the game engine, but that would limit the offensive nature of warp ins and allow the basic units of all races to be a little more even -- I'm looking at you marauder and roach
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Good read, I liked it.
As a defensive Terran from BW, I always liked defenders advantage, and was always pissed at warp in mechanic for nullifying defenders advantage. I always thought that removing warp in and buffing gateway units to be on par with their BW counterparts would make the game more balanced for all races, on a defender's advantage point of vue. And I still do.
Sadly, it's too late for such changes because if warp in mechanic were to be changed in a later expansion, it would create a different game. Already that there will be 3 different ladders for sc2, so the sc2 community will be divided. But if the core mechanics of races were to be changed, it would be another WC3 vs FT.
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On September 08 2011 23:57 OrchidThief wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 19:43 Velr wrote: I think the only thing truly missing is a "choice" between Warpgates and Gateways.
Why do Gateways even exist? Except for Blizzard rather having a "Warpgate research" instead of a "Warpgate range research". I was thinking, the advantage to having warpgates is that you can warp in anywhere, so how about the warpgate cooldown being slightly longer than the gateway buildtimes? This way, if you wanted to use them offensively you would have to deal with fewer units over time, but you could get them anywhere you wanted. This would also more or less completely fix all the PvP silliness, since the defender building his units out of gateways would simply have more units than the guy on offense. That would also give you an actual choice, and a mix of the two sorts of buildings would be viable. If you played a defensive kind of play you'd have mostly gateways, where as an aggressive player would have more warpgates.
I think Blizzard wants the way the races macro to be distinct. Gateways as gateways are just barracks. Even if they did give you a choice, it seems like they want Protoss to have a macro mechanic that is different. It seems like warp gate research is a timing thing, not a mechanic thing. Its like marauder slow being a research thing now. Its an intended part of the Marauder, but the research simply slows the timing down because it was so powerful in the super early game. I think Warpgate research is a similar timing oriented tech, its why we've seen the research time extended several times during beta and after release, but seen the mechanic stay largely intact.
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On September 08 2011 23:57 OrchidThief wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 19:43 Velr wrote: I think the only thing truly missing is a "choice" between Warpgates and Gateways.
Why do Gateways even exist? Except for Blizzard rather having a "Warpgate research" instead of a "Warpgate range research". I was thinking, the advantage to having warpgates is that you can warp in anywhere, so how about the warpgate cooldown being slightly longer than the gateway buildtimes? This way, if you wanted to use them offensively you would have to deal with fewer units over time, but you could get them anywhere you wanted. This would also more or less completely fix all the PvP silliness, since the defender building his units out of gateways would simply have more units than the guy on offense. That would also give you an actual choice, and a mix of the two sorts of buildings would be viable. If you played a defensive kind of play you'd have mostly gateways, where as an aggressive player would have more warpgates. Many people think this is the right way to go. It's a great idea and is in line with Browder's desire for strategic variety.
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On September 08 2011 22:59 RealQ wrote: Im amazed by how many people in this thread auctually think this is about Protoss Warpins being OP.
i see so many nerf protoss comments, that im thinking not many people read the OP or even thought about it.
Well, this kind of topics always end up silly. I just wish we didnt get so many of them
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On September 09 2011 00:06 SnuggleZhenya wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 23:57 OrchidThief wrote:On September 08 2011 19:43 Velr wrote: I think the only thing truly missing is a "choice" between Warpgates and Gateways.
Why do Gateways even exist? Except for Blizzard rather having a "Warpgate research" instead of a "Warpgate range research". I was thinking, the advantage to having warpgates is that you can warp in anywhere, so how about the warpgate cooldown being slightly longer than the gateway buildtimes? This way, if you wanted to use them offensively you would have to deal with fewer units over time, but you could get them anywhere you wanted. This would also more or less completely fix all the PvP silliness, since the defender building his units out of gateways would simply have more units than the guy on offense. That would also give you an actual choice, and a mix of the two sorts of buildings would be viable. If you played a defensive kind of play you'd have mostly gateways, where as an aggressive player would have more warpgates. I think Blizzard wants the way the races macro to be distinct. Gateways as gateways are just barracks. Even if they did give you a choice, it seems like they want Protoss to have a macro mechanic that is different. It seems like warp gate research is a timing thing, not a mechanic thing. Its like marauder slow being a research thing now. Its an intended part of the Marauder, but the research simply slows the timing down because it was so powerful in the super early game. I think Warpgate research is a similar timing oriented tech, its why we've seen the research time extended several times during beta and after release, but seen the mechanic stay largely intact.
I think you're right that they want the warpgate mechanic as a staple, but I largely disagree with that. One of the reasons Khaydarin amulet was nerfed was because HT's could be warped in anywhere to deal with drops. Being able to warpin onto your enemy protoss' ramp has received a lot of attention lately because of PvP, and so on. I really think making warpgates vs gateways a real choice would lead to a more interesting protoss overall, and like I said, I see it fixing a lot of the PvP problems, because the guy on the defense could choose to not get all warpgates and thus have a larger number of units. He'd be able to hold with three gateways vs fourwarpgates, and the game would end up progressing into midgame.
There might be issues with the deathball versus other races, but any change in design at this point would inevitably lead to a situation that'd require new tweaks to achieve balance.
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Why not... just buff the units that give a defender the advantage of having a closer rally? They're already doing so with increasing Immortal range. All they need to do now is lower the cost and build-time and nerf the unit slightly.
Or maybe add a unit to the stargate / robotics that can fill such a role. Then, the defender would benefit from having that closer rally.
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So you're saying this is only an issue for pvp? Against Z/T you'd still have the defender's advantage in the short rally. That makes this really hard to fix because a lot of these suggestions would impact the play against other races.
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I remember seeing a discussion like this many times here already. Protoss in SC2 is just too gimmicky. It's like an NFL team with more onside kicks than running plays in their playbook. It just doesn't have a good, back to basics, fundamental game. The race is too dependent on timing pushes with warp-ins, forcefields and blink.
Just check the stats of the dragoon in BW vs the stalker. (Shut it about the dragoon AI. It's irrelevant at the pro level.) Same cost but the stalker got a huge hit in raw stats because of warp-in and blink. It's a good trade off when making timing pushes but it's a liability when defending and in large scale late game battles.
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On September 09 2011 00:14 windsupernova wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 22:59 RealQ wrote: Im amazed by how many people in this thread auctually think this is about Protoss Warpins being OP.
i see so many nerf protoss comments, that im thinking not many people read the OP or even thought about it. Well, this kind of topics always end up silly. I just wish we didnt get so many of them
Warp Ins aren't OP. And the OP at no point said they were. The issue arises that Protoss is balanced around their Warp ability and early game Timing attacks. As a result GW units a weaker in order to make it so that their timing pushes are actually defendable.
The OP believes that a buff of GW units and a WG nerf is needed as not only will it allow Timing Attacks to still be viable, but make it so GW units don't get raped by MM and Roaches. This would also be a buff against crap like 4gate, roachLing all in, and Marine Tank all ins.
If only GW units are buffed. That would make 4/3 gate timings extremely OP. And for all those zergs complaining that a GW buff would break the late game. Zergs have only started to dig their toes into Hive Tech(Not including BL) and infestor Tech. And as of late are really owning up the Protosses with Infestor Ling. Heck Alot of Zergs neglect NP and the crap wrecks collosi.
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I don't understand why you think an even protoss army is weaker than an even terran or zerg army. I find this to be untrue. It's not that Toss doesn't have a defenders advantage. We have it even when attacking.
Gateway units are NOT weak. Especially upgraded gateway units with charge and blink. When supported with forcefields and good positioning, I think the Protoss Gateway composition is better than Zerg of equal tech, and only slightly worse than the Terran Bioball.
4 gate is balanced not by making Gateway units weaker, but giving other races strong defensive capabilities. Creep, spines, and larva inject are powerful defensive advantages that zergs have. Same with bunkers and repairs for Terran.
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On September 08 2011 22:18 vOdToasT wrote: Shield batteries would make PvP much better if they were strong enough. I seriously think they should add shield batteries in HotS. They should be quite cheap - 75 - 200 minerals.
The huge problem with shield batteries would be in other match ups... where you could have an immortal tanking siege hit for a veritable eternit.... NVM I want shield batteries! 1-1-1 Here's to your DEATH!
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On September 09 2011 00:28 KevinIX wrote: I don't understand why you think an even protoss army is weaker than an even terran or zerg army. I find this to be untrue. It's not that Toss doesn't have a defenders advantage. We have it even when attacking.
Gateway units are NOT weak. Especially upgraded gateway units with charge and blink. When supported with forcefields and good positioning, I think the Protoss Gateway composition is better than Zerg of equal tech, and only slightly worse than the Terran Bioball.
4 gate is balanced not by making Gateway units weaker, but giving other races strong defensive capabilities. Creep, spines, and larva inject are powerful defensive advantages that zergs have. Same with bunkers and repairs for Terran.
Blizzard has openly stated on multiple occasions that Gateways units are SUPPOSED to be more mechanically inefficient for cost than their Terran and Zerg counter parts because of the innate mobility that the warp in mechanic has given them.... which is why equal supply armies of purely hatch tech/barracks tech/cyber tech armies should always coincide with a non-protoss victory... if it did, then Protoss really WOULD be imbalanced...
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Correct me if I'm wrong, but what I got from reading this is that Protoss have an advantage creating units against Terran and Zerg, but not against Protoss. Last time I checked, a defensive 4 gate executed perfectly beats an offensive 4 gate executed perfectly. Actually I take that back, 4 gate isn't really the most popular opening in PvP right now.
I'm not sure what the issue is, I mean even after reading this, it seems like the whole implication of the argument you are making is, "If I don't scout/react properly to my opponent and they come kill me, I shouldn't be punished for it."
So I'm gonna assume the argument you are trying to make is that there is little to no defender's advantage in PvP, which I would disagree with. Aside from the obvious, (proxy pylons are still farther away from attacker than defender), a perfectly executed defensive 4 gate beats a perfectly executed offensive 4 gate. I just use that example because it was the opening you mentioned, but in other openings from the opponent, if you scout you should be fine.
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The OP took way too long to say "what happened to the shield battery?"
It's a good question though.
150 mineral shield battery at the nat would make FE Protoss a very scary and viable thing. I think that would probably be imba for current PvZ though. Put Hydras back down to hatch-tech, with adequate adjustments to make them useful, and I think we're talking.
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There are so many logic flaws in this post I can't even start to summarize them.
In short though, Protoss also has a attacking disadvantage because the opponent still gets relatively shorter rally times and does have time to respond. You still have to move out of your base as Protoss so the faster reinforcement doesnt matter at all for how much time the opponent has to respond. The respond time is only dependant on the time it takes for a unit to walk between the bases.. Protoss warp is mechanic is a great invention imo and really makes the races even more unique then they were in sc1. There really is no problem as a result of the warp-ins. At the moment protoss timing pushes are not that hard to stop at all, in fact they are probably the easiest to stop. Timing pushes in general are just quite strong in sc2 because many maps are relatively small and scouting is quite hard. In sc1 scouting is easier because you can't prevent it so easily, in sc2 the cost of scouting is rather high which leads to lots of very hard to stop timing pushes as you don't see them in time often.
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The warp mechanic is really good in the lategame though.. It's sort of like a double edged sword. If you're maxed and have a big bank then you generally have an advantage with 15+ gateways/double robos.
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On September 09 2011 00:36 mastergriggy wrote: Correct me if I'm wrong, but what I got from reading this is that Protoss have an advantage creating units against Terran and Zerg, but not against Protoss. Last time I checked, a defensive 4 gate executed perfectly beats an offensive 4 gate executed perfectly. Actually I take that back, 4 gate isn't really the most popular opening in PvP right now.
I'm not sure what the issue is, I mean even after reading this, it seems like the whole implication of the argument you are making is, "If I don't scout/react properly to my opponent and they come kill me, I shouldn't be punished for it."
So I'm gonna assume the argument you are trying to make is that there is little to no defender's advantage in PvP, which I would disagree with. Aside from the obvious, (proxy pylons are still farther away from attacker than defender), a perfectly executed defensive 4 gate beats a perfectly executed offensive 4 gate. I just use that example because it was the opening you mentioned, but in other openings from the opponent, if you scout you should be fine.
You completely ignored the fact that the OP states that chokes are another part of the defender's advantage...
There's a reason why everyone 4 gates on Tal'darim.
If there were no ramp and an open main offensive 4 gate would smash a defensive 4 gate to shreds, only an offensive 4 gate would fight another offensive 4 gate to a standstill....
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I think WG is a much better defensive ability than offensive one. Look at GSL: 7 gates aren't useful against Zerg anymore. They're consistently held off by Zergs... AFTER taking a third, and the Protoss ends up behind. 6-7 gates have always just been utter failures from the games I've seen. On the other hand, isn't Protoss being "too turtly" what people were complaining about just a month ago? From what I remember, they really had no good way of attacking, so most players just ended up waiting until they had a massive deathball and only then attacking.
I don't think gateway units are weak because of warp in. Gateway units are weak because the game would be terrible if every P matchup had to be played like T has to be played in TvP. It's not a fun game and it's boring to watch when you just max out on tier 1 units then attack.
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On September 09 2011 00:36 Jermstuddog wrote: The OP took way too long to say "what happened to the shield battery?"
It's a good question though.
150 mineral shield battery at the nat would make FE Protoss a very scary and viable thing. I think that would probably be imba for current PvZ though. Put Hydras back down to hatch-tech, with adequate adjustments to make them useful, and I think we're talking.
Hydras at hatch tech would make FFE really hard.. or any type of expansion for that matter. Fast 3rd macro hatch after expo and you have yourself a really tough timing to hold off
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On September 09 2011 00:28 KevinIX wrote: I don't understand why you think an even protoss army is weaker than an even terran or zerg army. I find this to be untrue. It's not that Toss doesn't have a defenders advantage. We have it even when attacking.
Gateway units are NOT weak. Especially upgraded gateway units with charge and blink. When supported with forcefields and good positioning, I think the Protoss Gateway composition is better than Zerg of equal tech, and only slightly worse than the Terran Bioball.
4 gate is balanced not by making Gateway units weaker, but giving other races strong defensive capabilities. Creep, spines, and larva inject are powerful defensive advantages that zergs have. Same with bunkers and repairs for Terran. I agree. I think that it's a misconception to say that Protoss Gateway units are inherently less cost efficient or weaker than Zerg/Terran units because of the strength of Warp-In. In practice, I have found that this is hardly the case, especially if Protoss uses their Force Fields well and even moreso if they use Blink well. In fact, with Force Fields + Blink, I think their army is more often than not more cost efficient than Zerg (not sure about Terran). Also, once you get to Robo Tech, you get units that are generally super cost efficient.
4 gate and early timing attacks are indeed balanced around giving other races strong defensive structures, not by weakening Protoss units. Personally, I think that WG research needs to come later in the game as a way of getting units to expansions for defense or for harass offense (warping in from hidden pylon to attack Zerg's third base while making a move towards their army). It shouldn't be available as an offensive tactic so early in the game. Moving it farther up the tech tree would probably shake up PvP considerably as well, making for a far more interesting matchup (hopefully anyways).
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On September 09 2011 00:37 Markwerf wrote: There are so many logic flaws in this post I can't even start to summarize them.
In short though, Protoss also has a attacking disadvantage because the opponent still gets relatively shorter rally times and does have time to respond. You still have to move out of your base as Protoss so the faster reinforcement doesnt matter at all for how much time the opponent has to respond. The respond time is only dependant on the time it takes for a unit to walk between the bases.. Protoss warp is mechanic is a great invention imo and really makes the races even more unique then they were in sc1. There really is no problem as a result of the warp-ins. At the moment protoss timing pushes are not that hard to stop at all, in fact they are probably the easiest to stop. Timing pushes in general are just quite strong in sc2 because many maps are relatively small and scouting is quite hard. In sc1 scouting is easier because you can't prevent it so easily, in sc2 the cost of scouting is rather high which leads to lots of very hard to stop timing pushes as you don't see them in time often.
That's a flawed way of thinking, even in broodwar it was never the absolute speed of a push that made it brilliant, but the control of relative speeds that let it do brilliant damage. With Chronoboost Protoss has the most malleable timing attack windows, allowing for timing attacks to come at significantly customize-able times and strengths. Warp-ins only exacerbate this with the ability to create an instant vanguard for your main army, allowing you to engage longer, and perhaps indefinitely with little to no map-crossing reinforce time...
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I like the idea of having a longer warpin in time, the further away the unit warps in from the gateway. This way you'll have a defenders advantage (with almost instant warpins), and also the rally disadvantage (though not as drastical as real rally point units).
I think warpin is a really cool and unique ability, but we pay the price of having weaker gateway units, which must be compromised with having AoE in the mid-late game. Still, this makes protoss greatly differ from the other 2 races, which is good too.
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Good Op. I would love to see the return of Shield Batteries. That's probably for the protoss expansion (with the Reaver hopefully)
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I think a better solution would be to have warpgates take longer to build units then regular gateways, that way you'd actually have to use some apm on opening/closing your gates depending on whether you are attacking (so you can warp in at a proxy pylon) or defending (building in regular gates and rallying your units like terran does with wrax).
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United Kingdom1381 Posts
I had an idea for PvP, what if it was impossible to warp in if your pylon's radius overlapped with an opponent's pylon? (e.g. place a pylon at the ramp to prevent warp ins when your opponent has vision)
This way there would be no effects on other match ups and it would add a defenders advantage.
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While I really liked shield batteries in SC1, I believe they do not have a place in SC2. Let's take a blink stalker timing push against zerg with +2 attack upgrades. The goal of the blink stalker push is not to kill the zerg, but to do damage to them while keeping your own units alive. After doing damage back out and allow shields to recharge.
This creates 2 effects. The zerg who lost units must replace them. If the protoss continues to produce units they can start a snowball effect and kill the zerg from mass units. This does of course have problems with infestors, who don't allow stalkers to blink out, so eventually the zerg may be able to tech quick enough to deal with the larger number of stalkers, but it's an easy way to end the game against a weak zerg.
The 2nd effect is that it allows the protoss army to maintain it's size while the zerg replaces their own. This means that rather then dumping more money into units, the protoss can dump that money into expansions and tech, giving them the economical and technological advantage going into the late game.
Now let's add a shield battery to that push. See any problems here? Blink stalker timing pushes are already very strong if executed and microed correctly. Add to that the ability to replenish shields faster and your going to have some real balance issues.
I think a better solution would be to break the cannon into 2 buildings as all other races have. Give them one that shoots air and detects, requires forge tech to make, and give them one that shoots ground, has a 50 second build time and requires gateway. Maybe adjust prices of them to 125 minerals for each as they don't lose mining time or the probe while making them, but don't have the option to move them around as zerg does.
I think overall this is a very simplistic thread and not enough options are being explored to really make any suggestions or conclusions. I also believe balance changes are best left in the hands of Blizzard.
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On September 09 2011 00:36 Jermstuddog wrote: The OP took way too long to say "what happened to the shield battery?"
It's a good question though.
150 mineral shield battery at the nat would make FE Protoss a very scary and viable thing. I think that would probably be imba for current PvZ though. Put Hydras back down to hatch-tech, with adequate adjustments to make them useful, and I think we're talking.
I really don't think the Shield Battery would help all that much. When I go through the situations where I have trouble defending an attack after expanding, I find that it really wouldn't matter all that much. Having a Shield Battery wouldn't help defend a 2 rax with 1 Gate FE, for instance, nor would it help against the 1/1/1.
This isn't BW, the units are different, and engagements play out differently.
On September 09 2011 00:37 Markwerf wrote: There are so many logic flaws in this post I can't even start to summarize them.
In short though, Protoss also has a attacking disadvantage because the opponent still gets relatively shorter rally times and does have time to respond. You still have to move out of your base as Protoss so the faster reinforcement doesnt matter at all for how much time the opponent has to respond. The respond time is only dependant on the time it takes for a unit to walk between the bases.. Protoss warp is mechanic is a great invention imo and really makes the races even more unique then they were in sc1. There really is no problem as a result of the warp-ins. At the moment protoss timing pushes are not that hard to stop at all, in fact they are probably the easiest to stop. Timing pushes in general are just quite strong in sc2 because many maps are relatively small and scouting is quite hard. In sc1 scouting is easier because you can't prevent it so easily, in sc2 the cost of scouting is rather high which leads to lots of very hard to stop timing pushes as you don't see them in time often.
Did you really read the opening post? If you did, I suggest reading it again. I honestly have no idea what you're arguing against...
To digress a bit though, I do think that one of the reasons SC2 has so many problems, is that the designers wanted to make the races too unique. That's why Protoss and Zerg drops aren't that good, because Terran is supposed to be the race that drops, and that's part of their "uniqueness". A ton of gameplay and strategic variety was sacrificed to shoehorn the races into the straightjackets the designers thought up for them.
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This is well thought out, I must say. I have been thinking this same thing for some time now. I hope someone finds a solution. My idea? make units come out of Gateways faster, and warpgates a little slower, so there is incentive to turn a warpgate back into a gateway... ?? It would also be a little more difficult and raise the skill cap a bit.
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I've been thinking this for a long time really and I'm surprised it hasn't been brought up earlier. SC's design is pretty heavily dependent on the defender's advantage for macro games to work (and I don't think I'm alone in saying that we want macro strategies to generally defeat early aggression with good execution). The defender's advantage being positioning, travel time and static defense.
Protoss really screws with this. Warp in negates travel time and blink can to a fair extent negate the effectiveness of static defense and ramps. Of course this hasn't really destroyed PvZ or PvT, so it's hard to really say why those matchups have evolved past 4 gate while PvP can't seem to. It seems to me that this is because toss needs sentries for gateway unit comps to handle zerg or terran with any sort of efficiency, which makes static defense more potent since blink is less viable with sentries.
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Wow, this is a very nice OP, and a very detailed analysis.
Hopefully the right people will read this and make something happen so finally PvZ and PvT will become enjoyable to watch again. Who knows, I might even start actually playing the game again.
Lately, PvP just seemed to be the only protoss matchup worth following, with players starting on even terms and and being able to actually punish equally skilled opponents for being greedy or aggressive. The other matchups look more like protoss getting trolled, with cheese builds like 6pool, 4 hatch or 1-1-1 becoming rather safe options to go. No Risk, High Reward, Problem?
And then you read forums and usually find a bunch of people arguing that its not bad game design/balance but the demographics, with terrans being just better gamers overall, thats where the results come from. Or even that all races are doing equally well right now. Alright.
Shield battery might be a nice idea, at this point it can't get much worse for protoss anyways. (Oh wait, MC, Alicia, Genius, Tester, Puzzle, Hongun, Nani and Huk are just bad and need to get their shit together, I forgot, lol)
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On September 09 2011 00:35 ShatterZer0 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 00:28 KevinIX wrote: I don't understand why you think an even protoss army is weaker than an even terran or zerg army. I find this to be untrue. It's not that Toss doesn't have a defenders advantage. We have it even when attacking.
Gateway units are NOT weak. Especially upgraded gateway units with charge and blink. When supported with forcefields and good positioning, I think the Protoss Gateway composition is better than Zerg of equal tech, and only slightly worse than the Terran Bioball.
4 gate is balanced not by making Gateway units weaker, but giving other races strong defensive capabilities. Creep, spines, and larva inject are powerful defensive advantages that zergs have. Same with bunkers and repairs for Terran. Blizzard has openly stated on multiple occasions that Gateways units are SUPPOSED to be more mechanically inefficient for cost than their Terran and Zerg counter parts because of the innate mobility that the warp in mechanic has given them.... which is why equal supply armies of purely hatch tech/barracks tech/cyber tech armies should always coincide with a non-protoss victory... if it did, then Protoss really WOULD be imbalanced... Have they? Can you link that to me? It'd be interesting if this were actually the case...
On September 09 2011 00:37 Markwerf wrote: In short though, Protoss also has a attacking disadvantage because the opponent still gets relatively shorter rally times and does have time to respond. You still have to move out of your base as Protoss so the faster reinforcement doesnt matter at all for how much time the opponent has to respond. The respond time is only dependant on the time it takes for a unit to walk between the bases..
Protoss warp is mechanic is a great invention imo and really makes the races even more unique then they were in sc1. There really is no problem as a result of the warp-ins. I think you understand attacking/defenders advantage wrong. Every race has to deal with the "attacking disadvantage" that you are talking about (the idea that when you attack, the defender gets units to reinforce sooner) so that is a moot point. But when every race attacks, Terran/Zerg can not reinforce as quickly as Protoss which nullifies an essential part of defenders advantage.
You are right in that when the Protoss moves out, that response time is the same as other races, however, the main issue is the reinforce time which is instant. No other race can do that (unless they proxy their production facilities) without basically losing the game instantly if their rush fails.
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On September 08 2011 22:53 windsupernova wrote: I thought we were all over the ¨I want to design the game¨ phase.
It seems not. Warpgate didn´t break protoss, just a few months ago Protoss were doign well, it may have been the WG nerf or the Metagame changing but can we stop blaming game design just because a race is having a hard time atm?
Every single time that a race is having a hard time, everybody claims that it was badly designed, broken, that it needs to be redesigned(and all the redesigns are just hey lets copy paste BW!).
Even with no warpgates Zealots and Dragoons would be ¨bad¨ in SC2, due to the new units the other races have, the improved controls. Warpgate is a really interesting and Novel concept, yeah its different but I have always been on the side of developers trying new things instead of being hindered by tradition.
Its not like its unreasonable that the game would feel imbalanced, the best testing is the playtesting. I am sure that for the expansions new units and abilities will be added to fill the holes in each races arsenal(like what happened from SC1 to BW).
Hey, but I guess its easier to say the game is broken and scream bad design everytime a race is in trouble. Although, with the new engine and units I can see how the Shield battery would be better in SC2 than it ever was in BW.
People have been calling the warp-in mechanic poorly designed for a long time. When Protoss was doing well, it was called boring and bad for spectators and imbalanced. And now, as Protoss edges towards extinction in Code S, it's being blamed for the overall fragility of the race. There was never a period when the mechanic wasn't being implicated for something, so your premise that it's only just now coming under scrutiny because of Protoss's recent lack of success is false. And it was an "interesting and novel concept" back in 2007. Now that we've had a year to observe its actual impact on gameplay, it's no longer novel and, arguably, not very interesting. Not in its current implementation.
You acknowledge that SC2 is a work in progress, with patches and expansions on the way, so I don't really see what your issue is with design theorizing. It's interesting to think about and discuss these things, so at worst it's harmless fun.
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1) Increase warp-in cooldown. Keep gateway build times the same 2) Adjust protoss gateway to be stronger so as to off-set the loss of units due to lost offensive warp-in capabilities, and to make gateway units stronger defensive units.
Problem, this would be really hard to test over the course of a PTR. Would probably have to be tested over the course of HotS beta. Still, the idea of gateway being the defensive unit producing structure and the warpgate being the offensive unit producing structure adds a palpable defenders advantage because the defender, if using gateways, will be able to get units out faster than the attacker. Imagine gateway --> warpgate and the opposite as the "bunker build time" or the "spinecrawler build time". Adjust it so that gateway builds <warpgate to gateway time> faster, so that scouting can be rewarded, as the first warp-in will coincide with the change to gateway, and then each warp-in cycle thereafter will fall behind the defender's superior production.
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I dunno, there just is no trade off to warp gate. You make units faster out of it, AND you can warp in at a pylon. I think they should make it so that normal gateways produce units faster than warpgates so that it isnt turned into "well warpgate is something I NEED to get."
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Making gateways as requirement for cannons can be great but cost of each cannon should be increased (175-200) to avoid cannon+GW unit rush.
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Warp-in is one of the most poorly designed mechanics in the game. There are very few reasons for the gateway (not warpgate) to exist as it is now. The only reason they're in the game right now is to keep protoss from being too strong in the early game.
The soloution to this is making converting gateways to warpgates cost minerals. They should also have a longer cooldown than gateways to make gateways usable and viable. If you do this and buff protoss warpgate units a bit, i think it will be pretty balanced.
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The thing is, the game already accounts for this. It's been repeatedly acknowledged that gateway units are inefficient for their cost in the early game compared to their T/Z counterparts because of the warp-in mechanic. That's exactly why Sentries exist. If you were to adjust the build speed and mechanics of warp gate tech, and rebalance the gateway tech units around it, Force Field would have to be nerfed into the ground (or even possibly removed), as you couldn't have stronger units *and* all the other defender's advantage points *AND* the ability to control the fight with force fields.
...Actually I'm kinda for this. Force Field was always a terrible mechanic as well.
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The point the OP is making is that Protoss is balanced under the assumption that they will be warping in offensively in every possible situation which means that they're made to be 'on par' power-wise with T/Z under those conditions.
In reality you aren't doing that in every situation and it also means that when fighting at your own base the conditions are not different than if you were fighting at any other spot on the map where you had a pylon other than your sim city.
I don't think that this is a very hard concept to understand. Warpgate is a really poor mechanic that shouldn't have made it out of F&F beta and now it may be too entrenched to ever remove. It's a problem.
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What if Cannons would be unlocked by the Cyber Core instead of the Forge (or alternatively to the Forge)? You would have good, viable 1-Gate expands against both T and Z and it may even lead to PvP expand builds. If the cannons were only unlockable through the Core it would be even possible to buff them slightly if necessary, since cannon rushing isn't a problem anymore. On the other hand, cannons still being also unlocked by the Forge would allow Forge FE to live on.
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They should make the warpgate a twilight council upgrade and tweak the gateway to replace the warpgates. Warpgates no longer reduce build times, they just let you warp in at far distances. The whole warp in anywhere + reduced build time is ridiculous, that's why warpgates were nerfed.
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Blizzard is so silly. All they have to do is give warp gates a trade-off. Make it so that they actually take longer to produce a unit with. That way, you only use them if you are being offensive. Otherwise you switch to regular gateways.
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Old knowledge.. Im pretty sure one would find similar topics in beta.
If Blizzard isnt going to redesign Warpgates with HotS they screwed up.
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Well, now that I think about it, perhaps the warp time should increase based on the distance the warp is from the nearest nexus. That way the advantage strictly remains to defending a base and toss would not be inclined to proxy all of their gateways as the gateways would be able to defend themselves very easily.
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On September 09 2011 00:04 Deltablazy wrote: Good read, I liked it.
As a defensive Terran from BW, I always liked defenders advantage, and was always pissed at warp in mechanic for nullifying defenders advantage. I always thought that removing warp in and buffing gateway units to be on par with their BW counterparts would make the game more balanced for all races, on a defender's advantage point of vue. And I still do.
Sadly, it's too late for such changes because if warp in mechanic were to be changed in a later expansion, it would create a different game. Already that there will be 3 different ladders for sc2, so the sc2 community will be divided. But if the core mechanics of races were to be changed, it would be another WC3 vs FT.
And that wouldn't be bad because Wc3 RoC was imbalanced as hell. Frozen Throne made the game WAY better as did BW with Classic Starcraft . Sometimes you gotta do drastic changes for the better overall.
Warpgate is just a stupid mechanic in my mind , way too important and hard to balance . Its too easy to abuse if its units are too good but on the other hand Protoss completely relies on Units made from Gateways.
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On September 09 2011 01:28 s3rp wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 00:04 Deltablazy wrote: Good read, I liked it.
As a defensive Terran from BW, I always liked defenders advantage, and was always pissed at warp in mechanic for nullifying defenders advantage. I always thought that removing warp in and buffing gateway units to be on par with their BW counterparts would make the game more balanced for all races, on a defender's advantage point of vue. And I still do.
Sadly, it's too late for such changes because if warp in mechanic were to be changed in a later expansion, it would create a different game. Already that there will be 3 different ladders for sc2, so the sc2 community will be divided. But if the core mechanics of races were to be changed, it would be another WC3 vs FT. And that wouldn't be bad because Wc3 RoC was imbalanced as hell. Frozen Throne made the game WAY better same as BW did with Classic Starcraft. Sometimes you gotta do drastic changes for the better overall.
Yeah Mutas were so gay in SC -_-. Stim, but no medics T_T. Mass cannons to stop Muta back stabs.
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Nice OP. I think it would be fascinating to see something like a shield battery added in the future. Although, would proxy shield battery strategies be problematic I wonder?
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OP already suggested a perfect solution to this problem - bring back the Shield Battery, strengthen gateway units, and weaken high-tech units (eg. Immortal obviously since Immortal with proxy Shield Battery means imba)
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On September 09 2011 01:00 shockaslim wrote: I dunno, there just is no trade off to warp gate. You make units faster out of it, AND you can warp in at a pylon. I think they should make it so that normal gateways produce units faster than warpgates so that it isnt turned into "well warpgate is something I NEED to get." +1 to this. This is actually how I expected it to be when I was first told about the warpgate mechanic. That would lead to interesting decisions being made and reduce how much warpgate negates the defender's reinforcement advantage.
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United States7483 Posts
On September 09 2011 01:44 IronDoc wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 01:00 shockaslim wrote: I dunno, there just is no trade off to warp gate. You make units faster out of it, AND you can warp in at a pylon. I think they should make it so that normal gateways produce units faster than warpgates so that it isnt turned into "well warpgate is something I NEED to get." +1 to this. This is actually how I expected it to be when I was first told about the warpgate mechanic. That would lead to interesting decisions being made and reduce how much warpgate negates the defender's reinforcement advantage.
The trade off to warp gate is that gateway units suck because it exists. But yes, blizzard wants every protoss to get warp gate no matter what.
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On September 09 2011 01:43 mrlie3 wrote: OP already suggested a perfect solution to this problem - bring back the Shield Battery, strengthen gateway units, and weaken high-tech units (eg. Immortal obviously since Immortal with proxy Shield Battery means imba) This would not be a perfect solution... The Shield Battery would be insanely strong offensively, especially when coupled with things like Blink Stalker pressure/rush.
If you strengthen Gateway units, you will absolutely crush Zerg in the early game with good Force Fields. It's already close with "weaker" Gateway units, an idea on which I'm not sold on. It'd be a blowout with stronger Gateway units. =/
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I really think it's fine the way it is. Why change it? You still see Terran and Zerg loosing to Protoss. So cmon, as soon as protoss is in a slump, they have to complain that THEY are imbalanced. Its all in the metagame, hello guys, protoss was winning 2 months ago, exclusivly. You have to adapt your play. You cant just go to blizzard and ask them for a buff, then it would ruin the game. "hey blizz buff marines, the die too quickly" - no we cant because then they would be op. Same with stalker.
So guys, just chill, READ FORUMS, WATCH REPLAYS and practice, the only way getting better. You wont get any better by writing long posts about how to "buff" races.
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I don't think the warpgate mechanic needs to be changed at all. Yes, it gives Protoss the advantage in certain situations, but the game is balanced around the situational advantages/disadvantages that every race has. I could write a page or two on how the MULE gives an "unfair advantage" to Terran players, or how Zerg's greater remaxing ability gives an "unfair advantage" but in the end it's pointless because the game is balanced around it. The ease of making bunkers/spines (especially bunkers) and the fact that Marauders and Roaches (which also melt both Zealots and Sentries) are better than Stalkers (early game anyway, but I'm trying to keep this post as short as possible) balance the fact that the offensive Toss can warp in wherever you allowed their nearest pylon to be placed. Nothing broken about it.
Edit: and as far as the warpgate mechanic shifting the balance so that Toss is weaker defensively, I'm sorry but I'd have to disagree there too. Like you said, the only situations in which cannons aren't viable static defense are pretty early game, as any Protoss, depending on what they scout, should have a forge up not too long after their second base, and I personally find that Toss early game is fine without cannons, based on my own play (which I'll admit is Platinum level so not as indicative of true balance) but also on the many, many pro level games I've seen... Protoss tends to lose in at least the midgame if not very late. There are a couple of all-in after the Toss FE scenarios that seem to be successful but that is because the defending player is caught off guard.
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I for one would agree with adding in the shield battery. It would slightly increase the defender's advantage, while not really messing with the offender's advantage. And I think this would really make a big difference to the way PvP usually turns out. 4 gating would not be so strong anymore... unless u warp in a shield battery at your proxy
However, it could have some insane consequences like abuse and that would obviously have to be taken into account. It would be really nice if Blizzard looked into this and considered it though.
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On September 08 2011 19:25 Pzar wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something? Well, jus thinking out loud here, but I never understood why warpgates allowed for higher production throughput than gateways. It made more sense to me that you should be giving up -something- (resources or time) to gain the front-loaded anywhere there's a power field style of unit creation. Especially given that you can convert warpgates back to gateways. Plus it'd be cool to see gateways<->warpgates happening as protoss move between defensive and offensive =P
Protoss gateway units are generally a little too weak (for reasons mentioned above) to justify their long build times in the lategame. However, shorter build times would overpower already potent VERY earlygame strats (2gate, proxy gates, etc) so the build time decrease that has to happen somewhere is bundled into warpgate.
regarding the op, yeah i've thought this for a while, i'm glad someone made a post on it, although its difficult to see the correct course of action to rectify the situation. I kinda feel like blizzard internally made the argument that forcefield will offset the defenders weakness and that was generally accepted, but then they made maps where forcefield is bad, which seems a bit odd. I'd like to see how protoss fares if every map were FFE friendly
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Why not add a shield battery upgrade to the Nexus..that way you couldn't build one next to your proxy pylon in an aggressive timing push (unless you build a...PROXY NEXUS?). Would also make a lot more sense when protoss FE in PvZ, and then zerg proceed to make 90 drones and throw units at you for the rest of the game.
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On September 09 2011 01:58 ShaEreHugo wrote: I really think it's fine the way it is. Why change it? You still see Terran and Zerg loosing to Protoss.
This is not about your laddering experience.
Its all in the metagame, hello guys, protoss was winning 2 months ago, exclusivly.
Umm no? Check the racial distribution in the gsl for example and stop making stuff up.
"hey blizz buff marines, the die too quickly" - no we cant because then they would be op..
OP against whom? the other terran in the finals? I dont think so.
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On September 08 2011 19:25 Pzar wrote: Well, jus thinking out loud here, but I never understood why warpgates allowed for higher production throughput than gateways.
It made more sense to me that you should be giving up -something- (resources or time) to gain the front-loaded anywhere there's a power field style of unit creation. Especially given that you can convert warpgates back to gateways.
Plus it'd be cool to see gateways<->warpgates happening as protoss move between defensive and offensive =P
Yes. This is what I think a lot of people look forward to. Something that gives defender's advantage back to Protoss.
A tweak to look into would be to add what Belisarius said. Warp-ins provide an upfront load of units and this is an important aspect of warp-ins. Units at 5 and 40 sec are definitely better than units at 30 and 60 sec (if you understand what I mean) This gives the attacking player 20 sec, between times 40 and 60 sec to attack with an additional set of units. If we tweak numbers to make it say 5 and 50 sec, while keeping gateway units to pop out at 30 and 60, then it might be workable, but that significantly affects timings and reinforcements against T and Z, where warp ins might be necessary. (I took out his suggestion about the cost, it was the instant gateway spawn that could fix the upfront problem)
On September 08 2011 22:28 Belisarius wrote: No that's my point. I'm toss by the way, I know how important that wave is. That's why I said warpgate should upgrade both gateway mode and its warp in mode.
I'd have the standard gateway train time mode disappear (because it's useless once you have wg), replaced with a mode where the units spawn instantly as with warpgate but do so at the gateway, as if they'd been trained. So you still get the extra round of units when WG comes online.
I see a lot of people making absurd arguments that the WG mechanic also has defender's advantage. See following:
+ Show Spoiler +On September 08 2011 20:09 siri wrote: you are wrong about warp gate not being good at defending
the strength of warpgates is equally strong offensively and defensibly. Its even more noticeable at defending!
example: terran to do a timing push needs to have minerals at time X to start production. now lets say terran needs 30 seconds to build the army and the distance from his base to the target is 30 seconds.
That means a delay of 1 minutes the moment you collect minerals to the moment your army built from those minerals hit the target. While protoss only has the delay of 5 seconds.
Which also means that a 8minutes timing attack from terran is a 7minutes army against a 8minutes protoss army which if you take the account that your productions only really starts to kick in at about 4/5 minutes in to the game, early timings the protoss can have 1/3 more army than terran and still lose because to balance this gateway units need to be weaker compared to t1 units from other races.
conclusion: WP is the most BROKEN mechanic in the game (2º is forcefield) and still protoss is very vulnerable to all ins because how weaker gateway units need to be. Honestly I dream one day WP be only upgradable on a fleet beacon.
The main point of a defender's advantage is that the distance that reinforcing units have to travel is WAY less than the distance that attacking units have to travel. Sentries help this out by delaying attacking units, thereby relatively shortening the time it takes for your units to come out.
Bunkers and Spine crawlers also achieve defender's advantage by being very cost effective through the increased range/damage + additional health. In addition, as the OP mentioned, ramp usage is important. As for Protoss, since they cannot effectively use the forge as a tech choice, it would be okay if there were some defensive structure available after the gateway. Hence, a lot of people suggested making the shield battery available again. So, this is a viable option as it gives all three races a defensive structure after gateway/rax/pool. However, we may need to examine that further as a shield battery can certainly be placed at forward pylons (similar to, but not exactly the same as bunkers).
As for the people suggesting warp-in times being different based on distance from original nexus or gateways, this introduces new complex mechanics. For example, would the warp in times be continuous in regards to distance measures? As in, would 5 meters be associated with 30 sec, 5.1 meters be associated with 30+x sec, and 5.2 meters be associated with 30+2x sec? Or would 5-10 meters be associated with 30 sec, and 10-20 be associated with 40 sec, and so on? (like multiple rings) Disregarding numbers that can be tweaked and adjusted, this option introduces multiple new problems. Should mapmakers now take into account "warp in ring" ranges? Are gamers supposed to calculate how much distance something is during their practice? As for me, I think that this new mechanic would introduce unnecessary refinement just to be able to warp in where they want.
I also like the suggestion that Milkis made:
+ Show Spoiler +On September 08 2011 22:32 Milkis wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 22:25 Excludos wrote:On September 08 2011 21:55 Milkis wrote: in my opinion if they make warp gate have a significantly longer cool time you'd get defender's advantage back and would let you get away with buffing protoss units a bit to deal with other kinds of attacks protoss has :p How is that suppose to work out exactly? whetever you have 4 stalkers, or one stalker as strong as 4 that takes 4 times as long to build, it doesn't matter. The fact is that you can still warpin everywhere, and if protoss had defenders advantage, timing attacks would be too strong =| I rather like the idea of units either costing more, or take longer to warp in, depending on the distance you warp in from the warpgate. The defender wouldn't use warpgates, so they can reinforce faster (in PvP), so early aggression plays are discouraged a bit. You can then buff gateway units on top of that to make them more workable against pushes like 1/1/1 This is a bit different from the "warpgate cd longer than gateway" because it gives Blizzard the option to buff/nerf Protoss units if needed. With the other solutions, we rely on the fact that Protoss units are unchanged, and are discussing warp gate changes with the current state of Protoss units in mind.
I think this post may be a little long, but I enjoy intelligent, civil discussion on this matter. Hopefully, this can summarize a portion of this thread and prevent some misunderstandings.
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On September 08 2011 19:13 RodYan wrote: The solution is: -Make Gateways start with warpgate -Proxy pylon warp-in is a mid or late game upgrade
Do you know how ridiculous that would make 2gate zealot? Also, the proxy pylon "upgrade" is just, it just blows my mind. It'd ruin Protoss, having to make units from each individual gateways radius. Plus hotkeying all your gateways would be a bit pointless since you'd have to go to each individual gateway to make them. It'd be like Brood War, which is an amazing game, but is known for its bad engine.
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Introduce a buffed shield battery for defense.
Buff Zealot and Zergling (cant rebalance one without the other, marines are too strong by comparaison anyway)
WARP IN UNITS WITHOUT SHIELDS, you can either engage at risk or wait for recharge
As for the melee unit buff, I honestly think if forces didnt naturally clump up, they would be much more effective....
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what the point of shield batteries, when Ghosts still can emp all shields of allmost all Protoss unit with 1-2 emps?...
But Op is right, Protoss lacks defenders advantage on maps where natural is open.
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There is a fundamental issue with the way warp works as well.
Basically when warp finishes you go from your last round of just produced units to warping in just a few seconds. It is almost impossible to balance those two timings.
If Toss can defend fairly right before warp then 15 seconds and potentially 16 supply later their attack is massively imba.
If instead you balance toss for after warp finishing, then 15 seconds earlier at 16 lower supply Toss is unable to defend.
The ability to warp in units must be seperated from the ability accelerate production. I propose the following:
Gateway goes away and only warpgates exist. By default Warpgates can only warp in units within radius of a Pylon that is near a Nexus. Warpgate/Gateway build time is increased. (maybe 10ish seconds) The Warp Upgrade allows protoss to warp in units at any pylon.
What this does: #1: Proxy gating goes away. Even if I build 3 gates your base I can only warp in units at my base. #2: 4 gate attack is delayed because Gateway build time is delayed. #3: Protoss is significantly better when defending because the first round of units arrives faster since they are "warped" in.
A second possibility related to OP is to change the nature of the cannon. Players that do not play Toss have no idea how hard it is to defend rushes when you have no access to Cannons. As zerg or Terran you scout a rush and drop a bunker or spine. Imagine if Bunker required Ebay or Spine required Evo Chamber?
To make the Toss mechanic more similar to Zeg and Terran I would propose making cannon require only Gateway, but Cannons would neither be able to detect nor shoot at air until Forge is complete.
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What if when you warped in your units had no shields, so you would have to wait out the recharge period. Also to make it easier to defend because of this, you can give the nexus a power grid once you get warpgates so that warping in at a nexus would make your units spawn with shields. Attacking while not having shields would be pretty suicidal imo so this would definately reduce aggressive play. Also i guess warping in at a warp prism should also give shields, so you could use a warp prism for a modern proxy pylon
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On September 09 2011 02:40 meadbert wrote: There is a fundamental issue with the way warp works as well.
Basically when warp finishes you go from your last round of just produced units to warping in just a few seconds. It is almost impossible to balance those two timings.
If Toss can defend fairly right before warp then 15 seconds and potentially 16 supply later their attack is massively imba.
If instead you balance toss for after warp finishing, then 15 seconds earlier at 16 lower supply Toss is unable to defend.
The ability to warp in units must be seperated from the ability accelerate production. I propose the following:
Gateway goes away and only warpgates exist. By default Warpgates can only warp in units within radius of a Pylon that is near a Nexus. Warpgate/Gateway build time is increased. (maybe 10ish seconds) The Warp Upgrade allows protoss to warp in units at any pylon.
What this does: #1: Proxy gating goes away. Even if I build 3 gates your base I can only warp in units at my base. #2: 4 gate attack is delayed because Gateway build time is delayed. #3: Protoss is significantly better when defending because the first round of units arrives faster since they are "warped" in.
A second possibility related to OP is to change the nature of the cannon. Players that do not play Toss have no idea how hard it is to defend rushes when you have no access to Cannons. As zerg or Terran you scout a rush and drop a bunker or spine. Imagine if Bunker required Ebay or Spine required Evo Chamber?
To make the Toss mechanic more similar to Zeg and Terran I would propose making cannon require only Gateway, but Cannons would neither be able to detect nor shoot at air until Forge is complete.
You could make the ability to warp in at a pylon an upgrade in the robotics support bay or TC
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Good read.
Since these threads always digress into suggested balance changes. Give my gateway units a temporary buff like a stim where I can trade all of my shields for a temporary raw damage amplifier...would help with EMP being completely broken against toss and deal with awful gateway DPS, which is in fact awful compared to the other races lower tier stuff.
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I like the idea of warpin being an extreme late-game tech for defending multiple expansions and harassing the enemy. Kinda like recall. Its exactly what Protoss needs especially when all races can harass much easier. I mean even in BW, its almost impossible to beat a 200/200 3/3 Terran with Protoss, Jangbi did it, but he had 6 bases vs 3 and about 30 gateways while doing perfect storms and stasis.
The problem is that its a super long duration but super cheap 50/50 upgrade from the cybernetics core, which is just ridiculous. In BW players would sometimes opt for air upgrade for a corsair opening, but with the massive research time and brainless decision making required for this upgrade, you will never have a strategy that researches anything else first.
IMO it should be researched from the templar archives, same as blink (which is currently citadel i know). Then the protoss player can decide whether he wants blink or warp in, depending on the situation.
At this point in time, players should have enough robo units and sentries to deal with warp-gate timings. It would still be bad, but no where near as bad. It should be coupled with longer cooldown times so that you would choose between warp-gate or gateway depending on the situation, and also longer warp-in times the further away from a nexus you get so it becomes more of a clutch defense tool rather than offensive.
Shield battery for Protoss is also a good idea, in SC2 every race lacks defenders advantage right now.
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On September 08 2011 19:20 XenoX101 wrote: The solution is this, warpgate should be a tier 2-2.5 upgrade and decrease gateway unit build times to match warpgate times. It should not be the first thing you get with a cybernetics core, having such an advantage so quickly in the game is silly and the equivalent of zerg getting ovie speed + ventral sacs off of hatchery tech. If it cost 200/200 and didn't speed up unit build times I think it would be perfectly positioned for the mid-late game as a sensible upgrade rather than a game-breaking one.
how is warpgate gamebreaking? The advantage warpgates bring is balanced out by the crappy cost inefficient warpgate units that are warped in early game as well as the fact that its much harder to macro warpgates than it is simple gateways (if you don't understand why then you just don't understand)
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Gateways produce units quicker, warpgates actually take time to morph. Problem solved.
Honestly it isn't that hard to see this obvious solution. You are able to make units a tiny bit quicker out of gateways for defense, but when you want to go offense a 30-45 second transformation to a warpgate with a longer cooldown seems a lot more balanced. Allows 4 warpgates to attack and 3 gateways to defend. "But this makes 4 gating terrible in PvP!"
Yeah. I know.
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I wouldn't mind having a mechanic that made units come out of whichever gateway you wanted and removed the warp-in thing. It would be like that show stargate, where units just walk through. So you build a zealot and it just walks out from the gateway with no build time, but with cool down. That way if you wanted to proxy you'd have to build a pylon AND a gateway. In exchange we could buff gateway units and there you go.
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Having a shield battery after gate would be the coolest thing in the whole world.
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On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something?
Easier for Terran? Yes. But less rewarding, inject + warp gates/chrono are way better when fully utilized
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On September 09 2011 01:49 arsenic wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 01:43 mrlie3 wrote: OP already suggested a perfect solution to this problem - bring back the Shield Battery, strengthen gateway units, and weaken high-tech units (eg. Immortal obviously since Immortal with proxy Shield Battery means imba) This would not be a perfect solution... The Shield Battery would be insanely strong offensively, especially when coupled with things like Blink Stalker pressure/rush. ...
Not if the Shield Battery is the Nexus. Granted, you could build an offensive Nexus, but then the other player deserves what's coming to him if you can somehow take advantage of that, just like an offensive planetary.
I personnaly think that a permanent aura around the nexus that removes the shield recharge cooldown while being attacked would be sufficient to give the defender an advantage without drastically comprimising the non mirror matchups since it would be such a marginal advantage.
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Here's what I would like to see:
Nexus now has a pylon-alike-radius
When the warptech research is done you can warp in at your nexus. You can no longer warp in at pylons.
Something you can do though is warp in at warp prism. Making the warp prism more unique and more of an harrasment tool it can also be used in battles so you can get quicker reinforcements but it's risky to do as the warp prism is somewhat easy to kill and it comes from the robo.
Now the game would need to be re-designed a bit but I think it would be better if they did what I just described and "start over". This would make PvP a lot funnier and defenders advantage would apply in all matchups.
Then again, this would need to be tested and you would need to lower the warpgate research and almost start over but I think that protoss would benefit from this in the long run
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Interesting write up, I never really thought about it that way before.
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On September 09 2011 03:11 PhiliBiRD wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something? Easier for Terran? Yes. But less rewarding, inject + warp gates/chrono are way better when fully utilized
It's easier for terran now when players haven't gotten perfect macro but when you see Zergs landing all the injects, making units so you get more larva. When people start doing that you will see the true potential of the Zerg race....
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Protoss will definitely get form of shield battery, just not until the expansion =/
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I agree with most aspects of this post, and I have been saying for a very long time now that the Warp mechanic is the entire reason why PvP is so volatile and Gateway units have to be relatively meh until mid game at least otherwise the other races could easily just be overrun in the first 9 minutes (still can with 4gate if you don't defend properly).
The other issue with warpgates is that you are front loading unit production which is EXTREMELY powerful combined with proxy pylons nullifying rush distances. For example if a protoss is 6 gating a zerg natural and every combat unit dies but 3 stalkers, the protoss will have 3 stalkers and 6 zealots to attack the mineral line for 15 in game seconds before any amount of zerglings pop from the hatchery. This is what makes the 4 gate such a powerful rush is the 15-20 seconds from when the protoss receives the unit the pay for and between when the terran/zerg receives their unit they payed for. The mechanic as a whole requires limiting of the protoss gateway units otherwise protoss would be overpowered.
Warp gates are also the reason that KA had to be removed because given than it takes 45 seconds to make a ghost and 50 to make an infestor if KA was still in existance by the time they came out of the barracks/hatch the HT would be at 100 energy.
In general the mechanic is polarizing meaning that it will either be too good or not good enough and honestly the ONLY way I could ever see it being balanced is if instead of a cooldown warping a unit in took its build time in a gateway to warp in and remove the whole double damage to warping units business and if you kill a warping unit it just gets canceled. This way you retain the warp gate's ability to reduce rally time but don't add the 15-20 seconds of time where protoss is simply ahead in units over their terran/zerg counterparts and this would actually allow gateway units to be semi decent.
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On September 09 2011 03:12 Coincoin wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 01:49 arsenic wrote:On September 09 2011 01:43 mrlie3 wrote: OP already suggested a perfect solution to this problem - bring back the Shield Battery, strengthen gateway units, and weaken high-tech units (eg. Immortal obviously since Immortal with proxy Shield Battery means imba) This would not be a perfect solution... The Shield Battery would be insanely strong offensively, especially when coupled with things like Blink Stalker pressure/rush. ... Not if the Shield Battery is the Nexus. Granted, you could build an offensive Nexus, but then the other player deserves what's coming to him if you can somehow take advantage of that, just like an offensive planetary. I personnaly think that a permanent aura around the nexus that removes the shield recharge cooldown while being attacked would be sufficient to give the defender an advantage without drastically comprimising the non mirror matchups since it would be such a marginal advantage.
and thus ends all forms of mineral line harass as probes recharge shields faster than harass units can deal to them.
srsly?
I like the shield battery concept, but a more hashed out one would probably be better than this.
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Is this threat just about PvP?
I was just about to post wondering how so many people can seriously argue about this until i realized this was only about PvP.
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I have been preaching this mentality since the beta, I agree 100%.
Only thing I've differed on is that I think that the actual units warping in should take 10s to warpin instead of 5s, and have the gateway --> warpgate transition take longer (so you don't shit out an extra round of units early on). Then you can rebuff Protoss accordingly, faster gateways, lower gateway buildtimes, etc. See a possible resurgence of nonproxied twogate PvZ.
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Threads like this never end up with agreement, so I won't bother to talk about the balance in detail but it's an interesting idea. Haven't thought of it like this, actually explains a lot that I was thinking about. Good read
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OK this might have been said already because i dont have time to read everything but make it to where you can only build a pylon within the radius of another pylon. and have the nexus have a pylon radius. This would mean no proxy stargates etc but it seems like it would take away some of the early game advantage. i think pylon radius would have to increase again tho and gateway units would prolly need some kind of buffs
im gold btw so feel free to tell me im wrong lol
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Shield Batteries are an EXCELLENT idea! Shield Battery + Immortal = bliss
Think about it: 1 battery at ramp, supreme defenders advantage vs 4gate. Stalkers can actually trade efficiently vs roaches in a straight out brawl. Immortals will live up to their name for once.
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I think that the best option as stated is to decrease the time of warp in near a nexus and increase it as it goes away. this way it would nullify 4gate in pvp becasue if the defender has the clear advantage then why do it?
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On September 09 2011 03:37 Selvik wrote: OK this might have been said already because i dont have time to read everything but make it to where you can only build a pylon within the radius of another pylon. and have the nexus have a pylon radius. This would mean no proxy stargates etc but it seems like it would take away some of the early game advantage. i think pylon radius would have to increase again tho and gateway units would prolly need some kind of buffs
im gold btw so feel free to tell me im wrong lol
It sound weird at first (Pylon highway to enemy base in order to reinforce quickly lategame). But when you allow pylons to be build below warpprisms that would actually be pretty good.
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On September 09 2011 03:39 MrBarryObama wrote: Shield Batteries are an EXCELLENT idea! Shield Battery + Immortal = bliss
Think about it: 1 battery at ramp, supreme defenders advantage vs 4gate. Stalkers can actually trade efficiently vs roaches in a straight out brawl. Immortals will live up to their name for once.
Holy shit... that would totally fix PvP I think...
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On September 09 2011 03:37 Selvik wrote: OK this might have been said already because i dont have time to read everything but make it to where you can only build a pylon within the radius of another pylon. and have the nexus have a pylon radius. This would mean no proxy stargates etc but it seems like it would take away some of the early game advantage. i think pylon radius would have to increase again tho and gateway units would prolly need some kind of buffs
im gold btw so feel free to tell me im wrong lol Would make warp in mostly pointless then. You have a huge liability in that giant line of pylons going to the enemy base. People would clear pylons like they clear creep tumors.
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I like the idea of Nexus recharging shields with chrono but the restriction of having the units near a Nexus for it work. The math I'm not sure but the player has the choice between recharge shields or lower cd/build time. Also, now a cost efficent army like Roaches or bioball needs to apply pressure on the toss to force him to burn chorno. The chorno makes the Protoss army cost efficent without being to overpower with warp-in mechanics.
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On September 09 2011 03:28 Kazeyonoma wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 03:12 Coincoin wrote:On September 09 2011 01:49 arsenic wrote:On September 09 2011 01:43 mrlie3 wrote: OP already suggested a perfect solution to this problem - bring back the Shield Battery, strengthen gateway units, and weaken high-tech units (eg. Immortal obviously since Immortal with proxy Shield Battery means imba) This would not be a perfect solution... The Shield Battery would be insanely strong offensively, especially when coupled with things like Blink Stalker pressure/rush. ... Not if the Shield Battery is the Nexus. Granted, you could build an offensive Nexus, but then the other player deserves what's coming to him if you can somehow take advantage of that, just like an offensive planetary. I personnaly think that a permanent aura around the nexus that removes the shield recharge cooldown while being attacked would be sufficient to give the defender an advantage without drastically comprimising the non mirror matchups since it would be such a marginal advantage. and thus ends all forms of mineral line harass as probes recharge shields faster than harass units can deal to them. srsly? I like the shield battery concept, but a more hashed out one would probably be better than this.
Or make it start with 50 energy like all casters. That way it needs to have been built for a while before it gets really strong.
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On September 09 2011 03:40 FabledIntegral wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 03:39 MrBarryObama wrote: Shield Batteries are an EXCELLENT idea! Shield Battery + Immortal = bliss
Think about it: 1 battery at ramp, supreme defenders advantage vs 4gate. Stalkers can actually trade efficiently vs roaches in a straight out brawl. Immortals will live up to their name for once. Holy shit... that would totally fix PvP I think...
Kinda makes you wonder why Blizzard didn't put the Shield Battery in the game from the start.
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One thing I always considered, since i first started playing this game.
Offensive Pylons. Why is it, that the warp in mechanic requires a building just like any other? THAT is what i would change.
Lets make a new building, call it the Tal'darim Network. This building costs 100 mins and 100 gas. You can warp in within a set range of this building (same as pylon energy matrix).
THEN change the warp in mechanic. Instead of beng able to warp in with ANY pylon. Give a range to the nexus (kinda like they do the Sensor tower) in which any pylon within range of this radius can be warped in on. This upgrade to nexus cost 50/50 and is as fast as a gate into warpgate transition to build.
By combining these two aspects (warp prism can warp in too, but add 50 gas to cost) the rally advantage of protoss is actually a LARGE sacrifice of economy.
To compensate for this lack of offensive capability early on (gas limitation) you can now create cannons from the Cybernetics Core OR the forge. This makes it so the FFE is still viable, but if you 1 gate expo you can cannon like a terran bunkers or a zerg uses spine crawlers.
These changes allow for a rally advantage, but also makes it more valuable when the forward "pylon" or warp prism gets sniped (espec with warp prism buff this can make for some heavy prism play). And would effectively change the pace of PvT/Z and eliminate the 4gate v 4gate scenario of PvP.
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The point of warp in then though would be the upfront build time not the instant reinforcement (except with warp prisms)
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On September 09 2011 03:43 branflakes14 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 03:40 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 03:39 MrBarryObama wrote: Shield Batteries are an EXCELLENT idea! Shield Battery + Immortal = bliss
Think about it: 1 battery at ramp, supreme defenders advantage vs 4gate. Stalkers can actually trade efficiently vs roaches in a straight out brawl. Immortals will live up to their name for once. Holy shit... that would totally fix PvP I think... Kinda makes you wonder why Blizzard didn't put the Shield Battery in the game from the start.
because with the new unit system, a forward shield battery would make the early protoss pushes insanely tough to deal with and make contains almost impossible to push against, especially a immortal push/contain.
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On September 09 2011 03:44 darklight54321 wrote: One thing I always considered, since i first started playing this game.
Offensive Pylons. Why is it, that the warp in mechanic requires a building just like any other? THAT is what i would change.
Lets make a new building, call it the Tal'darim Network. This building costs 100 mins and 100 gas. You can warp in within a set range of this building (same as pylon energy matrix).
THEN change the warp in mechanic. Instead of beng able to warp in with ANY pylon. Give a range to the nexus (kinda like they do the Sensor tower) in which any pylon within range of this radius can be warped in on. This upgrade to nexus cost 50/50 and is as fast as a gate into warpgate transition to build.
By combining these two aspects (warp prism can warp in too, but add 50 gas to cost) the rally advantage of protoss is actually a LARGE sacrifice of economy.
To compensate for this lack of offensive capability early on (gas limitation) you can now create cannons from the Cybernetics Core OR the forge. This makes it so the FFE is still viable, but if you 1 gate expo you can cannon like a terran bunkers or a zerg uses spine crawlers.
These changes allow for a rally advantage, but also makes it more valuable when the forward "pylon" or warp prism gets sniped (espec with warp prism buff this can make for some heavy prism play). And would effectively change the pace of PvT/Z and eliminate the 4gate v 4gate scenario of PvP.
I've always dreamed of units being being allowed to be warped in at a Warp Prism, and Gateway production speeds tweaked to compensate.
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You CAN warp in units under a warp prism.....unless you mean being able to warp inside the prism (ie, gets carried during warp in) and then be able to drop it later, which might be kinda cool but somewhat unnecessary.
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On September 09 2011 03:47 branflakes14 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 03:44 darklight54321 wrote: One thing I always considered, since i first started playing this game.
Offensive Pylons. Why is it, that the warp in mechanic requires a building just like any other? THAT is what i would change.
Lets make a new building, call it the Tal'darim Network. This building costs 100 mins and 100 gas. You can warp in within a set range of this building (same as pylon energy matrix).
THEN change the warp in mechanic. Instead of beng able to warp in with ANY pylon. Give a range to the nexus (kinda like they do the Sensor tower) in which any pylon within range of this radius can be warped in on. This upgrade to nexus cost 50/50 and is as fast as a gate into warpgate transition to build.
By combining these two aspects (warp prism can warp in too, but add 50 gas to cost) the rally advantage of protoss is actually a LARGE sacrifice of economy.
To compensate for this lack of offensive capability early on (gas limitation) you can now create cannons from the Cybernetics Core OR the forge. This makes it so the FFE is still viable, but if you 1 gate expo you can cannon like a terran bunkers or a zerg uses spine crawlers.
These changes allow for a rally advantage, but also makes it more valuable when the forward "pylon" or warp prism gets sniped (espec with warp prism buff this can make for some heavy prism play). And would effectively change the pace of PvT/Z and eliminate the 4gate v 4gate scenario of PvP.
I've always dreamed of units being being allowed to be warped in at a Warp Prism, and Gateway production speeds tweaked to compensate. ?
You mean Warp Prism only?
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The OP makes some good points about Shield Batteries. However I don't agree at all about buffing Toss units. They're already quite Tanky as is, and that is how their position in the 3 races was always meant to be. Terrans - Ranged DPS. Zerg - The Swarm Race. Protoss - Tanks. They're positioned as they should be.
If Shield Batteries were to be re-implemented in SCII, they'd need a completely revised from the BW days. I think looking at PvP is too narrow for Shield Battery applications and ignores how it affects the other races. Mainly Zergs. Can you imagine a Zerg trying to break a Protoss defensive position with Roaches if the Toss has Immortals out? The attack speed and DPS of the Roaches would make Roach play obsolete for Zergs. That leaves them with only one early game option - Ling/Blings. Shield Batteries would end up restricting Zerg's options immensely.
The only thing I can see to get around this is to either implement some sort of Cooldown to Shield Batteries or restriction on Shield Recharging on one unit. For instance one Immortal can't be recharged over and over again.
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On September 09 2011 03:46 darklight54321 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 03:43 branflakes14 wrote:On September 09 2011 03:40 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 03:39 MrBarryObama wrote: Shield Batteries are an EXCELLENT idea! Shield Battery + Immortal = bliss
Think about it: 1 battery at ramp, supreme defenders advantage vs 4gate. Stalkers can actually trade efficiently vs roaches in a straight out brawl. Immortals will live up to their name for once. Holy shit... that would totally fix PvP I think... Kinda makes you wonder why Blizzard didn't put the Shield Battery in the game from the start. because with the new unit system, a forward shield battery would make the early protoss pushes insanely tough to deal with and make contains almost impossible to push against, especially a immortal push/contain.
Shield batteries would have a build time and wouldnt start with full energy. They are an investment that delays the attacker from exploiting the contain.
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hmmm i think blizzard realized this when they made the game and that is why stalkers suck cost for cost
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Good read, but there is something that I think you need to add. In addition to removing the defenders advantage, units without a build time is inherently broken late game and makes slips in macro significantly less punishing. This is all because warpgates only have 5 seconds turnaround on investing resources into a unit.
People like to talk about the Zerg 300 supply push, however, that extra 100 supply still has both a build time and a travel time. Protoss has the ability to do a true 300 supply push by massing up gateways at 200 supply, and warping in reinforcements as units die. This is why some people say that you cannot let protoss sit on 4+ bases. A protoss on 4+ bases can support enough warpgates that it becomes nearly impossible to finish off the army unless the other player has a large supply/upgrade/positional advantage.
My suggestions for changing warpgate as a mechanic for HOTS would be as follows. (note, gateway units would likely have to be adjusted as well)
1. Gateways should have faster net production than warpgates. Warpgate CD's should be 5-10 seconds longer than gateway build times after warpgate has been researched. ie Warpgate research enables gateways to morph into warpgates, and reduces build time from gateways by 10 seconds. Warpgate CD's are the same as gateway build times before WG research.
2. Warpgates should go on CD when supply blocked or supply capped. No more potential for constantly maxed, fielded army.
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On September 09 2011 03:55 Eps wrote: The OP makes some good points about Shield Batteries. However I don't agree at all about buffing Toss units. They're already quite Tanky as is, and that is how their position in the 3 races was always meant to be. Terrans - Ranged DPS. Zerg - The Swarm Race. Protoss - Tanks. They're positioned as they should be.
If Shield Batteries were to be re-implemented in SCII, they'd need a completely revised from the BW days. I think looking at PvP is too narrow for Shield Battery applications and ignores how it affects the other races. Mainly Zergs. Can you imagine a Zerg trying to break a Protoss defensive position with Roaches if the Toss has Immortals out? The attack speed and DPS of the Roaches would make Roach play obsolete for Zergs. That leaves them with only one early game option - Ling/Blings. Shield Batteries would end up restricting Zerg's options immensely.
The only thing I can see to get around this is to either implement some sort of Cooldown to Shield Batteries or restriction on Shield Recharging on one unit. For instance one Immortal can't be recharged over and over again.
The max energy of shield batteries can be tweaked. Also, in BW, shield batteries froze the unit it was recharging. Tweak the restoration rate, and the immortal issue isn't so bad.
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On September 09 2011 03:58 Allred wrote: hmmm i think blizzard realized this when they made the game and that is why stalkers suck cost for cost
I don't see how people can just say Stalkers suck when compared to the other race's alternatives. They're not meant to be compared to Roaches or Marauders. Neither unit can shoot up, and Stalkers are one of the fastest non-upgraded land units straight out of production.
You can't compare units of different races that play different roles simply as is without looking at the bigger picture.
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thank you TC I have been thinking this for months
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You're making a huge assumption that the relative weakness of gateway units is because of warpgates and not some other design reason. It seems to me that if gateway units were buffed too much, along with protoss splash, it would be too much. Also, you don't really think that if they just removed warpgate and buffed gateway units that wouldn't cause huge problems, like the one I just mentioned.
We should also be careful about what we mean when we say 'weak'. You can argue that neither the zealot or the stalker are weak. Zealots are basically 4 slow zerglings (with the benefit of not losing 25% of their dps for every 35 damage done) and stalkers have exceptional health despite mediocre dps. Their weakness is a design problem, not a balance problem in my opinion.
And OP, I'd like for you to explain how you think this situation has contributed to the percieved current weakness. After all, we've discussed these pointes before, but they were discarded because Protoss found ways to win regardless. When I watch Protoss lose games, I don't necessarily think, if only warpgate units were stronger. I do think it may affect the general inflexibility of the race though.
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On September 08 2011 20:04 sleepingdog wrote: Make warp-ins only possible near a Nexus or under a warp-prism.
Problem solved?
This is what I wanted to post at first thought.
It would be awesome if Blizzard would make the warp prism more viable in addition to 1.4 by restricting warp-ins to only being possible in range of warp-prisms & Nexi. By disabling early warp-gate-pressure and all-in builds, warp gate units could therefore get a slight buff e.g. in build-time and (or) DMG / HP / cost and so on.
But balance wouldn't be finished with such a change. What if the warp-ins within the area of the warp prism would create new and similar timings for the Protoss? I could imagine a situation where the P got a buff concerning their warp gate units but they still can warp in range of the prism just a bit later than usual. Ordianry builds would strike later but with stronger units as before the changes were implemented.
And once again the same problems could arise and nerfs would possibly follow. This is really difficult to balance. Perhaps there's really an issue with the warp-in mechanic as such.
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On September 09 2011 03:47 branflakes14 wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On September 09 2011 03:44 darklight54321 wrote: One thing I always considered, since i first started playing this game.
Offensive Pylons. Why is it, that the warp in mechanic requires a building just like any other? THAT is what i would change.
Lets make a new building, call it the Tal'darim Network. This building costs 100 mins and 100 gas. You can warp in within a set range of this building (same as pylon energy matrix).
THEN change the warp in mechanic. Instead of beng able to warp in with ANY pylon. Give a range to the nexus (kinda like they do the Sensor tower) in which any pylon within range of this radius can be warped in on. This upgrade to nexus cost 50/50 and is as fast as a gate into warpgate transition to build.
By combining these two aspects (warp prism can warp in too, but add 50 gas to cost) the rally advantage of protoss is actually a LARGE sacrifice of economy.
To compensate for this lack of offensive capability early on (gas limitation) you can now create cannons from the Cybernetics Core OR the forge. This makes it so the FFE is still viable, but if you 1 gate expo you can cannon like a terran bunkers or a zerg uses spine crawlers.
These changes allow for a rally advantage, but also makes it more valuable when the forward "pylon" or warp prism gets sniped (espec with warp prism buff this can make for some heavy prism play). And would effectively change the pace of PvT/Z and eliminate the 4gate v 4gate scenario of PvP.
I've always dreamed of units being being allowed to be warped in at a Warp Prism, and Gateway production speeds tweaked to compensate.
Since you apparently didn't understand what he was saying: He was suggesting that you only be able to warp in at a special (presumably slower building) structure so that early proxy pylons would not be available. Warp prisms might still work, but that would still slow the build down.
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Bring back the shield battery <333333
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I agree the shield battery is really missing, and I agree Protoss as issues in the defense department compared to Terrans and Zergs.
Counters and timing are too Brutal in my taste against a Protoss player. The defender should always have an advantage of some sort.
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Shield battery is actually such a clever fix. I hope they do this.
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Shut up, warp in is not overpowered, no one is ever going to change it or take it away, you are an idiot. This thread has no purpose. If you havent noticed protoss is at the bottom of the food chain at the moment. If warp in was taken away or slowed down without any other extremely major buffs to everything protoss has, then litterally no one would play protoss. The game is solidified and will continue to stay the way it is, sparing any small changes blizzard makes. SMALL changes.
If you dont like this game then dont play it. Your complaining and bickering will not change anything, much less help anything. If you do like this game, then again, there is no purpose of this thread. Get used to a new game, get away from f'ing sc1, and like it or leave.
User was warned for this post
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A shield battery after gateway would be an awesome idea.
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On September 09 2011 04:05 Jerubaal wrote: You're making a huge assumption that the relative weakness of gateway units is because of warpgates and not some other design reason. It seems to me that if gateway units were buffed too much, along with protoss splash, it would be too much. Also, you don't really think that if they just removed warpgate and buffed gateway units that wouldn't cause huge problems, like the one I just mentioned.
We should also be careful about what we mean when we say 'weak'. You can argue that neither the zealot or the stalker are weak. Zealots are basically 4 slow zerglings (with the benefit of not losing 25% of their dps for every 35 damage done) and stalkers have exceptional health despite mediocre dps. Their weakness is a design problem, not a balance problem in my opinion.
And OP, I'd like for you to explain how you think this situation has contributed to the percieved current weakness. After all, we've discussed these pointes before, but they were discarded because Protoss found ways to win regardless. When I watch Protoss lose games, I don't necessarily think, if only warpgate units were stronger. I do think it may affect the general inflexibility of the race though. Thank you for understanding. The OP makes some huge assumptions about unit strength and how that it is because of Warp-ins that this has come about. I see no necessary correlation or any evidence to prove that this is the case and in fact, I would argue that with the tools that Protoss has, they have the ability to be even more cost efficient than most other races (FF, Blink) even with just Gateway units.
Buffing Gateway units and keeping all else the same would really be nonsensical as this would simply ruin ZvP. As I said in an earlier post, Protoss early game is already very strong and can trade very well with Zerg. If you have good FF's, you can usually come out way ahead in early engagements. If you also buff Protoss GW units and keep FF the way it is, the GW units will simply demolish all Zerg early/mid game. In addition, with the "weakened units", their late game is still pretty strong with later tech (HT, Robo Tech). If you buffed GW units, again the late game compositions will simply be out of control. Any kind of buff would have to be tempered by nerfs to several other facets of Protoss gameplay (early - late).
Also, anyone who is saying that Shield Batteries are a good idea haven't really thought about its implications in an offensive setting. Sure, it might be great defensively and allow for some better PvP, but in a contain scenario, it'd be flat out ridiculous (especially against Zerg). =/
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On September 09 2011 04:03 Eps wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 03:58 Allred wrote: hmmm i think blizzard realized this when they made the game and that is why stalkers suck cost for cost I don't see how people can just say Stalkers suck when compared to the other race's alternatives. They're not meant to be compared to Roaches or Marauders. Neither unit can shoot up, and Stalkers are one of the fastest non-upgraded land units straight out of production. You can't compare units of different races that play different roles simply as is without looking at the bigger picture.
This has been debated since the game came out and the simple answer is that it's true that certain units do well in certain situations and not so well in other situations. It just so happens that the situation that stalkers do not do so well in is a fair fight. The groaning has died down as pros maneuver themselves into situations where the stalker can do well, namely with sentry support and blink.
My question then is, what happens when you look at the bigger picture and it sucks?
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this article raises an interesting point that I hadn't thought of before. I really would like to sse thte shield battery back even if it had to be severely weakened.
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Interesting article, I never really looked it at that way. Warp gates probably won't be tossed away, though Blizzard should really look into fixing Protoss either in a patch or in the next expansion (preferably the sooner the better).
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On September 09 2011 04:19 arsenic wrote: Thank you for understanding. The OP makes some huge assumptions about unit strength and how that it is because of Warp-ins that this has come about. I see no necessary correlation or any evidence to prove that this is the case and in fact, I would argue that with the tools that Protoss has, they have the ability to be even more cost efficient than most other races (FF, Blink) even with just Gateway units.
That assumption is easy enough to test. Play against the best Toss practice partner you know and have him not use Warpgates at all. Or play it yourself without using Warpgates. Maybe you guys could still trade efficiently with gateway units. I however, seriously doubt it.
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Why not a shield battery? I think it's a great idea.
It would be even more cool if it were a ground robotics unit - maybe available after core or forge, and could have a phase mode/zone like the warp prism? Maybe it could transfer shields OR energy?
This would also help against Ghosts, since they would have to decide to EMP the shield battery or the casters.
Then again, it would fit as an ability for the sentry - the name and unit design fits perfectly. Maybe give hallucination to the warp prism or back to the HT?
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Shield battery unit (like warp prism) + warp gate cooldown slightly longer would be an AMAZING boost to strategic variety and excitement IMO. Do it Blizzard!
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What a stupid thread... If there's a shield battery, what makes you think I won't build one at my forward pylon too? Warp gate is an awesome mechanic, do you know how hard it is as protoss to leave their base once speedlings are out? How hard it is to deal with multipronged drops when the fastest unit you have is a stalker with blink that just happens to be hard countered by a stim mm drop?
I don't think you really know enough to be discussing the warp gate mechanic, trust me it does much more for P than it takes away.
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On September 09 2011 04:05 Jerubaal wrote: You're making a huge assumption that the relative weakness of gateway units is because of warpgates and not some other design reason. It seems to me that if gateway units were buffed too much, along with protoss splash, it would be too much. Also, you don't really think that if they just removed warpgate and buffed gateway units that wouldn't cause huge problems, like the one I just mentioned.
We should also be careful about what we mean when we say 'weak'. You can argue that neither the zealot or the stalker are weak. Zealots are basically 4 slow zerglings (with the benefit of not losing 25% of their dps for every 35 damage done) and stalkers have exceptional health despite mediocre dps. Their weakness is a design problem, not a balance problem in my opinion.
And OP, I'd like for you to explain how you think this situation has contributed to the percieved current weakness. After all, we've discussed these pointes before, but they were discarded because Protoss found ways to win regardless. When I watch Protoss lose games, I don't necessarily think, if only warpgate units were stronger. I do think it may affect the general inflexibility of the race though.
You say it, man. "Protoss found ways to win regardless." Go to the TL- front page where the IEM article about MC is. One line in there says that Protoss is UP at the highest level of play and that despite MC's wins in the past, he should not have won those tourneys in the first place. And I tell you why.
Terrans have been doing fine all along the way. Nothing wrong with that. However Zerg and Toss as races have gone through a lot of Ups and Downs as races.
For a long time Zergs were perceived to be "weak" and broken. And indeed Zergs got destroyed by so many timing pushes Ps and Ts were throwing at them. Looking back at those times I believe that a lot of this perceived "imbalances" were due to Zerg having the overall hardest learning curve in terms of basic macro, knowing when to drone and what units to build depending on the very little information you get from scouting. In the end lots of pushes were nerfed and the hard training for Zergs paid off: they learned their race, figured out how to hold timing attacks and mastered their race.
When MC won his first GSL, it was the BitByBit.Prime-Season where one-base allins were the cookie cutter strategies per se. And MC won mostly because he had timings and FF abuse that other players had no answer to. Yet.
After that Protoss had again a harsh time as maps changed and the game evolved. At that time Muta-Ling was very present and caused huge trouble for Protosses. But they found a solution called "6gate". Another timing push Zerg again had to take into account, learn to scout it and defend it.
After that it was deathball time. And all the world screamed "imba-toss". Terrans didn't know when to make vikings and how many of them to kill colossi and when to make ghosts to fight off templars. Zergs thought that waiting passively for the Toss to max out and then suiciding Roaches, Hydras and Corrupters into the Deathball was the way to go. As we know now, it was not.
But after some time, Terrans found the right combination of Medivacs and Vikings and Ghosts costing 100 gas made things easier as well. Zergs finally started using their brain and developped Roach/Ling aggression builds, Hydra/Roach drops, Banelings bombs, early 3 bases and finally Infestors and Broodlords.
Since then the situation got worse and worse for Toss to a point where I don't watch SC2 anymore, but instead crave for BW-Vods.
So what does this have to do with the topic?
As some have stated: Gateway units suck compared to their Terran or zerg counter party. Not only in terms of cost-efficiency, but also in terms of viability.
Imagine Protoss having good units for drops: Not only the dropped units would destroy your worker line but immediate reinforcements through warp-in would make Protoss drops more dangerous than any BFH-drop in the world.
You can't split your units as Toss since they are bad, you can't benefit from multi-tasking and dropping. All Protosses have done so far is relying on timings. Now those timings have been figured out and Protosses are losing games left and right.
The 1/1/1 is the ultimate proof that Gateway Units are made to get dumped into the trash can:
You don't have HTs or Colossi out in time, so can't fight mass marines.
The sole fact that Toss NEEDs one or both of these units to actually stay alive is a huge design blunder itself. They are not supporting the Protoss army as Medivacs or Ghosts do for Terrans or Infestors for Zerg, they are Core Units. Yet for being so important they are so fragile at times and Zs and Ts have found their ways to get rid of them.
There is a reason why the best way for Ps against Z is to turtle get 3 bases and hope to kill the Zerg in one push.
Without Colossi or HT there is almost no way to fight a Zerg. Even if you win an engagement (mainly through FF abuse), the next one the Zerg will probably come out on top.
Just look at BW. There were ways for Protoss to be aggressive at certain times and move out. As of now, despite some cute DT or Phoenix harass there is almost now Protoss aggression.
The risk of losing an engagment (which is easy with cost inefficient units) and being afterwards behind (your units cost more and are weaker, yet your economy is not better) is too big.
If that is the game you want to watch, there you have it.
I will look in here from times to times, get a glimpse of what is going on in the tournament scene and watch some TvT (great positional play coupled with harass) or TvZ (at least both races have their means to apply pressure and push eventually).
But for me as a Protoss-player/fan SC2 is not really appealing to me, since it hurts to watch Protoss - and I am not talking about 1/1/1 here.
And yes, this is a rant.
Maybe some magic-toss will show a neat timing and own up everything. But then again: It will get nerfed or figured out.
I can't remember any huge evolution or innovation in the way Protoss is played.
Is this because Protoss players are dumb and stupid or is it due to desgin flaws?
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what i'd like to see would be that units which get warped close to a nexus, recieve a 10s armor buff or smth.
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Wouldn't a fairly easy fix to the durability/trading problem be to give all protoss units their armour value as shield armour and instead make the shield upgrades a flat % bonus to shield regeneration? EMP could be easily dealt with by reducing the Shield damage done to 50 pts instead of 100.
Unless I'm spectacularly misunderstanding how shields work. Rather than blaming warp in mechanics (which are important to making races feel diverse) I'd prefer to do something mathematical.
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My suggestion:
Warp-ins only available through Warp Prisms. Other then that, Gateways only produce as they do pre-upgrade, similar to how Terran produces.
This change would stop PvP 4-gate vs. 4.gate, still allow warp-in to be used effectively when used in a smart way (attack+warp-in with prism behind the base, especially with w.prism getting buffed now), make some ridiculous Protoss timing pushes less effective (would help other races to defend) and overall would result in a better game imo. I'm surprised it has taken this long to notice how ridiculous and abusive warpgate mechanic is when it comes to being on the offensive timing pushes. Also, as the article mentioned, if you make warp-in only through warp-prisms, then you may buff gateway units to be stronger, and nerfing big hitters like Colossus a little bit to overall balance things out in a much wider way.
Great post, OP.
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On September 09 2011 04:39 Sevenofnines wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 04:19 arsenic wrote: Thank you for understanding. The OP makes some huge assumptions about unit strength and how that it is because of Warp-ins that this has come about. I see no necessary correlation or any evidence to prove that this is the case and in fact, I would argue that with the tools that Protoss has, they have the ability to be even more cost efficient than most other races (FF, Blink) even with just Gateway units.
That assumption is easy enough to test. Play against the best Toss practice partner you know and have him not use Warpgates at all. Or play it yourself without using Warpgates. Maybe you guys could still trade efficiently with gateway units. I however, seriously doubt it.
Unit build times are balanced around warpgate. The last few patches seem to indicate that (hypothetically) if warpgates were removed, the gateway build times would be reduced.
We're not seeing a direct connection between warpgates and the 'weakness' of gateway units. It always seemed to me that gateway units were meant to be weaker and the tier 3 aoe compensated for that. The sentry is there to compensate in the early game, but, as I said, that's not a balance issue, that's a desigin issue.
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cant think of any good solutions to this
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On September 09 2011 04:44 tehemperorer wrote: What a stupid thread... If there's a shield battery, what makes you think I won't build one at my forward pylon too?
Forward shield battery will not be as good as you think it will be. Let's say that the build time for a shield battery is the same as a gateway, which would be very reasonable as it is still faster than a forge+cannon and thus is easily completed before 4gate hits. That's 65 game seconds after the proxy pylon is already finished building. Now let us assume that the shield battery will start with 50 energy, like all casters, and has the same functionality as the BW shield battery. 2 shield pts per energy, unit is stunned while being regenerated. That's 100 additional shield pts upon completion, 2/3rds that of a zealots total HP. No, I don't see a shield battery being very useful at all except for holding choke points and preventing key units from being focused down.
It would give protoss something extra to contain with, but the shield battery should need to sit around for a while to gain cost effectiveness; at that point, you've been contained for a time already where the shield battery was detrimental to your opponent's effort.
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On September 09 2011 05:04 Jerubaal wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 04:39 Sevenofnines wrote:On September 09 2011 04:19 arsenic wrote: Thank you for understanding. The OP makes some huge assumptions about unit strength and how that it is because of Warp-ins that this has come about. I see no necessary correlation or any evidence to prove that this is the case and in fact, I would argue that with the tools that Protoss has, they have the ability to be even more cost efficient than most other races (FF, Blink) even with just Gateway units.
That assumption is easy enough to test. Play against the best Toss practice partner you know and have him not use Warpgates at all. Or play it yourself without using Warpgates. Maybe you guys could still trade efficiently with gateway units. I however, seriously doubt it. Unit build times are balanced around warpgate. The last few patches seem to indicate that (hypothetically) if warpgates were removed, the gateway build times would be reduced. We're not seeing a direct connection between warpgates and the 'weakness' of gateway units. It always seemed to me that gateway units were meant to be weaker and the tier 3 aoe compensated for that. The sentry is there to compensate in the early game, but, as I said, that's not a balance issue, that's a desigin issue.
I don't think anyone talks about balance here, at least that is not why I follow this thread, but because of design issues. And WG and its implications is an issue to me.
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On September 09 2011 04:44 tehemperorer wrote: What a stupid thread... If there's a shield battery, what makes you think I won't build one at my forward pylon too? Warp gate is an awesome mechanic, do you know how hard it is as protoss to leave their base once speedlings are out? How hard it is to deal with multipronged drops when the fastest unit you have is a stalker with blink that just happens to be hard countered by a stim mm drop?
I don't think you really know enough to be discussing the warp gate mechanic, trust me it does much more for P than it takes away. You could make it a robotics unit so it can't be warped in. If you tech you can defend warp-gate all-ins better.
Getting rid of pylon warp-in is not necessary. We just have to make warp-gates slightly slower than gateways.
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maybe make it so warping it so theres a warpgate button that shifts warpgates into "defensive mode" where when you click to warp in a unit it warps in next to the warpgate and then runs out to the rally of the warpgates (also allow warpgates to have a rally now)
when warpgates are in "defensive mode", cooldowns of unit buildtimes are reduced
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I believe the OP is true in some kind of sense. Protoss timing pushes are balanced in the sense if its assumed that protoss has a short rally (warping) however if they dont have it its pretty much isnt the same. The OP suggests to make warpping units offensively weaker however defensively stronger. There is one other way to deal with this as a solution.
First off, warpping units in should not have full 100% shields. By having something like 0% shield when first warped in, it gives units in a offensive sense weaker. However in order to make the defensive sense stronger, we can allow "normal constructing queueing" of gateways rather than warp gate warpping allow full 100% shields. The advantages of having warp gates would be the instant reinforcements and shorter cooldown for units such as HT and DT while normal gateway queueing allows full shield on creation but shorter cooldown for units such as zealots and stalkers.
This should help decide another new style factor for protoss to be more leaned towards warp style or the old standard brood war queueing style for protoss. Each having their benefits and weakness. This is merely a suggested idea that might offer a alternative solution to the OP as well as not making protoss so linear about style choices in battle. It might also amend some things about PvP 4 gate issue by allowing the defensive end having a slight advantage by having shorter cooldown time for zealot and stalker for queueing up (no need to warp in their base when the battle is on their defensive end) while the offensive can instantly reinforce but have a slight attackers disadvantage by having no shields.
It could be no shield or 50% shield, but either way, the idea is there.
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On September 09 2011 03:55 Eps wrote: The OP makes some good points about Shield Batteries. However I don't agree at all about buffing Toss units. They're already quite Tanky as is, and that is how their position in the 3 races was always meant to be. Terrans - Ranged DPS. Zerg - The Swarm Race. Protoss - Tanks. They're positioned as they should be.
If Shield Batteries were to be re-implemented in SCII, they'd need a completely revised from the BW days. I think looking at PvP is too narrow for Shield Battery applications and ignores how it affects the other races. Mainly Zergs. Can you imagine a Zerg trying to break a Protoss defensive position with Roaches if the Toss has Immortals out? The attack speed and DPS of the Roaches would make Roach play obsolete for Zergs. That leaves them with only one early game option - Ling/Blings. Shield Batteries would end up restricting Zerg's options immensely.
The only thing I can see to get around this is to either implement some sort of Cooldown to Shield Batteries or restriction on Shield Recharging on one unit. For instance one Immortal can't be recharged over and over again.
Wait wait wait, so immortals will be a decent solution to countering roaches as a defensive measure, when coupled with a building to support it? Is that not EXACTLY what we want? If you're opponent is massing a shitton of roaches, immortals are rarely the answer as is, despite being a hard counter, simply because Colossus are far better from the Robo. You rarely see someone get more than 2-3 Immortals, tops. If you go crashing in with Roaches vs a person camping with immortals + shield batteries, don't go pure Roach? It's not like zerglings/hydras/mutas have ANY problem with Immortals, JUST roaches, and even then in the current state of the game mass roach can ignore a few immortals tickling them.
I disagree with you 100%.
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A lot of people mistake this thread for some sort of whine or. (Im)balance discussion, when really it's about how a fundamental aspect of a race greatly affects a key feature of RTSs in general.
I really like how a lot of you are trying to find ways around it though. It's very possible that warp-ins fundamentally disturb the strategical balance in an RTS game, and alternatives should be discussed on ways to fix the current situation.
Personally, I'm a big fan of the shield battery idea, assuming a few changes are made to warpgates and shield regen as well. The idea would to reduce SOME of the effectiveness of warpgates in assault, while increasing SOME of the effectiveness at defending. Regardless, adding such a game-altering structure should be dealt with cautiously.
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Not sure how I like the shield battery idea. However, as some before have mentioned, it would be great if there's an advantage to using a regular gateway over a warp-gate. (Why the hell give us the option to switch back if there's no reason to, Blizzard?)
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i dont think there is a way to fix protoss without fundamental design changes, which are unlikely to occur until hots or later. The new patch will help slightly I think. Would really liek to see amulet brought back as well. TvP has never dropped below 40% afaik, and i dont think khaydarin is imbalanced at all.
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I always found the warp in mechanic in itself to be silly game design. Why would you make a mechanic that trivializes map features and dumbs them down? Makes no sense.
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United States7483 Posts
You know, I feel like one easy fix would be to put another spell on the nexus besides chrono boost. The Terran OC has 3 spells (supply drop, mule, and scan). There's no reason necessarily that you couldn't put a spell on the nexus that helps with defense but doesn't help much with offense. Something like a spell that buffs an area (a targeted area of effect buff) with a range limitation so it can't be used on offense, or perhaps an upgrade that turns the nexus into a shield battery? Or even an energy battery that can transfer its energy to a sentry or a high templar?
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Yep, shield batteries are a new building, something they would never add until the expansion, but one addition the should definitely make. There is no way someone can argue that they would be too powerful. It's a shield battery! How often were they used in BW?
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On September 09 2011 04:39 Sevenofnines wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 04:19 arsenic wrote: Thank you for understanding. The OP makes some huge assumptions about unit strength and how that it is because of Warp-ins that this has come about. I see no necessary correlation or any evidence to prove that this is the case and in fact, I would argue that with the tools that Protoss has, they have the ability to be even more cost efficient than most other races (FF, Blink) even with just Gateway units.
That assumption is easy enough to test. Play against the best Toss practice partner you know and have him not use Warpgates at all. Or play it yourself without using Warpgates. Maybe you guys could still trade efficiently with gateway units. I however, seriously doubt it. How one could test the design behind the 'strength' of units and why they are that way is beyond me... You'd have to go to the developers for the answer. What you are suggesting would not test those assumptions in any way.
In regards to what I think you're getting at, I wouldn't have to test to know that Protoss Gateway units are able to trade evenly and in some situations very favorably against Zerg. I have played enough games where FF and or Blink has let the Protoss come out very far ahead in engagements to know that this is the case.
Also again, for those of you who are for the Shield Battery... please think about what this would do offensively and how absolutely broken it would be if you didn't make drastic changes in another area. =/
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i think ther is no imbalance in this points. in the lategame fight you never talk about collosi, voidray etc. with those units a protoss army is very strong and the warpin is not that big of a deal. at this point of the game when protoss gets to this often called deathball, the efficiency of this army is the best and the other two races have to trade in the fights to stop it. in the early game point my opinion is, that the protoss got more and more greedier in their openings (for example mc on terminus, he walls very far forward to cover all three bases). such builds are of course weak against early aggression, but i think it is not imbalanced. its the task of the protoss to find new builds, that are solid and have no decent eco disadvantage. this is how the game goes. zerg played long time roach hydra corrupter vs protoss, then protoss learned to beat that and zerg had to find new things. so in my opinion this is not a question of imbalance or such things i think it is the normal way starcraft 2 gets explored in terms of strategies and openings.
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Its a cool idea but would totally throw game balance off
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what if forge was required for colussals not robo bay? Bay required for range/upgrades etc ?
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Units made out of normal Gateways take 5 seconds less to make.
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On September 09 2011 05:36 iRon aka bananajuice wrote:i think ther is no imbalance in this points. in the lategame fight you never talk about collosi, voidray etc. with those units a protoss army is very strong and the warpin is not that big of a deal. at this point of the game when protoss gets to this often called deathball, the efficiency of this army is the best and the other two races have to trade in the fights to stop it. in the early game point my opinion is, that the protoss got more and more greedier in their openings (for example mc on terminus, he walls very far forward to cover all three bases). such builds are of course weak against early aggression, but i think it is not imbalanced. its the task of the protoss to find new builds, that are solid and have no decent eco disadvantage. this is how the game goes. zerg played long time roach hydra corrupter vs protoss, then protoss learned to beat that and zerg had to find new things. so in my opinion this is not a question of imbalance or such things i think it is the normal way starcraft 2 gets explored in terms of strategies and openings. I agree with most points, however protoss is not always the more "efficient" .. It is all about the engagement and how it goes. I am talking mostly to PvT here.
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On September 09 2011 05:35 arsenic wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 04:39 Sevenofnines wrote:On September 09 2011 04:19 arsenic wrote: Thank you for understanding. The OP makes some huge assumptions about unit strength and how that it is because of Warp-ins that this has come about. I see no necessary correlation or any evidence to prove that this is the case and in fact, I would argue that with the tools that Protoss has, they have the ability to be even more cost efficient than most other races (FF, Blink) even with just Gateway units.
That assumption is easy enough to test. Play against the best Toss practice partner you know and have him not use Warpgates at all. Or play it yourself without using Warpgates. Maybe you guys could still trade efficiently with gateway units. I however, seriously doubt it. How one could test the design behind the 'strength' of units and why they are that way is beyond me... You'd have to go to the developers for the answer. What you are suggesting would not test those assumptions in any way. In regards to what I think you're getting at, I wouldn't have to test to know that Protoss Gateway units are able to trade evenly and in some situations very favorably against Zerg. I have played enough games where FF and or Blink has let the Protoss come out very far ahead in engagements to know that this is the case. Also again, for those of you who are for the Shield Battery... please think about what this would do offensively and how absolutely broken it would be if you didn't make drastic changes in another area. =/ Fungal growth, and nueral parasite do the same. Please don't make a balance whine in the post ^_^. But yeah, the sheild battery would be a really stupid thing to add to this game, but I would say that they would be kind of insane lategame if you just built some in the middle of a map like shakuras.
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The OP is right, and actually stuff people have said for a while. I really like the shield battery idea. Obviously it's an idea for the expansion, but I think it'd be a great solution to the problem. (And yeah, just adding it would have balance problems, but in an expansion you're doing that to all races, so they hopefully balance out, and you can tweak existing stuff accordingly.)
I really think warpgate tech should be a midgame-researched upgrade. Have build times be roughly the same before and after. Make the tech really just about the ability to make units appear anywhere instantly. That should be good enough on its own. (This will make proxy-gate rushes stronger... which is ok to an extent, but will require some nerfing of build times or unit stats to prevent being insane. And yes, that creates other problems, some of which might be solved by a shield battery that just requires a core...)
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I think the problem is that the game is being balanced "mathematically," and thus some bad protoss win situations that they shouldn't have won, while some good protoss lose situations that they should have won.
So overall balance can be achieved before HoTS, but it's still going to be unfair by design.
I know this is not a balance thread, but my point is that the experience of playing as Protoss suffers heavily, because Warp Gate design and Balance cannot be reconciled intuitively. So it may be balanced and still Protoss would have extremely volatile matchups, held only by a fine mathematical balance that breaks easily as soon as gameplay diversifies.
This is the sacrifice that was made in order to keep the cool idea of Warp Gates. But let's face it, it's volatile by nature and is really not good a gameplay experience design.
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You may state that protoss is disadvantaged because of warp in, but they gave us sentries. Sentries are so good it makes up for it. And also wide open expos are bad for terran and zerg sometimes too.
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On September 09 2011 05:04 Jerubaal wrote: Unit build times are balanced around warpgate. The last few patches seem to indicate that (hypothetically) if warpgates were removed, the gateway build times would be reduced.
We're not seeing a direct connection between warpgates and the 'weakness' of gateway units. It always seemed to me that gateway units were meant to be weaker and the tier 3 aoe compensated for that. The sentry is there to compensate in the early game, but, as I said, that's not a balance issue, that's a desigin issue.
If there was no connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units, then you could simply remove warpgates, keep all else equal, and there should be NO CHANGE in the strength of gateway units. That's pretty much the definition of no connection. But you, me, and everyone else here knows Protoss wouldn't stand a chance in a situation like that; that part of the strength of gateway units is the fact that you can make them so quickly and instantly reinforce via warpgates. While the actual stats of the units themselves and the resource/food costs would be the same, unit build times are an equally big part of what makes units weak or strong. The fact that gateway units NEED quick build times either via Warpgates or via a reduced Gateway build time if warpgates were removed, means that they are weak. Without the speedy build times they wouldn't stand a ghost of a chance.
Anyone can feel free to prove me wrong and play without warpgates. I think you'll find out just how much people take for granted that extra round of troops that instantly arrive before and during a battle. And that without the warpgate mechanic's quick build/reinforce times, gateway units are hopelessly weak compared to Terran and Zerg counterparts.
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On September 09 2011 05:47 Bippzy wrote: You may state that protoss is disadvantaged because of warp in, but they gave us sentries. Sentries are so good it makes up for it. And also wide open expos are bad for terran and zerg sometimes too. The problem the OP is pointing out isn't that protoss is fundamentally disadvantaged. You can balance the game like it is. (Remove stalkers, protoss is too weak, make them do 10 times their normal damage and protoss is too strong. Somewhere in between lies balance.) The problem is that the lack of a defender's advantage for protoss leads to them having to be more aggressive and not having good early expand options. Sentries are very good, and plenty good enough to win, but only when there are ramps are they *better* when defending than they are when attacking. That's the point.
Also, thinking about the shield battery thing more.... What about having the Nexus function as a shield battery? That should make it much more defensive.
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On September 09 2011 05:33 Fig wrote: Yep, shield batteries are a new building, something they would never add until the expansion, but one addition the should definitely make. There is no way someone can argue that they would be too powerful. It's a shield battery! How often were they used in BW?
I know, right? And some people actually think even a nerfed version would somehow be OP...
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So i just got another Idea and I think it is a good one. Buff the basic protoss units, but in order to mitigate the instant resupply advantage, make it so new warpins start with 0 shields. OR, if that is to harsh you can also add gateways having same build time as warpgates, therefore you would be able to get units for defense in teh standard way without having 0 shields. this would give incentive to switch back to gateways when need to defend or something etc. sound reasonable at all?
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On September 09 2011 05:53 MrBarryObama wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 05:33 Fig wrote: Yep, shield batteries are a new building, something they would never add until the expansion, but one addition the should definitely make. There is no way someone can argue that they would be too powerful. It's a shield battery! How often were they used in BW? I know, right? And some people actually think even a nerfed version would somehow be OP... If you think the game is roughly balanced now, then adding them would definitely be imbalanced, because it's something that helps one side in an otherwise balanced game. (Unless they're literally never used, in which case it's a bad idea for different reasons...)
That said, I'm really tired of people calling individual things that favor one side or another imbalanced. You can only judge balance of the overall game, not of individual things. Almost anything can be put in the game and the game can be made balanced by tweaking stats of other things.
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Ok here, look at it this way - Expand vs Pressure builds.
A) Look at a Protoss timing push vs a Terran expand build. Protoss 3gate pressure (into expand), vs a Terran 1rax gasless expand into 3 rax.
Terran expands, scouts the 3gate pressure, and bunkers up. Would you say this is a fair fight? Protoss is probably going to get repelled, but theres a chance that they can break it if the Terran is sloppy. It can go both ways, theres tension in the matchup, and it feels balanced. If the attack fails, Protoss is behind, and Terran has defended well. If the attack does damage, the attack has succeeded, and the Terran is behind.
What's actually happening in this example is that the Terran is compensating for their smaller army (since they expanded first) by using a defenders advantage - the bunker with repair. The salient features are: Protoss has a larger army (expanded later, pumped units early) Protoss has a short rally (warpin) Terran has a small army (expanded first, units later) Terran has bunkers (defenders advantage) Terran has a short rally (home base)
And this SET of features creates a fair fight.
B) Now flip the roles. Terran's doing a 2rax pressure (12 + 16 rax, 1 tech 1 reactor, concussive researched) vs a Protoss 1gate expand into 4gates.
These are more or less equivalent builds to the previous example, except its 2rax+addons which is slightly cheaper than 3gates + cyber. Anyways, Protoss scouts the 2rax. The Protoss, on 1 base with a nexus building and 4gates on their way, cannot get cannons up in time. No defensive structure is available, and the natural is wide open. The Protoss expanded off 1 gate, so they have at most, 3 units when the push hits (Stalker Sentry x2 usually), with no repaired bunker to fall back on.
I think we're all familiar with this situation. MC lost in this exact situation to Polt. This fight is NOT fair, its almost a build order loss. You either sac your nexus and abuse your defenders advantage (ramp + sentry), or SEVERELY outmicro your opponent. (Or you could be on Shakuras and you can FF your natural. Which is why I stated in the OP that these maps are good)
Again, examining the salient features: Protoss has a smaller army (expanded first) Protoss has a short rally (home base) Protoss has no defensive structure after gate Terran has a larger army (units first) Terran has a LONG rally (attacking)
And this SET of conditions results in a Terran gaining an advantage the majority of the time.
My argument is that an economically focused, defending Protoss, when they engage, has essentially the same characteristics as a Protoss doing a timing attack with a small army... which is, of course, a terrible idea, and results in losses.
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On September 09 2011 05:52 aristarchus wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 05:47 Bippzy wrote: You may state that protoss is disadvantaged because of warp in, but they gave us sentries. Sentries are so good it makes up for it. And also wide open expos are bad for terran and zerg sometimes too. The problem the OP is pointing out isn't that protoss is fundamentally disadvantaged. You can balance the game like it is. (Remove stalkers, protoss is too weak, make them do 10 times their normal damage and protoss is too strong. Somewhere in between lies balance.) The problem is that the lack of a defender's advantage for protoss leads to them having to be more aggressive and not having good early expand options. Sentries are very good, and plenty good enough to win, but only when there are ramps are they *better* when defending than they are when attacking. That's the point. Also, thinking about the shield battery thing more.... What about having the Nexus function as a shield battery? That should make it much more defensive.
Noooooo 6 pools impossible to win now
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however, as a master protoss the strange thing is my strats against terran/zerg are now highly revolving around not using warpgates and getting zero sentries
against terran is like to do a fast double robo + tons of immortals build. immortals are good against barracks units and actually pretty much can beat marines in food amounts less than 100food, however this build is a coinflip and auto loses to fast banshees
against zerg i like to do fast stargates, 1gate + stargate + expansion with zero sentries and then after i expand i like to get two stargates and pump out plenty voidrays with a couple cannons to defend against fast roach or baneling aggression and then go into robo to get immortals/collossi. with cannons ive found hydra pressure isnt that strong against this as long as you defend well with cannons and immortals are not too bad against hydras and as long as you keep scouting your base to prevent nydus ive found this strategy is pretty golden against zerg
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On September 09 2011 05:35 arsenic wrote:
How one could test the design behind the 'strength' of units and why they are that way is beyond me... You'd have to go to the developers for the answer. What you are suggesting would not test those assumptions in any way.
In regards to what I think you're getting at, I wouldn't have to test to know that Protoss Gateway units are able to trade evenly and in some situations very favorably against Zerg. I have played enough games where FF and or Blink has let the Protoss come out very far ahead in engagements to know that this is the case.
That's a cute dodge, but you still didn't address the issue at hand. The OP thinks that gateway unit strength is related to warpgates: specifically he thinks they have been made weaker to compensate for the advantages provided by warpgates. You disagree and claim there is little to no correlation at all. If that was the case, then removing warpgates completely and keeping all else equal should provide little to no change to the strength of the gateway units. You should be able to be just as effective without warpgates as with because you say there is supposedly no connection between warpgates and unit strength.
However I think you and I both know that Protoss wouldn't stand a chance without warpgates. You cite instances where you held off Zerg armies with FF and Blink, but what you don't recognize is that those spells were HEAVILY augmented by the fact that you are using warpgates to build and reinforce quickly, and thus have more Blink Stalkers and FF's available. I would posit that without the warpgate's added round of units and instant reinforcements, many of those engagements would have gone south for you very quickly unless you were just outright more skilled than your opponent. Like it or not, that IS a direct connection between unit strength and warpgates.
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I disagree with what your statement is.
Warpgate changes everything about protoss and it needs to be thought out in a completely different light. You can't just go off of gateway units defensively but you can offensively. To have to use robo or stargate tech to defend stuff I think is a really crazy thing.
What a lot of people seem to have forgotten is that lesson that we learned during TSL3. Gateway units work better for open feilds and HT's colossi and carriers are better for the closer ones. now we got to worry about where we use them as well.
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After thinking about the shield battery option more... I think it is truly the best idea. You should only be able to make it if you have a gateway and it just heals shields. This means it can be something used reactionarily like the bunker and spine etc... I hope blizzard considers this.
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On September 09 2011 05:15 DreamRaider wrote: I believe the OP is true in some kind of sense. Protoss timing pushes are balanced in the sense if its assumed that protoss has a short rally (warping) however if they dont have it its pretty much isnt the same. The OP suggests to make warpping units offensively weaker however defensively stronger. There is one other way to deal with this as a solution.
First off, warpping units in should not have full 100% shields. By having something like 0% shield when first warped in, it gives units in a offensive sense weaker. However in order to make the defensive sense stronger, we can allow "normal constructing queueing" of gateways rather than warp gate warpping allow full 100% shields. The advantages of having warp gates would be the instant reinforcements and shorter cooldown for units such as HT and DT while normal gateway queueing allows full shield on creation but shorter cooldown for units such as zealots and stalkers.
This should help decide another new style factor for protoss to be more leaned towards warp style or the old standard brood war queueing style for protoss. Each having their benefits and weakness. This is merely a suggested idea that might offer a alternative solution to the OP as well as not making protoss so linear about style choices in battle. It might also amend some things about PvP 4 gate issue by allowing the defensive end having a slight advantage by having shorter cooldown time for zealot and stalker for queueing up (no need to warp in their base when the battle is on their defensive end) while the offensive can instantly reinforce but have a slight attackers disadvantage by having no shields.
It could be no shield or 50% shield, but either way, the idea is there. The thing about Qing stuff up is that it takes time to build things. This is weaker defensively vs drops and run byes. I think that the Warp mechanic is defensively quite good currently. I think forcing you to only warp in units close to a warpgate instead of pylons(so if you proxy a warp gate in their base you could warp into their base.) It would make defending against Muta counters, Ling run byes, Terran drops etc. very good while warping in offensively is unpractical. In turn for the nerf you could make stalkers good vs Marauders (Stalkers are a joke vs them) and decent vs roaches by giving a slight buffed attack vs armoured and making Stalkers light units.
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On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something?
Nice balance whine that has nothing to do with the topic.
OP: excellent analysis and I really like the idea of re-introducing the shield battery or another type of non-attacking defensive structure that gets unlocked via gateway.
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On September 09 2011 05:59 FabledIntegral wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 05:52 aristarchus wrote:On September 09 2011 05:47 Bippzy wrote: You may state that protoss is disadvantaged because of warp in, but they gave us sentries. Sentries are so good it makes up for it. And also wide open expos are bad for terran and zerg sometimes too. The problem the OP is pointing out isn't that protoss is fundamentally disadvantaged. You can balance the game like it is. (Remove stalkers, protoss is too weak, make them do 10 times their normal damage and protoss is too strong. Somewhere in between lies balance.) The problem is that the lack of a defender's advantage for protoss leads to them having to be more aggressive and not having good early expand options. Sentries are very good, and plenty good enough to win, but only when there are ramps are they *better* when defending than they are when attacking. That's the point. Also, thinking about the shield battery thing more.... What about having the Nexus function as a shield battery? That should make it much more defensive. Noooooo 6 pools impossible to win now lol. Not sure that's really so bad... But if you care, you could make the Nexus's shield battery function an upgrade of roughly the same cost as warpgate, have it come from the core basically replacing warp gate in the current build order timings, and everything would be great.
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On September 09 2011 06:01 Sevenofnines wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 05:35 arsenic wrote:
How one could test the design behind the 'strength' of units and why they are that way is beyond me... You'd have to go to the developers for the answer. What you are suggesting would not test those assumptions in any way.
In regards to what I think you're getting at, I wouldn't have to test to know that Protoss Gateway units are able to trade evenly and in some situations very favorably against Zerg. I have played enough games where FF and or Blink has let the Protoss come out very far ahead in engagements to know that this is the case.
That's a cute dodge, but you still didn't address the issue at hand. The OP thinks that gateway unit strength is related to warpgates: specifically he thinks they have been made weaker to compensate for the advantages provided by warpgates. You disagree and claim there is little to no correlation at all. If that was the case, then removing warpgates completely and keeping all else equal should provide little to no change to the strength of the gateway units. You should be able to be just as effective without warpgates as with because you say there is supposedly no connection between warpgates and unit strength. However I think you and I both know that Protoss wouldn't stand a chance without warpgates. You cite instances where you held off Zerg armies with FF and Blink, but what you don't recognize is that those spells were HEAVILY augmented by the fact that you are using warpgates to build and reinforce quickly, and thus have more Blink Stalkers and FF's available. I would posit that without the warpgate's added round of units and instant reinforcements, many of those engagements would have gone south for you very quickly unless you were just outright more skilled than your opponent. Like it or not, that IS a direct connection between unit strength and warpgates.
protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
in even food amounts, 10 stalkers beat 10 roaches. roaches are cheaper, however protoss race design means if protoss gets 200food then his max army beats the zergs max army. 100 stalkers beat 100 roaches, and the zerg doesnt have the option of having a bigger army because of the foodcap
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the problem with warpgates is there isnt a way to make both sides even
if you balance warpgates so protoss aggression isnt overpowered, it means protoss defense is underpowered
if you balance warpgates so protoss defense isnt underpowered, then the aggression is overpowered
currently, the warpgate buildtimes are balanced so protoss aggression is not overpowered, this means currently protoss is equal with the other races in the aggression option, but protoss is weaker with the other races in the defensive option
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They just need to make it so warping in far away from your base/nexus requires an upgrade.
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give standard gate advantages over the warpgate. Then we could see some games with standard gates and warpgates doing differents jobs
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Strangely, I actually agree with this 100%. On the attack protoss has nothing to be desired, but on the defense protoss is by far the weakest race because of how out of the way forge tech is. A gateway-unlockable shield battery would solve this problem easily.
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On September 09 2011 05:52 aristarchus wrote: Also, thinking about the shield battery thing more.... What about having the Nexus function as a shield battery? That should make it much more defensive.
The more I think about it the more I like this idea. It is inherently defensive, since I don't think proxy nexuses would be cost effective, and provides similar energy tension as seen in the queen and orbital.
Something like 25 energy = 40/50 shields. If you, say, 1 gate expo, you'd only have 2 or so recharges by the time an early 2 rax hits, which hardly makes it impossible for the terran to do damage, but might give a slight edge to a good protoss.
It would also still die to a 3 rax or 4 rax marine, something that is blindly designed to kill it. This is similar to how a 1 rax expo dies to a well designed immortal + gates attack.
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Are you a video game designer? I trust david kim and his team. Also HotS is coming soon, and we know nothing about it except that there will be multiplayer balance changes, as well as new units. There's no point theorycrafting and speculating when big changes are around the corner.
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I hope the purpose of this thread is to offer alternatives to the race mechanics of protoss rather than to weaken it, because protoss is by far the weakest race atm as it stands both statistically and by simple observation watching pro streams/tournaments.
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On September 09 2011 06:28 Seldentar wrote: I hope the purpose of this thread is to offer alternatives to the race mechanics of protoss rather than to weaken it, because protoss is by far the weakest race atm as it stands both statistically and by simple observation watching pro streams/tournaments.
My main goal was to show why Protoss is struggling, not to suggest how to fix it. My small suggestion was a defensive structure available after gate (shield battery). There are many ways to help give back a defenders advantage, feel free to think about them.
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On September 09 2011 06:10 roymarthyup wrote: protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns.
The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf.
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I'd much rather have a shield battery thing + faster carriers instead of a stupid protoss 'harass' unit. What are DTs? HTs? Blink Stalkers? Air units? ugh.
The Reaver was a harass unit, but the colossus isn't because its splash sucks and it's too expensive. Gee, maybe replace the Colossus with a robotics splash units good for drop harass?
Hoped for HotS changes: Shield Battery thing Faster Carriers Colossus replacement
Save maybe a new unit for LotV
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This beautifull thing should be added in HoTs. (Offensive battery might be totally imba though) You have quite some valid points.
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On September 09 2011 06:31 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 06:28 Seldentar wrote: I hope the purpose of this thread is to offer alternatives to the race mechanics of protoss rather than to weaken it, because protoss is by far the weakest race atm as it stands both statistically and by simple observation watching pro streams/tournaments. My main goal was to show why Protoss is struggling, not to suggest how to fix it. My small suggestion was a defensive structure available after gate (shield battery). There are many ways to help give back a defenders advantage, feel free to think about them.
Ahh I didn't read much of your main post, so I wasn't sure what your goal was. Anyway I love your idea and I definitely hope Blizzard considers it
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You could negate offensive batteries by making it a building that warpgates can summon in around their proximity. (Yes I know it is a terrible idea. It is a decent non wordy way to leash them.
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Interesting points, and well thought.
I would really like to see how a defensive shield battery would do. I'm not too sure I would be happy with offensive batteries tho.
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On September 09 2011 06:34 Sevenofnines wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 06:10 roymarthyup wrote: protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns. The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf.
if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates
theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength
there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute
i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept
this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time
right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should.
but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units
in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units.
and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true.
if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck.
HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky
but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly
I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before
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On September 09 2011 06:52 Roggay wrote: Interesting points, and well thought.
I would really like to see how a defensive shield battery would do. I'm not too sure I would be happy with offensive batteries tho.
Make them cost something like 100 minerals/25 gas, so that they can't be used early on, require a core... it's not as if Protoss shields don't charge as is fairly fast, to actually make use during battle you'd have to build it super close up front.
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On September 09 2011 06:54 roymarthyup wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 06:34 Sevenofnines wrote:On September 09 2011 06:10 roymarthyup wrote: protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns. The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf. if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should. but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units. and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true. if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck. HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before
Even if buildtimes are the same switching to warpgate allows you to get out an additional round of units^^
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On September 09 2011 06:28 AlBundy wrote: Are you a video game designer? I trust david kim and his team. Also HotS is coming soon, and we know nothing about it except that there will be multiplayer balance changes, as well as new units. There's no point theorycrafting and speculating when big changes are around the corner.
If David Kim was perfect there would be no need for balance changes and new units. The point is of this is not only to keep the game balanced but to keep early macro capabilities good for P which is not working well in TvP.
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On September 09 2011 06:55 FabledIntegral wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 06:54 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 06:34 Sevenofnines wrote:On September 09 2011 06:10 roymarthyup wrote: protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns. The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf. if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should. but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units. and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true. if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck. HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before Even if buildtimes are the same switching to warpgate allows you to get out an additional round of units^^
correct. which is why i wrote ""as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before""
this implies that buildtimes must somehow be adjusted so the "extra round" from warpgates is incorporated into the numbers
you are correct, the extra round is part of warpgate balance. if warpgates were removed, gateway units would only perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before (extra round included)
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On September 09 2011 06:55 FabledIntegral wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 06:54 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 06:34 Sevenofnines wrote:On September 09 2011 06:10 roymarthyup wrote: protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns. The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf. if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should. but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units. and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true. if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck. HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before Even if buildtimes are the same switching to warpgate allows you to get out an additional round of units^^ You could make the gateway -> WG morph time 30 seconds.
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Shields often delete extremely fast, a shield battery may not necessary be "the thing" which protoss need for defense. I would also prefer something which repairs protoss mechanical units: because right now that immortal that only has 10 hp left would forever be at 10hp.
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On September 09 2011 07:00 Eppa! wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 06:55 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 06:54 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 06:34 Sevenofnines wrote:On September 09 2011 06:10 roymarthyup wrote: protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns. The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf. if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should. but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units. and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true. if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck. HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before Even if buildtimes are the same switching to warpgate allows you to get out an additional round of units^^ You could make the gateway -> WG morph time 30 seconds.
and what would that fix?
were talking about something complete way off from your point
some people are saying they think protoss t1 units are weaker because warpgates exist
im saying zealots and stalkers and sentries are not "made weaker" to compensate for warpgates
instead, blizzard balances warpgates so protoss offensive abilities are not oveprowered, but the BAD RESULT OF THIS is that protoss as a race has zero defenders advantage.
if you somehow gave protoss defenders advantage by making warpgates make more units, it would make their offensive ability overpowered
my point is that even if warpgates were removed, protoss still would defend just as well (as long as gateway build times are somehow adjusted to allow just as many units to come out)
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On September 09 2011 07:01 Hikari wrote: Shields often delete extremely fast, a shield battery may not necessary be "the thing" which protoss need for defense. I would also prefer something which repairs protoss mechanical units: because right now that immortal that only has 10 hp left would forever be at 10hp.
Strangely true. Never realized that, Terran with medivacs and repair, any unit that gets damaged can eventually be like new. Zerg regen same thing. Toss is the only race that has permanent damage done to units.
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On September 09 2011 07:05 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:01 Hikari wrote: Shields often delete extremely fast, a shield battery may not necessary be "the thing" which protoss need for defense. I would also prefer something which repairs protoss mechanical units: because right now that immortal that only has 10 hp left would forever be at 10hp.
Strangely true. Never realized that, Terran with medivacs and repair, any unit that gets damaged can eventually be like new. Zerg regen same thing. Toss is the only race that has permanent damage done to units. I'm a BW purist, and I think this makes sense based on the lore and balance. You don't need to repair things. Just regenerate the shields and hope for the best. (plague T_T )
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On September 09 2011 06:42 Diks wrote:This beautifull thing should be added in HoTs. (Offensive battery might be totally imba though) You have quite some valid points.
however, what if a limit was placed? what if the battery can only charge up to half the hit points of the unit using it (its only a suggestion), and reset the shield recharge cooldown (as when they are hit by a unit, but exemple), or even induce an effect on the unit that would prevent shield recharge for a few seconds (say the battery recharges some of your shields, then you cant recharge your shields for a few seconds because of the effect. Or even, you can only recharge your shields when they are completely down, battery recharges your shields, then you cant recharge sheilds for a longer time because of that effect).What I am saying is, it is always possible a few things to "limit" the use of that battery so it doesnt break the game in an offensive way (or give the battery a relatively long build time and/or a "kinda" big cost, so the battery would be essentially used for a defensive play, but would then give a not bad reward for a player risking an offensive use out of it.
Remember, thats all a bunch of ideas I am throwing out there.
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If added Shield batteries should work like immobile medivacs that cost maybe about 150/50 ?Maybe with a healrate of 4 shields per energy? It would be interesting in PvP as others mentioned, might make cannon expanding viable. +1 for Well though out post. ;D
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On September 08 2011 19:20 XenoX101 wrote: The solution is this, warpgate should be a tier 2-2.5 upgrade and decrease gateway unit build times to match warpgate times. It should not be the first thing you get with a cybernetics core, having such an advantage so quickly in the game is silly and the equivalent of zerg getting ovie speed + ventral sacs off of hatchery tech. If it cost 200/200 and didn't speed up unit build times I think it would be perfectly positioned for the mid-late game as a sensible upgrade rather than a game-breaking one.
Completely agree with this. I think delaying to a higher tech would make the toss strategies more various and interesting. Buff to gateways would be, of course, necessary but as the game gets more in depth, the toss timings are going to be impossible to hold in PvP in maps like Taldarim
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The other day I saw savior vs Bisu (commented by day9 and tyler) and for me it looked kind of cool the way toss functioned, pretty much like toss in sc2 does but based around zealots and dragoons beign good not coming fast
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On September 08 2011 19:19 Detri wrote:I had never thought about Protoss in this way before, nice post and valid points. All I have to say though, is "Chrono boost, Guardian Sheild, Forcefields" Also protoss have the cheapest expand. I know hatcheries are cheaper, but you lose a drone, and need a queen for it to function effectively. And an Orbital is 550 mins. No other race gets spell casters at the lowest tier, and I don't think they need fixed. I'm no balance tester though, I just play for fun But I certainly agree that PvP needs to be more dynamic, instead of being a game of chicken to see who expands first.
protoss do not have the cheapest expand, because terran gets mules from the orbital, as soon as it is finished they gain 300 minerals from the mule, meaning that their command center + orbital would cost 250 minerals
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On September 09 2011 07:05 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:01 Hikari wrote: Shields often delete extremely fast, a shield battery may not necessary be "the thing" which protoss need for defense. I would also prefer something which repairs protoss mechanical units: because right now that immortal that only has 10 hp left would forever be at 10hp.
Strangely true. Never realized that, Terran with medivacs and repair, any unit that gets damaged can eventually be like new. Zerg regen same thing. Toss is the only race that has permanent damage done to units.
Same goes for buildings: Terrans have repair, zerg has xfuse, toss has shrivel up and die
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A lot of good points raised about mechanics, but I'd just like to add one more complaint about warpin:
As a BW fan, the reason I've never been able to get into watching SC2 matches is because of warpin. It kills any fun to be had watching any PvX match. It's just a dumb mechanic from a viewer standpoint, and gets rid of a lot of the excitement.
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Edit: Sorry, bad formating.
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Very good read and I agree that Shield Batteries should make a comeback. It's an idea I've supported since the beta.
I'd like to add that the reason Photon Cannons require a Forge rather than a Gateway is the same reason why Warp Gates make for weaker Gateway units. The potential to abuse them offensively.
Photon Cannons are inherently different from Bunkers and Spine Crawlers in their capacity to be used offensively. Spine Crawlers need creep and Bunkers require units to occupy them and are also more vulnerable while constructing because of the ability to snipe the SCV. Photon Cannons need only a Pylon and in the early game are extremely powerful until units like Roaches and Marauders can be fielded.
As such they are a bit weaker and underused compared to the other static defensive structures. I think adding in a Shield Battery possibly in HOTS will give Protoss an equal defender's advantage to the other races. However, It cannot cost 125 minerals only like it did in SC1. It would have to be more expensive because of how much better it would be than in SC1.
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On September 09 2011 07:14 Plutonik wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 19:19 Detri wrote:I had never thought about Protoss in this way before, nice post and valid points. All I have to say though, is "Chrono boost, Guardian Sheild, Forcefields" Also protoss have the cheapest expand. I know hatcheries are cheaper, but you lose a drone, and need a queen for it to function effectively. And an Orbital is 550 mins. No other race gets spell casters at the lowest tier, and I don't think they need fixed. I'm no balance tester though, I just play for fun But I certainly agree that PvP needs to be more dynamic, instead of being a game of chicken to see who expands first. protoss do not have the cheapest expand, because terran gets mules from the orbital, as soon as it is finished they gain 300 minerals from the mule, meaning that their command center + orbital would cost 250 minerals
Money doesn't work like that. Much of the importance of spending minerals in starcraft 2 is about when they are spent. If you invest in a colossus at the 3:00 mark you get a ridiculously overpowered colossus. If you invest in it at the 15:00 mark it's a different story. You put money into tech which starts the timer until the tech is done. Just because you get the minerals back eventually does not mean that you didn't spend them in the first place.
And if you want to get even more theoretical, having the extra chronoboost means you need less production facilities to spend the same amount of money. Meaning you spend less money, meaning that in a way, the chronoboost could reduce the cost of the nexus as well.
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United States7483 Posts
On September 09 2011 07:17 Vindicare605 wrote: Very good read and I agree that Shield Batteries should make a comeback. It's an idea I've supported since the beta.
I'd like to add that the reason Photon Cannons require a Forge rather than a Gateway is the same reason why Warp Gates make for weaker Gateway units. The potential to abuse them offensively.
Photon Cannons are inherently different from Bunkers and Spine Crawlers in their capacity to be used offensively. Spine Crawlers need creep and Bunkers require units to occupy them and are also more vulnerable while constructing because of the ability to snipe the SCV. Photon Cannons need only a Pylon and in the early game are extremely powerful until units like Roaches and Marauders can be fielded.
As such they are a bit weaker and underused compared to the other static defensive structures. I think adding in a Shield Battery possibly in HOTS will give Protoss an equal defender's advantage to the other races. However, It cannot cost 125 minerals only like it did in SC1. It would have to be more expensive because of how much better it would be than in SC1.
What makes you think a shield battery in SC2 would be flat out better than one in SC1?
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On September 09 2011 07:17 Vindicare605 wrote: Very good read and I agree that Shield Batteries should make a comeback. It's an idea I've supported since the beta.
I'd like to add that the reason Photon Cannons require a Forge rather than a Gateway is the same reason why Warp Gates make for weaker Gateway units. The potential to abuse them offensively.
Photon Cannons are inherently different from Bunkers and Spine Crawlers in their capacity to be used offensively. Spine Crawlers need creep and Bunkers require units to occupy them and are also more vulnerable while constructing because of the ability to snipe the SCV. Photon Cannons need only a Pylon and in the early game are extremely powerful until units like Roaches and Marauders can be fielded.
As such they are a bit weaker and underused compared to the other static defensive structures. I think adding in a Shield Battery possibly in HOTS will give Protoss an equal defender's advantage to the other races. However, It cannot cost 125 minerals only like it did in SC1. It would have to be more expensive because of how much better it would be than in SC1. How would it be better than they were in BW?
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United States7483 Posts
On September 09 2011 07:18 TERRANLOL wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:14 Plutonik wrote:On September 08 2011 19:19 Detri wrote:I had never thought about Protoss in this way before, nice post and valid points. All I have to say though, is "Chrono boost, Guardian Sheild, Forcefields" Also protoss have the cheapest expand. I know hatcheries are cheaper, but you lose a drone, and need a queen for it to function effectively. And an Orbital is 550 mins. No other race gets spell casters at the lowest tier, and I don't think they need fixed. I'm no balance tester though, I just play for fun But I certainly agree that PvP needs to be more dynamic, instead of being a game of chicken to see who expands first. protoss do not have the cheapest expand, because terran gets mules from the orbital, as soon as it is finished they gain 300 minerals from the mule, meaning that their command center + orbital would cost 250 minerals Money doesn't work like that. Much of the importance of spending minerals in starcraft 2 is about when they are spent. If you invest in a colossus at the 3:00 mark you get a ridiculously overpowered colossus. If you invest in it at the 15:00 mark it's a different story. You put money into tech which starts the timer until the tech is done. Just because you get the minerals back eventually does not mean that you didn't spend them in the first place. And if you want to get even more theoretical, having the extra chronoboost means you need less production facilities to spend the same amount of money. Meaning you spend less money, meaning that in a way, the chronoboost could reduce the cost of the nexus as well.
If you want to bring opportunity cost into it, then zerg hatcheries and terran CC's just got cheaper too. This is a nonsense argument.
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On September 09 2011 07:03 roymarthyup wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:00 Eppa! wrote:On September 09 2011 06:55 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 06:54 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 06:34 Sevenofnines wrote:On September 09 2011 06:10 roymarthyup wrote: protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns. The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf. if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should. but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units. and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true. if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck. HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before Even if buildtimes are the same switching to warpgate allows you to get out an additional round of units^^ You could make the gateway -> WG morph time 30 seconds. and what would that fix? were talking about something complete way off from your point some people are saying they think protoss t1 units are weaker because warpgates exist im saying zealots and stalkers and sentries are not "made weaker" to compensate for warpgates instead, blizzard balances warpgates so protoss offensive abilities are not oveprowered, but the BAD RESULT OF THIS is that protoss as a race has zero defenders advantage. if you somehow gave protoss defenders advantage by making warpgates make more units, it would make their offensive ability overpowered my point is that even if warpgates were removed, protoss still would defend just as well (as long as gateway build times are somehow adjusted to allow just as many units to come out) It would remove the extra round of units?
They balance WG by making t1.5 tech WG weaker to compensate for the fact that WG weakens 1 of the biggest defenders advantages for the opponent(re-enforcement line).
They balance the stronger offensive use of WG by making t1 units weaker. Because t1 units are weaker defensive toss is weaker. Protoss has the weakest macro mechanic which makes the defenders advantage smaller(it not even close to zero even on bad Protoss maps like Dual Sight) This is not helped by the fact that slow zealots are weak unless you are attacking into a base.
Without WG you would only lose the extra round of production from conversion from gate to WG. Which would leave toss with weaker offensive capabilities PvZ and inferior defender advantage in TvP.
On September 09 2011 07:18 TERRANLOL wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:14 Plutonik wrote:On September 08 2011 19:19 Detri wrote:I had never thought about Protoss in this way before, nice post and valid points. All I have to say though, is "Chrono boost, Guardian Sheild, Forcefields" Also protoss have the cheapest expand. I know hatcheries are cheaper, but you lose a drone, and need a queen for it to function effectively. And an Orbital is 550 mins. No other race gets spell casters at the lowest tier, and I don't think they need fixed. I'm no balance tester though, I just play for fun But I certainly agree that PvP needs to be more dynamic, instead of being a game of chicken to see who expands first. protoss do not have the cheapest expand, because terran gets mules from the orbital, as soon as it is finished they gain 300 minerals from the mule, meaning that their command center + orbital would cost 250 minerals Money doesn't work like that. Much of the importance of spending minerals in starcraft 2 is about when they are spent. If you invest in a colossus at the 3:00 mark you get a ridiculously overpowered colossus. If you invest in it at the 15:00 mark it's a different story. You put money into tech which starts the timer until the tech is done. Just because you get the minerals back eventually does not mean that you didn't spend them in the first place. And if you want to get even more theoretical, having the extra chronoboost means you need less production facilities to spend the same amount of money. Meaning you spend less money, meaning that in a way, the chronoboost could reduce the cost of the nexus as well.
Saying an Terran expo cost more than 400 makes no sense. You don't need Orbital or PF to use it.
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On September 09 2011 07:18 Whitewing wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:17 Vindicare605 wrote: Very good read and I agree that Shield Batteries should make a comeback. It's an idea I've supported since the beta.
I'd like to add that the reason Photon Cannons require a Forge rather than a Gateway is the same reason why Warp Gates make for weaker Gateway units. The potential to abuse them offensively.
Photon Cannons are inherently different from Bunkers and Spine Crawlers in their capacity to be used offensively. Spine Crawlers need creep and Bunkers require units to occupy them and are also more vulnerable while constructing because of the ability to snipe the SCV. Photon Cannons need only a Pylon and in the early game are extremely powerful until units like Roaches and Marauders can be fielded.
As such they are a bit weaker and underused compared to the other static defensive structures. I think adding in a Shield Battery possibly in HOTS will give Protoss an equal defender's advantage to the other races. However, It cannot cost 125 minerals only like it did in SC1. It would have to be more expensive because of how much better it would be than in SC1. What makes you think a shield battery in SC2 would be flat out better than one in SC1?
Three reasons. The first is because you'd be now combining potentially Shield Batteries with Warp Gates. This allows for an abuse of the mechanic offensively to a much greater extent than was possible in SC1.
The second is because Shields are a little bit different in SC2 than they are in SC1. Shields regenerate rapidly outside of combat rather than slowly but constantly like in SC1. This means that shield batteries are less needed as a defensive repairing tool and more of an emergency defensive/offensive support structure similar to moon wells in WC3. They wouldn't be needed as a quality of life tool because shields regenerate so rapidly already, this would mean they are always stocked full of energy for when they are needed.
Finally, because the user interface in SC2 would allow them to be used much more efficiently than they could be in SC1. You couldn't select a bunch of structures at once. You'd have to manually click each Shield Battery in order to use it, this made it very hard to use them in the thick of battle but in SC2 they'd be much easier to use and potentially abuse in combat. It's for this reason that spells are less powerful than they were in SC1.
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On September 09 2011 07:15 PPTouch wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:05 susySquark wrote:On September 09 2011 07:01 Hikari wrote: Shields often delete extremely fast, a shield battery may not necessary be "the thing" which protoss need for defense. I would also prefer something which repairs protoss mechanical units: because right now that immortal that only has 10 hp left would forever be at 10hp.
Strangely true. Never realized that, Terran with medivacs and repair, any unit that gets damaged can eventually be like new. Zerg regen same thing. Toss is the only race that has permanent damage done to units. Same goes for buildings: Terrans have repair, zerg has xfuse, toss has shrivel up and die
Toss have shields (but when is the last game you saw regen win a toss a game?) I miss my shield battery =(
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why i don't see any mention of the warp prism in any of the post here who talk about removing WG? If you get rid of the wg, it will just make the toss willing to go even more for the death ball.
Terran have the Medivac who give the drop capacity and healing, Zerg got Overlord which give him supply plus drop and what is for toss' warp prism? ok drop, but how will you change the Warp Prism to be able to give another thing? Just keep the energy because it is still usefull to power the building? lol
This will require alot more than just a balance change.
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On September 09 2011 07:29 Vindicare605 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:18 Whitewing wrote:On September 09 2011 07:17 Vindicare605 wrote: Very good read and I agree that Shield Batteries should make a comeback. It's an idea I've supported since the beta.
I'd like to add that the reason Photon Cannons require a Forge rather than a Gateway is the same reason why Warp Gates make for weaker Gateway units. The potential to abuse them offensively.
Photon Cannons are inherently different from Bunkers and Spine Crawlers in their capacity to be used offensively. Spine Crawlers need creep and Bunkers require units to occupy them and are also more vulnerable while constructing because of the ability to snipe the SCV. Photon Cannons need only a Pylon and in the early game are extremely powerful until units like Roaches and Marauders can be fielded.
As such they are a bit weaker and underused compared to the other static defensive structures. I think adding in a Shield Battery possibly in HOTS will give Protoss an equal defender's advantage to the other races. However, It cannot cost 125 minerals only like it did in SC1. It would have to be more expensive because of how much better it would be than in SC1. What makes you think a shield battery in SC2 would be flat out better than one in SC1? Three reasons. The first is because you'd be now combining potentially Shield Batteries with Warp Gates. This allows for an abuse of the mechanic offensively to a much greater extent than was possible in SC1. The second is because Shields are a little bit different in SC2 than they are in SC1. Shields regenerate rapidly outside of combat rather than slowly like in SC1 and constantly. This means that shield batteries are less needed as a defensive repairing tool and more of an emergency defensive/offensive support structure similar to moon wells in WC3. They wouldn't be needed as a quality of life tool because shields regenerate so rapidly already, this would mean they are always stocked full of energy for when they are needed. Finally, because the user interface in SC2 would allow them to be used much more efficiently than they could be in SC1. You couldn't select a bunch of structures at once. You'd have to manually click each Shield Battery in order to use it, this made it very hard to use them in the thick of battle but in SC2 they'd be much easier to use and potentially abuse in combat. It's for this reason that spells are less powerful than they were in SC1.
Or they could make it so you use nexus energy to quickly recharge shields on a unit, much in the same way Terrans have to choose b/w scans and mules. Make it so the ability can only be used on units a certain distance from the nexus to give protoss a defender's advantage while not affecting balance on the offensive side of the equation.
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On September 09 2011 07:29 Vindicare605 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:18 Whitewing wrote:On September 09 2011 07:17 Vindicare605 wrote: Very good read and I agree that Shield Batteries should make a comeback. It's an idea I've supported since the beta.
I'd like to add that the reason Photon Cannons require a Forge rather than a Gateway is the same reason why Warp Gates make for weaker Gateway units. The potential to abuse them offensively.
Photon Cannons are inherently different from Bunkers and Spine Crawlers in their capacity to be used offensively. Spine Crawlers need creep and Bunkers require units to occupy them and are also more vulnerable while constructing because of the ability to snipe the SCV. Photon Cannons need only a Pylon and in the early game are extremely powerful until units like Roaches and Marauders can be fielded.
As such they are a bit weaker and underused compared to the other static defensive structures. I think adding in a Shield Battery possibly in HOTS will give Protoss an equal defender's advantage to the other races. However, It cannot cost 125 minerals only like it did in SC1. It would have to be more expensive because of how much better it would be than in SC1. What makes you think a shield battery in SC2 would be flat out better than one in SC1? Three reasons. The first is because you'd be now combining potentially Shield Batteries with Warp Gates. This allows for an abuse of the mechanic offensively to a much greater extent than was possible in SC1. The second is because Shields are a little bit different in SC2 than they are in SC1. Shields regenerate rapidly outside of combat rather than slowly like in SC1 and constantly. This means that shield batteries are less needed as a defensive repairing tool and more of an emergency defensive/offensive support structure similar to moon wells in WC3. They wouldn't be needed as a quality of life tool because shields regenerate so rapidly already, this would mean they are always stocked full of energy for when they are needed. Finally, because the user interface in SC2 would allow them to be used much more efficiently than they could be in SC1. You couldn't select a bunch of structures at once. You'd have to manually click each Shield Battery in order to use it, this made it very hard to use them in the thick of battle but in SC2 they'd be much easier to use and potentially abuse in combat. It's for this reason that spells are less powerful than they were in SC1. They still have a limited range. Since PvP was the only MU it was used in (In sc2 it would be used in both PvT and PvP.) You only build it to stop a timing push as macro wise it was to hard to use in any other way.
In Sc2 using it for recharging shield is useless because they recharge so fast anyway. Moonwells are not very strong offensively (although I never played much WC3) while still strong defensively. But it not like we put them on necessary macro structures like pylons.
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My solution:
- Warpgates by default - Add Shield battery (requires forge) - Can only warp near a Warpgate (no offensive advantage) - Warpgates can warp in at a warpprism - Pylon warp-in upgrade where it currently is (requires citadel of adun, or w/e its called, and stargate? ionno)
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On September 09 2011 07:32 Rorschach wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:15 PPTouch wrote:On September 09 2011 07:05 susySquark wrote:On September 09 2011 07:01 Hikari wrote: Shields often delete extremely fast, a shield battery may not necessary be "the thing" which protoss need for defense. I would also prefer something which repairs protoss mechanical units: because right now that immortal that only has 10 hp left would forever be at 10hp.
Strangely true. Never realized that, Terran with medivacs and repair, any unit that gets damaged can eventually be like new. Zerg regen same thing. Toss is the only race that has permanent damage done to units. Same goes for buildings: Terrans have repair, zerg has xfuse, toss has shrivel up and die Toss have shields (but when is the last game you saw regen win a toss a game?) I miss my shield battery =(
Shields add to blink's power. Injured stalkers in the back can regenerate a significant amount of shields before they have to engage again.
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On September 09 2011 06:54 roymarthyup wrote:
if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates
theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength
there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute
i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept
this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time
right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should.
Ah but that is contradictory. You say there is no connection between between unit strength and warpgates, and yet you say that if warpgates were removed, you would have to change gateways in order for the toss to make a similar number of units! If warpgates didn't affect the strength of units, then WHY would you need to change gateways at all? The answer of course, is that without that extra round of units and/or instant reinforcement, gateway units don't cut it against the other races.
You are correct that Protoss defense would probably not be seriously affected, but that is because there is little to no walking distance when you are on defense. On the other hand, no warpgates on offense means their offense is weaker. This results in a net nerf to gateway units: similar strength on defense, weaker on offense. Since the removal of warpgates would result in a net nerf to the strength of gateway units there MUST be a connection between the two. Now, we can argue how much of a connection there is and so on, but it's undeniable that it exists.
but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units
in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units.
and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true.
if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck.
HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky
but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly
I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before
You are correct that the STATS of the units don't change based on warpgates or no warpgates, so in that respect their "strength" does not change. The thing is, the tactical abilities of a unit are an integral part of their true strength. Warpgates add a layer of tactical strength to all the gateway units that goes beyond their stats. The fact that they can instantly reinforce, instantly defend anywhere on the map, etc. MUST be balanced out somewhere else, if not from gateway units themselves, then elsewhere in the race. It obviously isn't coming out of Colossi and Robotech. Maybe its coming out of Carriers. Actually on that thought, I retract my former theory. You are correct: gateway units aren't weaker because of warpgates. Carriers are. =P
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My argument against warp-in is simple economics. Considering equal economies at any point in the game, the Protoss can have his units right now, while the Terran or Zerg has to spend the money, then wait for the units. That is why P timings are so strong, you spend the money and get the units NOW. If an opponent has equal mining, he reacts to the attack, but now waits for his units to pop to defend. That is why it is so critical for T or Z to get an econ advantage over P at any stage of the game. That in itself is abusable by the warp in short rally point of the OP.
It lends itself to Protoss tech units to be so very cost effective since the gateway units must be less so (to an extent). Then, considering equal tech, Protoss tech destroys Terran and Zerg tech units, who then have to go back to low tier units to counter the P army. It's a very harsh cycle of events when players abuse this knowledge correctly.
That said, i don't think win/loss ratios would suggest this is overpowered by any means, but that the mechanic mentioned in the OP definitely raises more questions than answers when it comes to balance. I think map design will have to play a large role in the remaining balance equation. That and whatever units blizz decides to come up with in the upcoming expansions.
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Has it been suggested that warpgates are the pylon? As in, each warpgate has a power field around it where you warp in units, and you can't warp in at pylons? That way you can still warp defensively and offensively, except you'd have to proxy a gateway for offensive warp ins. Also, that would make pylons just used for powering buildings. Just a thought.
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On September 09 2011 07:39 Eppa! wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:29 Vindicare605 wrote:On September 09 2011 07:18 Whitewing wrote:On September 09 2011 07:17 Vindicare605 wrote: Very good read and I agree that Shield Batteries should make a comeback. It's an idea I've supported since the beta.
I'd like to add that the reason Photon Cannons require a Forge rather than a Gateway is the same reason why Warp Gates make for weaker Gateway units. The potential to abuse them offensively.
Photon Cannons are inherently different from Bunkers and Spine Crawlers in their capacity to be used offensively. Spine Crawlers need creep and Bunkers require units to occupy them and are also more vulnerable while constructing because of the ability to snipe the SCV. Photon Cannons need only a Pylon and in the early game are extremely powerful until units like Roaches and Marauders can be fielded.
As such they are a bit weaker and underused compared to the other static defensive structures. I think adding in a Shield Battery possibly in HOTS will give Protoss an equal defender's advantage to the other races. However, It cannot cost 125 minerals only like it did in SC1. It would have to be more expensive because of how much better it would be than in SC1. What makes you think a shield battery in SC2 would be flat out better than one in SC1? Three reasons. The first is because you'd be now combining potentially Shield Batteries with Warp Gates. This allows for an abuse of the mechanic offensively to a much greater extent than was possible in SC1. The second is because Shields are a little bit different in SC2 than they are in SC1. Shields regenerate rapidly outside of combat rather than slowly like in SC1 and constantly. This means that shield batteries are less needed as a defensive repairing tool and more of an emergency defensive/offensive support structure similar to moon wells in WC3. They wouldn't be needed as a quality of life tool because shields regenerate so rapidly already, this would mean they are always stocked full of energy for when they are needed. Finally, because the user interface in SC2 would allow them to be used much more efficiently than they could be in SC1. You couldn't select a bunch of structures at once. You'd have to manually click each Shield Battery in order to use it, this made it very hard to use them in the thick of battle but in SC2 they'd be much easier to use and potentially abuse in combat. It's for this reason that spells are less powerful than they were in SC1. They still have a limited range. Since PvP was the only MU it was used in (In sc2 it would be used in both PvT and PvP.) You only build it to stop a timing push as macro wise it was to hard to use in any other way. In Sc2 using it for recharging shield is useless because they recharge so fast anyway. Moonwells are not very strong offensively (although I never played much WC3) while still strong defensively. But it not like we put them on necessary macro structures like pylons.
Moonwells (like shield batteries) need time to gain energy. That's why they aren't effective offensively. If toss is really putting on the pressure, what would they rather have: another zealot, or a shield battery? Or even another proxy pylon! As far as contains go, terran are great at it. Sure, they cant warp in, but they bunkers and tanks, 2 of the best units for holding ground. I doubt shield batteries can ever overpower repair or siege mode.
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Warp-in has screwed up both Protoss defender's advantage and Protoss unit strength. Protoss units are supposed to be the "strong but few" style, yet their T1 is absolutely atrocious compared to both Terran and Protoss T1, and this is due to the fact that Protoss can reinforce T1 so easily across the map. I love Warp-in from a conceptual standpoint, but from a balance standpoint it's an absolute nightmare to have in the game.
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This is a very poorly constructed argument. While it does have some good points, the foundation of the argument is flawed and it does a lot of assuming.
Instead of explaining why Gateway units are weak, or how they are weak, it says they are and have to be because of Warpgate mechanics and thus Colossus have to make up for them by being overpowered, and when on the defensive early Protoss is thus underpowered unless you have a ramp because there is no Colossus and you can't benefit from your warpgate as much ect, ect.
I disagree because I think Gateway units are very good. But let me show you how easy it is to construct an arguement like this based on an assumption:
Why Marines broke SC2
Marines are really powerful in PvT, they just eat alive everything. Ever noticed that Colossus are so strong? They have to be to counter Marines.
The problem here is that Zerg doesn't a unit as powerful as the Marine, and thus Colossus rolf stomp the Zerg, and make Hydras useless.
And it also ruins PvP. Ever noticed that Colossus dominate PvP (if the game goes beyond the early game)? That is because they are overpowered, and both players must use Colossus because anything else is inferior.
Now without Marines being so strong, Colossus could be weaker, and then Hydras wouldn't be trash.
Never did you explain why Gateway units are weak, or why Colossus are strong. You just string together things and act like they are facts, when they are not.
However, there is some merit to some of your argument. Basically, the Force Field is the early defensive mechanism that Protoss uses to stay alive vs early pressure (Terran uses the Bunker, Zerg has the Spine Crawler and Queen). Cannons are obviously not viable unless you're opening with a Forge.
Thus on maps that you can't simply FF a choke easily or Forge Fast Expand, it is very difficult to hold against early aggression, forcing the Protoss player to build units. This constricts Protoss on certain maps.
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On September 09 2011 07:37 Skyro wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:29 Vindicare605 wrote:On September 09 2011 07:18 Whitewing wrote:On September 09 2011 07:17 Vindicare605 wrote: Very good read and I agree that Shield Batteries should make a comeback. It's an idea I've supported since the beta.
I'd like to add that the reason Photon Cannons require a Forge rather than a Gateway is the same reason why Warp Gates make for weaker Gateway units. The potential to abuse them offensively.
Photon Cannons are inherently different from Bunkers and Spine Crawlers in their capacity to be used offensively. Spine Crawlers need creep and Bunkers require units to occupy them and are also more vulnerable while constructing because of the ability to snipe the SCV. Photon Cannons need only a Pylon and in the early game are extremely powerful until units like Roaches and Marauders can be fielded.
As such they are a bit weaker and underused compared to the other static defensive structures. I think adding in a Shield Battery possibly in HOTS will give Protoss an equal defender's advantage to the other races. However, It cannot cost 125 minerals only like it did in SC1. It would have to be more expensive because of how much better it would be than in SC1. What makes you think a shield battery in SC2 would be flat out better than one in SC1? Three reasons. The first is because you'd be now combining potentially Shield Batteries with Warp Gates. This allows for an abuse of the mechanic offensively to a much greater extent than was possible in SC1. The second is because Shields are a little bit different in SC2 than they are in SC1. Shields regenerate rapidly outside of combat rather than slowly like in SC1 and constantly. This means that shield batteries are less needed as a defensive repairing tool and more of an emergency defensive/offensive support structure similar to moon wells in WC3. They wouldn't be needed as a quality of life tool because shields regenerate so rapidly already, this would mean they are always stocked full of energy for when they are needed. Finally, because the user interface in SC2 would allow them to be used much more efficiently than they could be in SC1. You couldn't select a bunch of structures at once. You'd have to manually click each Shield Battery in order to use it, this made it very hard to use them in the thick of battle but in SC2 they'd be much easier to use and potentially abuse in combat. It's for this reason that spells are less powerful than they were in SC1. Or they could make it so you use nexus energy to quickly recharge shields on a unit, much in the same way Terrans have to choose b/w scans and mules. Make it so the ability can only be used on units a certain distance from the nexus to give protoss a defender's advantage while not affecting balance on the offensive side of the equation.
Now that's an idea. I like that idea a lot.
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How about making gateways function in a defensive way? Maybe something like, if you research warpgate your Gateways also gain the abilities of a Shield Battery (i.e. they get energy and the ability to recharge Shields). When you turn them to Warpgates, this ability fades. That way it cannot really be used offensively. I also wouldn't give the gateways this ability from the get-go, as it might make protoss completely uncheeseable (which would be imbalanced, again). And it would probably make gateway-rushes imba as fuck :D
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On September 09 2011 07:54 Vindicare605 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:37 Skyro wrote:On September 09 2011 07:29 Vindicare605 wrote:On September 09 2011 07:18 Whitewing wrote:On September 09 2011 07:17 Vindicare605 wrote: Very good read and I agree that Shield Batteries should make a comeback. It's an idea I've supported since the beta.
I'd like to add that the reason Photon Cannons require a Forge rather than a Gateway is the same reason why Warp Gates make for weaker Gateway units. The potential to abuse them offensively.
Photon Cannons are inherently different from Bunkers and Spine Crawlers in their capacity to be used offensively. Spine Crawlers need creep and Bunkers require units to occupy them and are also more vulnerable while constructing because of the ability to snipe the SCV. Photon Cannons need only a Pylon and in the early game are extremely powerful until units like Roaches and Marauders can be fielded.
As such they are a bit weaker and underused compared to the other static defensive structures. I think adding in a Shield Battery possibly in HOTS will give Protoss an equal defender's advantage to the other races. However, It cannot cost 125 minerals only like it did in SC1. It would have to be more expensive because of how much better it would be than in SC1. What makes you think a shield battery in SC2 would be flat out better than one in SC1? Three reasons. The first is because you'd be now combining potentially Shield Batteries with Warp Gates. This allows for an abuse of the mechanic offensively to a much greater extent than was possible in SC1. The second is because Shields are a little bit different in SC2 than they are in SC1. Shields regenerate rapidly outside of combat rather than slowly like in SC1 and constantly. This means that shield batteries are less needed as a defensive repairing tool and more of an emergency defensive/offensive support structure similar to moon wells in WC3. They wouldn't be needed as a quality of life tool because shields regenerate so rapidly already, this would mean they are always stocked full of energy for when they are needed. Finally, because the user interface in SC2 would allow them to be used much more efficiently than they could be in SC1. You couldn't select a bunch of structures at once. You'd have to manually click each Shield Battery in order to use it, this made it very hard to use them in the thick of battle but in SC2 they'd be much easier to use and potentially abuse in combat. It's for this reason that spells are less powerful than they were in SC1. Or they could make it so you use nexus energy to quickly recharge shields on a unit, much in the same way Terrans have to choose b/w scans and mules. Make it so the ability can only be used on units a certain distance from the nexus to give protoss a defender's advantage while not affecting balance on the offensive side of the equation. Now that's an idea. I like that idea a lot. That is pretty good, yeah. Maybe make it an AoE that charges the shields of all your units inside the area over an amount of time. That way you'd also create more micro (keeping your units in the area vs. enemies trying to force you out)
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On September 09 2011 07:03 roymarthyup wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:00 Eppa! wrote:On September 09 2011 06:55 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 06:54 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 06:34 Sevenofnines wrote:On September 09 2011 06:10 roymarthyup wrote: protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns. The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf. if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should. but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units. and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true. if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck. HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before Even if buildtimes are the same switching to warpgate allows you to get out an additional round of units^^ You could make the gateway -> WG morph time 30 seconds. and what would that fix? were talking about something complete way off from your point some people are saying they think protoss t1 units are weaker because warpgates exist im saying zealots and stalkers and sentries are not "made weaker" to compensate for warpgates instead, blizzard balances warpgates so protoss offensive abilities are not oveprowered, but the BAD RESULT OF THIS is that protoss as a race has zero defenders advantage. if you somehow gave protoss defenders advantage by making warpgates make more units, it would make their offensive ability overpowered my point is that even if warpgates were removed, protoss still would defend just as well (as long as gateway build times are somehow adjusted to allow just as many units to come out)
I know what you're saying, I just disagree. I do think they made Protoss t1 units weaker because warpgates exist, so that timing attacks aren't too powerful. I still can't wrap my head exactly around how you're trying to suggest Protoss has no defenders advantage. Warpgates (exception of the extra warpin round) is highly irrelevant of defender's advantage, which we seem to agree upon (assuming build times were adjusted), but how does this eliminate a defender's advantage?
On September 09 2011 07:53 BronzeKnee wrote: This is a very poorly constructed argument. While it does have some good points, the foundation of the argument is flawed and it does a lot of assuming.
Instead of explaining why Gateway units are weak, or how they are weak, it says they are and have to be because of Warpgate mechanics and thus Colossus have to make up for them by being overpowered, and when on the defensive early Protoss is thus underpowered unless you have a ramp because there is no Colossus and you can't benefit from your warpgate as much ect, ect.
I disagree because I think Gateway units are very good. But let me show you how easy it is to construct an arguement like this based on an assumption:
Why Marines broke SC2
Marines are really powerful in PvT, they just eat alive everything. Ever noticed that Colossus are so strong? They have to be to counter Marines.
The problem here is that Zerg doesn't a unit as powerful as the Marine, and thus Colossus rolf stomp the Zerg, and make Hydras useless.
And it also ruins PvP. Ever noticed that Colossus dominate PvP (if the game goes beyond the early game)? That is because they are overpowered, and both players must use Colossus because anything else is inferior.
Now without Marines being so strong, Colossus could be weaker, and then Hydras wouldn't be trash.
Never did you explain why Gateway units are weak, or why Colossus are strong. You just string together things and act like they are facts, when they are not.
However, there is some merit to some of your argument. Basically, the Force Field is the early defensive mechanism that Protoss uses to stay alive vs early pressure (Terran uses the Bunker, Zerg has the Spine Crawler and Queen). Cannons are obviously not viable unless you're opening with a Forge.
Thus on maps that you can't simply FF a choke easily, it is very difficult to hold against early aggression, forcing the Protoss player to build units.
The argument isn't analogous because one involves a mechanic, such as warpin and how it kills something like defender's advantage and makes timing attacks much stronger consequently, while your argument is just unit A vs unit B vs unit C and their counters.
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Ok, I would like to make a contribution to this discussion. I have read/skimmed through to this (http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewpost.php?post_id=11296125) post and I find the conversation very intriguing. I do not have a strong opinion either way, but I think the OP makes some very good points. I think it is somewhat silly that maps require either a ramp or small choke (force field sized) to make one race viable or restrict its stratagem to a single viable method. While even in Broodwar most maps had a main choke to wider natural choke paradigm, I think there was a little bit more of a variance of what could be done and what was tried. As someone who is always interested to see map innovation, "fixing" protoss defense and its relationship to warp gate tech intrigues me. To me the best place to start is Broodwar and work our way back to SC2. Not because I think BW is the only thing that works, but it is a good guide. While SC2 is in many ways its own game, it does rely heavily on the foundational concepts in Broodwar -- there really aren't many truly different things in SC2 than in BW. In BW, Protoss mobility relied on two pillars, the arbter and the shuttle. Protoss defense relied on unit strength and cannon tech being strong (vs Z) as well as sweet tech/units at key timings (vs T/P). Protoss had shield batteries for defense, but the only time I really ever seeing it used in a pro game was when a Terran did a sneaky bio early timing push and the Protoss player was desperately trying to keep his few dragoons alive. Why did these things work in Broodwar? Let's start with the mobility units. Shuttles worked because they were strong and when upgraded very fast. The unit strength of zealots, dps of storms, splash of reavers, etc. made their payload quite deadly if not annoying for the receiving end. All it took was a few units to wreak a ton havoc. Arbiters worked because they did what a shuttle could not do, and that is move large armies all at once. It helped that they also gave a cloaking field to units within its effect radius. Not only this but they synergized with the strength of the protoss units through their last ability: stasis. Stasis could cut an opposing army in half, allowing the now indisputably more powerful protoss force to clean up each piece one at a time. In a rare case, statis could be used to block a path. So what did SC2 do with these things? Well Arbiters could be seen to be split out into three concepts: the Mothership, the Sentry, and Warp Gate technology. Shuttles have a fairly straight conversion into warp prisms, however, warp prisms, in conjunction with warp gate tech also have a bit of an arbiter role as well. First the obvious translation, the Mothership, is basically a souped up arbiter utterly and completely: cloaking field, check (plus buildings!); recall ability, check (massive radius!); split/immobilize opponent's army ability, check (but different!); sucky attack, couldn't leave this one out, check, check. The main difference really is the fact that you can only have one, which makes using the mothership for mobility as much as the arbiter was in BW for mobility purposes a problem. So what do we do about that? We allow for waves of the main army (gateway units) to be built out in the field near a power source instead of directly at the production facility: enter warp gate tech, warp prisms, and proxy pylons. I contest that this is Bliz's "poor man's recall" for when the mothership is not in play. Like recall, a large force can be brought to a distant location in an "instant", though instead of being limited by the recall spell radius, it is limited by the number of warpgates (and cooldown cycles, resources, supply, etc.). So now we have one problem left, we still don't have our "poor man's stasis": enter sentries. Sentries are basically one half of the arbiter with their crappy damage, buff ability for units within its effect radius, and most importantly, the "poor man's stasis" that is force field. Okay, we've laid out the similarities, so what are the differences and the effects those differences have made? Let's start backward. Force Field, to be very effective requires a lot of it cast, or favorable terrain since it is not unit targetable. It also has the downside that certain units can destroy it whereas in BW statis essentially took precedent over everything including other spells. A mixed blessing of force field is that it does not completely immobilize any units, though with enough force field or the right terrain conditions, it could do so, but this is not a direct effect. The major upside is the fact that it is now the ability of a tier 1.5 unit, and can be used as soon as that unit is created -- no upgrade, no waiting for energy. A major downside of this major upside is that now you have to balance the game (early game in particular) around an ability that though somewhat downgraded, used to be a tippy top tier ability. (You really couldn't get a more top tier unit than the Arbiter in BW requiring two tech paths to attain.) Sure, there are differences that make it less powerful, but do those differences in the long run balance out with it's availability? And if the answer is yes, we still need to ask whether base defense should be so heavily centered around the ability even if it is in some cases a very viable option. Warp-in, like recall, has the potential to deliver a huge number of troops to a distant location very quickly. In the late game with 20+ warpgates, whether via proxy pylons or warp prisms, it is quite easy to dump a large army somewhere. The two main differences are that the "recall" is straight from the production facility and that it does not affect units that have already been produced. On the one hand this is very strong since every production cycle can "recall" another 40+ supply of units. On the other hand power units like colossus or full energy templar, require a mothership to make the instant leap. Add to that the fact that you require either the static pylon or the self-indefensible warp prism to enable you warp-in. Keep in mind that as I talk about this, I am speaking of warp-in/recall in terms of its offensive capability. Like the arbiter in BW, the offensive capabilities of warping in tend to overshadow the defensive capabilities, intended or not (I remember seeing somewhere that the main idea for recall was to, as its name suggests, bring back an army to defend). While defense is certainly "possible" with these abilities, well... I think anyone who's heard the phrase "the best defense is a good offense" knows where I'm going with that one. Oh and this "poor man's recall" is also a tier 1.5 ability. Finally, motherships. RICH mans arbiter. 'nuff said. So now back to the OP. What worked in Broodwar was the usage of the Arbiter as the closer. But now we have dumbed down closer mechanics designed to be more accessible and less powerful. And as mentioned in the OP but put in my own terms, the problem lies in the fact that these abilities were in BW mainly *offensive in nature* and I argue that primarily they still are. They fact that force field *can* defend a main choke does not mean that it should be forced to do so any more than stasis. And in fact, that is exactly what is being "required", that protoss pigeonhole an offensive capability into a defensive one for a specific purpose that is viable only under specific circumstances. What used to work was the strength of the units themselves, but this was dumbed down to make warp tech not over powered. What used to work was cannons (to a degree), but this was dumbed down when the "dragoon" became a racially indifferent unit (i.e. terran got maraduer, zerg got roach). So what is left is the minute advantage of warp timing and force field which that early in the game in terrain dependant since you cannot have that many sentries that early. I think this is a sub-optimal design. This is not to say I do not like the changes in SC2 or that it cannot be its own game, but I do think protoss need something that allows for a defenders advantage, whether that be buffing gateway units, nerfing warpgate tech, a combination of both, or some other option like the Shield Battery. TLDR #1 -- I agree with the OP to a large degree. Comparing to Broodwar, Force Field should be seen as a primarily offensive ability, and relying on it to make up for the lack of a good defenders advantage is silly. Something needs to change in the protoss arsenal to allow for defenders advantage. So, you might ask "what should be done about it?" Well, I'm glad you did. Here's my baby that I think helps to solve multiple problems at once: Shield Battery. What? Someone already said that. Yes, but not the new, improved, SC2'ed Shield Battery. How does it work? Instead of the standard shield healing that the SC1/BW shield battery provided, instead it would look like this: Shield Equalizer (??) Stats: 100 hp / 100 shields / 100 energy Ability: Shield Redistribution (auto cast toggleable, enabled on creation) -- Effect: Within a radius of 5(/6/7/?), from the building, redistribute shields from all units/buildings at a rate of 2 shields for every 1 energy. When auto cast is disabled, the ability can target an area with the same radius within vision; this causes all units in the area to return to the building for shield redistribution. All units redistributed from/to are treated like they have just been attacked, i.e. delay before normal shield regeneration resumes. So an example of this would be as follows: We'll take a standard protoss ramp "wall off" scenario. One pylon, one gateway, one cyber core, and a zealot. Add a Shield Equalizer, and now the zealot has essentially 200 more shields. Three roaches poke in and attack the zealot who is waiting desperately for the stalker to get out. But instead of the zealot taking 48 shield damage, instead the Shield Equalizer uses its ability to spread out the damage amongst all the units/buildings within its radius, in this case, the zealot/gateway/cybercore/pylon/shield equalizer. So just to keep things simple, we'll say the zealot takes 8 shield damage itself, and the rest take 10 shield damage, and the shield equalizer uses up 20 energy to do so. In four more attacks, the zealot is at 40 shield damage, each building is at 50 shield damage, and the shield equalizer is now out of energy (really, the zealot and buildings would all be at 48 damage at this point and there would be a little energy left, but again for the example I'm simplifying). The next attack would render a full 48 damage on the zealot, but at this point the stalker could pop and help fend off the rush. This also conveniently doubles as the protoss response to terran repair and zerg transfuse. It also allows cannons to gain the beef they lose from the swarms of roach/maraduer. Finally, it lets you nerf warpgate tech to the point where it is still better than normal gateway tech, but actually has a trade off such as increased build (cooldown) time. Also, the nexus could go back to a reasonable 750/750. Oh and hellions don't necessarily immediately massacre all the probes on the first shot. Are there any other benefits? Probably. TLDR #2 -- Blizz please make the Shield Equalizer happen (so the rest of the stuff can be fixed)! If you want to but don't have the time, hire me, and I'll do it.
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On September 09 2011 08:07 FabledIntegral wrote: The argument isn't analogous because one involves a mechanic, such as warpin and how it kills something like defender's advantage and makes timing attacks much stronger consequently, while your argument is just unit A vs unit B vs unit C and their counters.
It is analogous because my point was to show that you can't string a bunch of popular opinions together and present it as fact. While warpgate tech does reduce the defenders advantage, it does not eliminate it. Nor does it necessarily mean that Gateway units are weaker or that they need to be or should be weaker due to warpgate tech!
Protoss Gateway units do just fine against tier 1 Zerg and Terran units. You could just as easily argue that Stalkers and Zealots are weak because of the Sentry and FF. And I think Stalkers and Zealots alone are underpowered vs mass tier 1 from other races, but when FF and Guardian Shield comes into play, they become very strong and compete well. And I play and love Protoss.
You need to look at the whole picture.
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On September 09 2011 08:15 HypertonicHydroponic wrote: TLDR #2 -- Blizz please make the Shield Equalizer happen (so the rest of the stuff can be fixed)! If you want to but don't have the time, hire me, and I'll do it.
Your equalizer would make any timing attack impossible vs Protoss early on. The amount of shields regened simply from the nexus (375) is insane, plus having like 2 pylons up there and you can effectively churn out 575 hp instantly.
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I've always felt like there should be some sort of advantage to using regular Gatways over Warp Gates, that would fix the whole "no defender advantage" in PvP at least if say, Gateways built units faster than Warp Gates did. It would add a whole different element of macromanagement for Protoss as well, turn all your Gates into Gateways when defending, transform to Warp Gates when attacking.
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On September 09 2011 08:23 BeeNu wrote: I've always felt like there should be some sort of advantage to using regular Gatways over Warp Gates, that would fix the whole "no defender advantage" in PvP at least if say, Gateways built units faster than Warp Gates did. It would add a whole different element of macromanagement for Protoss as well, turn all your Gates into Gateways when defending, transform to Warp Gates when attacking.
Blizzard has already stated that they wanted toss to start out with warpgates and be using warpgates at all points, but when they originally were testing the game warpgates were OP early on. Consequently, gateways were reintroduced to the game. They've stated they don't want gateways to have any advantage over warpgates.
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On September 09 2011 08:07 FabledIntegral wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 07:03 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 07:00 Eppa! wrote:On September 09 2011 06:55 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 06:54 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 06:34 Sevenofnines wrote:On September 09 2011 06:10 roymarthyup wrote: protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns. The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf. if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should. but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units. and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true. if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck. HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before Even if buildtimes are the same switching to warpgate allows you to get out an additional round of units^^ You could make the gateway -> WG morph time 30 seconds. and what would that fix? were talking about something complete way off from your point some people are saying they think protoss t1 units are weaker because warpgates exist im saying zealots and stalkers and sentries are not "made weaker" to compensate for warpgates instead, blizzard balances warpgates so protoss offensive abilities are not oveprowered, but the BAD RESULT OF THIS is that protoss as a race has zero defenders advantage. if you somehow gave protoss defenders advantage by making warpgates make more units, it would make their offensive ability overpowered my point is that even if warpgates were removed, protoss still would defend just as well (as long as gateway build times are somehow adjusted to allow just as many units to come out) I know what you're saying, I just disagree. I do think they made Protoss t1 units weaker because warpgates exist, so that timing attacks aren't too powerful. I still can't wrap my head exactly around how you're trying to suggest Protoss has no defenders advantage. Warpgates (exception of the extra warpin round) is highly irrelevant of defender's advantage, which we seem to agree upon (assuming build times were adjusted), but how does this eliminate a defender's advantage?
this is my explanation as to how warpgates eliminated protosses defenders advantage
blizzards logic on how to balance warpgates is what removes protosses defenders advantage which should be there if the game is to be balanced
zerg and terran both will have more units at their base if they are defending, and less units at the enemies base if they are attacking
zerg and terran are both more powerful when they are on the defensive. zerg and terran are both weaker when they are on the offensive
because of warpgates, PROTOSS has equal amounts of units whether he is attacking or defending
this is due to blizzards logic behind how to make warpgates function. blizzards logic on how to balance warpgates is what what eliminates protosses defenders advantage as an entire race
this, this statement right there means protoss has no defenders advantage as a race. protoss is not more powerful when it is on the defensive. i dont know how to explain it any clearer than that. because protoss is not more powerful when it is on the defensive, it means "protoss as a race has no defenders advantage"
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another way to look at it is like this. as a race, zerg and terran have the option to push a button that says "i will have more units and be more powerful, but i can only defend"
protoss does not have that option blizzard designed warpgate numbers so protoss aggression wouldnt be overpowered. warpgates were balanced so toss wouldnt have too many units when on the offensive. Because blizzard balanced warpgates so protoss couldnt get too many offensive units, this means protoss LACKS that option that zerg and terran have
zerg and terran have the option to push a button that says "i will have more units and be more powerful, but i can only defend". protoss does not have that option. protoss as a race has no defenders advantage compared to zerg or terran
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On September 09 2011 08:15 BronzeKnee wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 08:07 FabledIntegral wrote: The argument isn't analogous because one involves a mechanic, such as warpin and how it kills something like defender's advantage and makes timing attacks much stronger consequently, while your argument is just unit A vs unit B vs unit C and their counters. It is analogous because my point was to show that you can't string a bunch of popular opinions together and present it as fact. While warpgate tech does reduce the defenders advantage, it does not eliminate it. Nor does it necessarily mean that Gateway units are weaker or that they need to be or should be weaker due to warpgate tech! Protoss Gateway units do just fine against tier 1 Zerg and Terran units. You could just as easily argue that Stalkers and Zealots are weak because of the Sentry and FF. And I think Stalkers and Zealots alone are underpowered vs mass tier 1 from other races, but when FF and Guardian Shield comes into play, they become very strong and compete well. And I play and love Protoss. You need to look at the whole picture. you can't just say that "Protoss Gateway units do just fine against tier 1 Zerg and Terran units" and present it as fact either though. The problem is that looking at t1 vs t1 doesn't tell the whole story. Once you find the compositions that actually duke it out in games, you have to check the cost effectiveness of the armies and the micro capabilities and whatnot. For example, make equally costed armies with your equally skilled friend and simulate battles over and over, trying every maneuver on every kind of terrain. That would do a lot to answer the question, but is a crazy amount of work to go through, and would still not satisfy everyone. The only thing we can go on is how pro games turn out.
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On September 09 2011 08:27 roymarthyup wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 08:07 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 07:03 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 07:00 Eppa! wrote:On September 09 2011 06:55 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 06:54 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 06:34 Sevenofnines wrote:On September 09 2011 06:10 roymarthyup wrote: protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns. The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf. if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should. but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units. and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true. if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck. HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before Even if buildtimes are the same switching to warpgate allows you to get out an additional round of units^^ You could make the gateway -> WG morph time 30 seconds. and what would that fix? were talking about something complete way off from your point some people are saying they think protoss t1 units are weaker because warpgates exist im saying zealots and stalkers and sentries are not "made weaker" to compensate for warpgates instead, blizzard balances warpgates so protoss offensive abilities are not oveprowered, but the BAD RESULT OF THIS is that protoss as a race has zero defenders advantage. if you somehow gave protoss defenders advantage by making warpgates make more units, it would make their offensive ability overpowered my point is that even if warpgates were removed, protoss still would defend just as well (as long as gateway build times are somehow adjusted to allow just as many units to come out) I know what you're saying, I just disagree. I do think they made Protoss t1 units weaker because warpgates exist, so that timing attacks aren't too powerful. I still can't wrap my head exactly around how you're trying to suggest Protoss has no defenders advantage. Warpgates (exception of the extra warpin round) is highly irrelevant of defender's advantage, which we seem to agree upon (assuming build times were adjusted), but how does this eliminate a defender's advantage? this is my explanation as to how warpgates eliminated protosses defenders advantage blizzards logic on how to balance warpgates is what removes protosses defenders advantage which should be there if the game is to be balanced zerg and terran both will have more units at their base if they are defending, and less units at the enemies base if they are attacking zerg and terran are both more powerful when they are on the defensive. zerg and terran are both weaker when they are on the offensive because of warpgates, PROTOSS has equal amounts of units whether he is attacking or defending this is due to blizzards logic behind how to make warpgates function. blizzards logic on how to balance warpgates is what what eliminates protosses defenders advantage as an entire race this, this statement right there means protoss has no defenders advantage as a race. protoss is not more powerful when it is on the defensive. i dont know how to explain it any clearer than that. because protoss is not more powerful when it is on the defensive, it means "protoss as a race has no defenders advantage"
Oh, I see what you're saying. Haha, regardless, I still disagree completely. While Protoss will have the same amount of units when attacking or defending, the amount of units the Terran or Zerg units attacking/defending at that point in time will be different. You've already stated this, so we are agreeing on this point. Because when Protoss defends they will always be facing less units than if they were attacking, that is the defender's advantage, no?
You could just as easily interpret your argument as saying that warpin removes the defender's advantage for T/Z when facing P, and only Protoss experiences a defender's advantage.
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The big problem is that you totally disregard the power of forcefields, even on an open battlefield, they can be used extremely effectively to defend. And the whole thing of the lack of defenders advantage is wrong, protoss attacks are a bit more powerful than the other races, and their defense has zero rally, while the opponnent has to rally cross-map, meaning toss will be ahead by a full production cycle (due to warpgate mechanics) and whatever the rally distance is, 45 seconds or so on xel naga ramp to ramp, much further on the more open maps like cross pos metal and tal darim.
Warpgate makes protoss way too powerful offensively, so they've messed the timings up, so that the original timing builds don't line up as they did before, however once toss players figured out new builds, their gateway pushes were just as strong as before, just different timings to punish different things.
Protoss ramps/chokes are almost impossible to break with ground armies due to FF, and offensive, protoss can contain you forever with just a few hundred gas and very small food investment, compared to other races, protoss has the cheapest space control throughout the game.
The warpgate mechanic is a bit powerful for my taste, I think there should be an upgrade mb from the robo support bay or twilight council that makes protoss pylons have a greater warp-in range, back to pre-pylon nerf times, but the starting range would be 3, so that you can't just warp in over the cliff in PvT and PvP. This would help stabilize the metagame a lot, and allow terrans and protoss players to create a hugely wider variety of different builds, mech openings could be more greedy for example.
Also, gateway units are not weak... before stim gateway units are more efficient than marauders, and even after stim, the cost of production for gateway units makes the same investment into gateways pay off more than the investment into barracks or roach/ling.
tl; dr: 1) Didn't take into account the rally distance for whoever's attacking the protoss player, combined with the reversed production cycles from protoss. 2) Forcefield is super effective, on open ground it can easily allow protoss to destroy an army much larger than their own, and on a choke it can make protoss nigh invincible. 3) Gateway units are efficient against bio and lings/roachs and can be easily micro'd to increase their efficiency further. 4) The space control potential for sentries is through the roof compared to the other race's options, 1 sentry can prevent terran from leaving their base until medivacs are out, or allow protoss to tech up to double upgrade colosus with only a single stalker and 4 sentries, and easily hold off any ground attacks on maps like shakuras or antiga.
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I always said that warp-gate tech is stupid. But ofc protosses loved it until we learned to shut down their cannon rush and 4gate with proxy pylon. Game cannot be balanced with such broken mechanics as warpgate and spawn larva because they multiply EVERY single buff by incredible amount.
I guess the only way to balance the game for protoss is to buff/nerf other than gateway units (for example immortal buff).
But I think the real problem is with the larva inject. This retarded mechanic made zerg FE unpunishable, and you can't implement any real buffs to the zerg units because of this...
I hope in HotS blizzard could remove larva inject, warpgate, chronoboost and mules ;] but ofc that is not possible so at least they could revamp these mechanics a little bit ;] For example make warping units possible only within some radius around the nexus (about the same radius as sensor tower has), and make larva inject last for like 2 minutes so zerg doesn't have to do it manually, but nerf larva spawn to +1.
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On September 09 2011 08:35 CatNzHat wrote: The big problem is that you totally disregard the power of forcefields, even on an open battlefield, they can be used extremely effectively to defend. And the whole thing of the lack of defenders advantage is wrong, protoss attacks are a bit more powerful than the other races, and their defense has zero rally, while the opponnent has to rally cross-map, meaning toss will be ahead by a full production cycle (due to warpgate mechanics) and whatever the rally distance is, 45 seconds or so on xel naga ramp to ramp, much further on the more open maps like cross pos metal and tal darim.
Warpgate makes protoss way too powerful offensively, so they've messed the timings up, so that the original timing builds don't line up as they did before, however once toss players figured out new builds, their gateway pushes were just as strong as before, just different timings to punish different things.
Protoss ramps/chokes are almost impossible to break with ground armies due to FF, and offensive, protoss can contain you forever with just a few hundred gas and very small food investment, compared to other races, protoss has the cheapest space control throughout the game.
The warpgate mechanic is a bit powerful for my taste, I think there should be an upgrade mb from the robo support bay or twilight council that makes protoss pylons have a greater warp-in range, back to pre-pylon nerf times, but the starting range would be 3, so that you can't just warp in over the cliff in PvT and PvP. This would help stabilize the metagame a lot, and allow terrans and protoss players to create a hugely wider variety of different builds, mech openings could be more greedy for example.
Also, gateway units are not weak... before stim gateway units are more efficient than marauders, and even after stim, the cost of production for gateway units makes the same investment into gateways pay off more than the investment into barracks or roach/ling.
tl; dr: 1) Didn't take into account the rally distance for whoever's attacking the protoss player, combined with the reversed production cycles from protoss. 2) Forcefield is super effective, on open ground it can easily allow protoss to destroy an army much larger than their own, and on a choke it can make protoss nigh invincible. 3) Gateway units are efficient against bio and lings/roachs and can be easily micro'd to increase their efficiency further. 4) The space control potential for sentries is through the roof compared to the other race's options, 1 sentry can prevent terran from leaving their base until medivacs are out, or allow protoss to tech up to double upgrade colosus with only a single stalker and 4 sentries, and easily hold off any ground attacks on maps like shakuras or antiga.
"Also, gateway units are not weak... before stim gateway units are more efficient than marauders, and even after stim, the cost of production for gateway units makes the same investment into gateways pay off more than the investment into barracks or roach/ling."
where is your evidence for saying these things? Talking about balance is fine, but you have to back up your arguments, instead of trying to pass off your opinions as fact.
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Overall when I look at what Protoss is in SC2 it strikes me as what Terran was in SC1 (late game anyways). When they get into the later game it becomes a hard to kill ball type army, while in the early game it is fast pushes with an easier to kill (weaker unit) army.
I feel like to stop this mitigation of styles, Blizzard needs to make them stick to what they have been given late game. A few ways I was thinking that they could do this is by taking away the pylon warp in mechanic farther that is too far away from their base, what I mean by this is have a designated area around a nexus that allows units to be warped in that area (still by pylon radius).
Now to counter this I feel that Protoss units (mainly stalker) should have more armor, and move a little slower. maybe make all of their units a little better, make them cost a little more, I'm not sure so don't take that as my entire idea. Just something to throw out there.
This lets them stay truer to what they have become in SC2, instead of having these two drastically different styles that we see. This would also help in the late game, where the Protoss needs to have so many T3 units to kill bio armies and such.
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On September 09 2011 08:35 FabledIntegral wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 08:27 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 08:07 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 07:03 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 07:00 Eppa! wrote:On September 09 2011 06:55 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 06:54 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 06:34 Sevenofnines wrote:On September 09 2011 06:10 roymarthyup wrote: protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns. The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf. if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should. but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units. and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true. if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck. HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before Even if buildtimes are the same switching to warpgate allows you to get out an additional round of units^^ You could make the gateway -> WG morph time 30 seconds. and what would that fix? were talking about something complete way off from your point some people are saying they think protoss t1 units are weaker because warpgates exist im saying zealots and stalkers and sentries are not "made weaker" to compensate for warpgates instead, blizzard balances warpgates so protoss offensive abilities are not oveprowered, but the BAD RESULT OF THIS is that protoss as a race has zero defenders advantage. if you somehow gave protoss defenders advantage by making warpgates make more units, it would make their offensive ability overpowered my point is that even if warpgates were removed, protoss still would defend just as well (as long as gateway build times are somehow adjusted to allow just as many units to come out) I know what you're saying, I just disagree. I do think they made Protoss t1 units weaker because warpgates exist, so that timing attacks aren't too powerful. I still can't wrap my head exactly around how you're trying to suggest Protoss has no defenders advantage. Warpgates (exception of the extra warpin round) is highly irrelevant of defender's advantage, which we seem to agree upon (assuming build times were adjusted), but how does this eliminate a defender's advantage? this is my explanation as to how warpgates eliminated protosses defenders advantage blizzards logic on how to balance warpgates is what removes protosses defenders advantage which should be there if the game is to be balanced zerg and terran both will have more units at their base if they are defending, and less units at the enemies base if they are attacking zerg and terran are both more powerful when they are on the defensive. zerg and terran are both weaker when they are on the offensive because of warpgates, PROTOSS has equal amounts of units whether he is attacking or defending this is due to blizzards logic behind how to make warpgates function. blizzards logic on how to balance warpgates is what what eliminates protosses defenders advantage as an entire race this, this statement right there means protoss has no defenders advantage as a race. protoss is not more powerful when it is on the defensive. i dont know how to explain it any clearer than that. because protoss is not more powerful when it is on the defensive, it means "protoss as a race has no defenders advantage" Oh, I see what you're saying. Haha, regardless, I still disagree completely. While Protoss will have the same amount of units when attacking or defending, the amount of units the Terran or Zerg units attacking/defending at that point in time will be different. You've already stated this, so we are agreeing on this point. Because when Protoss defends they will always be facing less units than if they were attacking, that is the defender's advantage, no? You could just as easily interpret your argument as saying that warpin removes the defender's advantage for T/Z when facing P, and only Protoss experiences a defender's advantage.
in a way yes and in a way no
in reality, defenders advantage for a race accounts for roughly 1 round of units. it takes units normally 30 seconds to walk across the map and reach battle, or around there. so its 1 round of units
this is a very simplified version of defenders advantage and how it works but its so complicated its hard to explain properly... but here it is...
if terran is attacking, he has 1 less round of units in his forces if terran is defending, he has 1 more round of units in his forces
same can sort of be said for zerg
if terran is defending against zerg, his defenders advantage is strong because its +1 round for terran, -1 round for zerg. a defenders advantage of +2 for terran.
same for a zerg defending against a terran
but warpgates is balanced to not be too strong offensively. so when protoss is defending he only has a +1 defenders advantage
so i guess, in a way protoss does have a slight defenders advantage due to the fact that zerg/terran are balanced to have a offenders handicap. but protosses defenders advantage is still less than zerg/terran
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On September 09 2011 08:48 Fig wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 08:35 CatNzHat wrote: The big problem is that you totally disregard the power of forcefields, even on an open battlefield, they can be used extremely effectively to defend. And the whole thing of the lack of defenders advantage is wrong, protoss attacks are a bit more powerful than the other races, and their defense has zero rally, while the opponnent has to rally cross-map, meaning toss will be ahead by a full production cycle (due to warpgate mechanics) and whatever the rally distance is, 45 seconds or so on xel naga ramp to ramp, much further on the more open maps like cross pos metal and tal darim.
Warpgate makes protoss way too powerful offensively, so they've messed the timings up, so that the original timing builds don't line up as they did before, however once toss players figured out new builds, their gateway pushes were just as strong as before, just different timings to punish different things.
Protoss ramps/chokes are almost impossible to break with ground armies due to FF, and offensive, protoss can contain you forever with just a few hundred gas and very small food investment, compared to other races, protoss has the cheapest space control throughout the game.
The warpgate mechanic is a bit powerful for my taste, I think there should be an upgrade mb from the robo support bay or twilight council that makes protoss pylons have a greater warp-in range, back to pre-pylon nerf times, but the starting range would be 3, so that you can't just warp in over the cliff in PvT and PvP. This would help stabilize the metagame a lot, and allow terrans and protoss players to create a hugely wider variety of different builds, mech openings could be more greedy for example.
Also, gateway units are not weak... before stim gateway units are more efficient than marauders, and even after stim, the cost of production for gateway units makes the same investment into gateways pay off more than the investment into barracks or roach/ling.
tl; dr: 1) Didn't take into account the rally distance for whoever's attacking the protoss player, combined with the reversed production cycles from protoss. 2) Forcefield is super effective, on open ground it can easily allow protoss to destroy an army much larger than their own, and on a choke it can make protoss nigh invincible. 3) Gateway units are efficient against bio and lings/roachs and can be easily micro'd to increase their efficiency further. 4) The space control potential for sentries is through the roof compared to the other race's options, 1 sentry can prevent terran from leaving their base until medivacs are out, or allow protoss to tech up to double upgrade colosus with only a single stalker and 4 sentries, and easily hold off any ground attacks on maps like shakuras or antiga.
"Also, gateway units are not weak... before stim gateway units are more efficient than marauders, and even after stim, the cost of production for gateway units makes the same investment into gateways pay off more than the investment into barracks or roach/ling." where is your evidence for saying these things? Talking about balance is fine, but you have to back up your arguments, instead of trying to pass off your opinions as fact.
in a open field, zealot+sentry+stalker should beat marine/marauder before stim after stim its pretty equal and gateway units are equal to bio units. but this is assume terran has no tanks or thors or ghosts.
tanks/thors/ghosts deal so much damage for their gas cost it will beat gateway units. and its sort of a design flay that its easy for terran to get a few tanks but its extremely hard for toss to get a few collossi or templars. but i wont go there. T1 bio with stim is about even to T1 gateway units
sure, zealot units cost more gas than terran units. marines are mineral only, marauders take almost no gas to build. sentries/stalkers are gas expensive units.
this means protoss is spending more gas early game where terran has the option of saving gas or not even getting gas
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You need some Q's to go with your sour grapes? Have you seen what force fields do to zerg ground forces? Do you know you can press G for guardian shield? L2P, use sentries and STFU ;-) How is getting a forge not tech? You know it's not only for getting cannons? That it can also be used to get upgrades, which by my count is two different kinds of tech...
Anyone else getting sick of the bufukinhu my race isn't OP anymore posts?
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zealot sentry stalker doesnt beat mm with stim efficiently
thats why protosses get colossus and HT
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On September 09 2011 09:10 oZe wrote: You need some Q's to go with your sour grapes? Have you seen what force fields do to zerg ground forces? Do you know you can press G for guardian shield? L2P, use sentries and STFU ;-) How is getting a forge not tech? You know it's not only for getting cannons? That it can also be used to get upgrades, which by my count is two different kinds of tech...
Anyone else getting sick of the bufukinhu my race isn't OP anymore posts?
you sound mad
should probably get that checked out
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On September 09 2011 09:11 PPTouch wrote: zealot sentry stalker doesnt beat mm with stim efficiently
thats why protosses get colossus and HT
it does, in equal foods, as long as the terran has no ghosts or thors or tanks or medivacs
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On September 09 2011 09:02 roymarthyup wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 08:35 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 08:27 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 08:07 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 07:03 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 07:00 Eppa! wrote:On September 09 2011 06:55 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 06:54 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 06:34 Sevenofnines wrote:On September 09 2011 06:10 roymarthyup wrote: protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns. The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf. if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should. but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units. and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true. if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck. HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before Even if buildtimes are the same switching to warpgate allows you to get out an additional round of units^^ You could make the gateway -> WG morph time 30 seconds. and what would that fix? were talking about something complete way off from your point some people are saying they think protoss t1 units are weaker because warpgates exist im saying zealots and stalkers and sentries are not "made weaker" to compensate for warpgates instead, blizzard balances warpgates so protoss offensive abilities are not oveprowered, but the BAD RESULT OF THIS is that protoss as a race has zero defenders advantage. if you somehow gave protoss defenders advantage by making warpgates make more units, it would make their offensive ability overpowered my point is that even if warpgates were removed, protoss still would defend just as well (as long as gateway build times are somehow adjusted to allow just as many units to come out) I know what you're saying, I just disagree. I do think they made Protoss t1 units weaker because warpgates exist, so that timing attacks aren't too powerful. I still can't wrap my head exactly around how you're trying to suggest Protoss has no defenders advantage. Warpgates (exception of the extra warpin round) is highly irrelevant of defender's advantage, which we seem to agree upon (assuming build times were adjusted), but how does this eliminate a defender's advantage? this is my explanation as to how warpgates eliminated protosses defenders advantage blizzards logic on how to balance warpgates is what removes protosses defenders advantage which should be there if the game is to be balanced zerg and terran both will have more units at their base if they are defending, and less units at the enemies base if they are attacking zerg and terran are both more powerful when they are on the defensive. zerg and terran are both weaker when they are on the offensive because of warpgates, PROTOSS has equal amounts of units whether he is attacking or defending this is due to blizzards logic behind how to make warpgates function. blizzards logic on how to balance warpgates is what what eliminates protosses defenders advantage as an entire race this, this statement right there means protoss has no defenders advantage as a race. protoss is not more powerful when it is on the defensive. i dont know how to explain it any clearer than that. because protoss is not more powerful when it is on the defensive, it means "protoss as a race has no defenders advantage" Oh, I see what you're saying. Haha, regardless, I still disagree completely. While Protoss will have the same amount of units when attacking or defending, the amount of units the Terran or Zerg units attacking/defending at that point in time will be different. You've already stated this, so we are agreeing on this point. Because when Protoss defends they will always be facing less units than if they were attacking, that is the defender's advantage, no? You could just as easily interpret your argument as saying that warpin removes the defender's advantage for T/Z when facing P, and only Protoss experiences a defender's advantage. in a way yes and in a way no in reality, defenders advantage for a race accounts for roughly 1 round of units. it takes units normally 30 seconds to walk across the map and reach battle, or around there. so its 1 round of units this is a very simplified version of defenders advantage and how it works but its so complicated its hard to explain properly... but here it is... if terran is attacking, he has 1 less round of units in his forces if terran is defending, he has 1 more round of units in his forces same can sort of be said for zerg if terran is defending against zerg, his defenders advantage is strong because its +1 round for terran, -1 round for zerg. a defenders advantage of +2 for terran. same for a zerg defending against a terran but warpgates is balanced to not be too strong offensively. so when protoss is defending he only has a +1 defenders advantage so i guess, in a way protoss does have a slight defenders advantage due to the fact that zerg/terran are balanced to have a offenders handicap. but protosses defenders advantage is still less than zerg/terran
That doesn't make any sense at all. +1 and -1 relative to what?
Defender's advantage by army numbers is very simple. Attacker is at -1 round compared to the defender because his reinforcements are still walking across the map, while the defender's are where they need to be. Defender's advantage is relative to the attacker only.
So T and Z are both -1 when attacking. Protoss, however, is not. Protoss with forward warpins has a defender's advantage in the other guy's base. That's the power of warpin, and why toss gateway is crap cost-for-cost against the other races.
But defender's advantage is not just about unit counts. Creep for Z, static defenses for Z and T, and FF for toss all contribute to defender's advantage. Toss is stronger on the attack by raw round count, but Z and T in particular don't rely solely on numbers, and their units are more cost-efficient.
But, as long as it's still possible to warp-in over forcefields, toss does not have such secondary measures against another protoss, which is why PvP and PvP alone is aggressively broken at the warpgate timing.
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On September 09 2011 09:02 roymarthyup wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 08:35 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 08:27 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 08:07 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 07:03 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 07:00 Eppa! wrote:On September 09 2011 06:55 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 06:54 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 06:34 Sevenofnines wrote:On September 09 2011 06:10 roymarthyup wrote: protoss wouldnt stand a chance without warpgates because removing warpgates is a NERF. a strong nerf at that
if you removed warpgates, but instead made cybercores have a 50/50 upgrade that said "all warpgates now produce units 300% faster, units are the same cost, buildtimes are just reduced by75%" then protoss would still be the same early game but after getting that upgrade they would probably be able to do the sime timing attacks against zerg (maybe even stronger) while having a defenders advantage as well
the point of this post is gateway units are not made weaker to compensate for warpgates
INSTEAD, gateway unit BUILDTIMES are made longer to compensate for warpgates. and the cooldown on warping in is considered to be a buildtime.
essentially, the rate at which each production building can create gateway units is what blizzard uses to balance the strength of warpgates, not by making gateway units weaker
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns. The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf. if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should. but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units. and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true. if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck. HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before Even if buildtimes are the same switching to warpgate allows you to get out an additional round of units^^ You could make the gateway -> WG morph time 30 seconds. and what would that fix? were talking about something complete way off from your point some people are saying they think protoss t1 units are weaker because warpgates exist im saying zealots and stalkers and sentries are not "made weaker" to compensate for warpgates instead, blizzard balances warpgates so protoss offensive abilities are not oveprowered, but the BAD RESULT OF THIS is that protoss as a race has zero defenders advantage. if you somehow gave protoss defenders advantage by making warpgates make more units, it would make their offensive ability overpowered my point is that even if warpgates were removed, protoss still would defend just as well (as long as gateway build times are somehow adjusted to allow just as many units to come out) I know what you're saying, I just disagree. I do think they made Protoss t1 units weaker because warpgates exist, so that timing attacks aren't too powerful. I still can't wrap my head exactly around how you're trying to suggest Protoss has no defenders advantage. Warpgates (exception of the extra warpin round) is highly irrelevant of defender's advantage, which we seem to agree upon (assuming build times were adjusted), but how does this eliminate a defender's advantage? this is my explanation as to how warpgates eliminated protosses defenders advantage blizzards logic on how to balance warpgates is what removes protosses defenders advantage which should be there if the game is to be balanced zerg and terran both will have more units at their base if they are defending, and less units at the enemies base if they are attacking zerg and terran are both more powerful when they are on the defensive. zerg and terran are both weaker when they are on the offensive because of warpgates, PROTOSS has equal amounts of units whether he is attacking or defending this is due to blizzards logic behind how to make warpgates function. blizzards logic on how to balance warpgates is what what eliminates protosses defenders advantage as an entire race this, this statement right there means protoss has no defenders advantage as a race. protoss is not more powerful when it is on the defensive. i dont know how to explain it any clearer than that. because protoss is not more powerful when it is on the defensive, it means "protoss as a race has no defenders advantage" Oh, I see what you're saying. Haha, regardless, I still disagree completely. While Protoss will have the same amount of units when attacking or defending, the amount of units the Terran or Zerg units attacking/defending at that point in time will be different. You've already stated this, so we are agreeing on this point. Because when Protoss defends they will always be facing less units than if they were attacking, that is the defender's advantage, no? You could just as easily interpret your argument as saying that warpin removes the defender's advantage for T/Z when facing P, and only Protoss experiences a defender's advantage. in a way yes and in a way no in reality, defenders advantage for a race accounts for roughly 1 round of units. it takes units normally 30 seconds to walk across the map and reach battle, or around there. so its 1 round of units this is a very simplified version of defenders advantage and how it works but its so complicated its hard to explain properly... but here it is... if terran is attacking, he has 1 less round of units in his forces if terran is defending, he has 1 more round of units in his forces same can sort of be said for zerg if terran is defending against zerg, his defenders advantage is strong because its +1 round for terran, -1 round for zerg. a defenders advantage of +2 for terran. same for a zerg defending against a terran but warpgates is balanced to not be too strong offensively. so when protoss is defending he only has a +1 defenders advantage so i guess, in a way protoss does have a slight defenders advantage due to the fact that zerg/terran are balanced to have a offenders handicap. but protosses defenders advantage is still less than zerg/terran
I can agree with that^^. Although another part of defender's advantage is being able to see them move out and respond accordingly by Chrono, etc. I know it's SC2 specific and you hypothetically could have gotten the exact same units attacking, but it's just something to consider.
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On September 09 2011 09:14 roymarthyup wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 09:11 PPTouch wrote: zealot sentry stalker doesnt beat mm with stim efficiently
thats why protosses get colossus and HT it does, in equal foods, as long as the terran has no ghosts or thors or tanks or medivacs
naw terran t1 is snowball once they get past 35 supply of army and know how to kite terran t1 will trump protoss t1 so long as the terran isnt retarded and runs into range of sentries to cast ffs
ff range is pretty low and sentries are pretty slow
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On September 09 2011 09:14 Belisarius wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 09:02 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 08:35 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 08:27 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 08:07 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 07:03 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 07:00 Eppa! wrote:On September 09 2011 06:55 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 06:54 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 06:34 Sevenofnines wrote: [quote]
You are taking a far too limited view on warpgates. Yes of course the warpgate cooldown basically acts like a "buildtime". Thus over a very long period of time, the amount of units made via warpgates vs queues or whatever will be approximately the same. That isn't the issue with warpgates. The issue at hand is WHEN and WHERE those units become available. Warpgates get you the units up front (not X seconds later) and wherever you happen to need them. It is this tactical advantage that is the true power of warpgates, and that advantage has to be balanced out somewhere else. To put it another way, gateway units are being made weaker to compensate for the tactical advantages of warpgates, not their build cooldowns.
The reason I bought up how Toss would fair without warpgates is because some folks are saying that there isn't ANY connection between gateway unit strength and warpgates. If that's the case, then you could just remove it and gateway units should perform similarly. OF COURSE I know its a nerf. I mentioned that SPECIFICALLY because its a massive nerf to gateway units. This means there MUST be a connection between warpgates and the strength of gateway units because the removal of warpgates is a huge nerf to gateway units. If there was no connection at all, it wouldn't be a nerf. if you did removed warpgates right now in the current game, essentially what that means is protoss defensive power STAYS THE SAME, but their offensive power GOES DOWN. this assumes buildtimes on the gateway are altered to let toss get out just as many defensive units as he could get with warpgates theres no connection between warpgates and gateway unit strength there IS a connection between warpgates the amount of units blizzard designed warpgates/gateways to be able to produce per minute i agree with you, the fact that gateways can warp in anywhere is the "problem" with the warpgate concept this means blizzard cannot make balance out defenders advantage and protoss aggression at the same time right now, protoss defensive abilities are underpowered. protoss has a weaker defenders advantage than they should. but this doesnt mean protoss units are weaker than other races units in a pure UNIT COST and UNIT STRENGTH and FOOD vs FOOD comparison, i do not believe stalkers and zealots and sentries are weaker then other races T1 units. and I believe in all situations where a protoss is being defensive, you COULD "just remove warpgates" and gateway units would perform similarly... however ONLY in defensive scenarios would this be true. if you removed warpgates, protoss would suck because the enemy would know there is zero chance of being in danger of aggression so the enemy would play the game knowing he doesnt have to fear aggression. warpgates are the source of protoss aggression, if you remove that, protoss would suck. HOWEVER, thats simply logical that removing warpgates would make protoss suck because a race with no aggressive options is sucky but its not because protoss units are weaker, its because protoss would no longer be able to move those units across the map instantly I believe in every scenario where a protoss is being defensive, if warpgates were removed the gateway units WOULD perform similarly as long as gateway buildtimes were adjusted to allow the protoss to crank out just as many units to defend with as before Even if buildtimes are the same switching to warpgate allows you to get out an additional round of units^^ You could make the gateway -> WG morph time 30 seconds. and what would that fix? were talking about something complete way off from your point some people are saying they think protoss t1 units are weaker because warpgates exist im saying zealots and stalkers and sentries are not "made weaker" to compensate for warpgates instead, blizzard balances warpgates so protoss offensive abilities are not oveprowered, but the BAD RESULT OF THIS is that protoss as a race has zero defenders advantage. if you somehow gave protoss defenders advantage by making warpgates make more units, it would make their offensive ability overpowered my point is that even if warpgates were removed, protoss still would defend just as well (as long as gateway build times are somehow adjusted to allow just as many units to come out) I know what you're saying, I just disagree. I do think they made Protoss t1 units weaker because warpgates exist, so that timing attacks aren't too powerful. I still can't wrap my head exactly around how you're trying to suggest Protoss has no defenders advantage. Warpgates (exception of the extra warpin round) is highly irrelevant of defender's advantage, which we seem to agree upon (assuming build times were adjusted), but how does this eliminate a defender's advantage? this is my explanation as to how warpgates eliminated protosses defenders advantage blizzards logic on how to balance warpgates is what removes protosses defenders advantage which should be there if the game is to be balanced zerg and terran both will have more units at their base if they are defending, and less units at the enemies base if they are attacking zerg and terran are both more powerful when they are on the defensive. zerg and terran are both weaker when they are on the offensive because of warpgates, PROTOSS has equal amounts of units whether he is attacking or defending this is due to blizzards logic behind how to make warpgates function. blizzards logic on how to balance warpgates is what what eliminates protosses defenders advantage as an entire race this, this statement right there means protoss has no defenders advantage as a race. protoss is not more powerful when it is on the defensive. i dont know how to explain it any clearer than that. because protoss is not more powerful when it is on the defensive, it means "protoss as a race has no defenders advantage" Oh, I see what you're saying. Haha, regardless, I still disagree completely. While Protoss will have the same amount of units when attacking or defending, the amount of units the Terran or Zerg units attacking/defending at that point in time will be different. You've already stated this, so we are agreeing on this point. Because when Protoss defends they will always be facing less units than if they were attacking, that is the defender's advantage, no? You could just as easily interpret your argument as saying that warpin removes the defender's advantage for T/Z when facing P, and only Protoss experiences a defender's advantage. in a way yes and in a way no in reality, defenders advantage for a race accounts for roughly 1 round of units. it takes units normally 30 seconds to walk across the map and reach battle, or around there. so its 1 round of units this is a very simplified version of defenders advantage and how it works but its so complicated its hard to explain properly... but here it is... if terran is attacking, he has 1 less round of units in his forces if terran is defending, he has 1 more round of units in his forces same can sort of be said for zerg if terran is defending against zerg, his defenders advantage is strong because its +1 round for terran, -1 round for zerg. a defenders advantage of +2 for terran. same for a zerg defending against a terran but warpgates is balanced to not be too strong offensively. so when protoss is defending he only has a +1 defenders advantage so i guess, in a way protoss does have a slight defenders advantage due to the fact that zerg/terran are balanced to have a offenders handicap. but protosses defenders advantage is still less than zerg/terran That doesn't make any sense at all. +1 and -1 relative to what? Defender's advantage by army numbers is very simple. Attacker is at -1 round compared to the defender because his reinforcements are still walking across the map, while the defender's are where they need to be. Defender's advantage is relative to the attacker only. So T and Z are both -1 when attacking. Protoss, however, is not. Protoss with forward warpins has a defender's advantage in the other guy's base. That's the power of warpin, and why toss gateway is crap cost-for-cost against the other races. But defender's advantage is not just about unit counts. Creep for Z, static defenses for Z and T, and FF for toss all contribute to defender's advantage. Toss is stronger on the attack by raw round count, but Z and T in particular don't rely solely on numbers, and their units are more cost-efficient. But, as long as it's still possible to warp-in over forcefields, toss does not have such secondary measures against another protoss, which is why PvP and PvP alone is aggressively broken at the warpgate timing.
relative to the fact that zerg/terran have the option to press a button that says "i will have more units and i will be stronger, but i can only defend"
protoss doesnt have that option
as a result, protoss has a weaker defenders advantage. i guess i shouldnt say its zero, but the fact is protoss does not have a option to press that button. zerg/terran do
based on pure logic, protoss has less of a defenders advantage, based on pure logic of unit numbers and where they can be at a certain time.
terran "as a race" has more of a defenders advantage than protoss purely based off the fact that they can choose to only defend and it gives them a larger army
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On September 09 2011 09:16 PPTouch wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 09:14 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 09:11 PPTouch wrote: zealot sentry stalker doesnt beat mm with stim efficiently
thats why protosses get colossus and HT it does, in equal foods, as long as the terran has no ghosts or thors or tanks or medivacs naw terran t1 is snowball once they get past 35 supply of army and know how to kite terran t1 will trump protoss t1 so long as the terran isnt retarded and runs into range of sentries to cast ffsff range is pretty low and sentries are pretty slow
ff range is long enough. if both players have good micro, mm cannot kite gateway units if its equal foods vs equal foods, FF will prevent kiting. guardian shield makes marauders do super low dps to zealots
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On September 09 2011 09:16 PPTouch wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 09:14 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 09:11 PPTouch wrote: zealot sentry stalker doesnt beat mm with stim efficiently
thats why protosses get colossus and HT it does, in equal foods, as long as the terran has no ghosts or thors or tanks or medivacs naw terran t1 is snowball once they get past 35 supply of army and know how to kite terran t1 will trump protoss t1 so long as the terran isnt retarded and runs into range of sentries to cast ffsff range is pretty low and sentries are pretty slow
Only if Terran has stim, combat shields, and conc though, while Toss having no upgrades. A 1/1 toss T1 army can compete. Only comparable thing to measure really since Charge/Blink are so much further ahead.
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very nice read, and sheild battery would be so awesome
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Good but interesting post.
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I think the warpgate mechanic adds a lot of diversity to the protoss race but att he price of having less cost efficient units. I think having the warpgate mechanic makes toss unique and i would not want it to be nerfed. But i agree that something needs to be done to give protoss a defensive advantage and shield battery does sound like a good idea. It even requires micro which is what protoss is all about
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Excellent analysis. It's the lack of a defensive structure on the standard tech path that makes fast expanding as Protoss so risky. We saw HuK for example punished for this trying 1 gate expands versus a top tier terran in GSL. Sure it works on ladder against lesser players, but against the best players it loses due to lack of a defenders advantage. A shield battery or something that could only be used in a defensive fashion would really help to allow a fast expo (without forge first) style Protoss to evolve.
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On September 09 2011 09:19 FabledIntegral wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 09:16 PPTouch wrote:On September 09 2011 09:14 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 09:11 PPTouch wrote: zealot sentry stalker doesnt beat mm with stim efficiently
thats why protosses get colossus and HT it does, in equal foods, as long as the terran has no ghosts or thors or tanks or medivacs naw terran t1 is snowball once they get past 35 supply of army and know how to kite terran t1 will trump protoss t1 so long as the terran isnt retarded and runs into range of sentries to cast ffsff range is pretty low and sentries are pretty slow Only if Terran has stim, combat shields, and conc though, while Toss having no upgrades. A 1/1 toss T1 army can compete. Only comparable thing to measure really since Charge/Blink are so much further ahead.
Stim is enough.
In fact, if the Protoss doesn't get any aoe, you don't actually need Marauders for anything, past a certain supply threshold.
There's a point, around 30 supply, where the synergy between Zealots and Sentries is the strongest, and then Gateway armies can trade efficiently with Bio. But if you go significantly above that, you will lose, no matter tha upgrades. Take it from someone who plays Tyler's build on ladder fairly often - I've had games where 70 supply of Zealot/Stalker/Sentry at 2/2 got rolled by 70 supply of Bio at 1/0. Like, it wasn't even close, Terran didn't even need to kite, just spread his stuff into an arc during the battle. Once they kill the Zealots, you lose instantly.
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On September 09 2011 09:17 roymarthyup wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 09:14 Belisarius wrote: That doesn't make any sense at all. +1 and -1 relative to what?
Defender's advantage by army numbers is very simple. Attacker is at -1 round compared to the defender because his reinforcements are still walking across the map, while the defender's are where they need to be. Defender's advantage is relative to the attacker only.
So T and Z are both -1 when attacking. Protoss, however, is not. Protoss with forward warpins has a defender's advantage in the other guy's base. That's the power of warpin, and why toss gateway is crap cost-for-cost against the other races.
But defender's advantage is not just about unit counts. Creep for Z, static defenses for Z and T, and FF for toss all contribute to defender's advantage. Toss is stronger on the attack by raw round count, but Z and T in particular don't rely solely on numbers, and their units are more cost-efficient.
But, as long as it's still possible to warp-in over forcefields, toss does not have such secondary measures against another protoss, which is why PvP and PvP alone is aggressively broken at the warpgate timing. relative to the fact that zerg/terran have the option to press a button that says "i will have more units and i will be stronger, but i can only defend" protoss doesnt have that option as a result, protoss has a weaker defenders advantage. i guess i shouldnt say its zero, but the fact is protoss does not have a option to press that button. zerg/terran do based on pure logic, protoss has less of a defenders advantage, based on pure logic of unit numbers and where they can be at a certain time. terran "as a race" has more of a defenders advantage than protoss purely based off the fact that they can choose to only defend and it gives them a larger army
...what the heck button are you talking about? There's absolutely nothing in the terran arsenal that gives them a larger army but forces them to defend with it. Literally nothing.
Terran have bunkers (which are amazing) and units which are more cost-effective (which is also amazing). But those have nothing to do with having a larger army, nor do they lock him into defending. The terran can take his cost efficient army right the hell up to your nat whenever he likes; he can even build bunkers and siege up tanks there.
It's conceivably possible to say Z have such a button with their larvae mechanic, but that's balanced by their needing larvae for drones as well as military. Zerg's defender's advantage early game comes from creep speed, spine crawlers, queens, and their ability to rapidly create reactive compositions.
I agree that protoss have the least defender's advantage once they've expanded past their ramp. But it's really not for the reasons you're stating.
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You didn't think this completely through.
There are 2! Not 1, advantage to warp ins:
1. Distance, which you heavily emphasized and I agree.
2. 5 second warp in time! yes that is 5 seconds for minerals to turn into a unit.
2 advantage means not only are you behind beacuse they can warp in close to you, but also means Protoss production cycle spends money first, unit, wait, instead of money, wait, unit.
So, 4 Warpgates producing 4 zealots vs 2 Reactor Barracks producing 4 marines. If both players start at the same time, the Protoss will actually always be 1 production cycle ahead! BEFORE CHRONOBOOST!
first 5 seconds, 4 zealots pop, leaves 21 before marines pop out of the barracks, 8 seconds after the marines pop, 4 more zealots are active, total of 8 so its 8 on 4 for 17 seconds before its 8 on 8! Remember with warpgate these new 4 zealots dont even have to walk!
Now lets take a practical example of how this concept affects Starcraft 2.Look at PvP and 3 Gate Robo vs 4 Gate. As the Robo player defends his ramp, he sees he has 250 100, yay an Immo. Meanwhile the 4 gate says oh 250 100, yay 2 stalkers. Normal game, it would take the 2 stalkers 30 ish seconds to build, then walk from the gateway to the ramp. Meanwhile the Immortal takes its 55 seconds(no chrono) to build, little to walk to the ramp.
However, these two stalkers hit the field a full 50 seconds before the Immortal. Guess what, suddenly you can only use warpgate in PvP because it spends the money you have NOW NOW, not 35 seconds from NOW. PLUS its PROXIED!
TL;DR Not only walk time, also build time. 5 seconds to spend your money with gate vs 35. This means if both people are constantly spending their money NOW warpgates make units FASTER AND PROXIED.
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I always thought that PvP needs the combo Shield Battery + Immortal for a safe expand. We'll see in HOTS.
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On September 09 2011 09:51 Kajarn wrote:+ Show Spoiler +You didn't think this completely through.
There are 2! Not 1, advantage to warp ins:
1. Distance, which you heavily emphasized and I agree.
2. 5 second warp in time! yes that is 5 seconds for minerals to turn into a unit.
2 advantage means not only are you behind beacuse they can warp in close to you, but also means Protoss production cycle spends money first, unit, wait, instead of money, wait, unit.
So, 4 Warpgates producing 4 zealots vs 2 Reactor Barracks producing 4 marines. If both players start at the same time, the Protoss will actually always be 1 production cycle ahead! BEFORE CHRONOBOOST!
first 5 seconds, 4 zealots pop, leaves 21 before marines pop out of the barracks, 8 seconds after the marines pop, 4 more zealots are active, total of 8 so its 8 on 4 for 17 seconds before its 8 on 8! Remember with warpgate these new 4 zealots dont even have to walk!
Now lets take a practical example of how this concept affects Starcraft 2.Look at PvP and 3 Gate Robo vs 4 Gate. As the Robo player defends his ramp, he sees he has 250 100, yay an Immo. Meanwhile the 4 gate says oh 250 100, yay 2 stalkers. Normal game, it would take the 2 stalkers 30 ish seconds to build, then walk from the gateway to the ramp. Meanwhile the Immortal takes its 55 seconds(no chrono) to build, little to walk to the ramp.
However, these two stalkers hit the field a full 50 seconds before the Immortal. Guess what, suddenly you can only use warpgate in PvP because it spends the money you have NOW NOW, not 35 seconds from NOW. PLUS its PROXIED!
TL;DR Not only walk time, also build time. 5 seconds to spend your money with gate vs 35. This means if both people are constantly spending their money NOW warpgates make units FASTER AND PROXIED. Please dont theory craft there is a lot more going on such as: Pound for pound the immortal is worth a lot more than 2 stalkers and other factors that even i dont know about.
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United States7483 Posts
On September 09 2011 10:03 hobosrus wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 09:51 Kajarn wrote:+ Show Spoiler +You didn't think this completely through.
There are 2! Not 1, advantage to warp ins:
1. Distance, which you heavily emphasized and I agree.
2. 5 second warp in time! yes that is 5 seconds for minerals to turn into a unit.
2 advantage means not only are you behind beacuse they can warp in close to you, but also means Protoss production cycle spends money first, unit, wait, instead of money, wait, unit.
So, 4 Warpgates producing 4 zealots vs 2 Reactor Barracks producing 4 marines. If both players start at the same time, the Protoss will actually always be 1 production cycle ahead! BEFORE CHRONOBOOST!
first 5 seconds, 4 zealots pop, leaves 21 before marines pop out of the barracks, 8 seconds after the marines pop, 4 more zealots are active, total of 8 so its 8 on 4 for 17 seconds before its 8 on 8! Remember with warpgate these new 4 zealots dont even have to walk!
Now lets take a practical example of how this concept affects Starcraft 2.Look at PvP and 3 Gate Robo vs 4 Gate. As the Robo player defends his ramp, he sees he has 250 100, yay an Immo. Meanwhile the 4 gate says oh 250 100, yay 2 stalkers. Normal game, it would take the 2 stalkers 30 ish seconds to build, then walk from the gateway to the ramp. Meanwhile the Immortal takes its 55 seconds(no chrono) to build, little to walk to the ramp.
However, these two stalkers hit the field a full 50 seconds before the Immortal. Guess what, suddenly you can only use warpgate in PvP because it spends the money you have NOW NOW, not 35 seconds from NOW. PLUS its PROXIED!
TL;DR Not only walk time, also build time. 5 seconds to spend your money with gate vs 35. This means if both people are constantly spending their money NOW warpgates make units FASTER AND PROXIED. Please dont theory craft there is a lot more going on such as: Pound for pound the immortal is worth a lot more than 2 stalkers and other factors that even i dont know about.
I'd rather have 2 blink stalkers than an immortal in most situations, unless I'm fighting mass roach or mass marauder or some really heavy armor composition.
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On September 09 2011 09:50 Belisarius wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 09:17 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 09:14 Belisarius wrote: That doesn't make any sense at all. +1 and -1 relative to what?
Defender's advantage by army numbers is very simple. Attacker is at -1 round compared to the defender because his reinforcements are still walking across the map, while the defender's are where they need to be. Defender's advantage is relative to the attacker only.
So T and Z are both -1 when attacking. Protoss, however, is not. Protoss with forward warpins has a defender's advantage in the other guy's base. That's the power of warpin, and why toss gateway is crap cost-for-cost against the other races.
But defender's advantage is not just about unit counts. Creep for Z, static defenses for Z and T, and FF for toss all contribute to defender's advantage. Toss is stronger on the attack by raw round count, but Z and T in particular don't rely solely on numbers, and their units are more cost-efficient.
But, as long as it's still possible to warp-in over forcefields, toss does not have such secondary measures against another protoss, which is why PvP and PvP alone is aggressively broken at the warpgate timing. relative to the fact that zerg/terran have the option to press a button that says "i will have more units and i will be stronger, but i can only defend" protoss doesnt have that option as a result, protoss has a weaker defenders advantage. i guess i shouldnt say its zero, but the fact is protoss does not have a option to press that button. zerg/terran do based on pure logic, protoss has less of a defenders advantage, based on pure logic of unit numbers and where they can be at a certain time. terran "as a race" has more of a defenders advantage than protoss purely based off the fact that they can choose to only defend and it gives them a larger army ...what the heck button are you talking about? There's absolutely nothing in the terran arsenal that gives them a larger army but forces them to defend with it. Literally nothing. Terran have bunkers (which are amazing) and units which are more cost-effective (which is also amazing). But those have nothing to do with having a larger army, nor do they lock him into defending. The terran can take his cost efficient army right the hell up to your nat whenever he likes; he can even build bunkers and siege up tanks there. It's conceivably possible to say Z have such a button with their larvae mechanic, but that's balanced by their needing larvae for drones as well as military. Zerg's defender's advantage early game comes from creep speed, spine crawlers, queens, and their ability to rapidly create reactive compositions. I agree that protoss have the least defender's advantage once they've expanded past their ramp. But it's really not for the reasons you're stating.
the thing in the terran arsenal that gives him a larger army but forces him to defend with it is the fact that gameplay mechanics create a scenario for the terran that allows him to have a larger more powerful army in the field of combat but if the terran is not defending he will lose such an advantage.
the terran is not "forced" to defend with it, however he is forced to defend if he wants to keep the advantage. by attacking, the terran loses his defenders advantage
if a terran chooses to defend and his enemy attacks him, the terrans army is large and more powerful in the field of combat (his base) compared to how large the terrans WOULD BE if the terran was attacking at that moment
this is defenders advantage
by choosing to defend, the terran is deciding to use gameplay mechanics to his advantage which dictate that the terrans army will be more powerful but only if he is defending. if the terran decides to attack the field of combat is at the enemies base and thus new units will need to walk longer to reinforce and thus the terrans army will not be as strong where the combat is taking place
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On September 09 2011 08:22 FabledIntegral wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 08:15 HypertonicHydroponic wrote: TLDR #2 -- Blizz please make the Shield Equalizer happen (so the rest of the stuff can be fixed)! If you want to but don't have the time, hire me, and I'll do it. Your equalizer would make any timing attack impossible vs Protoss early on. The amount of shields regened simply from the nexus (375) is insane, plus having like 2 pylons up there and you can effectively churn out 575 hp instantly. I think there is a misunderstanding with how this would work. As I mentioned shields would not start to regenerate from any unit that has had shields redistributed for the same amount of time it takes for shield regeneration to start after a unit has been attacked (so 10 seconds). So in my example, the zealot is actually attacked, but the gateway/cyber/pylon/Shield Equalizer would all also not be regenerating shields right away because they are in essence attacked as well. While the individual unit survives the barrage, the group is weakened. After the 100 energy of the Shield Equalizer is spent redistributing the shields, everything in that group is one volley closer to the three roaches killing it. This is the tradeoff that parodies the tradeoff of repair (lose mining time and resources) and transfuse (lose potential larva/creep, maybe minerals/supply from extra queens). Sure the energy will regenerate, but the rate could be made slow, and the building itself could cost something like 150 minerals. Five 3x roach volleys of mitigation I don't think is as game breaking as you make it out to be.
Let's try another example: Two Blue flame hellions are dropped in the back of your base and you don't notice at first. They line up an awesome shot and roast 8 probes. However, you have a pylon, a Shield Equalizer, the nexus, and 8 other probes within the Equalizer's vicinity. So here's what would happen -- the total damage taken would be 19 x 2 x 8 = 304. If the equalizer were not there the probes would have 2 hp and everything else mentioned would be full hp/shield. However the equalizer would essentially divert a large portion of that damage to the other 11 units (I can think of at least two different ways this work mathematically (all units draw from each other or attacked units draw from unattacked units, but I'll stick to the one I'm thinking of). If the total damage were to be equalized among the 19 units/buildings, then each unit would take 16 damage. For the 11 non-attacked units/buildings to take 16 damage from the 8 attacked units, a total of 176 shield damage would need to be redistributed, which means 88 energy would be drained from the shield equalizer to accomplish this. That means only 12 energy is left to redistribute shields on the next volley of attacks, which means only 24 shields can be soaked up from other units/buildings, which means the next shot would be almost full damage to the probes. At 20hp and 4 shields, that means that they would wind up at something like 7hp on the next volley. So it give the probes another volley to kill and actually makes the rest of the probes easier to kill as well (and well as weakening the shields of the structures slightly). I do not see how that is so completely overpowered.
Plus instead of just free energy per 150 minerals or whatever like with the normal shield battery, there is an actual downside like there is with repair and transfuse. The idea may need work, but imba it is not.
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On September 09 2011 09:48 Toadvine wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 09:19 FabledIntegral wrote:On September 09 2011 09:16 PPTouch wrote:On September 09 2011 09:14 roymarthyup wrote:On September 09 2011 09:11 PPTouch wrote: zealot sentry stalker doesnt beat mm with stim efficiently
thats why protosses get colossus and HT it does, in equal foods, as long as the terran has no ghosts or thors or tanks or medivacs naw terran t1 is snowball once they get past 35 supply of army and know how to kite terran t1 will trump protoss t1 so long as the terran isnt retarded and runs into range of sentries to cast ffsff range is pretty low and sentries are pretty slow Only if Terran has stim, combat shields, and conc though, while Toss having no upgrades. A 1/1 toss T1 army can compete. Only comparable thing to measure really since Charge/Blink are so much further ahead. Stim is enough. In fact, if the Protoss doesn't get any aoe, you don't actually need Marauders for anything, past a certain supply threshold. There's a point, around 30 supply, where the synergy between Zealots and Sentries is the strongest, and then Gateway armies can trade efficiently with Bio. But if you go significantly above that, you will lose, no matter tha upgrades. Take it from someone who plays Tyler's build on ladder fairly often - I've had games where 70 supply of Zealot/Stalker/Sentry at 2/2 got rolled by 70 supply of Bio at 1/0. Like, it wasn't even close, Terran didn't even need to kite, just spread his stuff into an arc during the battle. Once they kill the Zealots, you lose instantly.
I highly question that. In that situation you should have max 16 supply in stalkers, the rest zealot/sentry still. You need to do multiple rows of forcefields so that bio in the back can't fire. 70 supply bio, no medivacs?
Regardless, there might be a small window where you're vulnerable in that situation, but if you have charge (which isn't exactly unusual when you alright have a twilight from 2/2), a gateway army 2/2 would trash a bio army.
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I assume this has been said various times, but do remember that warpgate, although it's main feature is shortening attack distances, does also lower build times. There a push coming at you? Morph in four units. Chrono and more warps mid battle. Regardless of the lack of defensive options, you can make units quickly to defend.
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United States7483 Posts
On September 09 2011 09:51 Kajarn wrote: You didn't think this completely through.
There are 2! Not 1, advantage to warp ins:
1. Distance, which you heavily emphasized and I agree.
2. 5 second warp in time! yes that is 5 seconds for minerals to turn into a unit.
2 advantage means not only are you behind beacuse they can warp in close to you, but also means Protoss production cycle spends money first, unit, wait, instead of money, wait, unit.
So, 4 Warpgates producing 4 zealots vs 2 Reactor Barracks producing 4 marines. If both players start at the same time, the Protoss will actually always be 1 production cycle ahead! BEFORE CHRONOBOOST!
first 5 seconds, 4 zealots pop, leaves 21 before marines pop out of the barracks, 8 seconds after the marines pop, 4 more zealots are active, total of 8 so its 8 on 4 for 17 seconds before its 8 on 8! Remember with warpgate these new 4 zealots dont even have to walk!
Now lets take a practical example of how this concept affects Starcraft 2.Look at PvP and 3 Gate Robo vs 4 Gate. As the Robo player defends his ramp, he sees he has 250 100, yay an Immo. Meanwhile the 4 gate says oh 250 100, yay 2 stalkers. Normal game, it would take the 2 stalkers 30 ish seconds to build, then walk from the gateway to the ramp. Meanwhile the Immortal takes its 55 seconds(no chrono) to build, little to walk to the ramp.
However, these two stalkers hit the field a full 50 seconds before the Immortal. Guess what, suddenly you can only use warpgate in PvP because it spends the money you have NOW NOW, not 35 seconds from NOW. PLUS its PROXIED!
TL;DR Not only walk time, also build time. 5 seconds to spend your money with gate vs 35. This means if both people are constantly spending their money NOW warpgates make units FASTER AND PROXIED.
This is true for the first production cycle of the game. Later ones this doesn't apply, considering the weakness of gateway units, this is not a big advantage in PvT or PvZ, it merely compensates for a huge weakness. I'd rather not have this advantage but have strong gateway units.
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On September 09 2011 09:51 Kajarn wrote: You didn't think this completely through.
There are 2! Not 1, advantage to warp ins:
1. Distance, which you heavily emphasized and I agree.
2. 5 second warp in time! yes that is 5 seconds for minerals to turn into a unit.
2 advantage means not only are you behind beacuse they can warp in close to you, but also means Protoss production cycle spends money first, unit, wait, instead of money, wait, unit.
So, 4 Warpgates producing 4 zealots vs 2 Reactor Barracks producing 4 marines. If both players start at the same time, the Protoss will actually always be 1 production cycle ahead! BEFORE CHRONOBOOST!
first 5 seconds, 4 zealots pop, leaves 21 before marines pop out of the barracks, 8 seconds after the marines pop, 4 more zealots are active, total of 8 so its 8 on 4 for 17 seconds before its 8 on 8! Remember with warpgate these new 4 zealots dont even have to walk!
Now lets take a practical example of how this concept affects Starcraft 2.Look at PvP and 3 Gate Robo vs 4 Gate. As the Robo player defends his ramp, he sees he has 250 100, yay an Immo. Meanwhile the 4 gate says oh 250 100, yay 2 stalkers. Normal game, it would take the 2 stalkers 30 ish seconds to build, then walk from the gateway to the ramp. Meanwhile the Immortal takes its 55 seconds(no chrono) to build, little to walk to the ramp.
However, these two stalkers hit the field a full 50 seconds before the Immortal. Guess what, suddenly you can only use warpgate in PvP because it spends the money you have NOW NOW, not 35 seconds from NOW. PLUS its PROXIED!
TL;DR Not only walk time, also build time. 5 seconds to spend your money with gate vs 35. This means if both people are constantly spending their money NOW warpgates make units FASTER AND PROXIED.
Your math is cute and all but youre missing an argument... like where is the argument in all that? Warpgates are good, the units that come out of them are lacking because warpgates are good. That's the premise of the OP: refute or agree... thats pretty much the format.
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lol you still have the rally advantage.
you see an army moving out, you have time to prepare for it, and they cant reinforce as fast as you can.
and this crap about not having a defending advantage cause your units suck is complete garbage.
go watch huk 1 gate expand is the majority of his pvts and alot of his pvzs. he holds off larger MM forces repeatedly with A) sentries B) rally advantage.
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On September 09 2011 11:26 danson wrote: lol you still have the rally advantage.
you see an army moving out, you have time to prepare for it, and they cant reinforce as fast as you can.
and this crap about not having a defending advantage cause your units suck is complete garbage.
go watch huk 1 gate expand is the majority of his pvts and alot of his pvzs. he holds off larger MM forces repeatedly with A) sentries B) rally advantage.
Just to comment, being able to hold something off is meaningless, has nothing to do with it really.
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As a protoss, warp gate makes protoss really weak early game, due to their units being weaker but makes them even stronger late game due to "instant" reproduction of units. I do not have a problem with the concept coming from Blizzard's perspective, it is a cool idea, but the problem is, just as the OP stated, the removal of defender's advantage early game (late game too but not as extensively). The ability to create units in 5 seconds anywhere on the map you have pylon power should not arrive 6 minutes into the game. I would love to see Blizzard make warp gate a late game tech choice instead of a requirement to survive. Plus if they get rid of warp gate early game, they can then buff gateway units (and get rid of forcefield for fuck's sake) and have the early game balanced around fights using the defender's advantage from either side. In order to compensate for the appropriately buffed gateway units, they could add a cost to make each gateway a warp gate and/or make the cooldown longer, it takes more time overall to create a unit on the other side of the map than it does to have it spawn in your base.
If they aren't willing to change warpgate, which I'm sure they won't, and see how its hurting the protoss race, at least give a means for defenders advantage that aren't antimicro, a la shield battery (since cannons after gateway would be too good).
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On September 09 2011 09:50 Belisarius wrote: ...what the heck button are you talking about? There's absolutely nothing in the terran arsenal that gives them a larger army but forces them to defend with it. Literally nothing.
Terran has the army advantage midgame if both sides macro equally due to design. much shorter buildtimes (Early game) and still shorter build times after warpgates are up. and everything little additional tech strengthes m&m&m play.
And since gateway army loses lots of it's value midgame the investment into techunits further reduces the size of protoss army in general.
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I've always hated the warpgate as a zerg player. Theres a reason that 4 gate is standard against Zerg early game.
It allows you to create units that are more powerful in mass than zerg units, and it allows you to put them on the map anywhere, instantly reinforcing. Not only that but its frontloaded as opposed to rear loaded. So units come out before the end of the production cycle, not after. This makes it hugely in favor of protoss.
Why do you think KA was removed? Because of the underlying flaw of the core mechanic that was tied to what made KA so bad to have.
Warp gates are PURE win. Quicker build time? Check. Build anywhere on map? Check. load units in front of the cycle instaed of at end? check. Only costs 50/50? Check.
There is no drawback to having warpgates or going for them. theres no reason to have gateways instead of warpgates, even for the queuing procedure. Is Queue better than having your units pop out instantly anywhere on map?
its a nydus worm tied to your production facilities at 50/50 cost. and that nydus worm also speeds up production, even before chronoboost.
Protoss can zerg Zergs far more effectively, if they efficiently trade army with zerg and then hit their base right after, because I see more and more protoss CHOOSING to have 10+ warp gates by 18 minutes.
Why have that many? Because warp gate units are inefficent and you need to make up for that with greater throughput?
Hmm, doesn't that sound exactly like a ZERG mechanic?
So what you have is one race that has great survivability in blink stalkers and such, that can army trade and remax faster than a zerg, with chronos applied.
Makes sense right?
I remember in Brood war, Warp gate units were strong and the main for of P, supplemented by carriers or reavers.
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On September 08 2011 20:02 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 19:54 FuRong wrote: I still don't see why bringing back shield batteries isn't an answer to this.
They add nothing to attacking armies (although I suppose technically Protoss could use them offensively as part of a push) and provide the missing defender's advantage. Thats why I offered them as a possible solution? I'd love to see them. Who said they wouldn't help? I loved and miss shield batts from brood war as well, but lets not kid ourselves. its abusable as shit.
Mass blink stalkers. 4 proxy pylons outside enemy base. attack, blink micro, kill 90% of their army, fall back and regen shields full, repeat before they rebuild army.
Not gonna happen. not on my watch, no fucking way.
there's another issue.
Zealot warpgate = 28 seconds Stalker warpgate = 32
Zergling = 24 + larva. so zergling = 24+10 per injected larva or 24 + 14 per hatchery larva. Roach = 27 (not including larva time) hydra = 33 (not including larva time)
You might say "but.. but Zerg gets 4 units out at once!".
This is true. It gets 4 units out in what what you could average to be 10-12 seconds. However in realistic terms, those units come out in (build time + larva build time) seconds.
So sure, you might be able to get 16 lings at once from 2 hatches, but does protoss ever have only 1 warpgate? No. Lets take the standard 4 gate.
28 seconds/4 = an average of 7 seconds per stalker. Thats less average seconds than a zerg making units, because a Zergling is 24/4 = 6 + 2 for the injected larva or 4 for the hatch larva = 8 or 10 seconds average!
Now add chronoboost on top. It lasts 25 seconds, so assuming 28 second build time, you're looking at 14 seconds for 4 stalkers, or 3.5 seconds per stalker.
Also, banelings take 20 second to morph. just in case anyone thinks banelings are so quick to get. Zerg has to make everything before a push comes, not during.
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i really dont get the point of this discussion. All i see is how protoss have it easy because they can warp in units where they want, if they have pylon up, and how this deny defender advantage. This could be valid IF, and only IF, protoss would actually be winning each tournement like terrans are doing right now.
The whole thing about protoss can do that but not terran QQ is meaningless, terran is destroying everything everywhere, check all the last mlg, check the vast number of player that are able to qualify into code S, big majority are terran. Yeah sure protoss can warp in units, but this is way not OP as they really cant win atm.
This is like saying, well i find it annoying that i need active scouting and map awareness but any zerg that use creep correctly dont need that awareness because they see you come miles away. That is true they see you coming but that doesnt make it not fair. Zerg need that to survive as protoss need it to survive. whitout "abusing" warp in and sentry (forcefield), protoss units are extremelly weak, so to me this QQ about it is a big non sense.
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On September 09 2011 15:03 Nders wrote: i really dont get the point of this discussion. All i see is how protoss have it easy because they can warp in units where they want, if they have pylon up, and how this deny defender advantage. This could be valid IF, and only IF, protoss would actually be winning each tournement like terrans are doing right now.
The whole thing about protoss can do that but not terran QQ is meaningless, terran is destroying everything everywhere, check all the last mlg, check the vast number of player that are able to qualify into code S, big majority are terran. Yeah sure protoss can warp in units, but this is way not OP as they really cant win atm.
This is like saying, well i find it annoying that i need active scouting and map awareness but any zerg that use creep correctly dont need that awareness because they see you come miles away. That is true they see you coming but that doesnt make it not fair. Zerg need that to survive as protoss need it to survive. whitout "abusing" warp in and sentry (forcefield), protoss units are extremelly weak, so to me this QQ about it is a big non sense. The argument in the OP was that protoss can use what is normally a defender's advantage, the close rally, for offense. If the Protoss offense is balanced so that it is not overpowered, then that leaves protoss without a defender's advantage if it is defending.
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On September 09 2011 15:03 Nders wrote: i really dont get the point of this discussion. All i see is how protoss have it easy because they can warp in units where they want, if they have pylon up, and how this deny defender advantage. This could be valid IF, and only IF, protoss would actually be winning each tournement like terrans are doing right now.
The whole thing about protoss can do that but not terran QQ is meaningless, terran is destroying everything everywhere, check all the last mlg, check the vast number of player that are able to qualify into code S, big majority are terran. Yeah sure protoss can warp in units, but this is way not OP as they really cant win atm.
This is like saying, well i find it annoying that i need active scouting and map awareness but any zerg that use creep correctly dont need that awareness because they see you come miles away. That is true they see you coming but that doesnt make it not fair. Zerg need that to survive as protoss need it to survive. whitout "abusing" warp in and sentry (forcefield), protoss units are extremelly weak, so to me this QQ about it is a big non sense.
when Protoss get wise enough to see that warp prism is the "poor man's" version of blink for throwing units up a cliff during an all out attack, we'll see TvP numbers shift to favor the all inning protoss again.
It mystifies me how an entire race can neglect to see the offensive power capabilities of warp prisms dropping units right on top of their heads. Zerg does this with bane bombs.
Of course, to be fair, Zerg avoided winning a lot of months by neglecting infestor.
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The only way to really change this is add a protoss defensive structure after gateway. The timing pushes are already even. Without being able to warp-in after getting WG research then zergs can freely take a fast 3rd without having to worry about defending a sentry push or a possibility of a 4gate. A buffed shield battery would be very helpful. I haven't taken the time to think of a useful defensive structure for protoss.
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A lot of people are getting the wrong idea... I edited in a new conclusion:
The differences in the races amounts to basic units and their defenders advantage. A Zealot, Stalker, Sentry army is equally good on offense and on defense. A Marine, Marauder force is good on offense, but BETTER on defense, because of bunkers and a shorter rally compared to their offense. Same goes for Zerg - a force at home is BETTER than an attacking force because of creep, spines, and relatively short rally. A defending Protoss army has literally no advantage compared to an attacking one, there is nothing to set the defending army above the attacking one. So, if a Protoss early expands, their weaker army cannot make up for their lack of size with any external forces like a Terran or Zerg one can, and is vulnerable to timing pushes from the enemy.
- An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance.
- Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing).
- Because of these two points, a defensive Protoss with an small unit count and economic opener is weak because what is normally a defenders advantage is not a defenders advantage for them, it's a given in both offense and defense.
- The lack of a defensive structure after gateway adds to this problem.
- Therefore, the lack of a strong defenders advantage means Protoss has no safe, economic openers.
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I think it'd be interesting if gateway units warped in without shields, and then the shields recharged as they do normally. This would weaken offensive warp-ins such as the pvp four-gate where you warp into their base.
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make gateways produce faster than warp gates do.
defender's advantage macro reward higher level decision making (gear up for attack? when to change gateways?) 4gate nerf
bam.
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The warp in mechanic by design should be a late game tech. If protoss stayed longer on Gateways with stronger gateway units. Most of these problems would be addressed.
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What happens if you don't upgrade warpgate? If warpgate is great as an offensive capability then why not delay warpgate and get an important tech up faster for defense like fast DTs?
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On September 09 2011 15:14 Truedot wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:03 Nders wrote: i really dont get the point of this discussion. All i see is how protoss have it easy because they can warp in units where they want, if they have pylon up, and how this deny defender advantage. This could be valid IF, and only IF, protoss would actually be winning each tournement like terrans are doing right now.
The whole thing about protoss can do that but not terran QQ is meaningless, terran is destroying everything everywhere, check all the last mlg, check the vast number of player that are able to qualify into code S, big majority are terran. Yeah sure protoss can warp in units, but this is way not OP as they really cant win atm.
This is like saying, well i find it annoying that i need active scouting and map awareness but any zerg that use creep correctly dont need that awareness because they see you come miles away. That is true they see you coming but that doesnt make it not fair. Zerg need that to survive as protoss need it to survive. whitout "abusing" warp in and sentry (forcefield), protoss units are extremelly weak, so to me this QQ about it is a big non sense. when Protoss get wise enough to see that warp prism is the "poor man's" version of blink for throwing units up a cliff during an all out attack, we'll see TvP numbers shift to favor the all inning protoss again. It mystifies me how an entire race can neglect to see the offensive power capabilities of warp prisms dropping units right on top of their heads. Zerg does this with bane bombs. Of course, to be fair, Zerg avoided winning a lot of months by neglecting infestor.
I... what? Never have I ever mentioned Protoss offense being too weak. How does making a warp prism help a weak Protoss defense? Are you saying to compensate for our weak defense, we should allin more with warp prisms?
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On September 09 2011 14:52 Truedot wrote: I've always hated the warpgate as a zerg player. Theres a reason that 4 gate is standard against Zerg early game.
It allows you to create units that are more powerful in mass than zerg units, and it allows you to put them on the map anywhere, instantly reinforcing. Not only that but its frontloaded as opposed to rear loaded. So units come out before the end of the production cycle, not after. This makes it hugely in favor of protoss.
Why do you think KA was removed? Because of the underlying flaw of the core mechanic that was tied to what made KA so bad to have.
Warp gates are PURE win. Quicker build time? Check. Build anywhere on map? Check. load units in front of the cycle instaed of at end? check. Only costs 50/50? Check.
There is no drawback to having warpgates or going for them. theres no reason to have gateways instead of warpgates, even for the queuing procedure. Is Queue better than having your units pop out instantly anywhere on map?
its a nydus worm tied to your production facilities at 50/50 cost. and that nydus worm also speeds up production, even before chronoboost.
Protoss can zerg Zergs far more effectively, if they efficiently trade army with zerg and then hit their base right after, because I see more and more protoss CHOOSING to have 10+ warp gates by 18 minutes.
Why have that many? Because warp gate units are inefficent and you need to make up for that with greater throughput?
Hmm, doesn't that sound exactly like a ZERG mechanic?
So what you have is one race that has great survivability in blink stalkers and such, that can army trade and remax faster than a zerg, with chronos applied.
Makes sense right?
I remember in Brood war, Warp gate units were strong and the main for of P, supplemented by carriers or reavers.
Since when was 4 gate standard vs Z? You speak of warp gate having no drawbacks as if normal gateways were an option. You know, there are no drawbacks to making queens for injects.
I'm sure if given the proper scenario of a 3 base zerg vs 5 base protoss, the protoss will likely remax faster than the zerg. 18 minutes is also a rather subjective time. If the protoss is still on 3 base by the 18 minute mark, you'd likely have 10+ gateways, but you can support more than that.
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Canada5894 Posts
What about lowering the cost of the forge slightly, and possibly cannons as well? Or maybe buffing cannons so that they have more health/armour/damage?
This would make forge expands somewhat safer and more viable, increasing the defender's advantage for Protoss. However, it has no influence on any offensive advantage they enjoy, as it is unrelated to Warpgate units.
This would also help rail-road a Protoss into choosing to invest either into defense to make their economic opening safer, or offense in the form of more gateways and gateway units instead of a forge/cannons.
Also, we have to remember that you can't be greedy and safe at the same time. There's three basic openings: aggressive, greedy, and safe, and I'm over-simplifying a bit, but they form a kind of counter circle. Buffing cannons would make playing safe more viable, which is what the OP seems to be addressing, with the apparent weakness of a Protoss defender's advantage, when going for a strong economic opening.
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On September 09 2011 15:26 ducken wrote: make gateways produce faster than warp gates do.
defender's advantage macro reward higher level decision making (gear up for attack? when to change gateways?) 4gate nerf
bam.
problems with proxy becoming OP ... bam!
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On September 09 2011 15:32 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:14 Truedot wrote:On September 09 2011 15:03 Nders wrote: i really dont get the point of this discussion. All i see is how protoss have it easy because they can warp in units where they want, if they have pylon up, and how this deny defender advantage. This could be valid IF, and only IF, protoss would actually be winning each tournement like terrans are doing right now.
The whole thing about protoss can do that but not terran QQ is meaningless, terran is destroying everything everywhere, check all the last mlg, check the vast number of player that are able to qualify into code S, big majority are terran. Yeah sure protoss can warp in units, but this is way not OP as they really cant win atm.
This is like saying, well i find it annoying that i need active scouting and map awareness but any zerg that use creep correctly dont need that awareness because they see you come miles away. That is true they see you coming but that doesnt make it not fair. Zerg need that to survive as protoss need it to survive. whitout "abusing" warp in and sentry (forcefield), protoss units are extremelly weak, so to me this QQ about it is a big non sense. when Protoss get wise enough to see that warp prism is the "poor man's" version of blink for throwing units up a cliff during an all out attack, we'll see TvP numbers shift to favor the all inning protoss again. It mystifies me how an entire race can neglect to see the offensive power capabilities of warp prisms dropping units right on top of their heads. Zerg does this with bane bombs. Of course, to be fair, Zerg avoided winning a lot of months by neglecting infestor. I... what? Never have I ever mentioned Protoss offense being too weak. How does making a warp prism help a weak Protoss defense? Are you saying to compensate for our weak defense, we should allin more with warp prisms?
Protoss have defender advantage on the attack right? Yet their defender advantage is still weak due to their units being weaker right? Terran have huge defender advantage right? Concave is the most basic element of gaining the upper hand in a fight right? warp prisms from the sides to warp in a bunch of units from chronod gates while a main force goes up the middle.
boom, dead terran and protoss get into code S and MLG.
Protoss winning is contingent on them taking the initiative I think. They are anti-zerg in that fashion at least.
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maybe this is why 1-1-1 wreck protoss faces? :/
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On September 09 2011 15:33 Tyrant0 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 14:52 Truedot wrote: I've always hated the warpgate as a zerg player. Theres a reason that 4 gate is standard against Zerg early game.
It allows you to create units that are more powerful in mass than zerg units, and it allows you to put them on the map anywhere, instantly reinforcing. Not only that but its frontloaded as opposed to rear loaded. So units come out before the end of the production cycle, not after. This makes it hugely in favor of protoss.
Why do you think KA was removed? Because of the underlying flaw of the core mechanic that was tied to what made KA so bad to have.
Warp gates are PURE win. Quicker build time? Check. Build anywhere on map? Check. load units in front of the cycle instaed of at end? check. Only costs 50/50? Check.
There is no drawback to having warpgates or going for them. theres no reason to have gateways instead of warpgates, even for the queuing procedure. Is Queue better than having your units pop out instantly anywhere on map?
its a nydus worm tied to your production facilities at 50/50 cost. and that nydus worm also speeds up production, even before chronoboost.
Protoss can zerg Zergs far more effectively, if they efficiently trade army with zerg and then hit their base right after, because I see more and more protoss CHOOSING to have 10+ warp gates by 18 minutes.
Why have that many? Because warp gate units are inefficent and you need to make up for that with greater throughput?
Hmm, doesn't that sound exactly like a ZERG mechanic?
So what you have is one race that has great survivability in blink stalkers and such, that can army trade and remax faster than a zerg, with chronos applied.
Makes sense right?
I remember in Brood war, Warp gate units were strong and the main for of P, supplemented by carriers or reavers. Since when was 4 gate standard vs Z? You speak of warp gate having no drawbacks as if normal gateways were an option. You know, there are no drawbacks to making queens for injects. I'm sure if given the proper scenario of a 3 base zerg vs 5 base protoss, the protoss will likely remax faster than the zerg. 18 minutes is also a rather subjective time. If the protoss is still on 3 base by the 18 minute mark, you'd likely have 10+ gateways, but you can support more than that.
actually there are. queens are a low hp (compared to warp gate hp) unit, snipable easily, require energy to actually work, UNLIKE warpgate, and don't cost 50/50 one time but 150 every time.
1 queen + 1 hatch = 500 minerals. 2 warpgates = 300. and then you can throw chrono on top and get equal unit production with less minerals and stronger units, on a 1:1 basis with a zerg.
please.
Also base count isn't as important to protoss, warpgate count is. protoss can 1 base far more effectively than zerg. c/d? protoss can have maxed army easily on 2 base. c/d?
A zerg player must maintain a hatch to warpgate ratio of 2:3 or else be overwhelmed by protoss spam. And then on top they can spam anywhere on the map, negating zerg defender advantage.
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The title is quite misleading. It promotes the misconception that the warp mechanic somehow contributes to the lack of Protoss defender's advantage when the same claims would be applicable regardless of the means by which units are spawned. I'm not entirely convinced this is a prevalent problem for Protoss in early game scenarios but I can see how this issue might explain some of the results we have seen in the GSL.
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On September 09 2011 15:38 Truedot wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:33 Tyrant0 wrote:On September 09 2011 14:52 Truedot wrote: I've always hated the warpgate as a zerg player. Theres a reason that 4 gate is standard against Zerg early game.
It allows you to create units that are more powerful in mass than zerg units, and it allows you to put them on the map anywhere, instantly reinforcing. Not only that but its frontloaded as opposed to rear loaded. So units come out before the end of the production cycle, not after. This makes it hugely in favor of protoss.
Why do you think KA was removed? Because of the underlying flaw of the core mechanic that was tied to what made KA so bad to have.
Warp gates are PURE win. Quicker build time? Check. Build anywhere on map? Check. load units in front of the cycle instaed of at end? check. Only costs 50/50? Check.
There is no drawback to having warpgates or going for them. theres no reason to have gateways instead of warpgates, even for the queuing procedure. Is Queue better than having your units pop out instantly anywhere on map?
its a nydus worm tied to your production facilities at 50/50 cost. and that nydus worm also speeds up production, even before chronoboost.
Protoss can zerg Zergs far more effectively, if they efficiently trade army with zerg and then hit their base right after, because I see more and more protoss CHOOSING to have 10+ warp gates by 18 minutes.
Why have that many? Because warp gate units are inefficent and you need to make up for that with greater throughput?
Hmm, doesn't that sound exactly like a ZERG mechanic?
So what you have is one race that has great survivability in blink stalkers and such, that can army trade and remax faster than a zerg, with chronos applied.
Makes sense right?
I remember in Brood war, Warp gate units were strong and the main for of P, supplemented by carriers or reavers. Since when was 4 gate standard vs Z? You speak of warp gate having no drawbacks as if normal gateways were an option. You know, there are no drawbacks to making queens for injects. I'm sure if given the proper scenario of a 3 base zerg vs 5 base protoss, the protoss will likely remax faster than the zerg. 18 minutes is also a rather subjective time. If the protoss is still on 3 base by the 18 minute mark, you'd likely have 10+ gateways, but you can support more than that. actually there are. queens are a low hp (compared to warp gate hp) unit, snipable easily, require energy to actually work, UNLIKE warpgate, and don't cost 50/50 one time but 150 every time. 1 queen + 1 hatch = 500 minerals. 2 warpgates = 300. and then you can throw chrono on top and get equal unit production with less minerals and stronger units, on a 1:1 basis with a zerg. please.
I'm referring to the upgrade and general use of it, not the physical gateway building. I'm not sure if you could find a drawback to making a gateway, much like making a hatchery when you inevitably start with one.
But if you're going to argue that queens have a drawback as if they're less vital to zerg than warp gates are to protoss, go right ahead.
edit:
Also base count isn't as important to protoss, warpgate count is. protoss can 1 base far more effectively than zerg. c/d? protoss can have maxed army easily on 2 base. c/d?
A zerg player must maintain a hatch to warpgate ratio of 2:3 or else be overwhelmed by protoss spam. And then on top they can spam anywhere on the map, negating zerg defender advantage.
All of that is meaningless though. A competent zerg will take their natural 90% of the time unopposed versus a one base protoss. It's way too rare to even see a protoss stay on one base past six minutes, where the zerg is invited to their third if they hold the pressure/2 base all-in.
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On September 09 2011 15:36 Truedot wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:32 susySquark wrote:On September 09 2011 15:14 Truedot wrote:On September 09 2011 15:03 Nders wrote: i really dont get the point of this discussion. All i see is how protoss have it easy because they can warp in units where they want, if they have pylon up, and how this deny defender advantage. This could be valid IF, and only IF, protoss would actually be winning each tournement like terrans are doing right now.
The whole thing about protoss can do that but not terran QQ is meaningless, terran is destroying everything everywhere, check all the last mlg, check the vast number of player that are able to qualify into code S, big majority are terran. Yeah sure protoss can warp in units, but this is way not OP as they really cant win atm.
This is like saying, well i find it annoying that i need active scouting and map awareness but any zerg that use creep correctly dont need that awareness because they see you come miles away. That is true they see you coming but that doesnt make it not fair. Zerg need that to survive as protoss need it to survive. whitout "abusing" warp in and sentry (forcefield), protoss units are extremelly weak, so to me this QQ about it is a big non sense. when Protoss get wise enough to see that warp prism is the "poor man's" version of blink for throwing units up a cliff during an all out attack, we'll see TvP numbers shift to favor the all inning protoss again. It mystifies me how an entire race can neglect to see the offensive power capabilities of warp prisms dropping units right on top of their heads. Zerg does this with bane bombs. Of course, to be fair, Zerg avoided winning a lot of months by neglecting infestor. I... what? Never have I ever mentioned Protoss offense being too weak. How does making a warp prism help a weak Protoss defense? Are you saying to compensate for our weak defense, we should allin more with warp prisms? Protoss have defender advantage on the attack right? Yet their defender advantage is still weak due to their units being weaker right? Terran have huge defender advantage right? Concave is the most basic element of gaining the upper hand in a fight right? warp prisms from the sides to warp in a bunch of units from chronod gates while a main force goes up the middle. boom, dead terran and protoss get into code S and MLG. Protoss winning is contingent on them taking the initiative I think. They are anti-zerg in that fashion at least.
I think you misunderstand what I mean when I say defenders advantage. Protoss does not have a defenders advantage when attacking. They're freaking attacking. They simply have an army, which is large, and reinforced quickly.
... And I reread your post. Yes, you are telling Protosses to allin more with warp prisms. The discussion is about DEFENSE, not offense.
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On September 09 2011 15:26 susySquark wrote:A lot of people are getting the wrong idea... I edited in a new conclusion: The differences in the races amounts to basic units and their defenders advantage. A Zealot, Stalker, Sentry army is equally good on offense and on defense. A Marine, Marauder force is good on offense, but BETTER on defense, because of bunkers and a shorter rally compared to their offense. Same goes for Zerg - a force at home is BETTER than an attacking force because of creep, spines, and relatively short rally. A defending Protoss army has literally no advantage compared to an attacking one, there is nothing to set the defending army above the attacking one. So, if a Protoss early expands, their weaker army cannot make up for their lack of size with any external forces like a Terran or Zerg one can, and is vulnerable to timing pushes from the enemy. - An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance.
- Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing).
- Because of these two points, a defensive Protoss with an small unit count and economic opener is weak because what is normally a defenders advantage is not a defenders advantage for them, it's a given in both offense and defense.
- The lack of a defensive structure after gateway adds to this problem.
- Therefore, the lack of a strong defenders advantage means Protoss has no safe, economic openers.
This is a good conclusion.
Many months ago (7 months), I wrote a post entitled "Warpgates, a broken mechanic": http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=189432 and suggested a nerf to WGs with a "nexus cannon" as a compensating solution. This is a non-detecting ground attack only defensive structure that can only be built within a certain radius of a nexus. The pre-requisite for this structure would be a gateway.
One thing I didn't mention in the post is also to re-balance the gateway building times for units. I found it a bit silly that WGs also allows for faster units.
A shield battery is a good alternative idea if it can only be built within a certain radius of a nexus. It's important to have this "nexus nearby" pre-requisite or the cheesy protosses will abuse it for offense.
Anyways, my feelings is that protoss is the "gimmick" race. There is also a higher tendency for the people that picked protoss to also be similarly gimmicky and all-inn'ish. With the other races now mastering ways to counter their gimmicks, protoss have been struggling. And I
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On September 09 2011 15:38 Truedot wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:33 Tyrant0 wrote:On September 09 2011 14:52 Truedot wrote: I've always hated the warpgate as a zerg player. Theres a reason that 4 gate is standard against Zerg early game.
It allows you to create units that are more powerful in mass than zerg units, and it allows you to put them on the map anywhere, instantly reinforcing. Not only that but its frontloaded as opposed to rear loaded. So units come out before the end of the production cycle, not after. This makes it hugely in favor of protoss.
Why do you think KA was removed? Because of the underlying flaw of the core mechanic that was tied to what made KA so bad to have.
Warp gates are PURE win. Quicker build time? Check. Build anywhere on map? Check. load units in front of the cycle instaed of at end? check. Only costs 50/50? Check.
There is no drawback to having warpgates or going for them. theres no reason to have gateways instead of warpgates, even for the queuing procedure. Is Queue better than having your units pop out instantly anywhere on map?
its a nydus worm tied to your production facilities at 50/50 cost. and that nydus worm also speeds up production, even before chronoboost.
Protoss can zerg Zergs far more effectively, if they efficiently trade army with zerg and then hit their base right after, because I see more and more protoss CHOOSING to have 10+ warp gates by 18 minutes.
Why have that many? Because warp gate units are inefficent and you need to make up for that with greater throughput?
Hmm, doesn't that sound exactly like a ZERG mechanic?
So what you have is one race that has great survivability in blink stalkers and such, that can army trade and remax faster than a zerg, with chronos applied.
Makes sense right?
I remember in Brood war, Warp gate units were strong and the main for of P, supplemented by carriers or reavers. Since when was 4 gate standard vs Z? You speak of warp gate having no drawbacks as if normal gateways were an option. You know, there are no drawbacks to making queens for injects. I'm sure if given the proper scenario of a 3 base zerg vs 5 base protoss, the protoss will likely remax faster than the zerg. 18 minutes is also a rather subjective time. If the protoss is still on 3 base by the 18 minute mark, you'd likely have 10+ gateways, but you can support more than that. actually there are. queens are a low hp (compared to warp gate hp) unit, snipable easily, require energy to actually work, UNLIKE warpgate, and don't cost 50/50 one time but 150 every time. 1 queen + 1 hatch = 500 minerals. 2 warpgates = 300. and then you can throw chrono on top and get equal unit production with less minerals and stronger units, on a 1:1 basis with a zerg. please. Also base count isn't as important to protoss, warpgate count is. protoss can 1 base far more effectively than zerg. c/d? protoss can have maxed army easily on 2 base. c/d? A zerg player must maintain a hatch to warpgate ratio of 2:3 or else be overwhelmed by protoss spam. And then on top they can spam anywhere on the map, negating zerg defender advantage.
And here you're saying a 4gate is unstoppably good in PvZ? No, sorry.
This is the misconception that everyone has. Protoss warpgate DOES NOT NEGATE DEFENDERS ADVANTAGE. Your defense still has a short rally compared to your offense, you still have creep, you still have spines. Protoss warpgate simply makes Protoss offense and defense the same. But your defense is supposed to be stronger per cost than your offense, which means that either: Protoss offense is too good, but defense is fine, or, as I'm arguing, Protoss offense is balanced, but defense is lacking.
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On September 09 2011 15:35 Kaolla wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:26 ducken wrote: make gateways produce faster than warp gates do.
defender's advantage macro reward higher level decision making (gear up for attack? when to change gateways?) 4gate nerf
bam. problems with proxy becoming OP ... bam!
so your argument is that cheese and not reacting to cheese is op?
also i don't actually know this but could anyone tell me when protoss ever actually uses gateways when they have warpgate?
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I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough.
Also: Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing).
It would be a lot nicer and look less biased, if you'd say "allegedly" or "presumably" balanced timing atacks, and both of the other races have economic openings that are ahead IF they defend the protoss timing push, if not they just died.
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Very good post. It provides a very good theoretical argument for why balancing Protoss (and fixing the mirror) is inherently difficult.
There are certain situations in balancing where minor fixes (changing unit hp, cost, dmg, etc) cannot fix the game. In those certain cases a better theoretical understanding of game mechanics, in particular of defender's advantage, are necessary to make changes. I think you've found one of those tricky balance situations and it's awesome how you took the time to inform people of it.
I don't want to speculate too strongly, but having seen the poor Protoss performance recently there may come a time where Protoss needs to be given another source of defender's advantage (either through map design or game changes) in order to give them a more competitive edge. Who knows, maybe the shield battery will return.
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On September 09 2011 15:51 ducken wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:35 Kaolla wrote:On September 09 2011 15:26 ducken wrote: make gateways produce faster than warp gates do.
defender's advantage macro reward higher level decision making (gear up for attack? when to change gateways?) 4gate nerf
bam. problems with proxy becoming OP ... bam! so your argument is that cheese and not reacting to cheese is op? also i don't actually know this but could anyone tell me when protoss ever actually uses gateways when they have warpgate?
Warpgates produce faster than non-morphed gateways. To use a magic the gathering term, Warpgates are strictly better than gateways.
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On September 09 2011 15:53 Geo.Rion wrote: I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough.
Also: Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing).
It would be a lot nicer and look less biased, if you'd say "allegedly" or "presumably" balanced timing atacks, and both of the other races have economic openings that are ahead IF they defend the protoss timing push, if not they just died.
Well, I just sort of assumed that the games in all our tournaments speak for themselves. Terrans and Zergs are capable of defending early Protoss pressure with economic openers. If this weren't true, every Terran or Zerg would open much more unit heavy than they currently do.
Yes, I am making assumptions, but I feel they aren't that ridiculous. I'm just assuming that it is possible as a Terran or Zerg, to expand before (ie play more economically than) a pressuring Protoss and survive. Do you disagree? If yes, do you have a replay?
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On September 09 2011 15:53 Geo.Rion wrote: I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough.
I think what he's trying to say is that Protoss have the ability to negate part of the other races defender's advantage. In order to make that balanced Protoss needs to be weaker in some sense. This weakness, that is necessary to make Protoss timing attacks balanced, will cause problems for P when they are on the defence. So in order to make up for that weakness they need another defenders advantage because the proximity advantage has been "negated" in some sense.
Of course they still have the proximity advantage, but other balance changes have negated it's effect to make offensive Protoss balanced.
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I would argue that both the sentry and the stalker work better on the defense than the offense, there are far more forms of defenders advantage than what you have described.
Sentries can trap attacking units far more easily than defending units (fall back to your natural nexus etc.) Stalkers can kite and harass attacking units across the map back to your base to weaken early timings (stalker pokes are pretty common in every matchup)
And then of course there is always the big one, you can always pull workers. You can pull probes on defense to trap units to stop them kiting/surrounding your zealots but they just get in the way if you try to allin with them (unlike scv/marine).
So I'm assuming the ultimate point was that Warpgate help on the offense but not on the defense, I would argue that there are many small things like those above that give protoss a defenders advantage other than rally points.
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On September 09 2011 15:47 Azzur wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:26 susySquark wrote:A lot of people are getting the wrong idea... I edited in a new conclusion: The differences in the races amounts to basic units and their defenders advantage. A Zealot, Stalker, Sentry army is equally good on offense and on defense. A Marine, Marauder force is good on offense, but BETTER on defense, because of bunkers and a shorter rally compared to their offense. Same goes for Zerg - a force at home is BETTER than an attacking force because of creep, spines, and relatively short rally. A defending Protoss army has literally no advantage compared to an attacking one, there is nothing to set the defending army above the attacking one. So, if a Protoss early expands, their weaker army cannot make up for their lack of size with any external forces like a Terran or Zerg one can, and is vulnerable to timing pushes from the enemy. - An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance.
- Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing).
- Because of these two points, a defensive Protoss with an small unit count and economic opener is weak because what is normally a defenders advantage is not a defenders advantage for them, it's a given in both offense and defense.
- The lack of a defensive structure after gateway adds to this problem.
- Therefore, the lack of a strong defenders advantage means Protoss has no safe, economic openers.
This is a good conclusion. Many months ago (7 months), I wrote a post entitled "Warpgates, a broken mechanic": http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=189432 and suggested a nerf to WGs with a "nexus cannon" as a compensating solution. This is a non-detecting ground attack only defensive structure that can only be built within a certain radius of a nexus. The pre-requisite for this structure would be a gateway. One thing I didn't mention in the post is also to re-balance the gateway building times for units. I found it a bit silly that WGs also allows for faster units. A shield battery is a good alternative idea if it can only be built within a certain radius of a nexus. It's important to have this "nexus nearby" pre-requisite or the cheesy protosses will abuse it for offense. Anyways, my feelings is that protoss is the "gimmick" race. There is also a higher tendency for the people that picked protoss to also be similarly gimmicky and all-inn'ish. With the other races now mastering ways to counter their gimmicks, protoss have been struggling. And I
I really like that Nexus cannon suggestion. Hopefully Blizzard can cook up something creative like that in HoTS.
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On September 09 2011 16:04 Divergence wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:53 Geo.Rion wrote: I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough. I think what he's trying to say is that Protoss have the ability to negate part of the other races defender's advantage. In order to make that balanced Protoss needs to be weaker in some sense. This weakness, that is necessary to make Protoss timing attacks balanced, will cause problems for P when they are on the defence. So in order to make up for that weakness they need another defenders advantage because the proximity advantage has been "negated" in some sense. Of course they still have the proximity advantage, but other balance changes have negated it's effect to make offensive Protoss balanced.
This is the misconception that everyone has. Protoss warpgate DOES NOT NEGATE DEFENDERS ADVANTAGE. T&Z defense still has a short rally compared to offense, you still have creep, you still have bunkers. Protoss warpgate simply makes Protoss offense and defense the same. But your defense is supposed to be stronger per cost than your offense, which means that either: Protoss offense is too good, but defense is fine, or, as I'm arguing, Protoss offense is balanced, but defense is lacking.
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On September 09 2011 15:58 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:53 Geo.Rion wrote: I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough.
Also: Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing).
It would be a lot nicer and look less biased, if you'd say "allegedly" or "presumably" balanced timing atacks, and both of the other races have economic openings that are ahead IF they defend the protoss timing push, if not they just died. Well, I just sort of assumed that the games in all our tournaments speak for themselves. Terrans and Zergs are capable of defending early Protoss pressure with economic openers. If this weren't true, every Terran or Zerg would open much more unit heavy than they currently do. Yes, I am making assumptions, but I feel they aren't that ridiculous. I'm just assuming that it is possible as a Terran or Zerg, to expand before (ie play more economically than) a pressuring Protoss and survive. Do you disagree? If yes, do you have a replay? I sincerly believe, it is not possible to expand before the Protoss because on most positions a Protoss can go 15 nexus before forge against anything slower then a 13 pool, or just forge first in wich case the Zerg is not allowed to hatch first, because he dies to canons on most of the maps, and even if he goes pool first has to have at least one drone following the probe because of possible contain or just 1 well placed canon behind the mineral line.
The Zerg's standard response to this is either go for an allin, some sort of 2 base risky timing attack, Or do the more mainstream double exp thing (on some maps anyways). The double expantion though is fairly risky because it can easily die to a 2 base allin or get behind vs a well played Stargate play.
To this, recently the WarpPrims rushes and allins were added (mind you which will get just stronger with the new warprism). The blinkstalker+waprism 2 base attack with elevating 2 sentries to block the main ramp, blinking in with stalkers and just reinforcing trough WP is unbeatable imo, unless you know it exactly it s coming and prepare perfectly. If not, your main and the majority of ur tech and production is gone. But the standard Warprism +6or7 warpgates are almost as potent and even less allinish. Imo protoss is fine in PvZ, i know im biased, but the nerfs/buffs proposed are out of proportion right now on PTR.
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On September 09 2011 16:05 TheLink wrote: I would argue that both the sentry and the stalker work better on the defense than the offense, there are far more forms of defenders advantage than what you have described.
Sentries can trap attacking units far more easily than defending units (fall back to your natural nexus etc.) Stalkers can kite and harass attacking units across the map back to your base to weaken early timings (stalker pokes are pretty common in every matchup)
And then of course there is always the big one, you can always pull workers. You can pull probes on defense to trap units to stop them kiting/surrounding your zealots but they just get in the way if you try to allin with them (unlike scv/marine).
So I'm assuming the ultimate point was that Warpgate help on the offense but not on the defense, I would argue that there are many small things like those above that give protoss a defenders advantage other than rally points.
Sentries trapping is map dependent, XNC has those two hallways into your nat, Shak has a ramp, etc. Maps like Typhon there is almost no difference between a sentry at home and a sentry in the middle of the map.
Stalkers can kite yes. This can be big, but its completely shut down by concussive shells or zergling speed, both of which are standard.
Worker pulling goes against the whole point of doing a safe opening. Safe openings are supposed t come out economically ahead of aggressive openings, but if he kills enough workers, you've simply come out even.
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On September 09 2011 16:08 Geo.Rion wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:58 susySquark wrote:On September 09 2011 15:53 Geo.Rion wrote: I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough.
Also: Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing).
It would be a lot nicer and look less biased, if you'd say "allegedly" or "presumably" balanced timing atacks, and both of the other races have economic openings that are ahead IF they defend the protoss timing push, if not they just died. Well, I just sort of assumed that the games in all our tournaments speak for themselves. Terrans and Zergs are capable of defending early Protoss pressure with economic openers. If this weren't true, every Terran or Zerg would open much more unit heavy than they currently do. Yes, I am making assumptions, but I feel they aren't that ridiculous. I'm just assuming that it is possible as a Terran or Zerg, to expand before (ie play more economically than) a pressuring Protoss and survive. Do you disagree? If yes, do you have a replay? I sincerly believe, it is not possible to expand before the Protoss because on most positions a Protoss can go 15 nexus before forge against anything slower then a 13 pool, or just forge first in wich case the Zerg is not allowed to hatch first, because he dies to canons on most of the maps, and even if he goes pool first has to have at least one drone following the probe because of possible contain or just 1 well placed canon behind the mineral line.
And I politely disagree with your opinion that Zerg cannot open more economically than a Protoss. Once cannon rushing is denied, the length of time to any aggressive maneuver is long enough for you to 3 base and prepare. Keep in mind that a forge + cannons does not advance tech towards any units at all. In other words, If you defend a pylon + 2 cannon rush with lings, but lose 400 minerals of lings, you're technically ahead, because both players have lost the same amount of minerals, but you actually can make attacking units. I still have to build my gateway to get going.
Agree to disagree, I suppose. I think most people would agree with me though >.>
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On September 09 2011 16:07 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 16:04 Divergence wrote:On September 09 2011 15:53 Geo.Rion wrote: I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough. I think what he's trying to say is that Protoss have the ability to negate part of the other races defender's advantage. In order to make that balanced Protoss needs to be weaker in some sense. This weakness, that is necessary to make Protoss timing attacks balanced, will cause problems for P when they are on the defence. So in order to make up for that weakness they need another defenders advantage because the proximity advantage has been "negated" in some sense. Of course they still have the proximity advantage, but other balance changes have negated it's effect to make offensive Protoss balanced. This is the misconception that everyone has. Protoss warpgate DOES NOT NEGATE DEFENDERS ADVANTAGE. T&Z defense still has a short rally compared to offense, you still have creep, you still have bunkers. Protoss warpgate simply makes Protoss offense and defense the same. But your defense is supposed to be stronger per cost than your offense, which means that either: Protoss offense is too good, but defense is fine, or, as I'm arguing, Protoss offense is balanced, but defense is lacking. Well, according to your reasoning, this means that if the protoss were given a defensive ability that does not affect their offense (e.g. "nexus shield battery" or my "nexus cannon" idea), then it should be fine.
However, I prefer to take a broader outlook rather than just considering offense and defence. I believe the real issue is that WGs are broken. They should be nerfed and then everything re-balanced to that.
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On September 09 2011 16:23 Azzur wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 16:07 susySquark wrote:On September 09 2011 16:04 Divergence wrote:On September 09 2011 15:53 Geo.Rion wrote: I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough. I think what he's trying to say is that Protoss have the ability to negate part of the other races defender's advantage. In order to make that balanced Protoss needs to be weaker in some sense. This weakness, that is necessary to make Protoss timing attacks balanced, will cause problems for P when they are on the defence. So in order to make up for that weakness they need another defenders advantage because the proximity advantage has been "negated" in some sense. Of course they still have the proximity advantage, but other balance changes have negated it's effect to make offensive Protoss balanced. This is the misconception that everyone has. Protoss warpgate DOES NOT NEGATE DEFENDERS ADVANTAGE. T&Z defense still has a short rally compared to offense, you still have creep, you still have bunkers. Protoss warpgate simply makes Protoss offense and defense the same. But your defense is supposed to be stronger per cost than your offense, which means that either: Protoss offense is too good, but defense is fine, or, as I'm arguing, Protoss offense is balanced, but defense is lacking. Well, according to your reasoning, this means that if the protoss were given a defensive ability that does not affect their offense (e.g. "nexus shield battery" or my "nexus cannon" idea), then it should be fine. However, I prefer to take a broader outlook rather than just considering offense and defence. I believe the real issue is that WGs are broken. They should be nerfed and then everything re-balanced to that.
To your first point - Exactly! You got it.
To your second point - thats a matter of opinion, subject to how Blizzard wants the game to turn out. It is possible to properly fix the game either by making warpgate less offensive, OR making another defensive option.
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On September 09 2011 16:07 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 16:04 Divergence wrote:On September 09 2011 15:53 Geo.Rion wrote: I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough. I think what he's trying to say is that Protoss have the ability to negate part of the other races defender's advantage. In order to make that balanced Protoss needs to be weaker in some sense. This weakness, that is necessary to make Protoss timing attacks balanced, will cause problems for P when they are on the defence. So in order to make up for that weakness they need another defenders advantage because the proximity advantage has been "negated" in some sense. Of course they still have the proximity advantage, but other balance changes have negated it's effect to make offensive Protoss balanced. This is the misconception that everyone has. Protoss warpgate DOES NOT NEGATE DEFENDERS ADVANTAGE. T&Z defense still has a short rally compared to offense, you still have creep, you still have bunkers. Protoss warpgate simply makes Protoss offense and defense the same. But your defense is supposed to be stronger per cost than your offense, which means that either: Protoss offense is too good, but defense is fine, or, as I'm arguing, Protoss offense is balanced, but defense is lacking. Also, one more thing - defender's advantage is a broad term. One of the aspects of it that the attackers are far away from their supply lines and reinforcements. Thus, in the layman sense, WGs do negate the defender's advantage because this time the attackers are close to their reinforcements.
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On September 09 2011 15:51 ducken wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:35 Kaolla wrote:On September 09 2011 15:26 ducken wrote: make gateways produce faster than warp gates do.
defender's advantage macro reward higher level decision making (gear up for attack? when to change gateways?) 4gate nerf
bam. problems with proxy becoming OP ... bam! so your argument is that cheese and not reacting to cheese is op? also i don't actually know this but could anyone tell me when protoss ever actually uses gateways when they have warpgate?
the rewards of cheese shouldn't get too big... of course still depends on the timings a bit, but it is the risk of making gateways produce faster... and i doubt anyone uses warpgates after having the tech...havent ever seen it anyway...
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blizzard already noticed this when they intended to reduce the build times of units from gateways, and increase warp gate research time to balance it out. however, people complained that 2 gate pressure or proxy 2 gates will be too powerful, which i agree to as well. they still kept the sentry build time reduction though, which i think has helped a bit. perhaps reducing sentry/stalker gateway production times will help with the early game vulnerability, and since both these units require a cybernetics core to be constructed before they can be produced, the threat of 2 gate pressure becoming too strong is not there.
every race has its own diversity and the warpgate mechanics is one of the most unique features of protoss and obviously should remain as it is. changing it in anyway besides the research duration would completely change the way the race is played.
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I'm not sure that the warp mechanic is the reason for the boring PvP matchup and the brutal beating Protoss has experienced in the other match ups. Nonetheless, the warp mechanic is f***ing retarded. Because there is exist only a small the defenders advantage namely the ramp while in the other matchups there exists additional advantages for the defender, time. Time to react through more units and their composition, "static" defence. Protoss does have a static defence disadvantage as compared to the other races because zerg can move their spine crawlers and spore crawlers. Terran can salvage bunkers. This mechanic allows these races to secure an expansion and transition from 1 base static defences to 2 base static defences. Phase cannons anyone?
Early game: I think PvP is responsible for the sentry which main ability is the forcefield. The forcefield is necessary for one of the three defensive advantages in PvP, denying access through the ramp while the other advantages is the high ground and the ramp itself (concave defence vs one line aggression). If there were no forcefield the aggressor would only have one obstacle to worry about the high ground advantage and a concave defence.
Mid game: As mid game has been reached in the match up or rather blink has been upgraded then the defenders advantage diminishes even more. Because the ramp has almost lost its importance due to the fact that the ramp is not the only entry point into the base. The high ground advantage is also of less importance with an enemy observer.
Solutions: Allow only same level blinking or conversely disallow cliff blinking. This would allow only one entry point for blink stalkers to a protoss base. If that is not enough then the sentries should have a greater range so that they could attack behind stalkers and gain an ever stronger concave defence (Could be imba in PvT and PvZ but i'm solely brainstorming in the PvP match up)
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On September 09 2011 17:05 archonOOid wrote: I'm not sure that the warp mechanic is the reason for the boring PvP matchup and the brutal beating Protoss has experienced in the other match ups. Nonetheless, the warp mechanic is f***ing retarded. Because there is exist only a small the defenders advantage namely the ramp while in the other matchups there exists additional advantages for the defender, time. Time to react through more units and their composition, "static" defence. Protoss does have a static defence disadvantage as compared to the other races because zerg can move their spine crawlers and spore crawlers. Terran can salvage bunkers. This mechanic allows these races to secure an expansion and transition from 1 base static defences to 2 base static defences. Phase cannons anyone?
Early game: I think PvP is responsible for the sentry which main ability is the forcefield. The forcefield is necessary for one of the three defensive advantages in PvP, denying access through the ramp while the other advantages is the high ground and the ramp itself (concave defence vs one line aggression). If there were no forcefield the aggressor would only have one obstacle to worry about the high ground advantage and a concave defence.
Mid game: As mid game has been reached in the match up or rather blink has been upgraded then the defenders advantage diminishes even more. Because the ramp has almost lost its importance due to the fact that the ramp is not the only entry point into the base. The high ground advantage is also of less importance with an enemy observer.
Solutions: Allow only same level blinking or conversely disallow cliff blinking. This would allow only one entry point for blink stalkers to a protoss base. If that is not enough then the sentries should have a greater range so that they could attack behind stalkers and gain an ever stronger concave defence (Could be imba in PvT and PvZ but i'm solely brainstorming in the PvP match up)
PvP would actually be the one most clearly and easily fixed with the addition of a gateway tech defensive structure, in my opinion. As long as there were some way to restrict it to solely defensive use. Just start a shield battery, ff your ramp a couple times to let it get up, and bam you're safe.
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Not sure if this has been mentioned, but I think Blizzard could make the gateway units' warpin times almost instant when defending, and the same warpin time it has now for proxy pylons on offense. Maybe like, if you warp in units close to a nexus there is little to no warpin time allowing for instant reinforcements instead of having to wait the 3-4s for them to warpin.
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On September 09 2011 15:26 ducken wrote: make gateways produce faster than warp gates do.
defender's advantage macro reward higher level decision making (gear up for attack? when to change gateways?) 4gate nerf
bam.
proxy 2 gate every game
bam.
( but with a longer gateway build time your change could really be the way to go)
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I really like the idea about shield battery as a defensive structure avaible after the gateway, it could be an addon to the nexus (yes addon, I dont think it should use up all chrono energy!).
This would stop the battery from being used offensively and give a hefty boost to your defenders advantage. It would also let toss deal with terran drops later with fewer units left back in your base. If you have proper awareness and micro.
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Noticed everything OP said all the way back when I was first learning protoss FE builds and studying how the different races defend timings after FE. I think a point that most people are not considering is that everything OP said, if true (and frankly I don't see how it could be untrue, unless you argue the compliment, that protoss defense is fine and offense overpowered) does not by default make it a balance issue. Personally I think it could be okay for one particular race to have greater difficulty FE'ing. I remember a time where zerg was the only race that consistently FEs and people worked with it. It'll take some smart balancing, but little racial mechanic differences like these make the game more interesting imo.
I'm not saying the state of the game is balanced now. I'm just saying a balanced game doesn't need to have similar feasible expand timings/openers or overall similar dynamics for each race and each matchup.
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On September 09 2011 16:16 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 16:08 Geo.Rion wrote:On September 09 2011 15:58 susySquark wrote:On September 09 2011 15:53 Geo.Rion wrote: I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough.
Also: Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing).
It would be a lot nicer and look less biased, if you'd say "allegedly" or "presumably" balanced timing atacks, and both of the other races have economic openings that are ahead IF they defend the protoss timing push, if not they just died. Well, I just sort of assumed that the games in all our tournaments speak for themselves. Terrans and Zergs are capable of defending early Protoss pressure with economic openers. If this weren't true, every Terran or Zerg would open much more unit heavy than they currently do. Yes, I am making assumptions, but I feel they aren't that ridiculous. I'm just assuming that it is possible as a Terran or Zerg, to expand before (ie play more economically than) a pressuring Protoss and survive. Do you disagree? If yes, do you have a replay? I sincerly believe, it is not possible to expand before the Protoss because on most positions a Protoss can go 15 nexus before forge against anything slower then a 13 pool, or just forge first in wich case the Zerg is not allowed to hatch first, because he dies to canons on most of the maps, and even if he goes pool first has to have at least one drone following the probe because of possible contain or just 1 well placed canon behind the mineral line. And I politely disagree with your opinion that Zerg cannot open more economically than a Protoss. Once cannon rushing is denied, the length of time to any aggressive maneuver is long enough for you to 3 base and prepare. Keep in mind that a forge + cannons does not advance tech towards any units at all. In other words, If you defend a pylon + 2 cannon rush with lings, but lose 400 minerals of lings, you're technically ahead, because both players have lost the same amount of minerals, but you actually can make attacking units. I still have to build my gateway to get going. Agree to disagree, I suppose. I think most people would agree with me though >.> well thanks for not quoting half of my post, which is the direct answer to your first few lines. I suggest re-read it, i dont feel like copy pasting it here again.
If you defend a pylon+2 canons with lings? Bad news, you canot, if he walls himself in, or hides or finds any way for the canons to finish or be close to finish no ammount of lings would take it out, if the Zerg can hold the canon rush, that becomes obvious before any canon or additional pylon is finished, in most of the cases, then you just cancel them and exp. But honestly, a smart Protoss doesnt go for a canon rush if it can be denied with drones in that position, or if the pool is fast enough for zerglings to come out before canons warp in.
But smart protosses are as rare as white ravens, im above 1k masters, which granted isnt very good, but 1/3 of the Protosses go for canon rush, yes, even against 12 or 13 pool with having 1 drone right clicked on their probes, another good proportion goes for 15 nexus no matter what, yes vs 12 pool too, then the rest go for an allin either off of one or 2 base, and the remaining few %s turtle up and wait for a deathball. And even against opponents this bad and many autowins due to their horribly bad openers i have a fairly poor ZvP record, somewhere around 50%, which would be a tone worse if those autowins wont happen.
So when i hear protosses are doing everything that's possible and Zerg and Terran are just overpowered, and bad players in general, that's why they werent owning harder up till now. OK, this wasnt in this topic, but it's a quite popular opinion here and on bnet.
And how can you close out with a line like that, seriously? If by most people you mean those protosses who canot beat double exping Zerg, then i think you got a fairly tiny majority there bro.
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Its kinda weird with this mechanic.... If you play Protoss its a lot of fun in terms of Gameplay etc. but if you don´t play Protoss and your Opponets reinforces his army right at your choke it feels kinda broken,
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On September 09 2011 05:04 Bleak wrote: My suggestion:
Warp-ins only available through Warp Prisms. Other then that, Gateways only produce as they do pre-upgrade, similar to how Terran produces.
This change would stop PvP 4-gate vs. 4.gate, still allow warp-in to be used effectively when used in a smart way (attack+warp-in with prism behind the base, especially with w.prism getting buffed now), make some ridiculous Protoss timing pushes less effective (would help other races to defend) and overall would result in a better game imo. I'm surprised it has taken this long to notice how ridiculous and abusive warpgate mechanic is when it comes to being on the offensive timing pushes. Also, as the article mentioned, if you make warp-in only through warp-prisms, then you may buff gateway units to be stronger, and nerfing big hitters like Colossus a little bit to overall balance things out in a much wider way.
Great post, OP.
like ur idea !
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Honestly, I don't think you even need to make such a detailed opening post. To me this is a matter of common sense. Gateways have slower production than Warpgates and Gateways have less utility than Warpgates. Obviously the solution is making Warpgates slower than gateways and forbid chronoboost on them. The whole warp-in mechanic is wrong but there is nothing we can do unless the progamers admit it and start bugging Blizzard about it....
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I like the OP, even if it's a little on the provocative side.
I don't think the warp-in mechanic can be construed as a disadvantage when defending - the Protoss is still on par with the other 2 races in this regard (in the sense that they can reinforce faster in defence than an attacking Zerg or Terran). It's a spurious argument to say that it's weak when compared to its usage when attacking. The comparison should be with other races' ability to defend with reinforcements, not Protoss's ability to reinforce attacks.
As for the problem with defensive structures; I never thought about it before (since cannons are so awesome), but the OP made a pretty convincing argument that Protoss is lacking in this regard. I have no idea how to fix it, since cannons are awesome, and if you could make them after, say, only a gateway, they would probably become too powerful.
The OP's suggestion is interesting, and although it would obviously help Protoss defence, it also has implications for attacks which may make it an unreasonable response to a relatively small problem.
In BW, didn't Protoss frequently expand with a Zealot and a cannon?
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On September 09 2011 17:39 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 17:05 archonOOid wrote: I'm not sure that the warp mechanic is the reason for the boring PvP matchup and the brutal beating Protoss has experienced in the other match ups. Nonetheless, the warp mechanic is f***ing retarded. Because there is exist only a small the defenders advantage namely the ramp while in the other matchups there exists additional advantages for the defender, time. Time to react through more units and their composition, "static" defence. Protoss does have a static defence disadvantage as compared to the other races because zerg can move their spine crawlers and spore crawlers. Terran can salvage bunkers. This mechanic allows these races to secure an expansion and transition from 1 base static defences to 2 base static defences. Phase cannons anyone?
Early game: I think PvP is responsible for the sentry which main ability is the forcefield. The forcefield is necessary for one of the three defensive advantages in PvP, denying access through the ramp while the other advantages is the high ground and the ramp itself (concave defence vs one line aggression). If there were no forcefield the aggressor would only have one obstacle to worry about the high ground advantage and a concave defence.
Mid game: As mid game has been reached in the match up or rather blink has been upgraded then the defenders advantage diminishes even more. Because the ramp has almost lost its importance due to the fact that the ramp is not the only entry point into the base. The high ground advantage is also of less importance with an enemy observer.
Solutions: Allow only same level blinking or conversely disallow cliff blinking. This would allow only one entry point for blink stalkers to a protoss base. If that is not enough then the sentries should have a greater range so that they could attack behind stalkers and gain an ever stronger concave defence (Could be imba in PvT and PvZ but i'm solely brainstorming in the PvP match up)
PvP would actually be the one most clearly and easily fixed with the addition of a gateway tech defensive structure, in my opinion. As long as there were some way to restrict it to solely defensive use. Just start a shield battery, ff your ramp a couple times to let it get up, and bam you're safe.
PvP doesnt need to be fixed, its the only fair matchup for p right now. There is the possibility of a build order loss, but other than that its a clear test of skill and no bullshit involved. If you dont like how it usually plays out, that might be another thing, but thats a matter of preference really.
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On September 09 2011 20:30 barrykp wrote: I like the OP, even if it's a little on the provocative side.
I don't think the warp-in mechanic can be construed as a disadvantage when defending - the Protoss is still on par with the other 2 races in this regard (in the sense that they can reinforce faster in defence than an attacking Zerg or Terran). It's a spurious argument to say that it's weak when compared to its usage when attacking. The comparison should be with other races' ability to defend with reinforcements, not Protoss's ability to reinforce attacks.
As for the problem with defensive structures; I never thought about it before (since cannons are so awesome), but the OP made a pretty convincing argument that Protoss is lacking in this regard. I have no idea how to fix it, since cannons are awesome, and if you could make them after, say, only a gateway, they would probably become too powerful.
The OP's suggestion is interesting, and although it would obviously help Protoss defence, it also has implications for attacks which may make it an unreasonable response to a relatively small problem.
In BW, didn't Protoss frequently expand with a Zealot and a cannon?
Cannons shoot only ground,no detection, 100 minerals, unlocked with the cyberneticscore. add a forge upgrade that gives cannons detection + air attack.
so cannons still wont be as fast as spines or bunker, but also not as hampering as building a damn forge way too early in the game.
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On September 09 2011 21:40 beute wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 20:30 barrykp wrote: I like the OP, even if it's a little on the provocative side.
I don't think the warp-in mechanic can be construed as a disadvantage when defending - the Protoss is still on par with the other 2 races in this regard (in the sense that they can reinforce faster in defence than an attacking Zerg or Terran). It's a spurious argument to say that it's weak when compared to its usage when attacking. The comparison should be with other races' ability to defend with reinforcements, not Protoss's ability to reinforce attacks.
As for the problem with defensive structures; I never thought about it before (since cannons are so awesome), but the OP made a pretty convincing argument that Protoss is lacking in this regard. I have no idea how to fix it, since cannons are awesome, and if you could make them after, say, only a gateway, they would probably become too powerful.
The OP's suggestion is interesting, and although it would obviously help Protoss defence, it also has implications for attacks which may make it an unreasonable response to a relatively small problem.
In BW, didn't Protoss frequently expand with a Zealot and a cannon? Cannons shoot only ground,no detection, 100 minerals, unlocked with the cyberneticscore. add a forge upgrade that gives cannons detection + air attack. so cannons still wont be as fast as spines or bunker, but also not as hampering as building a damn forge way too early in the game.
Cannons are kind of jack of trades master of none defensive structure. Compared to the missle turrent it costs 50% more and does 50% less damage. Also missle turrents have few upgrades, repair and spores can move. The problem with cannons are you almost never need them to hit air and ground at the same time. You want to be able to kill the drop ship when it comes in, they tend to only wound. Once a marine is dropped the target changes and their drop ship almost never dies. You want a static defence that is either stoping drops or is doing good anti ground dps. I would maybe suggest 2 cannons. 1 ground only without decetion and 1 air only with detection. Allow the ground only cannon when gateway is made. Adjust damage/cost, this would make protoss base defenses a little more useful.
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In Brood War Zerg didn't have roaches and Terran didn't have marauders.
There are some people who don't seem to understand what the OP is saying. He's not saying that Warpgates are a defensive disadvantage (which of course would be rubbish), he is saying that warpgates cause Protoss to be at a defensive disadvantage and he is absolutely correct.
There aren't any stupidly scary Protoss timing attacks (which means Toss isn't overpowered) but there are certainly some very strong ones (that are so primarily because of their ability to quickly reinforce). The reason is that despite the excellent reinforcement abilities of a Protoss army basic Protoss units are neither particularly effective (but aren't terrible either) nor particularly cost efficient (eg: 2 roaches cost about the same as a Stalker but dominate them in combat).
This balances out their quick reinforcement and makes their timing pushes not bullshit strong (and if you could warp-in MM or Ling/Roach how stupidly sick would that be?). HOWEVER, this has the side-effect of making Protoss units weaker for defending - eg: when they would have that reinforcement advantage anyway (aka part 1 of the defenders advantage). They can't be made strong enough for defending without also making them TOO strong for attacking (although in the mid-late game I'm not too sure this would be a problem to be honest, but early game certainly would be).
So this means that Protoss can't safely expand economically without sacrificing tech.
Firstly I'll explain what I mean with a couple of popular builds in each (non-mirror) Toss matchup:
PvZ: Now, Protoss obviously has the (very safe on some maps) Forge Fast Expand which allows them to get a very fast 2 base economy going, however they have to sacrifice tech to do so. Every time a Protoss does the FFE he will be behind vs a good Zerg player (this isn't actually debatable, nor is it in any way imbalanced, this matchup is actually fine I think). However Protoss is in the game and has the opportunity to outplay their opponent and win (Toss is having a hard time in this matchup right now but I feel this is just one of those swings and roundabouts kinda things).
1-Gate Stargate Expand (counting this as 1-gate-star and 1-gate-nexus-star): Pretty safe build but forces a lot of resources into a tech path that shouldn't deal much in the way of direct damage and will still put you economically behind as well as delaying any other sort of tech you might want to go. Still in general safe enough but as with all PvZ openers if your opponent responds correctly you will be behind.
3-Gate Expand: Not really very economical and doesn't actually get any tech up (a bunch of sentries is kinda like tech though) but similar to FFE is relatively safe (if you have good scouting and control) and gets you into the game a little behind (again assuming Zerg is taking every opportunity to drone, which is of course easier said than done). This is my preferred (or 2-gate-nexus-tech which works about the same) opening because it allows for putting pressure on the zerg (so you don't fall too far behind in econ).
Summary: Impossible to be even or ahead vs equally skilled opponent early-on, but with good control (particularly of the sentry) can absolutely win vs similarly skilled opponents (especially with Toss' better late-midgame army). However you will have to outplay them, but behind economically doesn't mean a phenomenal come back or anything like that is needed. This matchup is tougher for the Protoss IMO than the Zerg, but it's definitely still pretty well balanced (and Toss can often get pretty easy wins vs poor Zergs whereas the other way is not necessarily the case).
PvT: 1-Gate expand: Can lose to several Terran openers (even with ideal scouting) depending on follow-up. Obviously there are things like the uber-fast 2-rax marine+SCV push which will stop it, but that will also just lose Terran the game. However 1-1-1 needs a Robo right after Nexus which means you lose to 2-rax which needs 2 more gates with probe cutting to have any hope to hold (and doing so means losing to 1-1-1).
3-Gate expand: Flat-out dies to 1-1-1 and puts you well behind vs any fast Terran expo.
Tech Expand (2-gate + tech) Put's you behind almost no matter what Terran does. IMO not a good opening vs Terran usually.
1-gate Robo->Obs: Very safe expand but puts you behind vs any sort of Bio opening (because you have to cancel the Nexus) and doesn't seem to be able to hold off the 1-1-1 whilst expanding.
Summary: Can expand safely and be behind (and still possible die) or riskily and maybe still be behind. Once 1-1-1 gets solved/patched out of the game 1-gate-Nexus-2 more gates should be (barely) holdable with good control which will allow Protoss to enter the mid-game on even footing (although Protoss really wants to be ahead economically vs Terran, IMO). Of course if you have much better control than your opponent you will usually be able to pull off riskier openings and will be ahead assuming the Terran player is aggressive early (and there's almost no reason not to be). Big maps also make things safer for Toss (but make it harder to scout at the same time which benefits Terran).
As you can see there's no genuinely safe opening vs equally skilled opponents that doesn't put you behind without your being able to scout it/kill it. This is a problem caused by the general (and necessary) inefficiency of Toss units and it's also not helped that so much money needs to be devoted to static defence which isn't very useful vs Terran anyway.
Shield Battery would actually be awesome and would I think aid not only PvP but would also basically make gateway based expands safe and flexible vs Zerg (but you'd still end up economically behind but that's ok in this matchup) and make 1-gate-nexus-robo a viable, safe and flexible opener vs Terran.
Apologies if I rambled on a bit, it's late and I'm tired.
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What they should do is require chronoboost energy to warp-in units. Each unit will cost 25 energy(might need to tweak this value) per warp-in. Reduce warp-gate cooldown to that of current chrono'd warp-gate's cooldown.
Or give pylons 25 starting energy (200 max energy) and whenever a unit is warped in its power grid, take 25 energy from that pylon. (Might need to tweak these values)
Either would require tweaks to Gateway unit build times. Find a way to strike a balance in build time such that a toss player would choose warpgates for quickly powering an army (with penalty to proxy pylon reinforcements) and gateways for economic defense.
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On September 10 2011 01:45 mieke wrote: What they should do is require chronoboost energy to warp-in units. Each unit will cost 25 energy(might need to tweak this value) per warp-in. Reduce warp-gate cooldown to that of current chrono'd warp-gate's cooldown.
Or give pylons 25 starting energy (200 max energy) and whenever a unit is warped in its power grid, take 25 energy from that pylon. (Might need to tweak these values)
Either would require tweaks to Gateway unit build times. Find a way to strike a balance in build time such that a toss player would choose warpgates for quickly powering an army (with penalty to proxy pylon reinforcements) and gateways for economic defense.
I like the pylon energy idea. I think one of the goals of blizz with the warpgate mechanic was that it's just plain cool and adds a lot to the visual appeal of protoss. As a viewer, the fact you can warp in units and attack multiple fronts is exciting, and why I believe blizz wanted warpgates to be strictly better than gateways in way, shape and form.
However it does lead to overly cheesy and simply unenjoyable scenarios/builds for players. K4G is a retarded, but effective build. Builds should not rely on ensuring a single pylon going up and the second it goes up they have an entire army knocking on your front door. Giving pylons energy not only makes it so you can't warp in an entire army at that location for eternity but also gives time for defenders to take it out. Then rebalance gateway units accordingly.
But this is probably all just pointless discussion because does anybody truly believe blizzard would make such a drastic change this late into development? The only possible time I could see this actually being revisited is when HotS comes out, and even then I seriously doubt it.
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On September 10 2011 02:42 Skyro wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 01:45 mieke wrote: What they should do is require chronoboost energy to warp-in units. Each unit will cost 25 energy(might need to tweak this value) per warp-in. Reduce warp-gate cooldown to that of current chrono'd warp-gate's cooldown.
Or give pylons 25 starting energy (200 max energy) and whenever a unit is warped in its power grid, take 25 energy from that pylon. (Might need to tweak these values)
Either would require tweaks to Gateway unit build times. Find a way to strike a balance in build time such that a toss player would choose warpgates for quickly powering an army (with penalty to proxy pylon reinforcements) and gateways for economic defense. However it does lead to overly cheesy and simply unenjoyable scenarios/builds for players. K4G is a retarded, but effective build. Builds should not rely on ensuring a single pylon going up and the second it goes up they have an entire army knocking on your front door. Giving pylons energy not only makes it so you can't warp in an entire army at that location for eternity but also gives time for defenders to take it out. Then rebalance gateway units accordingly.
That's not even a relevant point. K4G was common almost a year ago. And of course, a warp gate timing will rely on a proxy pylon. It's the entire balance and functionality of protoss, and it's not even remotely overpowered. It's also upon the defender to be actively aware of his opponents build and to know that he should be moving out to deny the proxy pylon from going down.
You suggest a warpgate nerf/gateway unit rebalance as if it's overpowered.
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On September 10 2011 02:49 Tyrant0 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 02:42 Skyro wrote:On September 10 2011 01:45 mieke wrote: What they should do is require chronoboost energy to warp-in units. Each unit will cost 25 energy(might need to tweak this value) per warp-in. Reduce warp-gate cooldown to that of current chrono'd warp-gate's cooldown.
Or give pylons 25 starting energy (200 max energy) and whenever a unit is warped in its power grid, take 25 energy from that pylon. (Might need to tweak these values)
Either would require tweaks to Gateway unit build times. Find a way to strike a balance in build time such that a toss player would choose warpgates for quickly powering an army (with penalty to proxy pylon reinforcements) and gateways for economic defense. However it does lead to overly cheesy and simply unenjoyable scenarios/builds for players. K4G is a retarded, but effective build. Builds should not rely on ensuring a single pylon going up and the second it goes up they have an entire army knocking on your front door. Giving pylons energy not only makes it so you can't warp in an entire army at that location for eternity but also gives time for defenders to take it out. Then rebalance gateway units accordingly. That's not even a relevant point. K4G was common almost a year ago. And of course, a warp gate timing will rely on a proxy pylon. It's the entire balance and functionality of protoss, and it's not even remotely overpowered. It's also upon the defender to be actively aware of his opponents build and to know that he should be moving out to deny the proxy pylon from going down. You suggest a warpgate nerf/gateway unit rebalance as if it's overpowered. It is relevant; you can K4G still, GMs do it; just do it on a 4player map where there are equal distances between mains on all start locations, like Typhon Peaks. Place 9 pylon in a remote location not scouted as normal, easy peasy. 9 pylon 9 gate cb nexus 13 gas 13 core 16 pylon in base WG cb 18 gate gate gate drop pylons (4-5) viola, K4G
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On September 09 2011 19:32 Geo.Rion wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 16:16 susySquark wrote:On September 09 2011 16:08 Geo.Rion wrote:On September 09 2011 15:58 susySquark wrote:On September 09 2011 15:53 Geo.Rion wrote: I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough.
Also: Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing).
It would be a lot nicer and look less biased, if you'd say "allegedly" or "presumably" balanced timing atacks, and both of the other races have economic openings that are ahead IF they defend the protoss timing push, if not they just died. Well, I just sort of assumed that the games in all our tournaments speak for themselves. Terrans and Zergs are capable of defending early Protoss pressure with economic openers. If this weren't true, every Terran or Zerg would open much more unit heavy than they currently do. Yes, I am making assumptions, but I feel they aren't that ridiculous. I'm just assuming that it is possible as a Terran or Zerg, to expand before (ie play more economically than) a pressuring Protoss and survive. Do you disagree? If yes, do you have a replay? I sincerly believe, it is not possible to expand before the Protoss because on most positions a Protoss can go 15 nexus before forge against anything slower then a 13 pool, or just forge first in wich case the Zerg is not allowed to hatch first, because he dies to canons on most of the maps, and even if he goes pool first has to have at least one drone following the probe because of possible contain or just 1 well placed canon behind the mineral line. And I politely disagree with your opinion that Zerg cannot open more economically than a Protoss. Once cannon rushing is denied, the length of time to any aggressive maneuver is long enough for you to 3 base and prepare. Keep in mind that a forge + cannons does not advance tech towards any units at all. In other words, If you defend a pylon + 2 cannon rush with lings, but lose 400 minerals of lings, you're technically ahead, because both players have lost the same amount of minerals, but you actually can make attacking units. I still have to build my gateway to get going. Agree to disagree, I suppose. I think most people would agree with me though >.> well thanks for not quoting half of my post, which is the direct answer to your first few lines. I suggest re-read it, i dont feel like copy pasting it here again. If you defend a pylon+2 canons with lings? Bad news, you canot, if he walls himself in, or hides or finds any way for the canons to finish or be close to finish no ammount of lings would take it out, if the Zerg can hold the canon rush, that becomes obvious before any canon or additional pylon is finished, in most of the cases, then you just cancel them and exp. But honestly, a smart Protoss doesnt go for a canon rush if it can be denied with drones in that position, or if the pool is fast enough for zerglings to come out before canons warp in. But smart protosses are as rare as white ravens, im above 1k masters, which granted isnt very good, but 1/3 of the Protosses go for canon rush, yes, even against 12 or 13 pool with having 1 drone right clicked on their probes, another good proportion goes for 15 nexus no matter what, yes vs 12 pool too, then the rest go for an allin either off of one or 2 base, and the remaining few %s turtle up and wait for a deathball. And even against opponents this bad and many autowins due to their horribly bad openers i have a fairly poor ZvP record, somewhere around 50%, which would be a tone worse if those autowins wont happen. So when i hear protosses are doing everything that's possible and Zerg and Terran are just overpowered, and bad players in general, that's why they werent owning harder up till now. OK, this wasnt in this topic, but it's a quite popular opinion here and on bnet. And how can you close out with a line like that, seriously? If by most people you mean those protosses who canot beat double exping Zerg, then i think you got a fairly tiny majority there bro.
So, what I'm getting from you is: cannon rushes put Protoss an expo ahead and do significant damage to Zerg consistantly with low risk. Right?
There's no way for either of us to prove that we're right without actually citing games. Right now its your word against mine, and honestly, I think you're being ridiculous. Cannon rushes are not low risk guaranteed reward, and you cannot cannon expo every map... there are only like 2 or 3 maps you can theoretically do a good cannon expo.
This is also completely off target of the thread too. No matter how much anecdotal evidence you throw out it's probably not going to change my mind. Just drop it, or make a thread about how cannons are imba with good evidence.
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On September 10 2011 04:05 tehemperorer wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 02:49 Tyrant0 wrote:On September 10 2011 02:42 Skyro wrote:On September 10 2011 01:45 mieke wrote: What they should do is require chronoboost energy to warp-in units. Each unit will cost 25 energy(might need to tweak this value) per warp-in. Reduce warp-gate cooldown to that of current chrono'd warp-gate's cooldown.
Or give pylons 25 starting energy (200 max energy) and whenever a unit is warped in its power grid, take 25 energy from that pylon. (Might need to tweak these values)
Either would require tweaks to Gateway unit build times. Find a way to strike a balance in build time such that a toss player would choose warpgates for quickly powering an army (with penalty to proxy pylon reinforcements) and gateways for economic defense. However it does lead to overly cheesy and simply unenjoyable scenarios/builds for players. K4G is a retarded, but effective build. Builds should not rely on ensuring a single pylon going up and the second it goes up they have an entire army knocking on your front door. Giving pylons energy not only makes it so you can't warp in an entire army at that location for eternity but also gives time for defenders to take it out. Then rebalance gateway units accordingly. That's not even a relevant point. K4G was common almost a year ago. And of course, a warp gate timing will rely on a proxy pylon. It's the entire balance and functionality of protoss, and it's not even remotely overpowered. It's also upon the defender to be actively aware of his opponents build and to know that he should be moving out to deny the proxy pylon from going down. You suggest a warpgate nerf/gateway unit rebalance as if it's overpowered. It is relevant; you can K4G still, GMs do it; just do it on a 4player map where there are equal distances between mains on all start locations, like Typhon Peaks. Place 9 pylon in a remote location not scouted as normal, easy peasy. 9 pylon 9 gate cb nexus 13 gas 13 core 16 pylon in base WG cb 18 gate gate gate drop pylons (4-5) viola, K4G
Who cares if a few GM's still do it on the ladder? It's non-existent in competitive play. It's been solved almost a year ago, and even nerfed; inadvertently. The only advantage you even gain from doing it is that it's unexpected, and punishes a greedy opening (blindly). But a normal 4 gate can do that too, and is much more stable. Furthermore, there is no way K4G can be propped up as an argument against warp gates. Oh, and thanks for the build order.
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On September 09 2011 23:25 althaz wrote: In Brood War Zerg didn't have roaches and Terran didn't have marauders.
There are some people who don't seem to understand what the OP is saying. He's not saying that Warpgates are a defensive disadvantage (which of course would be rubbish), he is saying that warpgates cause Protoss to be at a defensive disadvantage and he is absolutely correct.
There aren't any stupidly scary Protoss timing attacks (which means Toss isn't overpowered) but there are certainly some very strong ones (that are so primarily because of their ability to quickly reinforce). The reason is that despite the excellent reinforcement abilities of a Protoss army basic Protoss units are neither particularly effective (but aren't terrible either) nor particularly cost efficient (eg: 2 roaches cost about the same as a Stalker but dominate them in combat).
This balances out their quick reinforcement and makes their timing pushes not bullshit strong (and if you could warp-in MM or Ling/Roach how stupidly sick would that be?). HOWEVER, this has the side-effect of making Protoss units weaker for defending - eg: when they would have that reinforcement advantage anyway (aka part 1 of the defenders advantage). They can't be made strong enough for defending without also making them TOO strong for attacking (although in the mid-late game I'm not too sure this would be a problem to be honest, but early game certainly would be).
So this means that Protoss can't safely expand economically without sacrificing tech.
Firstly I'll explain what I mean with a couple of popular builds in each (non-mirror) Toss matchup:
PvZ: Now, Protoss obviously has the (very safe on some maps) Forge Fast Expand which allows them to get a very fast 2 base economy going, however they have to sacrifice tech to do so. Every time a Protoss does the FFE he will be behind vs a good Zerg player (this isn't actually debatable, nor is it in any way imbalanced, this matchup is actually fine I think). However Protoss is in the game and has the opportunity to outplay their opponent and win (Toss is having a hard time in this matchup right now but I feel this is just one of those swings and roundabouts kinda things).
1-Gate Stargate Expand (counting this as 1-gate-star and 1-gate-nexus-star): Pretty safe build but forces a lot of resources into a tech path that shouldn't deal much in the way of direct damage and will still put you economically behind as well as delaying any other sort of tech you might want to go. Still in general safe enough but as with all PvZ openers if your opponent responds correctly you will be behind.
3-Gate Expand: Not really very economical and doesn't actually get any tech up (a bunch of sentries is kinda like tech though) but similar to FFE is relatively safe (if you have good scouting and control) and gets you into the game a little behind (again assuming Zerg is taking every opportunity to drone, which is of course easier said than done). This is my preferred (or 2-gate-nexus-tech which works about the same) opening because it allows for putting pressure on the zerg (so you don't fall too far behind in econ).
Summary: Impossible to be even or ahead vs equally skilled opponent early-on, but with good control (particularly of the sentry) can absolutely win vs similarly skilled opponents (especially with Toss' better late-midgame army). However you will have to outplay them, but behind economically doesn't mean a phenomenal come back or anything like that is needed. This matchup is tougher for the Protoss IMO than the Zerg, but it's definitely still pretty well balanced (and Toss can often get pretty easy wins vs poor Zergs whereas the other way is not necessarily the case).
PvT: 1-Gate expand: Can lose to several Terran openers (even with ideal scouting) depending on follow-up. Obviously there are things like the uber-fast 2-rax marine+SCV push which will stop it, but that will also just lose Terran the game. However 1-1-1 needs a Robo right after Nexus which means you lose to 2-rax which needs 2 more gates with probe cutting to have any hope to hold (and doing so means losing to 1-1-1).
3-Gate expand: Flat-out dies to 1-1-1 and puts you well behind vs any fast Terran expo.
Tech Expand (2-gate + tech) Put's you behind almost no matter what Terran does. IMO not a good opening vs Terran usually.
1-gate Robo->Obs: Very safe expand but puts you behind vs any sort of Bio opening (because you have to cancel the Nexus) and doesn't seem to be able to hold off the 1-1-1 whilst expanding.
Summary: Can expand safely and be behind (and still possible die) or riskily and maybe still be behind. Once 1-1-1 gets solved/patched out of the game 1-gate-Nexus-2 more gates should be (barely) holdable with good control which will allow Protoss to enter the mid-game on even footing (although Protoss really wants to be ahead economically vs Terran, IMO). Of course if you have much better control than your opponent you will usually be able to pull off riskier openings and will be ahead assuming the Terran player is aggressive early (and there's almost no reason not to be). Big maps also make things safer for Toss (but make it harder to scout at the same time which benefits Terran).
As you can see there's no genuinely safe opening vs equally skilled opponents that doesn't put you behind without your being able to scout it/kill it. This is a problem caused by the general (and necessary) inefficiency of Toss units and it's also not helped that so much money needs to be devoted to static defence which isn't very useful vs Terran anyway.
Shield Battery would actually be awesome and would I think aid not only PvP but would also basically make gateway based expands safe and flexible vs Zerg (but you'd still end up economically behind but that's ok in this matchup) and make 1-gate-nexus-robo a viable, safe and flexible opener vs Terran.
Apologies if I rambled on a bit, it's late and I'm tired.
gateway units are not "made weaker" to other races units to balance warpgates. thats simply not true. gateway units are equal in strength to other races tier1 units, however protoss warpgates are balanced so offensive builds cannot pump out too many units to be overpowered. this means protoss cannot do safe-economic-defensive builds like zerg/terran can.
but alas, gateway units are not weak compared to other races tier1
roaches beat stalkers because of race mechanics between toss/zerg. 1 stalker beats 1 roach, a roach costs 50 less minerals and 25 less gas. Yeah, 2 roaches cost almost as much as 1stalker and will pwn the stalker, lets call this fact the "roach advantage". so the zerg can mass more of them to beat the toss, but if the toss can use forcefields he can make battle favorable then he can effectively kill the roaches/lings and the zerg cannot use this "roach advantage" until he gets ultralisks to pop FF or broodlords to longrange pwn a FFing toss
by the time the zerg gets those things, the toss is at 200food with storm/collossi/3 bases (hopefully). this now means the zerg is bound by his supply cap. now the toss has an advantage because 50 stalkers will slaughter 50 roaches easily. so zerg has a "roach advantage" early game, but late game it doesnt count because equal food in stalkers will kill equal food in roaches lategame
marauders beat stalkers because of race mechancis as well. marauders cannot shoot up. marauders beat stalkers, however sentry+staker+zealot will beat MM+stim early game in equal food amounts as long as the terran has no ghosts/thors/tanks/medivacs
guardian shield causes marauders/marines to do very little damage to zealots. force field stops MM balls from being able to kite the toss ball properly. using stims forces a terran to get medivacs to do it properly which hopefully gives the toss time to get collossi.
ive done this plenty times in micro/unit testers against my friends trying to micro MM as best as they can. gateway units are NOT WEAK. equal foods of gateway units will defeat equal foods of MM+stim units (assuming the terran has no ghosts or siegetanks or medivacs). the problem is warpgates are balanced so protoss is never really able to get out "equal food" of unts because warpgates are balanced to not let toss timing attacks get too many units
zerg is the swarm race with cheaper units that can swarm the enemy, but protoss has the stronger unit that wins a 200v200 battle.
terran is in the middle ground of this concept. for example comparing stalkers to marines. 10 stalkers should beat 20 marines with combat shield (but not with stim too. sentrys are needed to beat stim). but the marines are cheaper, require no gas. however if the protoss can defend and get a 200food deathball he should be unstoppable because marines are extremely weak to toss aoe (collossi) and stalkers are alot more resilient to terran aoe (tanks) so the marines vaporize but the stalkers are allowed to remain. etc.
im not saying theres no problem, im just saying the problem is "warpgates are balanced to give toss reduced unit creation power. this means because toss is balanced to not have overpowered timing attacks, their defensive abilities are weak"
the problem is NOT "gateway units are weak compared to other races t1 units"
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Defenders advantage is measured against your opponent, not your own army. Protoss having similar rally distances on offense and defense isn't a 'lack of a defenders advantage' it's just a massive boost to offense. The short rally relative to the opponent is still there on defense. It doesnt just magically disappear because it can also exist on offense. This idea that because they enjoy this advantage on offense means it is no longer an advantage on defense is asinine.
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On September 10 2011 02:49 Tyrant0 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 02:42 Skyro wrote:On September 10 2011 01:45 mieke wrote: What they should do is require chronoboost energy to warp-in units. Each unit will cost 25 energy(might need to tweak this value) per warp-in. Reduce warp-gate cooldown to that of current chrono'd warp-gate's cooldown.
Or give pylons 25 starting energy (200 max energy) and whenever a unit is warped in its power grid, take 25 energy from that pylon. (Might need to tweak these values)
Either would require tweaks to Gateway unit build times. Find a way to strike a balance in build time such that a toss player would choose warpgates for quickly powering an army (with penalty to proxy pylon reinforcements) and gateways for economic defense. However it does lead to overly cheesy and simply unenjoyable scenarios/builds for players. K4G is a retarded, but effective build. Builds should not rely on ensuring a single pylon going up and the second it goes up they have an entire army knocking on your front door. Giving pylons energy not only makes it so you can't warp in an entire army at that location for eternity but also gives time for defenders to take it out. Then rebalance gateway units accordingly. That's not even a relevant point. K4G was common almost a year ago. And of course, a warp gate timing will rely on a proxy pylon. It's the entire balance and functionality of protoss, and it's not even remotely overpowered. It's also upon the defender to be actively aware of his opponents build and to know that he should be moving out to deny the proxy pylon from going down. You suggest a warpgate nerf/gateway unit rebalance as if it's overpowered.
You misunderstand. I'm not saying anything about WG being OP or not, I'm saying I believe the primary motivation for blizz to allow warping in of units was for the visual appeal and coolness factor for spectators to lend itself as an esports game, and are now finding it hard to effectively balance around that mechanic in a fun way for the players who actually play the game. K4G is just an example (albeit a dated one due to all the WG nerfs) of how ridiculous the mechanic is from a player's perspective. I don't think anybody really found playing or defending a K4G fun in the slightest. The pylon energy idea keeps warpgates in the game (pleasing spectators) while still keeping the fundamental RTS tenet of a defender's advantage intact (pleasing players), and from there you can rebalance the units as necessary.
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So, do you want cannons to be off the gateway? The photon cannon is an amazingly powerful early game; if you were given easy access to it, every game would be a zeal/cannon rush.
You seem to think short rally distance makes reinforcing better, but your reinforce point is instant as protoss, so the only situation you have to worry about is in PvP. Is it OK if warp ins are obnoxious for everyone else to deal with but not protoss? Yeah, if you have more gateway units and attack, it's very reasonable that you should win, so you need to match his gateway numbers or get some sort of tech advantage to overcome that.
Also, defensive protoss macro styles are already rediculously powerful versus zerg, shield battery would be ridiculous in SC2 PvZ
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On September 10 2011 04:30 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 19:32 Geo.Rion wrote:On September 09 2011 16:16 susySquark wrote:On September 09 2011 16:08 Geo.Rion wrote:On September 09 2011 15:58 susySquark wrote:On September 09 2011 15:53 Geo.Rion wrote: I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough.
Also: Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing).
It would be a lot nicer and look less biased, if you'd say "allegedly" or "presumably" balanced timing atacks, and both of the other races have economic openings that are ahead IF they defend the protoss timing push, if not they just died. Well, I just sort of assumed that the games in all our tournaments speak for themselves. Terrans and Zergs are capable of defending early Protoss pressure with economic openers. If this weren't true, every Terran or Zerg would open much more unit heavy than they currently do. Yes, I am making assumptions, but I feel they aren't that ridiculous. I'm just assuming that it is possible as a Terran or Zerg, to expand before (ie play more economically than) a pressuring Protoss and survive. Do you disagree? If yes, do you have a replay? I sincerly believe, it is not possible to expand before the Protoss because on most positions a Protoss can go 15 nexus before forge against anything slower then a 13 pool, or just forge first in wich case the Zerg is not allowed to hatch first, because he dies to canons on most of the maps, and even if he goes pool first has to have at least one drone following the probe because of possible contain or just 1 well placed canon behind the mineral line. And I politely disagree with your opinion that Zerg cannot open more economically than a Protoss. Once cannon rushing is denied, the length of time to any aggressive maneuver is long enough for you to 3 base and prepare. Keep in mind that a forge + cannons does not advance tech towards any units at all. In other words, If you defend a pylon + 2 cannon rush with lings, but lose 400 minerals of lings, you're technically ahead, because both players have lost the same amount of minerals, but you actually can make attacking units. I still have to build my gateway to get going. Agree to disagree, I suppose. I think most people would agree with me though >.> well thanks for not quoting half of my post, which is the direct answer to your first few lines. I suggest re-read it, i dont feel like copy pasting it here again. If you defend a pylon+2 canons with lings? Bad news, you canot, if he walls himself in, or hides or finds any way for the canons to finish or be close to finish no ammount of lings would take it out, if the Zerg can hold the canon rush, that becomes obvious before any canon or additional pylon is finished, in most of the cases, then you just cancel them and exp. But honestly, a smart Protoss doesnt go for a canon rush if it can be denied with drones in that position, or if the pool is fast enough for zerglings to come out before canons warp in. But smart protosses are as rare as white ravens, im above 1k masters, which granted isnt very good, but 1/3 of the Protosses go for canon rush, yes, even against 12 or 13 pool with having 1 drone right clicked on their probes, another good proportion goes for 15 nexus no matter what, yes vs 12 pool too, then the rest go for an allin either off of one or 2 base, and the remaining few %s turtle up and wait for a deathball. And even against opponents this bad and many autowins due to their horribly bad openers i have a fairly poor ZvP record, somewhere around 50%, which would be a tone worse if those autowins wont happen. So when i hear protosses are doing everything that's possible and Zerg and Terran are just overpowered, and bad players in general, that's why they werent owning harder up till now. OK, this wasnt in this topic, but it's a quite popular opinion here and on bnet. And how can you close out with a line like that, seriously? If by most people you mean those protosses who canot beat double exping Zerg, then i think you got a fairly tiny majority there bro. So, what I'm getting from you is: cannon rushes put Protoss an expo ahead and do significant damage to Zerg consistantly with low risk. Right? There's no way for either of us to prove that we're right without actually citing games. Right now its your word against mine, and honestly, I think you're being ridiculous. Cannon rushes are not low risk guaranteed reward, and you cannot cannon expo every map... there are only like 2 or 3 maps you can theoretically do a good cannon expo. This is also completely off target of the thread too. No matter how much anecdotal evidence you throw out it's probably not going to change my mind. Just drop it, or make a thread about how cannons are imba with good evidence. Just to prove how wrong you are: Nerazim, Abyssal, Thaldarim, Shattered, Shakuras, Antiga are very good/decent for canon exp, and i ve seen it done totally safely on every single map including Xel Naga. (i dont even know about the lava map, i thumbed that down long ago, but afair that s good for it too)
It's not my word against yours, Zergs do not hatch first against forge opening unless there is no way to wall in effectively behind mineral lines or if they want to take a huge risk. The standard ZvP openings are 12 pool, 14/15pool and 14gas14pool, Hatch first on 1 or 2 maps and it s a big risk even so. Canon rushes are very low risk vs 15 hatch, if you do them right and not in those few scenarios where it can be stopped while going hatch first, and it is relevant to the topic, since forge FEs are the way to 6/7gate builds and warprism+warpgate builds, which you claim are not able to hurt double expoing zergs, which is flat out wrong, and not a matter of perspective.
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On September 10 2011 05:42 tetracycloide wrote: This idea that because they enjoy this advantage on offense means it is no longer an advantage on defense is asinine.
It is also true, and perfectly logical.
Gateway Units need to be balanced with Warpgate in mind else they would be overpowered. if Gateway Units are balanced around their offensiv potential, then defending with them will be worse, where the Protoss units can't defend due to map design with forcefields (which is the majority of maps) and lack of defensiv structures.
Hell that is the reason why Roach/Ling all-ins work.
Protoss lacks the defensiv structure, that unlocks normally with the first production building structure (Baracks/Pool). Some cost effective defensiv structure would instantly fix all match ups and make the game alot more macro orientated, because your opponent can't just blindly all-in and know they will be in 90% the more favorable side.
In the end Protoss has 2 techonologies that are a core advantage. Warpgate/Forcefield
If both Warpgate Timings are not good anymore due to nerfs and the map doesn't suit for Forcefield play, then the map (or the game) is imbalanced towards Protoss.
Because there is nothing left to fall back on, while the opponents macromechanic will always be something that has benefits.
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i think you also have to take in the fact that we (as a protoss player myself) have forcefields, which provide huge defensive capability. ask any zerg/terran player that we've forcefielded half-way up ramp!
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On September 10 2011 06:12 Skyro wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 02:49 Tyrant0 wrote:On September 10 2011 02:42 Skyro wrote:On September 10 2011 01:45 mieke wrote: What they should do is require chronoboost energy to warp-in units. Each unit will cost 25 energy(might need to tweak this value) per warp-in. Reduce warp-gate cooldown to that of current chrono'd warp-gate's cooldown.
Or give pylons 25 starting energy (200 max energy) and whenever a unit is warped in its power grid, take 25 energy from that pylon. (Might need to tweak these values)
Either would require tweaks to Gateway unit build times. Find a way to strike a balance in build time such that a toss player would choose warpgates for quickly powering an army (with penalty to proxy pylon reinforcements) and gateways for economic defense. However it does lead to overly cheesy and simply unenjoyable scenarios/builds for players. K4G is a retarded, but effective build. Builds should not rely on ensuring a single pylon going up and the second it goes up they have an entire army knocking on your front door. Giving pylons energy not only makes it so you can't warp in an entire army at that location for eternity but also gives time for defenders to take it out. Then rebalance gateway units accordingly. That's not even a relevant point. K4G was common almost a year ago. And of course, a warp gate timing will rely on a proxy pylon. It's the entire balance and functionality of protoss, and it's not even remotely overpowered. It's also upon the defender to be actively aware of his opponents build and to know that he should be moving out to deny the proxy pylon from going down. You suggest a warpgate nerf/gateway unit rebalance as if it's overpowered. You misunderstand. I'm not saying anything about WG being OP or not, I'm saying I believe the primary motivation for blizz to allow warping in of units was for the visual appeal and coolness factor for spectators to lend itself as an esports game, and are now finding it hard to effectively balance around that mechanic in a fun way for the players who actually play the game. K4G is just an example (albeit a dated one due to all the WG nerfs) of how ridiculous the mechanic is from a player's perspective. I don't think anybody really found playing or defending a K4G fun in the slightest. The pylon energy idea keeps warpgates in the game (pleasing spectators) while still keeping the fundamental RTS tenet of a defender's advantage intact (pleasing players), and from there you can rebalance the units as necessary.
You brought up K4G again. It's irrelevant. It shouldn't be used as an example, especially outside of PVP. I don't know which players you're trying to please either; warp gate timings are protoss's only method of punishing/pressuring. Just their very existence is what keeps most greedy players honest.
And again, the entire way you word your posts, you empower the user using warp gates, and take all credit away from their opponent.
On September 10 2011 05:41 roymarthyup wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 23:25 althaz wrote: In Brood War Zerg didn't have roaches and Terran didn't have marauders.
There are some people who don't seem to understand what the OP is saying. He's not saying that Warpgates are a defensive disadvantage (which of course would be rubbish), he is saying that warpgates cause Protoss to be at a defensive disadvantage and he is absolutely correct.
There aren't any stupidly scary Protoss timing attacks (which means Toss isn't overpowered) but there are certainly some very strong ones (that are so primarily because of their ability to quickly reinforce). The reason is that despite the excellent reinforcement abilities of a Protoss army basic Protoss units are neither particularly effective (but aren't terrible either) nor particularly cost efficient (eg: 2 roaches cost about the same as a Stalker but dominate them in combat).
This balances out their quick reinforcement and makes their timing pushes not bullshit strong (and if you could warp-in MM or Ling/Roach how stupidly sick would that be?). HOWEVER, this has the side-effect of making Protoss units weaker for defending - eg: when they would have that reinforcement advantage anyway (aka part 1 of the defenders advantage). They can't be made strong enough for defending without also making them TOO strong for attacking (although in the mid-late game I'm not too sure this would be a problem to be honest, but early game certainly would be).
So this means that Protoss can't safely expand economically without sacrificing tech.
Firstly I'll explain what I mean with a couple of popular builds in each (non-mirror) Toss matchup:
PvZ: Now, Protoss obviously has the (very safe on some maps) Forge Fast Expand which allows them to get a very fast 2 base economy going, however they have to sacrifice tech to do so. Every time a Protoss does the FFE he will be behind vs a good Zerg player (this isn't actually debatable, nor is it in any way imbalanced, this matchup is actually fine I think). However Protoss is in the game and has the opportunity to outplay their opponent and win (Toss is having a hard time in this matchup right now but I feel this is just one of those swings and roundabouts kinda things).
1-Gate Stargate Expand (counting this as 1-gate-star and 1-gate-nexus-star): Pretty safe build but forces a lot of resources into a tech path that shouldn't deal much in the way of direct damage and will still put you economically behind as well as delaying any other sort of tech you might want to go. Still in general safe enough but as with all PvZ openers if your opponent responds correctly you will be behind.
3-Gate Expand: Not really very economical and doesn't actually get any tech up (a bunch of sentries is kinda like tech though) but similar to FFE is relatively safe (if you have good scouting and control) and gets you into the game a little behind (again assuming Zerg is taking every opportunity to drone, which is of course easier said than done). This is my preferred (or 2-gate-nexus-tech which works about the same) opening because it allows for putting pressure on the zerg (so you don't fall too far behind in econ).
Summary: Impossible to be even or ahead vs equally skilled opponent early-on, but with good control (particularly of the sentry) can absolutely win vs similarly skilled opponents (especially with Toss' better late-midgame army). However you will have to outplay them, but behind economically doesn't mean a phenomenal come back or anything like that is needed. This matchup is tougher for the Protoss IMO than the Zerg, but it's definitely still pretty well balanced (and Toss can often get pretty easy wins vs poor Zergs whereas the other way is not necessarily the case).
PvT: 1-Gate expand: Can lose to several Terran openers (even with ideal scouting) depending on follow-up. Obviously there are things like the uber-fast 2-rax marine+SCV push which will stop it, but that will also just lose Terran the game. However 1-1-1 needs a Robo right after Nexus which means you lose to 2-rax which needs 2 more gates with probe cutting to have any hope to hold (and doing so means losing to 1-1-1).
3-Gate expand: Flat-out dies to 1-1-1 and puts you well behind vs any fast Terran expo.
Tech Expand (2-gate + tech) Put's you behind almost no matter what Terran does. IMO not a good opening vs Terran usually.
1-gate Robo->Obs: Very safe expand but puts you behind vs any sort of Bio opening (because you have to cancel the Nexus) and doesn't seem to be able to hold off the 1-1-1 whilst expanding.
Summary: Can expand safely and be behind (and still possible die) or riskily and maybe still be behind. Once 1-1-1 gets solved/patched out of the game 1-gate-Nexus-2 more gates should be (barely) holdable with good control which will allow Protoss to enter the mid-game on even footing (although Protoss really wants to be ahead economically vs Terran, IMO). Of course if you have much better control than your opponent you will usually be able to pull off riskier openings and will be ahead assuming the Terran player is aggressive early (and there's almost no reason not to be). Big maps also make things safer for Toss (but make it harder to scout at the same time which benefits Terran).
As you can see there's no genuinely safe opening vs equally skilled opponents that doesn't put you behind without your being able to scout it/kill it. This is a problem caused by the general (and necessary) inefficiency of Toss units and it's also not helped that so much money needs to be devoted to static defence which isn't very useful vs Terran anyway.
Shield Battery would actually be awesome and would I think aid not only PvP but would also basically make gateway based expands safe and flexible vs Zerg (but you'd still end up economically behind but that's ok in this matchup) and make 1-gate-nexus-robo a viable, safe and flexible opener vs Terran.
Apologies if I rambled on a bit, it's late and I'm tired. gateway units are not "made weaker" to other races units to balance warpgates. thats simply not true. gateway units are equal in strength to other races tier1 units, however protoss warpgates are balanced so offensive builds cannot pump out too many units to be overpowered. this means protoss cannot do safe-economic-defensive builds like zerg/terran can. but alas, gateway units are not weak compared to other races tier1 roaches beat stalkers because of race mechanics between toss/zerg. 1 stalker beats 1 roach, a roach costs 50 less minerals and 25 less gas. Yeah, 2 roaches cost almost as much as 1stalker and will pwn the stalker, lets call this fact the "roach advantage". so the zerg can mass more of them to beat the toss, but if the toss can use forcefields he can make battle favorable then he can effectively kill the roaches/lings and the zerg cannot use this "roach advantage" until he gets ultralisks to pop FF or broodlords to longrange pwn a FFing toss by the time the zerg gets those things, the toss is at 200food with storm/collossi/3 bases (hopefully). this now means the zerg is bound by his supply cap. now the toss has an advantage because 50 stalkers will slaughter 50 roaches easily. so zerg has a "roach advantage" early game, but late game it doesnt count because equal food in stalkers will kill equal food in roaches lategame marauders beat stalkers because of race mechancis as well. marauders cannot shoot up. marauders beat stalkers, however sentry+staker+zealot will beat MM+stim early game in equal food amounts as long as the terran has no ghosts/thors/tanks/medivacs guardian shield causes marauders/marines to do very little damage to zealots. force field stops MM balls from being able to kite the toss ball properly. using stims forces a terran to get medivacs to do it properly which hopefully gives the toss time to get collossi. ive done this plenty times in micro/unit testers against my friends trying to micro MM as best as they can. gateway units are NOT WEAK. equal foods of gateway units will defeat equal foods of MM+stim units (assuming the terran has no ghosts or siegetanks or medivacs). the problem is warpgates are balanced so protoss is never really able to get out "equal food" of unts because warpgates are balanced to not let toss timing attacks get too many units zerg is the swarm race with cheaper units that can swarm the enemy, but protoss has the stronger unit that wins a 200v200 battle. terran is in the middle ground of this concept. for example comparing stalkers to marines. 10 stalkers should beat 20 marines with combat shield (but not with stim too. sentrys are needed to beat stim). but the marines are cheaper, require no gas. however if the protoss can defend and get a 200food deathball he should be unstoppable because marines are extremely weak to toss aoe (collossi) and stalkers are alot more resilient to terran aoe (tanks) so the marines vaporize but the stalkers are allowed to remain. etc. im not saying theres no problem, im just saying the problem is "warpgates are balanced to give toss reduced unit creation power. this means because toss is balanced to not have overpowered timing attacks, their defensive abilities are weak" the problem is NOT "gateway units are weak compared to other races t1 units"
What? Getting a lot of units is precisely what a warp gate timing attack accomplishes. You get an influx of units as warpgate/gateways finish, ontop of the fact gateway units are produced first, and put on cooldown later.\
Your arguments are non-existent. You treat forcefields as if they're indefinite. Zergs aren't going roach ling and then waiting for ultralisks to break forcefields these days. I don't know how many PVT's you see where you get a chance to fight purely marines with just stalkers, or how often a terran marine/marauder mix will sit still to let you get perfect forcefields and let your zealots get anywhere close.
Gateway units suck vs current meta game compositions. You will rarely see a game end with purely gateway units that isn't part of a timing attack.
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On September 10 2011 06:37 Tyrant0 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 06:12 Skyro wrote:On September 10 2011 02:49 Tyrant0 wrote:On September 10 2011 02:42 Skyro wrote:On September 10 2011 01:45 mieke wrote: What they should do is require chronoboost energy to warp-in units. Each unit will cost 25 energy(might need to tweak this value) per warp-in. Reduce warp-gate cooldown to that of current chrono'd warp-gate's cooldown.
Or give pylons 25 starting energy (200 max energy) and whenever a unit is warped in its power grid, take 25 energy from that pylon. (Might need to tweak these values)
Either would require tweaks to Gateway unit build times. Find a way to strike a balance in build time such that a toss player would choose warpgates for quickly powering an army (with penalty to proxy pylon reinforcements) and gateways for economic defense. However it does lead to overly cheesy and simply unenjoyable scenarios/builds for players. K4G is a retarded, but effective build. Builds should not rely on ensuring a single pylon going up and the second it goes up they have an entire army knocking on your front door. Giving pylons energy not only makes it so you can't warp in an entire army at that location for eternity but also gives time for defenders to take it out. Then rebalance gateway units accordingly. That's not even a relevant point. K4G was common almost a year ago. And of course, a warp gate timing will rely on a proxy pylon. It's the entire balance and functionality of protoss, and it's not even remotely overpowered. It's also upon the defender to be actively aware of his opponents build and to know that he should be moving out to deny the proxy pylon from going down. You suggest a warpgate nerf/gateway unit rebalance as if it's overpowered. You misunderstand. I'm not saying anything about WG being OP or not, I'm saying I believe the primary motivation for blizz to allow warping in of units was for the visual appeal and coolness factor for spectators to lend itself as an esports game, and are now finding it hard to effectively balance around that mechanic in a fun way for the players who actually play the game. K4G is just an example (albeit a dated one due to all the WG nerfs) of how ridiculous the mechanic is from a player's perspective. I don't think anybody really found playing or defending a K4G fun in the slightest. The pylon energy idea keeps warpgates in the game (pleasing spectators) while still keeping the fundamental RTS tenet of a defender's advantage intact (pleasing players), and from there you can rebalance the units as necessary. You brought up K4G again. It's irrelevant. It shouldn't be used as an example, especially outside of PVP. I don't know which players you're trying to please either; warp gate timings are protoss's only method of punishing/pressuring. Just their very existence is what keeps most greedy players honest. And again, the entire way you word your posts, you empower the user using warp gates, and take all credit away from their opponent.
Again you misunderstand. You focus on balance. Can you not understand that something can be balanced (or imbalanced, again I'm not saying anything about balance, at all), but not fun for the players? I'm saying the concept of warpgates, as currently implemented, causes issues with how enjoyable the game is for the players. This is a design flaw, and essentially the whole point of the topic in the first place. K4G is used an example as it is the most obvious example to point out this design flaw.
And when I say please players, I mean make the game, from a strategic point of view, more enjoyable to play. All players of all races would IMO welcome a change to the warp-gate mechanic that kept the basic RTS tenet of a defender's advantage intact, or at least myself as a protoss player would. Or to put it another way, from a design standpoint it is better to ensure all your basic RTS principles are intact, and then balance around that. A stronger, rebalanced gateway units with limited offensive warp-in potential would absolutely do wonders to the enjoyability of the early game for players IMO.
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On September 09 2011 15:58 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:53 Geo.Rion wrote: I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough.
Also: Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing).
It would be a lot nicer and look less biased, if you'd say "allegedly" or "presumably" balanced timing atacks, and both of the other races have economic openings that are ahead IF they defend the protoss timing push, if not they just died. Well, I just sort of assumed that the games in all our tournaments speak for themselves. Terrans and Zergs are capable of defending early Protoss pressure with economic openers. If this weren't true, every Terran or Zerg would open much more unit heavy than they currently do. Yes, I am making assumptions, but I feel they aren't that ridiculous. I'm just assuming that it is possible as a Terran or Zerg, to expand before (ie play more economically than) a pressuring Protoss and survive. Do you disagree? If yes, do you have a replay?
Turned around, unless you have an eco opener vs P, they simply overwhelm you with masses of 4 gated units.
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This is a really stupid discussion. OP claims that a lot of openers are completely invalid vs a lot of terran openers which is complete bullshit. With good enough micro it is possible to hold off a 2rax with a 1gate expo + a 1 gate expo is really good against 1/1/1.
Protoss is all about good micro, if you fuck up with army positioning or micro in the early game, its just like missing injects as zerg or not siegeing your tanks in time as terran. Saying that Protoss openings are underpowered is bullshit since its all about how well you execute it.
Yeah PvP is a hyper aggressive matchup just like zvz in BW. But thats just the way the game works atm. A lot of new stuff is going to come in the expations and the possibilities will grow. But as of now this is what we got. Don't tell me its not possible to play defensive in PvP though, since it definitely is on maps with ramps.
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On September 10 2011 09:48 Truedot wrote:Show nested quote +On September 09 2011 15:58 susySquark wrote:On September 09 2011 15:53 Geo.Rion wrote: I really do not mean to troll you, but it seems like this is your logic:
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Hence, Protoss doesnt have an advantage in defence, because it doesnt have a disadvantage in attack cuz of easy reinforcing, so it is pretty clear, that Protoss is weak.
I appreciate your work and the effort you put in it, but you really did not convince me, actually it is ridiculous, maybe i didnt understand it well enough.
Also: Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing).
It would be a lot nicer and look less biased, if you'd say "allegedly" or "presumably" balanced timing atacks, and both of the other races have economic openings that are ahead IF they defend the protoss timing push, if not they just died. Well, I just sort of assumed that the games in all our tournaments speak for themselves. Terrans and Zergs are capable of defending early Protoss pressure with economic openers. If this weren't true, every Terran or Zerg would open much more unit heavy than they currently do. Yes, I am making assumptions, but I feel they aren't that ridiculous. I'm just assuming that it is possible as a Terran or Zerg, to expand before (ie play more economically than) a pressuring Protoss and survive. Do you disagree? If yes, do you have a replay? Turned around, unless you have an eco opener vs P, they simply overwhelm you with masses of 4 gated units.
You DO have eco openers vs P though! That was the whole point of the argument. Bunkers, spines, and close rallies help T and Z defend against superior Protoss numbers. 4 Gate hasn't been a problem in the non-mirror for a LONG time now.
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this really did make me think a lot, and i do agree there is no defenders advantage for a toss... i would think the shield battery could be a pretty sick building to introduce...
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On September 10 2011 10:21 Kong John wrote: This is a really stupid discussion. OP claims that a lot of openers are completely invalid vs a lot of terran openers which is complete bullshit. With good enough micro it is possible to hold off a 2rax with a 1gate expo + a 1 gate expo is really good against 1/1/1.
Allow me to rephrase your statement: "With some of the best micro in the world the Protoss player can defend a 2 rax reactor first push with 6 scvs after doing a 1 Gate FE, if the Terran screws up his positioning." - see Naniwa vs Strelok at the EU Blizzard Invitational for an example.
Also, it's hilarious how 1 Gate FE has become "really good against 1/1/1" suddenly, all the while Protosses in the GSL still lose to the all-in after 1 Gate expanding.
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On September 10 2011 10:48 Toadvine wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 10:21 Kong John wrote: This is a really stupid discussion. OP claims that a lot of openers are completely invalid vs a lot of terran openers which is complete bullshit. With good enough micro it is possible to hold off a 2rax with a 1gate expo + a 1 gate expo is really good against 1/1/1.
Allow me to rephrase your statement: "With some of the best micro in the world the Protoss player can defend a 2 rax reactor first push with 6 scvs after doing a 1 Gate FE, if the Terran screws up his positioning." - see Naniwa vs Strelok at the EU Blizzard Invitational for an example. Also, it's hilarious how 1 Gate FE has become "really good against 1/1/1" suddenly, all the while Protosses in the GSL still lose to the all-in after 1 Gate expanding.
Took the words right outta my mouth. Or... right off my keyboard.
1 Gate FE has a chance to hold of 1/1/1, but its not "really good". 1 Gate FE must sac expo to 2rax, unless you have godly micro and your opponent screws up. If they bring SCV's and bunker you, you're almost guaranteed to lose your nexus.
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I REALLY enjoy, how this topic, which used to talk about design issues relating to a concept and how it could be changed to still fit the current balance (only talk of balance) between races has now turned into a balance talk about allins.
Good job Teamliquid.net. good. fucking. job.
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Somewhat Agree with OP regarding Protoss doesn't have rally disadvantage when attacking. But it affect to PVP the most I think.
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God, people seem to be missing the point completely. Gateway units fair poorly against the lower tier units of the other races. There are various ways to deal with this (e.g. forciefields and templar), but the point is that perhaps there just shouldn't be this inequity. If gateway units were stronger, it would make protoss less dependent on tech units like collosi and storm. This would allow for new ways of playing. The problem the op is suggesting is that improving gateway units would make warp gate timings too strong, so perhaps warpgates could be nerfed to allow for these other changes.
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On September 10 2011 06:26 freetgy wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 05:42 tetracycloide wrote: This idea that because they enjoy this advantage on offense means it is no longer an advantage on defense is asinine.
It is also true, and perfectly logical. Gateway Units need to be balanced with Warpgate in mind else they would be overpowered. if Gateway Units are balanced around their offensiv potential, then defending with them will be worse, where the Protoss units can't defend due to map design with forcefields (which is the majority of maps) and lack of defensiv structures. Hell that is the reason why Roach/Ling all-ins work. Protoss lacks the defensiv structure, that unlocks normally with the first production building structure (Baracks/Pool). Some cost effective defensiv structure would instantly fix all match ups and make the game alot more macro orientated, because your opponent can't just blindly all-in and know they will be in 90% the more favorable side. In the end Protoss has 2 techonologies that are a core advantage. Warpgate/Forcefield If both Warpgate Timings are not good anymore due to nerfs and the map doesn't suit for Forcefield play, then the map (or the game) is imbalanced towards Protoss. Because there is nothing left to fall back on, while the opponents macromechanic will always be something that has benefits.
give the protoss a defensive structure that is unlocked with gateway without needing other tech = zerg cannot attack at all, and must play it to macro game.
Funny how Zerg is the only race forced to go for long game if they don't want to all-in and get a coin flip win/loss.
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On September 10 2011 11:46 darklight54321 wrote: I REALLY enjoy, how this topic, which used to talk about design issues relating to a concept and how it could be changed to still fit the current balance (only talk of balance) between races has now turned into a balance talk about allins.
Good job Teamliquid.net. good. fucking. job. This really made me laugh.
To be fair, that's kinda in the OP since the main point of the OP is the lack of defender's advantage for one race as opposed to the other races (the warp gate just being a factor of that fact in the OP's eyes). But I know what you mean...
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The OP seems to imply that warp-ins make Protoss' defender's advantage weaker. Not true. The choice of where to warp-in can only help Protoss; it can't hurt it. Protoss always has the close rally perk in PvT and PvZ, because it has the close rally perk everywhere, whether attacking or defending. PvP is balanced by definition (both sides have the perk).
It seems to me that the best way to solve Protoss' lack of early defensive structure is to make the Photon Cannon weaker at the outset and include a midgame upgrade for it, bringing it to its current strength. Not only would this solve the problem of needing an early forge to expand, it would reduce the effectiveness of the ever-annoying cannon rush.
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On September 10 2011 15:58 MShaw006 wrote: The OP seems to imply that warp-ins make Protoss' defender's advantage weaker. Not true. The choice of where to warp-in can only help Protoss; it can't hurt it. Protoss always has the close rally perk in PvT and PvZ, because it has the close rally perk everywhere, whether attacking or defending. PvP is balanced by definition (both sides have the perk).
It seems to me that the best way to solve Protoss' lack of early defensive structure is to make the Photon Cannon weaker at the outset and include a midgame upgrade for it, bringing it to its current strength. Not only would this solve the problem of needing an early forge to expand, it would reduce the effectiveness of the ever-annoying cannon rush.
This is kind of how I feel. I'll agree that there is no difference between where you rally because of the warpin mechanic, but that doesn't change the fact that you still have a defenders advantage (with the exception of PvP). No matter what Zerg and Terran still have to travel to your base to attack, so reinforcements arrive late, Protoss reinforcements will be wherever you have power. In this sense the only thing here that has changed is that the warp in mechanic lessens the defenders advantage for your opponent.
Now if you want to talk about defensive structures then I will also agree that Forge is a bit outside what would be your ideal build, whereas Zerg has access to Spine Crawlers as soon as his Pool is finished and Terran has access to Bunkers as soon as his first Barracks is finished. Still I would have trouble justifying Cannon in their current condition being made available earlier for Protoss. Some of what worries me is the potential for using Cannons offensively and that Cannons hit both air, ground and can detect. This is quite a lot for a single building to do and I doubt many would say that Cannons are a horrible structure, the problem like stated is most likely where they are in your tech tree.
Finally if we're talking about balance then it is hard for me to say if Protoss need help defending or should even have help opening up extremely economy oriented. I personally feel like you guys can keep up fairly well in terms of economy with chronoboost and sentries, and your two base timings are just so darn good that I would feel uneasy if Protoss had access to higher economy all ins with well fortified bases. If anything the changes that would be made would have to be very carefully thought out, it seems like it would be too easy to make something overpowered.
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Well i dont see any problem with it. If Toss is bad at defending(what i dont even think, well placed forcefields not just at your choke, can redude the opponents army value pretty hard) then dont play defensive. I think thats what good about starcraft , different races represent different gamestyles. If you like to defend, play a race thats good at defending and has a advantage in small groups. If a race is good at doing pushes, then go for it and abuse all the positive aspects of agressive protoss play.
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So you're saying that Protoss players should be able to instantly warp across the map and have defender's advantage?
I'd be fine with giving P shield batteries, but that means you should give up your warp gate. Having both means P has superior aggression and defender's advantage.
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On September 10 2011 17:31 Nyxisto wrote: Well i dont see any problem with it. If Toss is bad at defending(what i dont even think, well placed forcefields not just at your choke, can redude the opponents army value pretty hard) then dont play defensive. I think thats what good about starcraft , different races represent different gamestyles. If you like to defend, play a race thats good at defending and has a advantage in small groups. If a race is good at doing pushes, then go for it and abuse all the positive aspects of agressive protoss play.
It makes Protoss boring and stagnant if they cant open economically and defensively. Someone else mentioned it, but openers are balanced between greedy, aggressive, and safe, which all beat each other in a rock/paper/scissors fashion. It's currently hard to open "safe" as Protoss because of the lack of defense - if you open economically, its closer to "greedy" on that scale. A Protoss opener is thus kept in a smaller box, which makes it predictable... which can be taken advantage of by a smart opponent.
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On September 10 2011 16:32 CaptTerrible wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 15:58 MShaw006 wrote: The OP seems to imply that warp-ins make Protoss' defender's advantage weaker. Not true. The choice of where to warp-in can only help Protoss; it can't hurt it. Protoss always has the close rally perk in PvT and PvZ, because it has the close rally perk everywhere, whether attacking or defending. PvP is balanced by definition (both sides have the perk).
It seems to me that the best way to solve Protoss' lack of early defensive structure is to make the Photon Cannon weaker at the outset and include a midgame upgrade for it, bringing it to its current strength. Not only would this solve the problem of needing an early forge to expand, it would reduce the effectiveness of the ever-annoying cannon rush. This is kind of how I feel. I'll agree that there is no difference between where you rally because of the warpin mechanic, but that doesn't change the fact that you still have a defenders advantage (with the exception of PvP). No matter what Zerg and Terran still have to travel to your base to attack, so reinforcements arrive late, Protoss reinforcements will be wherever you have power. In this sense the only thing here that has changed is that the warp in mechanic lessens the defenders advantage for your opponent. Now if you want to talk about defensive structures then I will also agree that Forge is a bit outside what would be your ideal build, whereas Zerg has access to Spine Crawlers as soon as his Pool is finished and Terran has access to Bunkers as soon as his first Barracks is finished. Still I would have trouble justifying Cannon in their current condition being made available earlier for Protoss. Some of what worries me is the potential for using Cannons offensively and that Cannons hit both air, ground and can detect. This is quite a lot for a single building to do and I doubt many would say that Cannons are a horrible structure, the problem like stated is most likely where they are in your tech tree. Finally if we're talking about balance then it is hard for me to say if Protoss need help defending or should even have help opening up extremely economy oriented. I personally feel like you guys can keep up fairly well in terms of economy with chronoboost and sentries, and your two base timings are just so darn good that I would feel uneasy if Protoss had access to higher economy all ins with well fortified bases. If anything the changes that would be made would have to be very carefully thought out, it seems like it would be too easy to make something overpowered.
you're right, the race is inefficient. It needs to be streamlined so that you pay as little as possible for as much tech as possible. I mean, its not like there was ever the need for forge in brood war for the cannons. Its not like forge is needed for the upgrades for timing pushes which incidentally opens up cannons.
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On September 10 2011 16:32 CaptTerrible wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 15:58 MShaw006 wrote: The OP seems to imply that warp-ins make Protoss' defender's advantage weaker. Not true. The choice of where to warp-in can only help Protoss; it can't hurt it. Protoss always has the close rally perk in PvT and PvZ, because it has the close rally perk everywhere, whether attacking or defending. PvP is balanced by definition (both sides have the perk).
It seems to me that the best way to solve Protoss' lack of early defensive structure is to make the Photon Cannon weaker at the outset and include a midgame upgrade for it, bringing it to its current strength. Not only would this solve the problem of needing an early forge to expand, it would reduce the effectiveness of the ever-annoying cannon rush. Finally if we're talking about balance then it is hard for me to say if Protoss need help defending or should even have help opening up extremely economy oriented. I personally feel like you guys can keep up fairly well in terms of economy with chronoboost and sentries, and your two base timings are just so darn good that I would feel uneasy if Protoss had access to higher economy all ins with well fortified bases. If anything the changes that would be made would have to be very carefully thought out, it seems like it would be too easy to make something overpowered.
First off, cannons are right where they belong, just like turrets and spores. Toss just has no bunker/spine equivalent, tech wise. Sentries fill this role of early defense... But by making sentries to defend, you have less attacking units, so the number of gateways you have to produce before expanding with a good defense is more than the other races. And its not like sentries are free! 50/100 is EXPENSIVE. Extra sentries means more gas, which means less minerals. More sentries means more gateways for other units, which means less minerals. Which all adds up to a later expansion.
Also, Protoss has the slowest econ growth of the 3 races. Some chrono must be devoted to early units and warp gate for any defense to be viable at all, and MULEs and inject are much more efficient at growing an economy.
On September 10 2011 17:50 Truedot wrote: you're right, the race is inefficient. It needs to be streamlined so that you pay as little as possible for as much tech as possible. I mean, its not like there was ever the need for forge in brood war for the cannons. Its not like forge is needed for the upgrades for timing pushes which incidentally opens up cannons.
And you've just gone into sarcasm mode. Great, how does anyone discuss anything at all anymore
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I disagree with the logic of the OP saying toss have no defender's advantage.
Protoss is equally effective whether they're attacking or defending. (warp in, cannons require tech) T/Z is more effective when defending(shorter rally, defensive structures) than attacking.
If the game is balanced in this regard, T/Z and Protoss should have an equal chance to hold off an attack or succeed in an attack against the other race. This is not achieved by setting Protoss attack = T/Z defense, which makes T/Z attack > Protoss defense, as stated in the OP. Rather, it is achieved by making the advantage T/Z gets in defending equal to the disadvantage it gets when attacking.
If protoss is squarely in the middle of T/Z's offensive capability and its defensive capability, everything is balanced. Protoss has a defender's advantage in T/Z's long rally.
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I agreed instinctively before playing the game somethign was off about warping tech.
It kind of completely ignores map design almost fully.
Which is why I think protoss is really boring compared to zerg or terran.
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Simplified explanation (correct me if I'm wrong):
- Protoss seems to have an offensive advantage with warpgates. This offensive advantage was neutered by having inefficient gateway units. Thus, Protoss has no net advantage in offense because of a permanent penalty imposed on Gateway units. Protoss is balanced for offense because of a permanent penalty + several patches toning down 4gate, etc.
- In a defensive context, the permanent penalty is still in effect (Gateway units are weak for cost - source: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?authkey=CM2fmeYD&key=0Ah7e8gd66xh6dG1JZ1JEc3BlZFpENU1hWjh0ajF1dnc&hl=en&authkey=CM2fmeYD#gid=0). This penalty was imposed because of Protoss offense (warpgates would otherwise have been an advantage).
Thus, Protoss now has balanced offense (especially after the patches) but suffers from the same penalty in non-offensive context.
Shield battery would address this.
Edit: I don't even like this solution, but I think the OP has a winning case. My personal opinion is that Protoss needs some major core changes.
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Just because you can reinforce the same on offence as defence dosnt mean you dont have defenders advantage. You still have advantage of short rally over the opponent. And wide naturals are just as vulnerable for the other player.
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You didn't mention PvP because it is "balanced" but I think one of the biggest problems lay in PvP.
Rock, Paper, Scissors is also perfectly balanced but it is hardly suitable for competitive play. PvP is too volatile (or too random). Meaning, the better player has a high chance of losing against the worst player. Compare this to Terran, where the better player generally wins. For who wants to spend tens of thousands of hours preparing for a tournament when you know it is a very chance you will lose as soon as you meet another Protoss, regardless of skill?
This is mainly due to one of the problems you discuss though, that Protoss has poor defense. As there is such a poor defense, attacking is generally a good strategy and with the shorter games, the better player has less of an advantage.
A shield battery requiring only gateway-tech that would "pulse" out shields would greatly help PvP, as it would make it less viable to attack early on.
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On September 10 2011 18:31 Lucko wrote: Just because you can reinforce the same on offence as defence dosnt mean you dont have defenders advantage. You still have advantage of short rally over the opponent. And wide naturals are just as vulnerable for the other player.
Lets put it in numbers:
If a Terran attacks a zerg on a map where it takes 1 minute to cross, he will be attacking with a 7 minute army against a 8 minute army. Easy to understand, yes?
If a protoss attacks a terran, no matter the distance, he will be attacking with an 8 minute army against a 8 minute army. This is obviously too strong with regular units, thus protoss gateway units have been nerfed into the ground (especially stalkers) to be as strong as a 7 minute army. It seems to work, because right now, a protoss on the offense can still be very strong, but its not imba.
Heres comes the bad part about this. If a terran attacks a protoss. He will be attacking with a 7 minute army into a 8 minute army. But because protoss units have been nerfed to be a 7 minute army, the protoss suddenly don't have the "rally defenders advantage" that the other two races has. This leads to terran timing pushes becomming incredibly strong. On open maps where other defenders advantages are taken away (Wide areas at natural making forcefields useless, for instance), then it becomes very troublesome for a protoss to defend himself.
Canons isn't the answer either, because 1, they suck vs terran units with their massive dps, and 2, they're out of the way and a bit expensive in the beginning of the game. (Meaning, you'll need a forge to build them, and you can't move them or salvage them afterwards)
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Excludos: The situation you presented in which protoss is nerfed into the ground does not result in balance as you explained. If blizzard overnerfed protoss units, protoss win ratios would be very low.
Instead, if blizzard would nerf protoss units just enough so that their strength in offense is equal the terran's strength in offense, resulting in balance. Since win ratios are roughly equal, protoss units are roughly nerfed to this degree.
In other words, by saying "this is obviously too strong (so protoss must be overnerfed)" you are assuming what you are trying to prove.
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On September 10 2011 19:49 saus wrote: Excludos: The situation you presented in which protoss is nerfed into the ground does not result in balance as you explained. If blizzard overnerfed protoss units, protoss win ratios would be very low.
in gsl (pro lvl) the protoss win ratio is redicilous low ^^
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On September 10 2011 19:49 saus wrote: Excludos: The situation you presented in which protoss is nerfed into the ground does not result in balance as you explained. If blizzard overnerfed protoss units, protoss win ratios would be very low.
Instead, if blizzard would nerf protoss units just enough so that their strength in offense is equal the terran's strength in offense, resulting in balance. Since win ratios are roughly equal, protoss units are roughly nerfed to this degree.
In other words, by saying "this is obviously too strong (so protoss must be overnerfed)" you are assuming what you are trying to prove.
You're a tad off there. Protoss units are bad offense so they'll be equally to terrans defense. But now terrans offense will be much stronger because protoss units have been tuned for offense. aka: No defensive advantage for protoss.
I used the word "nerfed", because thats what happened in early beta. When blizzard themself figured that warpgate was too strong offensively. but I guess the accurate word would be "bad". And it has to be, its not like blizzard can buff protoss units, because else the offense would be too strong. But like I said, this negates the defensive advantages, which is what the OP has been trying to tell us.
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I don't know, I see this argument a lot that WG mechanic meant significantly weaker Protoss units. I used to think so myself, but I'm not sure anymore. The Zealot remains a strong unit, its stats similar or close to the BW Zealot. The Stalker, which I dislike, is strong in the early game but does get progressively worse as the game goes on. It is effective, however, in the mid/late game in mass numbers and with Blink (which is a cool ability). The Sentry is a decent support unit which has two great abilities in FF and GS and does ok damage for what it is. Therefore, it may not be the Protoss gateway army or WG mechanic that may be the issue here.
I don't know, maybe the issue is that when Blizzard added the Roach and the Marauder to SC2 they did not add something similar to the Protoss so that the Protoss Gateway army remains un-upgraded from BW apart from the addition of the Sentry with its FF/GS as a support unit. I'm also no longer sure, like I used to think, that the Sentry FF was meant to compensate for the weakness of Gateway units as a result of the WG mechanic. Rather, that specific Sentry ability was more to counteract the ability of other races to have significantly numerically superior forces than Protoss very quickly (through such mechanisms as Reactors and Larva Inject). Protoss' WG mechanic is the Protoss version of these race abilities in SC2 but, IMO, seems weaker as its advantage in mobility (i.e. warp in within pylon range) has to be played off against the timing of these Z and T racial abilities (along with complicated factors such as stim; concussive; ling speed and so on). Whatever the strengths of the WG mechanic in neutralising distance, you are still limited to the number of gates you have.
Returning to my earlier point, I think the Immortal as it was originally conceived was meant to be the Protoss gateway equivalent of the Roach/Marauder (it certainly counters them very effectively) but is probably too powerful and tanky (especially with such gimmicks as hardened shield) to remain a Gateway unit. This leaves Protoss Tier 1 unable to handle these armies without significant assistance and, at least versus Terran, is made worse by the power of Marines when they reach a significant number (aided by the Reactor ability on Rax). Therefore, I am doubtful if the WG mechanic is the core of Protoss design flaws and issues with the race in general.
I'm sorry if I am being a little unclear, I think I usually make my points better. But I have been thinking about this a little and am coming around to the conclusion that pinpointing the WG mechanic (as I used to do) as the core flaw in Protoss design may be wrong. The WG mechanic, fundamentally, may be fine as are Protoss Gateway units (although I do think the Stalker needs a little work - at least 1/1 for upgrades, please). The issue, rather, may be in a missing gateway unit for Protoss in SC2 and racial Z and T racial mechanics which, while legitimate, have no direct Protoss counter. Nor should they, I think. The WG mechanic works fine as an indirect response to these abilities, what needs to be also tweaked are the timings of this ability (together with, perhaps, minor tweaks to Gateway units).
Edit/ That said, I think bringing back the shield battery would be a great idea. It would, however, have to be tied to the Nexus or base in some way, as the way shield regeneration works in SC2 means, I think, that there could be room for abuse if it could be generated at any pylon anywhere on the map.
TL; DR: The WG mechanic does not necessarily lead to weaker Gateway units. What is lacking is a Gateway equivalent to the Marauder and Roach. Sentry FF/GS are not a buffer to the weakness of Gateway units, rather they compensate for the racial mechanics of Reactors for Terran and Larva Inject for Zerg which gives their armies a numerical advantage which P cannot match without FF/GS. The WG mechanic is therefore fine and does not break Protoss. Rather, what is required is better tweaking of the timing of the WG mechanic and the addition of a new Gateway unit.
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People keep speaking of potential abuse from a shield generator if it was implemented in sc2.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but did that ever happen in bw? Tbh I don't even remember seeing it that often (except for one spesific game where a single dragoon held of a terran allin). What makes you think it will be that much more insane in sc2? Remember the shield battery we're talking about only has the capacity to restore 200 shield, and takes quite a while to regenerate. Its not actually that much.
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On September 10 2011 17:57 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 16:32 CaptTerrible wrote:On September 10 2011 15:58 MShaw006 wrote: The OP seems to imply that warp-ins make Protoss' defender's advantage weaker. Not true. The choice of where to warp-in can only help Protoss; it can't hurt it. Protoss always has the close rally perk in PvT and PvZ, because it has the close rally perk everywhere, whether attacking or defending. PvP is balanced by definition (both sides have the perk).
It seems to me that the best way to solve Protoss' lack of early defensive structure is to make the Photon Cannon weaker at the outset and include a midgame upgrade for it, bringing it to its current strength. Not only would this solve the problem of needing an early forge to expand, it would reduce the effectiveness of the ever-annoying cannon rush. Finally if we're talking about balance then it is hard for me to say if Protoss need help defending or should even have help opening up extremely economy oriented. I personally feel like you guys can keep up fairly well in terms of economy with chronoboost and sentries, and your two base timings are just so darn good that I would feel uneasy if Protoss had access to higher economy all ins with well fortified bases. If anything the changes that would be made would have to be very carefully thought out, it seems like it would be too easy to make something overpowered. First off, cannons are right where they belong, just like turrets and spores. Toss just has no bunker/spine equivalent, tech wise. Sentries fill this role of early defense... But by making sentries to defend, you have less attacking units, so the number of gateways you have to produce before expanding with a good defense is more than the other races. And its not like sentries are free! 50/100 is EXPENSIVE. Extra sentries means more gas, which means less minerals. More sentries means more gateways for other units, which means less minerals. Which all adds up to a later expansion. Also, Protoss has the slowest econ growth of the 3 races. Some chrono must be devoted to early units and warp gate for any defense to be viable at all, and MULEs and inject are much more efficient at growing an economy. Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 17:50 Truedot wrote: you're right, the race is inefficient. It needs to be streamlined so that you pay as little as possible for as much tech as possible. I mean, its not like there was ever the need for forge in brood war for the cannons. Its not like forge is needed for the upgrades for timing pushes which incidentally opens up cannons. And you've just gone into sarcasm mode. Great, how does anyone discuss anything at all anymore
Okay the point is that the entire game, any entire strategy game, is based around arbitrarily set limitations on the pieces on the board. These pieces must be traded off in a risk vs reward fashion, given what may or may not help now, and what definitely will help in the long run (to the ultimate goal of winning).
giving some sort of defense structure available to protoss right off of gateway, as it stands now, would multiply they variables of protoss construction and timing tenfold, making them that much more unpredictable. Sure, this huge leap in versatility will grant them the ability to play "shadowy" and trick T enough time to coin flip some wins out, but at the end of the day, although a more shadowy nature, I thought, was supposed to be the role of protoss, as a hit and fade army, and not some deathball ballbuster army, thats not really good for the game as it simply makes it that much harder to balance it, and removes a lot of the element of understanding the opposition and reading them and then countering them.
My sarcasm was just a tired attempt to point that out without taking the time to go in depth.
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life of lively to live to life of full life thx to shield battery
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Interesting read, OP --------------------------------
Balancing Toss, and discussing the balance of Toss, has always been a really weird thing. It's difficult to put your finger on for several reasons. I'll just make a few observations:
- Bunker / Spine / _____ ??? -
- The bunker is a defensive structure that does not add DPS for cost. It absolutely increases the utility of Marines, which in TvP can be extremely weak in early confrontations (Stim, of course, changes this). It is basically a DPS reduction ability, and allows you to hold a position.
- The Spine is a wonderful defensive structure that adds DPS to the fight for its cost. It has a lot of utility, it can move, and it can be created during sessions of power droning. It requires a lot of work to use these offensively in anything but ZvZ.
- Protoss has no defensive structure available after gate!? - It has been addressed by the comments already, but is an interesting observation to make. The Sentry fills the role of the bunker and the Spine in early game, but has a role in the entire game (usually). All of the abilities are essentially DPS reduction skills but like most Toss abilities, are completely mobile. FF can actually eliminate the fight completely, or reduce DPS by partitioning the opponent's range. Guardian shield reduces all ranged DPS. And Hallucinate can also absorb a ridiculous amount of DPS.
- The cannon must require the forge for obvious reasons. The cannon is so all purpose, and such a formidable cheesing tool, it basically has to stay in the forge. I think everyone agrees on this.
- Warpgate tech is super powerful in early game and late game. It's slightly less powerful in the mid-game. Skipping a round of units, and eliminating rally distance, gives the Warpgate units a huge advantage in early game. Couple this with the Sentry and the Toss army is very powerful until Stim hits the field. Secondly, since the Warpgate is a gassless production structure it can be used as a mineral dump in late game, when the Toss is maxed. After a Toss is maxed, Every warpgate skips a productions cycle, once supply is freed up again.
- It's always been about Tech and Abilities - Abilities and tech completely swing the favor in TvP. In super early game, a concussive shell rush can punish a Toss. Once Warpgates and/or Sentries hit the field a non-Stim Bio army is at a serious disadvantage. Once Stim is up, the Bio Ball has a serious advantage over a GW Ball. Colossus is typically the answer to a bio ball, but Charge and Blink add a tremendous amount of efficacy to their respective units. Once either of these two things hit the field, the Bio Ball and the GW Ball are on relatively even ground.
I contend that the strength of certain abilities and tech paths are contributing a great deal to the sensitivities in the TvP matchup in all stages.
This response might be overkill, : / but I think there are some worthy observations here.
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On September 10 2011 19:49 saus wrote: Excludos: The situation you presented in which protoss is nerfed into the ground does not result in balance as you explained. If blizzard overnerfed protoss units, protoss win ratios would be very low.
Protoss win ratios are incredibly low -_-
There are only 5 Protoss in the GSL this season.
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Great idea with the shield battery. I loved the building in SC1, and it would be awesome as a building to help correct the lack of defense for protoss. However, you know as well as anyone else that it would take 3-4 days before people started to proxy them (they already have the pylon), and would be used primarily for offence/contains.
Loved the whole post tho. Aptly sums it all up.
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I'd rather they just remove warp gate, buff gateway units and give toss a shield battery. Nullifying defenders advantage and proxy pylons are just incredibly annoying and disruptive to the game.
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Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army.
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I'm quite late to the discussion but something that may help restore a defender's advantage is some kind of warp-in jamming device. A bit like Terrans have sensor towers to detect enemy movement, Protoss could construct a jamming tower to prevent warp-ins in a particular area. I don't think the area of effect should obviously be nearly as big as the sensor tower's range, but something appropriate can be worked out.
And for it to help defend against a 4gate, it should be available fairly early, maybe after Gateway or after the Cybernetics Core. Again, something which brings balance can be figured out.
Comments? Criticisms (constructive)? What do you think?
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On September 10 2011 17:31 Nyxisto wrote: Well i dont see any problem with it. If Toss is bad at defending(what i dont even think, well placed forcefields not just at your choke, can redude the opponents army value pretty hard) then dont play defensive. I think thats what good about starcraft , different races represent different gamestyles. If you like to defend, play a race thats good at defending and has a advantage in small groups. If a race is good at doing pushes, then go for it and abuse all the positive aspects of agressive protoss play.
The OP does not say Protoss as they are now are bad at defending period. He says they are bad at defending it certain situations which force certain conventions that don't need to be necessary. Maps should not be forced to have one small diagonal ramp from the main to the natural to be successful as a rule. Sentry defense relies on forcefield on that kind of choke. The OP is saying that Protoss defense could be more flexible if they had a defender's advantage which partly involves unit build time, but also involves something akin to a bunker/spine crawler which is barracks/spawning pool/gateway level tech instead of the cannon which is forge/evolution chamber/engineering bay level tech. In light of zealot strength and cannon versatility, it makes sense that the cannon is not gateway tech, the combination would be too powerful. The question is what can be done to give the protoss the defender's advantage building that is gateway tech that does not make protoss overpowered. In a sense, warp gate tech has nothing to do with it nor sentry forcefield. The only reason warp gate was brought up was to "get inside blizzard's head" about why there is no defenders advantage for protoss (beyond mass forcefield which you cannot have super early in the game).
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Yeah i always questioned why blizz gave protoss the (zerg) ability to mass quickly...it seems like zerg is cheap but massable, terran mid cost, takes some time to mass, but toss is powerful and massable
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oh please give me a shield battery
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On September 10 2011 20:14 aZealot wrote: I don't know, maybe the issue is that when Blizzard added the Roach and the Marauder to SC2 they did not add something similar to the Protoss so that the Protoss Gateway army remains un-upgraded from ....... [edit]
Roach and Marauder are roughly the Z/T Dragoon, same as Stalker is the new Dragoon. Problem is the direct translation is weaker than the original at its base, and now it has to contend with equals much earlier making it less effective for what it did.
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Another thing you forgot about.
Protoss offense is balanced with chrono on gateways in mind, as it may happen and thus must be very possible to defend against. However, if you do not chrono your gateways and use it on tech or probes instead, your defense will also be worse off.
As such, it is not just warp gates that are a problem but also chrono boost itself.
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On September 11 2011 01:47 BushidoSnipr wrote: Yeah i always questioned why blizz gave protoss the (zerg) ability to mass quickly...it seems like zerg is cheap but massable, terran mid cost, takes some time to mass, but toss is powerful and massable
Pretty much, except that you see p's goign mass stalker for a reason. its not as weak as people are making it out to be. That high range on stalkers is the reason, coupled with their high HP. lets be honest, 160 hp for a 125 50 unit is more than a tank's HP at 125 125, and it costs 1 less supply. And then it moves 2.95 speed. And then it can move even faster with blink. And then it can live forever with blink micro.
There's a reason we're seeing a huge upswing trend in blink stalker rushes vs Z. High HP, long range, and the ability to save every single unit from death in early/midgame..
And then if some die, no problem, 4 more instantly. And if it gets to late game, 20 gates and you get 20 very powerful units instantly.
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On September 11 2011 03:12 Truedot wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 01:47 BushidoSnipr wrote: Yeah i always questioned why blizz gave protoss the (zerg) ability to mass quickly...it seems like zerg is cheap but massable, terran mid cost, takes some time to mass, but toss is powerful and massable Pretty much, except that you see p's goign mass stalker for a reason. its not as weak as people are making it out to be. That high range on stalkers is the reason, coupled with their high HP. lets be honest, 160 hp for a 125 50 unit is more than a tank's HP at 125 125, and it costs 1 less supply. And then it moves 2.95 speed. And then it can move even faster with blink. And then it can live forever with blink micro. There's a reason we're seeing a huge upswing trend in blink stalker rushes vs Z. High HP, long range, and the ability to save every single unit from death in early/midgame.. And then if some die, no problem, 4 more instantly. And if it gets to late game, 20 gates and you get 20 very powerful units instantly.
It does less dps than a single marine. In a way it's like an amazing acrobat/ninja, who jumps all over the place, does back flips into front flips, and takes a few hits and survives. It's not as effective as it is cool (although it's half decent, it's weaker than comparable units from other races).
It's basically Sammo Hung, minus the ability to hurt things.
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Anyone whining that protoss is too strong because of warp mechanic is way off the mark.
This game is good because the races have different mechanics, warp ins are perfect for this game, stop having pointless debates its dumb and sad.
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On September 11 2011 03:36 IsraeL wrote: Anyone whining that protoss is too strong because of warp mechanic is way off the mark.
This game is good because the races have different mechanics, warp ins are perfect for this game, stop having pointless debates its dumb and sad.
Did you even read anything at all? Warp is not OP, its actually creating a weakness. It's fine for the game, yes... if we can cover for defense somehow.
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On September 11 2011 01:47 BushidoSnipr wrote: Yeah i always questioned why blizz gave protoss the (zerg) ability to mass quickly...it seems like zerg is cheap but massable, terran mid cost, takes some time to mass, but toss is powerful and massable
You're overlooking the fact that they cost more than Either T or Z units.
If you let Protoss get on 20+ WGs, you let them live too long.
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Very nice, what you say makes sense, and opened my eyes a little.
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On September 11 2011 01:34 Lucky Strike wrote: I'm quite late to the discussion but something that may help restore a defender's advantage is some kind of warp-in jamming device. A bit like Terrans have sensor towers to detect enemy movement, Protoss could construct a jamming tower to prevent warp-ins in a particular area. I don't think the area of effect should obviously be nearly as big as the sensor tower's range, but something appropriate can be worked out.
And for it to help defend against a 4gate, it should be available fairly early, maybe after Gateway or after the Cybernetics Core. Again, something which brings balance can be figured out.
Comments? Criticisms (constructive)? What do you think?
your making one unit that can only be specifically used in the mirror? this is a pretty bad idea...
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On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army.
Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection.
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On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection.
not necessarily, they can use photon cannons
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but protoss army is not weak... it can kill almost any unit composition by simple a-move... why do you think you need more benefits "at the cost" of having warpgates (rofl) ;]
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On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection.
Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway.
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On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway.
I forget who did it in the GSL, but I've been opening expand into stargate, delayed robo. Scouting with the first phoenix, you have time to cancel your robo if you dont see cloak. Keep in mind cloak is more expensive than robo+obs. Phoenixes are total bosses at holding 1/1/1 too, lifting tanks and giving banshee killing power so you can make more zealots. Cloak also delays the 1/1/1 significantly.
But thats a completely separate issue. If Toss had a better defense, you COULD commit the resources to a robo and still hold. I don't think robo tech detection is necessarily that bad. Remember when we had to get an observatory in addition to a robo? Good god.
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On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway.
man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late.
The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue.
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Very good read. I've often contemplated the warp in mechanics myself, and how it affected pushes. Hope you do more articles like these brah.
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On September 11 2011 01:34 Lucky Strike wrote: I'm quite late to the discussion but something that may help restore a defender's advantage is some kind of warp-in jamming device. A bit like Terrans have sensor towers to detect enemy movement, Protoss could construct a jamming tower to prevent warp-ins in a particular area. I don't think the area of effect should obviously be nearly as big as the sensor tower's range, but something appropriate can be worked out.
And for it to help defend against a 4gate, it should be available fairly early, maybe after Gateway or after the Cybernetics Core. Again, something which brings balance can be figured out.
Comments? Criticisms (constructive)? What do you think?
This would only help in PvP, which, by nature, is 100% balanced. The problem, which explained in the OP, is in PvT and PvZ. It would not help a protoss to defend against a terran attack if he could jam his own warpgate technology..
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Let me try this again.
People are saying Protoss units need to be balanced to be equal in offense as Terran is in defense, or else Protoss units would be OP.
But if you do this, suddenly Terran units are OP in offense against Protoss, as is clearly stated in the first post.
Following the same logic that attacking units in offense need to be equal to the opposing race in defense, we should now weaken Terran units so they don't always win when attacking Protoss. This process will never end, therefore we CAN'T make the attacker in offense equal to the defender in defense and have a balanced game.
A balanced game does result if we make attacking or defending strength independent of your race. In other words, Protoss's warp gate advantage should be partially balanced back by weakening their units, but not so much that terran will steamroll them in attacks.
The first post is framing the WG as having an inherent balance flaw, but it does not.
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On September 11 2011 10:10 saus wrote: Let me try this again.
People are saying Protoss units need to be balanced to be equal in offense as Terran is in defense, or else Protoss units would be OP.
But if you do this, suddenly Terran units are OP in offense against Protoss, as is clearly stated in the first post.
Following the same logic that attacking units in offense need to be equal to the opposing race in defense, we should now weaken Terran units so they don't always win when attacking Protoss. This process will never end, therefore we CAN'T make the attacker in offense equal to the defender in defense and have a balanced game.
A balanced game does result if we make attacking or defending strength independent of your race. In other words, Protoss's warp gate advantage should be partially balanced back by weakening their units, but not so much that terran will steamroll them in attacks.
The first post is framing the WG as having an inherent balance flaw, but it does not.
your argument kinda seemed to agree with his =/
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"The first post is framing the WG as having an inherent balance flaw, but it does not."
This is where it's different. The main point of the original post.
In the first few paragraphs I go through the logic of this thread and show that it is inconsistent. Then I present a new philosophy of balance that is consistent.
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On September 11 2011 10:13 saus wrote: "The first post is framing the WG as having an inherent balance flaw, but it does not."
This is where it's different. The main point of the original post.
In the first few paragraphs I go through the logic of this thread and show that it is inconsistent. Then I present a new philosophy of balance that is consistent.
No, you basically spent the entire post explaining to yourself why the wg is flawed (by explaining that protoss can't be balanced both for offense and defense), follow it up with "protoss units needs to be balanced so they're not too strong offensively or defensively, finishing it with "the warpgate is not a problem"
edit: I'll elaborate a bit on the middle part:
On September 11 2011 10:13 saus wrote: A balanced game does result if we make attacking or defending strength independent of your race. In other words, Protoss's warp gate advantage should be partially balanced back by weakening their units, but not so much that terran will steamroll them in attacks."
But herein lies the core of the problem! Because of the wg, its incredibly hard to balance protoss so it doesn't steamroll or get steamrolled. Thats why we have seen protoss dominating everything for a few months, get nerfed a bit, and then get dominated by everything for few a months.
I could keep on explaining this, about how weak gateway units means that protoss gets insane non-gateway units, about how this makes them very vulnerable when the only defensive capability they have is made void (by either map or, for instance, the siege tank in a 1-1-1 push), or about how this makes the whole race a tad gimmicky, but I think I should rather just redirect you back to the thread OP
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Oh there is so many things wrong with this post it actually hurts my brain.
An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Yeah so if terran wants to stop any early game aggression by Protoss they need 3 to 4 bunkers. After Warpgate is finished, because of the influx of units you will never seen a Protoss get attacked as Warpgate finishes (TvP anyways)
The abbility to WARP IN to where you want to defend IS A DEFENDERS advantage. Instead of T and Z having to rally (which can lead to bad positioning ie. Forcefield or ramp chokes) you get them @ your natural...
Saying the Marine Maraduer force is good because of Bunkers defensivly is like saying... Well Zerglings do better if there is a Spinecrawler, Zealots do better if there is a Cannon.
Can't believe this was not closed...
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On September 08 2011 18:59 susySquark wrote:Disclaimer: This is not complaining about warpgates - this is examining how warpgates by design have lead to a smaller defenders advantage for Protoss, which makes safe, economic openers difficult to pull off.Each race in SC2 has its own mechanical quirks quite separate from individual unit balance. Terrans have their addon swapping and mules, Zergs have larvae injects and creep, Protoss have warpgates and chrono. The most profound effect of the warpgate mechanic is not defensive in nature, but offensive. To find out why, we must examine the concept of the defenders advantage. A primer of defenders advantageWhen playing as a Terran or Zerg, you naturally have several advantages as a defender before you even build a unit. First, your ramp - the narrow choke allows your units to have a concave against a bunched up pack trying to push its way up the ramp. Second, your production - your rally distances are much, much shorter than if you were out in the middle of the map, so you can produce less units and still defend, because your second wave comes quickly. Also, both Terrans and Zergs have access to a defensive structure after building their first basic unit production structure. The spine crawler only requires a spawning pool, and the bunker only requires a barracks. These structures can be produced as a reaction to a scouted push in order to provide you with an additional advantage as a defender, which can help mitigating the loss of the ramp advantage when you expand. Defending against a pushConsider what happens when defending - assuming perfect balance, the only way to survive a push with an inferior army is to abuse your defenders advantages: your quick reinforcements, your ramp, and any defensive structures. This is why as a fast expanding Terran (no ramp advantage) you construct bunkers against a Protoss gateway timing. Same goes for spines as a Zerg. But what about Protoss? Leveling offense and defenseThe warp mechanic, by its very nature, crosses "short rally" off of the defender's advantage list for Protoss. An attacking Protoss army and a defending Protoss army will be reinforced just as quickly. And here comes problem number one: in a PvP, the defender has essentially NO advantage besides the ramp (and on Tal Darim Altar, there is no ramp!). The only way to survive a gateway push is to match your opponents unit count or abuse the crap out of your ramp (sentries, hooo). This is how the 4gate v 4gate metagame evolved, especially on TD Altar. Cannons represent an absurd deviation from normal tech in order to provide a defender advantage, since there is no defensive structure after gateway. Scouting a forge + 2 cannons (450 minerals) can be responded to with a free expansion (400 minerals), since the cannoning player theoretically cannot attack with more units than the expanding one. But PvP, as a mirror matchup, is inherently balanced no matter the design flaws, so I'll ignore it for now. Still, there are other implications of the Protoss equivalency of offense and defense. The three types of engagementsThere are three fundamental types of engagements in SC2. It's basically common sense, but it'll help to give them names. When you do a (1) timing push, you have usually sacrificed a small amount of economy for a stronger army at a specific time in the game. Therefore, when you push and engage, you have a stronger army then your opponent. This is the first type of engagement. If you are (2) defending a timing push, your goal is usually to use your smaller army together with a defenders advantage to defend and later capitalize on your stronger economy. This is the second type of engagement. Finally, in the lategame, midmap engagements are commonplace, where both players have relatively evenly matched armies. We'll call this an (3) even fight. As mentioned before, Protoss has a natural advantage in timing pushes because of the warp mechanic. I feel that if a Protoss is engaging in a timing push, game feels well balanced - extremely strong Protoss timing pushes can punish greedy Terran or Zerg play, and well executed defenses can hold in safe play. A pushing Protoss, with a stronger army and a short rally, is meant to have a fair shake at attacking a smaller, but defensive structure and rally fortified Terran or Zerg.As a defender, Protosses have cannons for defense, a rally advantage, and a ramp / choke advantage. Cannons, because of their sometimes inconvenient tech, are missing from a Protoss defense in a lot of earlygame scenarios (4gate, 2 or 3rax, roach+ling aggression on expo). This reduces Protoss defensive options to a ramp or choke advantage, and a rally advantage. Protosses can defend using the choke advantage very well, by using forcefields. However, on maps with open expansions, this becomes extremely difficult. This is why Protosses prefer maps with narrowly choked off naturals, like Shakuras, or Anitga. On open maps, the choke advantage disappears almost completely. So what about the rally advantage? Here's the problem. Because of the warp mechanic, Protoss is balanced as if they have the rally advantage for a timing push engagement. In a defensive sense, the warpin mechanic provides no additional benefit compared to an offensive one. As the Protoss is playing defensively, they have a smaller army compared to the pushing player. The choke advantage is missing at the natural on many maps. Cannons are absent because of tech inconvenience. All that's left is the rally - which is designed to be fair for a PUSHING Protoss! A defending Protoss, with a weaker army at home, has no significant defender's advantage over a timing push from the opponent, making the battle favor the pushing player.The differences in the races amounts to basic units and their defenders advantage. A Zealot, Stalker, Sentry army is equally good on offense and on defense. A Marine, Marauder force is good on offense, but BETTER on defense, because of bunkers and a shorter rally compared to their offense. Same goes for Zerg - a force at home is BETTER than an attacking force because of creep, spines, and relatively short rally. This lets you open economically and defend with a smaller, but advantaged army. A defending Protoss army has no advantage compared to an attacking one, no edge to capitalize on. So, if a Protoss early expands, their weaker army cannot make up for their lack of size with any external forces like a Terran or Zerg one can, and is vulnerable to timing pushes from the enemy. As a result of this, Protoss expansion builds, in order to be safe to strong early timing attacks, must have one of the following characteristics to provide the necessary missing defenders advantage: - An early forge (FFE v Z, delays tech because of forge tech being out of the way... imagine expanding as Terran by going ebay+turrets... tech and units for your own offense are going to be slow!)
- A map with a choke for sentries to use (Shak, Antiga, this is by far the best option)
- A lot of units (3gate exp, sacs econ compared to other races expo builds)
TL;DR:
- An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance.
- Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing, but there is potential to do damage against a greedy opponent).
- Because of these two points, a defensive Protoss with an small unit count and economic opener is weak because what is normally a defenders advantage is not a defenders advantage for them, it's a given in both offense and defense.
- The lack of a defensive structure after gateway adds to this problem.
- Therefore, the lack of a strong defenders advantage means Protoss has no safe, economic openers.
As an aside (not to be taken too seriously), To fix this: Add additional defensive building. A buffed shield battery could be awesome as a defensive tool if it were available after gateway. Not necessarily a clone of the BW one, maybe something more like a stationary medivac for shields only. ADDENDUM:+ Show Spoiler +Ok here, look at it this way - Expand vs Pressure builds.
A) Look at a Protoss timing push vs a Terran expand build. Protoss 3gate pressure (into expand), vs a Terran 1rax gasless expand into 3 rax.
Terran expands, scouts the 3gate pressure, and bunkers up. Would you say this is a fair fight? Protoss is probably going to get repelled, but theres a chance that they can break it if the Terran is sloppy. It can go both ways, theres tension in the matchup, and it feels balanced. If the attack fails, Protoss is behind, and Terran has defended well. If the attack does damage, the attack has succeeded, and the Terran is behind.
What's actually happening in this example is that the Terran is compensating for their smaller army (since they expanded first) by using a defenders advantage - the bunker with repair. The salient features are: Protoss has a larger army (expanded later, pumped units early) Protoss has a short rally (warpin) Terran has a small army (expanded first, units later) Terran has bunkers (defenders advantage) Terran has a short rally (home base)
And this SET of features creates a fair fight.
B) Now flip the roles. Terran's doing a 2rax pressure (12 + 16 rax, 1 tech 1 reactor, concussive researched) vs a Protoss 1gate expand into 4gates.
These are more or less equivalent builds to the previous example, except its 2rax+addons which is slightly cheaper than 3gates + cyber. Anyways, Protoss scouts the 2rax. The Protoss, on 1 base with a nexus building and 4gates on their way, cannot get cannons up in time. No defensive structure is available, and the natural is wide open. The Protoss expanded off 1 gate, so they have at most, 3 units when the push hits (Stalker Sentry x2 usually), with no repaired bunker to fall back on.
I think we're all familiar with this situation. MC lost in this exact situation to Polt. This fight is NOT fair, its almost a build order loss. You either sac your nexus and abuse your defenders advantage (ramp + sentry), or SEVERELY outmicro your opponent. (Or you could be on Shakuras and you can FF your natural. Which is why I stated in the OP that these maps are good)
Again, examining the salient features: Protoss has a smaller army (expanded first) Protoss has a short rally (home base) Protoss has no defensive structure after gate Terran has a larger army (units first) Terran has a LONG rally (attacking)
And this SET of conditions results in a Terran gaining an advantage the majority of the time.
My argument is that an economically focused, defending Protoss, when they engage, has essentially the same characteristics as a Protoss doing a timing attack with a small army... which is, of course, a terrible idea, and results in losses.
There's something you missed with your advantages to warp ins. POSITIONAL ADVANTAGE. When units pop out of a rally (Zerg and Terran), they are always on move command and sometimes pass through an enemy army. Even with high apm to get them all to attack move to the enemy army (or pull back in an ATTEMPT to regroup, which rarely works) isn't nearly as powerful as just plopping down a handful of units EXACTLY where you need them to reinforce. As Zerg or Terran, if they get to your production, units that come out of those production buildings are basically dead. As Protoss, you can easily warp them in somewhere safe and group up.
Also, you failed to mention that "even engagements" severely favor a Protoss player. NO OTHER RACE can DIRECTLY REINFORCE DURING A BATTLE. In a 200/200 battle, assuming both armies are equal and should completely destroy each other, with a single Pylon behind the army, as Protoss loses supply, they can immediately reinforce DIRECTLY TO THE BATTLE with a brand new army. As a result, the army gets significantly stronger and is essentially equal to an army much greater than 200/200 in size. And even battles become severely lopsided battles if you add even a handful of units to one side. As a result, you get much better army retention, get to your opponent's base, kill units as they rally move to their death, and reinforce directly to their base.
Also, you failed to mention (until next patch hopefully) that Warp ins also essentially negate the ramp advantage. When they can warp units right in your base, or above the ramp, the requirement to go through a choke in order to attack is completely removed.
And during a contain, you can warp units outside your base and around the contain using Pylons on the edge of your cliff.
Warp ins are far more powerful and flexible than you give them credit for. While you do have a point about Protoss expansion defenses being relatively weak, that's more so a result of Protoss units just being so damn expensive and taking so long to make during the early parts of the game.
Also, repairing a Bunker costs a lot of economy. You lose minerals per second and you lose a lot of mining time. So as a result, you're reduced to essentially a 1 base economy at best so your production is even instead of being ahead like it should be. Transfusing a Spine Crawler costs Larvae Injects unless you spend money on an extra Queen(s). And with Terran, a Bunker is useless unless you have units inside. For Protoss, it's the only static defense that attacks both air and ground. Bunkers attack air and ground only if filled with Marines or Ghosts. And Zerg has to make Spore Crawlers to attack air. Also, Spine Crawlers and Bunkers don't give any detection. So in actuality, the Photon Cannon is by far the best static defense. But sadly it requires power and can become unpowered. Everything has it's ups and downs. And with a 2 rax pressure, unless it's all in, it's relatively easy to defend as it's only 5 Marines and a Marauder. Chrono Boost properly and you should be more than safe (I can't say I know exactly what to Chrono Boost and when to Chrono Boost them).
On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something?
Queue may be easier to to, but it's also less efficient. People are more likely to have idle resources in excessively queued units than with Warp Gates or Larvae. You CAN'T have idle resources in your production with Zerg and Protoss. When you make a unit, you spend a Larvae or a cooldown and you can't overspend into production like you can with Terran (how many times have you seen low level Terrans queue up 5 Banshees, 5 Marauders, 5 or 8 Marines, and so on? How many times have you seen a Protoss somehow have an extra 500~ minerals invested in units that aren't being produced? How many times have you seen that for Zerg? Just because something is easier doesn't make it better at all.
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If we make Protoss in offense equal to Terran in defense, Protoss is underpowered in defense. Not balanced. (the logic of this thread)
If we make Protoss in defense equal to Terran in offense, Protoss is overpowered in offense. Not balanced.
So why are we assuming the the first situation is necessary? Instead if we put protoss strength in between these 2 situations, we have balance. Let's pick that one. The first one isn't necessary.
It's like saying a 500 damage colossus would be imbalanced. Yes, it would, but we can just put a normal damage colossus in the game instead, voila we have balance and we don't have to worry about 500 damage colossi.
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Has this thread addressed switching warp gate and gateway cooldown times yet?
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On September 11 2011 09:39 iblink wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway. man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late. The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue.
Banshees come out of the third tier of terran structures; they are tier 3. Cloak requires research. An observer comes out of the second tier of protoss structures; it is tier 2. There's no reason to argue semantics. If a terran is rushing for banshees, then he is spending a lot of gas on things that are not stim/siege mode/extra tanks/extra banshees, or he is delaying the 111 push. It would be pretty stupid if terran teched all the way to starport, used a tech lab, researched cloak, and produced the banshees themselves only for the protoss to be able to completely thwart them no matter what tech path he went down, which is what the poster I quoted was rather boldly suggesting. The only way to follow that poster's suggestion would be to give protoss mobile detection at tier 1, or add detection at the stargate. Either way would be stupid and basically eliminate the cloaked banshee and DT from play against protoss. If you're complaining about how difficult it is to scout terrans, than that isn't really material to the thread. Go complain in the "why 111 is imbalanced" thread. Trying to hold off 111 with gateway units only is pretty futile, anyway, and gateway units are what this thread is about.
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On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote: Oh there is so many things wrong with this post it actually hurts my brain.
Lets split this post up a bit:
On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote:Yeah so if terran wants to stop any early game aggression by Protoss they need 3 to 4 bunkers. After Warpgate is finished, because of the influx of units you will never seen a Protoss get attacked as Warpgate finishes (TvP anyways) Good, you found a point in the game where terran can't attack. This has nothing to do with the OP whatsoever.
On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote: The abbility to WARP IN to where you want to defend IS A DEFENDERS advantage. Instead of T and Z having to rally (which can lead to bad positioning ie. Forcefield or ramp chokes) you get them @ your natural... Not really. Because protoss units are so incredibly weak by themselves, warping in to "defend" anything is usually incredibly hard. The best you can do is warp in a bunch og zealots to buy a bit more time until your real army comes to the rescue. Again, you're missing the point completely here.
I explained this earlier, but lets do it again:
7 minutes in the game, terran attacks a Zerg. With a 1 minute walking distance, the zerg now has a 8 minute army to defend with. This is called "defenders advantage".
8 minutes in the game, protoss attacks the terran. The terran now has a 8 minute army to defend with. This seems incredibly strong! Protoss units thus are equally bad, to leave the terran a chance to fend for himself. Protoss 8 minute attack is nerfed to become a 7 minute attack. But heres the bad part about this:
7 minutes in the game, terran attacks the protoss. With 1 minute walking distance, the protoss now has a 8 minute army to defend himself with. But wait! the protoss army is weakened to become a 7 minute army, as to not become too strong offensively. This means protoss has no defenders advantage whatsoever. This is the essence of what the OP is on about. Now go back and read the OP again.
On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote: Saying the Marine Maraduer force is good because of Bunkers defensivly is like saying... Well Zerglings do better if there is a Spinecrawler, Zealots do better if there is a Cannon.
Can't believe this was not closed...
Zealots don't do better if there are canons vs terran. Thats largely the problem here. That, pluss the fact that spines and bunkers 1. comes from pool/barracks, while canon comes from forge, which is out of the way early on, and 2. Can't be moved or salvaged.
Thus canons, while helpful, doesn't provide the optimal way to defend yourself compared to spines and bunkers. Again, this was explained in the OP to the detail..
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On September 11 2011 09:39 iblink wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway. man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late. The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue.
Depending on how you look at the Terran tech tree, Banshees ARE Tier 3. Barracks being Tier 1, Factory being Tier 2, and Starport being Tier 3. However, Terran also has add ons. So does that add an extra .5? Would that make Banshees Tier 3.5? Then Battlecruisers with their additional requirement of a Fusion Core becomes Tier 4? The Terran tech tree is just odd to call what is what tier. But for Banshees, they are absolutely at least Tier 2.5. To say they are anything less is absolutely untrue (because they are fucking retarded units). A Thor though would be considered Tier 3, probably due to it following the same system Protoss has.
For the Protoss tech tree, Tier 3 is basically any unit that is built from a Tier 2 building but requires an additional building to unlock it (Fleet Beacon for Tier 3 Carriers and Robotics Support Bay for Tier 3 Colossi; although I suppose Dark Shrine and Templar Archives also count for Tier 3).
For Zerg, it's clear-cut. Hatchery tech is Tier 1. Lair tech is Tier 2. Hive tech is Tier 3.
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On September 11 2011 10:33 Gheed wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 09:39 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway. man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late. The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue. Banshees come out of the third tier of terran structures; they are tier 3. Cloak requires research. An observer comes out of the second tier of protoss structures; it is tier 2. There's no reason to argue semantics. If a terran is rushing for banshees, then he is spending a lot of gas on things that are not stim/siege mode/extra tanks/extra banshees, or he is delaying the 111 push. It would be pretty stupid if terran teched all the way to starport, used a tech lab, researched cloak, and produced the banshees themselves only for the protoss to be able to completely thwart them no matter what tech path he went down, which is what the poster I quoted was rather boldly suggesting. The only way to follow that poster's suggestion would be to give protoss mobile detection at tier 1, or add detection at the stargate. Either way would be stupid and basically eliminate the cloaked banshee and DT from play against protoss. If you're complaining about how difficult it is to scout terrans, than that isn't really material to the thread. Go complain in the "why 111 is imbalanced" thread. Trying to hold off 111 with gateway units only is pretty futile, anyway, and gateway units are what this thread is about.
On September 11 2011 10:35 RyLai wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 09:39 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway. man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late. The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue. Depending on how you look at the Terran tech tree, Banshees ARE Tier 3. Barracks being Tier 1, Factory being Tier 2, and Starport being Tier 3. However, Terran also has add ons. So does that add an extra .5? Would that make Banshees Tier 3.5? Then Battlecruisers with their additional requirement of a Fusion Core becomes Tier 4? The Terran tech tree is just odd to call what is what tier. But for Banshees, they are absolutely at least Tier 2.5. To say they are anything less is absolutely untrue (because they are fucking retarded units). A Thor though would be considered Tier 3, probably due to it following the same system Protoss has. For the Protoss tech tree, Tier 3 is basically any unit that is built from a Tier 2 building but requires an additional building to unlock it (Fleet Beacon for Tier 3 Carriers and Robotics Support Bay for Tier 3 Colossi; although I suppose Dark Shrine and Templar Archives also count for Tier 3). For Zerg, it's clear-cut. Hatchery tech is Tier 1. Lair tech is Tier 2. Hive tech is Tier 3.
Stop derailing the thread please. This is not a discussion about whetever you believe in tiers like its somekind of religion. The only thing thats true is that they can't be compared crossrace. Zerg has to upgrade their main building to reach each "tier", terran can change between these "tiers" as if changing socks, and protoss has to choose between one of 3 "tiers".
This is what makes this game unique after all.
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On September 11 2011 10:39 Excludos wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 10:33 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 09:39 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway. man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late. The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue. Banshees come out of the third tier of terran structures; they are tier 3. Cloak requires research. An observer comes out of the second tier of protoss structures; it is tier 2. There's no reason to argue semantics. If a terran is rushing for banshees, then he is spending a lot of gas on things that are not stim/siege mode/extra tanks/extra banshees, or he is delaying the 111 push. It would be pretty stupid if terran teched all the way to starport, used a tech lab, researched cloak, and produced the banshees themselves only for the protoss to be able to completely thwart them no matter what tech path he went down, which is what the poster I quoted was rather boldly suggesting. The only way to follow that poster's suggestion would be to give protoss mobile detection at tier 1, or add detection at the stargate. Either way would be stupid and basically eliminate the cloaked banshee and DT from play against protoss. If you're complaining about how difficult it is to scout terrans, than that isn't really material to the thread. Go complain in the "why 111 is imbalanced" thread. Trying to hold off 111 with gateway units only is pretty futile, anyway, and gateway units are what this thread is about. Stop derailing the thread please. This is not a discussion about whetever you believe in tiers like its somekind of religion. The only thing thats true is that they can't be compared crossrace. Zerg has to upgrade their main building to reach each "tier", terran can change between these "tiers" as if changing socks, and protoss has to choose between one of 3 "tiers". This is what makes this game unique after all.
... Did you even read my post?
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At this point I don't think even half of the posts on these last few pages are discussing anything related to what the OP was about.
Rampant debates over semantics of what is considered Tier 1/2/3 are completely irrelevant here.
Also if your POSTS are written CAREFULLY and CLEANLY there should be NO REASON to RANDOMLY capitalize WORDS in the MIDDLE of your SENTENCES so as to ARTIFICIALLY INTRODUCE EMPHASIS into your POINTS.
In any case I think Warpgates as a whole when they were first introduced were a bad idea for the exact reasons in the OP. It continues to be a problem when any balance discussion pops up since its inextricably tied in with everything now.
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On September 11 2011 10:41 Gheed wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 10:39 Excludos wrote:On September 11 2011 10:33 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 09:39 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway. man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late. The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue. Banshees come out of the third tier of terran structures; they are tier 3. Cloak requires research. An observer comes out of the second tier of protoss structures; it is tier 2. There's no reason to argue semantics. If a terran is rushing for banshees, then he is spending a lot of gas on things that are not stim/siege mode/extra tanks/extra banshees, or he is delaying the 111 push. It would be pretty stupid if terran teched all the way to starport, used a tech lab, researched cloak, and produced the banshees themselves only for the protoss to be able to completely thwart them no matter what tech path he went down, which is what the poster I quoted was rather boldly suggesting. The only way to follow that poster's suggestion would be to give protoss mobile detection at tier 1, or add detection at the stargate. Either way would be stupid and basically eliminate the cloaked banshee and DT from play against protoss. If you're complaining about how difficult it is to scout terrans, than that isn't really material to the thread. Go complain in the "why 111 is imbalanced" thread. Trying to hold off 111 with gateway units only is pretty futile, anyway, and gateway units are what this thread is about. Stop derailing the thread please. This is not a discussion about whetever you believe in tiers like its somekind of religion. The only thing thats true is that they can't be compared crossrace. Zerg has to upgrade their main building to reach each "tier", terran can change between these "tiers" as if changing socks, and protoss has to choose between one of 3 "tiers". This is what makes this game unique after all. ... Did you even read my post?
Yes, I was responding to the fact that this thread started derailing into whetever or not Starcraft 2 has "tiers". Part of this started with your: "Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit."
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On September 11 2011 10:48 Excludos wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 10:41 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 10:39 Excludos wrote:On September 11 2011 10:33 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 09:39 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway. man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late. The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue. Banshees come out of the third tier of terran structures; they are tier 3. Cloak requires research. An observer comes out of the second tier of protoss structures; it is tier 2. There's no reason to argue semantics. If a terran is rushing for banshees, then he is spending a lot of gas on things that are not stim/siege mode/extra tanks/extra banshees, or he is delaying the 111 push. It would be pretty stupid if terran teched all the way to starport, used a tech lab, researched cloak, and produced the banshees themselves only for the protoss to be able to completely thwart them no matter what tech path he went down, which is what the poster I quoted was rather boldly suggesting. The only way to follow that poster's suggestion would be to give protoss mobile detection at tier 1, or add detection at the stargate. Either way would be stupid and basically eliminate the cloaked banshee and DT from play against protoss. If you're complaining about how difficult it is to scout terrans, than that isn't really material to the thread. Go complain in the "why 111 is imbalanced" thread. Trying to hold off 111 with gateway units only is pretty futile, anyway, and gateway units are what this thread is about. Stop derailing the thread please. This is not a discussion about whetever you believe in tiers like its somekind of religion. The only thing thats true is that they can't be compared crossrace. Zerg has to upgrade their main building to reach each "tier", terran can change between these "tiers" as if changing socks, and protoss has to choose between one of 3 "tiers". This is what makes this game unique after all. ... Did you even read my post? Yes, I was responding to the fact that this thread started derailing into whetever or not Starcraft 2 has "tiers". Part of this started with your: "Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit."
So I'm the one derailing the thread because someone grossly misinterpreted the colloquial use of the word tier with regards to SC2 and then used his post to complain about 111, which only tangentially relates to what the OP is about? Yeah, I don't think so.
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I agree with the OP. I've been saying this for quite a while, and I think there is only one real solution if Blizzard is really keen on keeping their warp-gate mechanic. Give normal gateways a faster production time than warp-gates, and let people decide between offense and defense. If it takes 12 seconds from one natural to the other, then all you need to have is units to come out 4-8 seconds faster. You won't increase P's offensive power but significantly make them better at defending. Obviously these numbers should be changed according to testing and what not.
This adds a shit ton more depth to P strategy and adds another thing they (we) need to think about.
1) Pushes don't become any better as it is always faster to just warp in units with a proxy pylon (which will use the old warp-gate timings)
2) Defending timing pushes becomes much easier, allowing for more economic openings and more macro games.
3) Fixes PvP. Not "fix pvp like Blizz tried to do" but ACTUALLY fix PvP. You get the defender's advantage and reactionary 3/4 gates will be able to hold fast 4 gate.
4) Allows a dynamic for the players where they have to decide if they want to be agressive or defensive or maybe even both. How many gateways you want as warp-gate becomes a real decision throughout the game, and becomes more important as the game progresses.
5) P is the easiest race to macro in, and the chronoboost mechanic is much easier than larva inject or creep tumor because you can forget it and then catch up without problems. Even T has to think about if they want to save 50-100 energy for mules at a certain period of the game. This gives P another thing to do, switching between gateways and warpgates throughout the game to maximize production, according to your strategy.
I honestly don't see any negatives, but feel free to add/correct anything I might have said wrong.
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On September 11 2011 10:34 Excludos wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote: Oh there is so many things wrong with this post it actually hurts my brain. Lets split this post up a bit: Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote:An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Yeah so if terran wants to stop any early game aggression by Protoss they need 3 to 4 bunkers. After Warpgate is finished, because of the influx of units you will never seen a Protoss get attacked as Warpgate finishes (TvP anyways) Good, you found a point in the game where terran can't attack. This has nothing to do with the OP whatsoever. Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote: The abbility to WARP IN to where you want to defend IS A DEFENDERS advantage. Instead of T and Z having to rally (which can lead to bad positioning ie. Forcefield or ramp chokes) you get them @ your natural... Not really. Because protoss units are so incredibly weak by themselves, warping in to "defend" anything is usually incredibly hard. The best you can do is warp in a bunch og zealots to buy a bit more time until your real army comes to the rescue. Again, you're missing the point completely here. I explained this earlier, but lets do it again: 7 minutes in the game, terran attacks a Zerg. With a 1 minute walking distance, the zerg now has a 8 minute army to defend with. This is called "defenders advantage". 8 minutes in the game, protoss attacks the terran. The terran now has a 8 minute army to defend with. This seems incredibly strong! Protoss units thus are equally bad, to leave the terran a chance to fend for himself. Protoss 8 minute attack is nerfed to become a 7 minute attack. But heres the bad part about this: 7 minutes in the game, terran attacks the protoss. With 1 minute walking distance, the protoss now has a 8 minute army to defend himself with. But wait! the protoss army is weakened to become a 7 minute army, as to not become too strong offensively. This means protoss has no defenders advantage whatsoever. This is the essence of what the OP is on about. Now go back and read the OP again. Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote: Saying the Marine Maraduer force is good because of Bunkers defensivly is like saying... Well Zerglings do better if there is a Spinecrawler, Zealots do better if there is a Cannon.
Can't believe this was not closed... Zealots don't do better if there are canons vs terran. Thats largely the problem here. That, pluss the fact that spines and bunkers 1. comes from pool/barracks, while canon comes from forge, which is out of the way early on, and 2. Can't be moved or salvaged. Thus canons, while helpful, doesn't provide the optimal way to defend yourself compared to spines and bunkers. Again, this was explained in the OP to the detail..
Bolded Part = 100% completely wrong Sentry is all im going to say for that.
The positional advantage you get from Warpgate, which benefits protoss THE MOST (Positioning your Army). That is where you realize that the OP probably has no idea what he is talking about. The warp-in mechanic along with the Sentry FF and Zealot is very good and goes with the race perfectly. If you understand positioning, it is a great benifit, if you don't then... you post stuff like this. I've given my 2 cents, won't post in this thread again or bother to read a response to mine.
EDIT: @ OP If you include how your argument relates to the positional advantage you get from warp-in to your natural/main where ever you are defending then you might have a legit argument.
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Protoss is the worst race stop mentioning protoss even being good.............
User was warned for this post
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On September 11 2011 10:53 GMonster wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 10:34 Excludos wrote:On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote: Oh there is so many things wrong with this post it actually hurts my brain. Lets split this post up a bit: On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote:An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Yeah so if terran wants to stop any early game aggression by Protoss they need 3 to 4 bunkers. After Warpgate is finished, because of the influx of units you will never seen a Protoss get attacked as Warpgate finishes (TvP anyways) Good, you found a point in the game where terran can't attack. This has nothing to do with the OP whatsoever. On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote: The abbility to WARP IN to where you want to defend IS A DEFENDERS advantage. Instead of T and Z having to rally (which can lead to bad positioning ie. Forcefield or ramp chokes) you get them @ your natural... Not really. Because protoss units are so incredibly weak by themselves, warping in to "defend" anything is usually incredibly hard. The best you can do is warp in a bunch og zealots to buy a bit more time until your real army comes to the rescue. Again, you're missing the point completely here. I explained this earlier, but lets do it again: 7 minutes in the game, terran attacks a Zerg. With a 1 minute walking distance, the zerg now has a 8 minute army to defend with. This is called "defenders advantage". 8 minutes in the game, protoss attacks the terran. The terran now has a 8 minute army to defend with. This seems incredibly strong! Protoss units thus are equally bad, to leave the terran a chance to fend for himself. Protoss 8 minute attack is nerfed to become a 7 minute attack. But heres the bad part about this: 7 minutes in the game, terran attacks the protoss. With 1 minute walking distance, the protoss now has a 8 minute army to defend himself with. But wait! the protoss army is weakened to become a 7 minute army, as to not become too strong offensively. This means protoss has no defenders advantage whatsoever. This is the essence of what the OP is on about. Now go back and read the OP again. On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote: Saying the Marine Maraduer force is good because of Bunkers defensivly is like saying... Well Zerglings do better if there is a Spinecrawler, Zealots do better if there is a Cannon.
Can't believe this was not closed... Zealots don't do better if there are canons vs terran. Thats largely the problem here. That, pluss the fact that spines and bunkers 1. comes from pool/barracks, while canon comes from forge, which is out of the way early on, and 2. Can't be moved or salvaged. Thus canons, while helpful, doesn't provide the optimal way to defend yourself compared to spines and bunkers. Again, this was explained in the OP to the detail.. Bolded Part = 100% completely wrong Sentry is all im going to say for that. The positional advantage you get from Warpgate, which benefits protoss THE MOST (Positioning your Army). That is where you realize that the OP probably has no idea what he is talking about. The warp-in mechanic along with the Sentry FF and Zealot is very good and goes with the race perfectly. If you understand positioning, it is a great benifit, if you don't then... you post stuff like this. I've given my 2 cents, won't post in this thread again or bother to read a response to mine. EDIT: @ OP If you include how your argument relates to the positional advantage you get from warp-in to your natural/main where ever you are defending then you might have a legit argument.
Hi. New to TL, but cant help respond to this thread for a long time. I think this reply is right. Sentry is the Protoss' most important unit early game and compensates for all the Protoss "weakess" early. However, warpgate is the single most important mechanic in the entire Protoss gamestyle. Without it, or changing it drastically, P will be broken. It needs tweaking, but not as OP suggests.
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United States7483 Posts
Reliance on the sentry early game is a major disadvantage in the mid-game and end game for protoss, it turns into a ton of gas that delays tech in exchange for not dying immediately outright. The unit becomes worthless after the beginning of the game ends in most cases.
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Yeah, I said as much a couple of pages ago. IMO, the WG mechanic is fine as are Gateway units, for the most part. What is needed for Protoss is another unit as part of its Gateway army - one that counter-acts or is the equivalent of the Roach/Marauder, and some tweaking of the WG in terms of its timings vs Z and T racial mechanics such as Larva Inject and Reactors.
That said, the addition of a nexus tied Shield Battery would be nice.
I don't know, I see this argument a lot that WG mechanic meant significantly weaker Protoss units. I used to think so myself, but I'm not sure anymore. The Zealot remains a strong unit, its stats similar or close to the BW Zealot. The Stalker, which I dislike, is strong in the early game but does get progressively worse as the game goes on. It is effective, however, in the mid/late game in mass numbers and with Blink (which is a cool ability). The Sentry is a decent support unit which has two great abilities in FF and GS and does ok damage for what it is. Therefore, it may not be the Protoss gateway army or WG mechanic that may be the issue here.
I don't know, maybe the issue is that when Blizzard added the Roach and the Marauder to SC2 they did not add something similar to the Protoss so that the Protoss Gateway army remains un-upgraded from BW apart from the addition of the Sentry with its FF/GS as a support unit. I'm also no longer sure, like I used to think, that the Sentry FF was meant to compensate for the weakness of Gateway units as a result of the WG mechanic. Rather, that specific Sentry ability was more to counteract the ability of other races to have significantly numerically superior forces than Protoss very quickly (through such mechanisms as Reactors and Larva Inject). Protoss' WG mechanic is the Protoss version of these race abilities in SC2 but, IMO, seems weaker as its advantage in mobility (i.e. warp in within pylon range) has to be played off against the timing of these Z and T racial abilities (along with complicated factors such as stim; concussive; ling speed and so on). Whatever the strengths of the WG mechanic in neutralising distance, you are still limited to the number of gates you have.
Returning to my earlier point, I think the Immortal as it was originally conceived was meant to be the Protoss gateway equivalent of the Roach/Marauder (it certainly counters them very effectively) but is probably too powerful and tanky (especially with such gimmicks as hardened shield) to remain a Gateway unit. This leaves Protoss Tier 1 unable to handle these armies without significant assistance and, at least versus Terran, is made worse by the power of Marines when they reach a significant number (aided by the Reactor ability on Rax). Therefore, I am doubtful if the WG mechanic is the core of Protoss design flaws and issues with the race in general.
I'm sorry if I am being a little unclear, I think I usually make my points better. But I have been thinking about this a little and am coming around to the conclusion that pinpointing the WG mechanic (as I used to do) as the core flaw in Protoss design may be wrong. The WG mechanic, fundamentally, may be fine as are Protoss Gateway units (although I do think the Stalker needs a little work - at least 1/1 for upgrades, please). The issue, rather, may be in a missing gateway unit for Protoss in SC2 and racial Z and T racial mechanics which, while legitimate, have no direct Protoss counter. Nor should they, I think. The WG mechanic works fine as an indirect response to these abilities, what needs to be also tweaked are the timings of this ability (together with, perhaps, minor tweaks to Gateway units).
Edit/ That said, I think bringing back the shield battery would be a great idea. It would, however, have to be tied to the Nexus or base in some way, as the way shield regeneration works in SC2 means, I think, that there could be room for abuse if it could be generated at any pylon anywhere on the map.
TL; DR: The WG mechanic does not necessarily lead to weaker Gateway units. What is lacking is a Gateway equivalent to the Marauder and Roach. Sentry FF/GS are not a buffer to the weakness of Gateway units, rather they compensate for the racial mechanics of Reactors for Terran and Larva Inject for Zerg which gives their armies a numerical advantage which P cannot match without FF/GS. The WG mechanic is therefore fine and does not break Protoss. Rather, what is required is better tweaking of the timing of the WG mechanic and the addition of a new Gateway unit.
Edit/ How do I hide the quote?
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On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something?
Hahahahhahahaha. Sorry. Your cluelessness is just too good.
User was temp banned for this post.
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On September 11 2011 10:53 GMonster wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 10:34 Excludos wrote:On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote: Oh there is so many things wrong with this post it actually hurts my brain. Lets split this post up a bit: On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote:An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance. Yeah so if terran wants to stop any early game aggression by Protoss they need 3 to 4 bunkers. After Warpgate is finished, because of the influx of units you will never seen a Protoss get attacked as Warpgate finishes (TvP anyways) Good, you found a point in the game where terran can't attack. This has nothing to do with the OP whatsoever. On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote: The abbility to WARP IN to where you want to defend IS A DEFENDERS advantage. Instead of T and Z having to rally (which can lead to bad positioning ie. Forcefield or ramp chokes) you get them @ your natural... Not really. Because protoss units are so incredibly weak by themselves, warping in to "defend" anything is usually incredibly hard. The best you can do is warp in a bunch og zealots to buy a bit more time until your real army comes to the rescue. Again, you're missing the point completely here. I explained this earlier, but lets do it again: 7 minutes in the game, terran attacks a Zerg. With a 1 minute walking distance, the zerg now has a 8 minute army to defend with. This is called "defenders advantage". 8 minutes in the game, protoss attacks the terran. The terran now has a 8 minute army to defend with. This seems incredibly strong! Protoss units thus are equally bad, to leave the terran a chance to fend for himself. Protoss 8 minute attack is nerfed to become a 7 minute attack. But heres the bad part about this: 7 minutes in the game, terran attacks the protoss. With 1 minute walking distance, the protoss now has a 8 minute army to defend himself with. But wait! the protoss army is weakened to become a 7 minute army, as to not become too strong offensively. This means protoss has no defenders advantage whatsoever. This is the essence of what the OP is on about. Now go back and read the OP again. On September 11 2011 10:21 GMonster wrote: Saying the Marine Maraduer force is good because of Bunkers defensivly is like saying... Well Zerglings do better if there is a Spinecrawler, Zealots do better if there is a Cannon.
Can't believe this was not closed... Zealots don't do better if there are canons vs terran. Thats largely the problem here. That, pluss the fact that spines and bunkers 1. comes from pool/barracks, while canon comes from forge, which is out of the way early on, and 2. Can't be moved or salvaged. Thus canons, while helpful, doesn't provide the optimal way to defend yourself compared to spines and bunkers. Again, this was explained in the OP to the detail.. Bolded Part = 100% completely wrong Sentry is all im going to say for that. The positional advantage you get from Warpgate, which benefits protoss THE MOST (Positioning your Army). That is where you realize that the OP probably has no idea what he is talking about. The warp-in mechanic along with the Sentry FF and Zealot is very good and goes with the race perfectly. If you understand positioning, it is a great benifit, if you don't then... you post stuff like this. I've given my 2 cents, won't post in this thread again or bother to read a response to mine. EDIT: @ OP If you include how your argument relates to the positional advantage you get from warp-in to your natural/main where ever you are defending then you might have a legit argument.
lolololol
Have you ever seen Terrans drop on Protoss? Stim+Medivac = more than an equal number of units needed for Protoss.
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On September 11 2011 10:33 Gheed wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 09:39 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway. man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late. The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue. Banshees come out of the third tier of terran structures; they are tier 3. Cloak requires research. An observer comes out of the second tier of protoss structures; it is tier 2. There's no reason to argue semantics. If a terran is rushing for banshees, then he is spending a lot of gas on things that are not stim/siege mode/extra tanks/extra banshees, or he is delaying the 111 push. It would be pretty stupid if terran teched all the way to starport, used a tech lab, researched cloak, and produced the banshees themselves only for the protoss to be able to completely thwart them no matter what tech path he went down, which is what the poster I quoted was rather boldly suggesting. The only way to follow that poster's suggestion would be to give protoss mobile detection at tier 1, or add detection at the stargate. Either way would be stupid and basically eliminate the cloaked banshee and DT from play against protoss. If you're complaining about how difficult it is to scout terrans, than that isn't really material to the thread. Go complain in the "why 111 is imbalanced" thread. Trying to hold off 111 with gateway units only is pretty futile, anyway, and gateway units are what this thread is about.
did you misread my post or did you do it intentionally? i dont care about definition of tiers, my point is that banshees come really early in the game as part of a very popular and flexible terran all in. you re presenting this like 111 rarely uses cloaked banshees but thats not the case. you will see very frequently cloaked banshees in a 111 (sometimes harassing until terran masses enough units to push) and no, cloak doesnt severely delay stim/siege or anything else. when all your gas goes into 2 buildings you can research cloak too and maybe make one less banshee fe. either you have 3 or 4 banshees in your final push, it doesnt matter. still 3 (cloaked) banshees are a powerfull part of your army and can cause a lot of damage.
ofc i agree that protoss shouldnt have detection for free when terran spends money in order to get cloak tech, all im saying is that its difficult to hold early strong terran pushes with robo tech only and unfortunately you cant go for more than 1 tech route because you wont have enough units to defend. Im not complaining about 111 or anything really, im just discussing. gateway units and their strength, which is the topic of this thread, is a core part of what im saying.
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On September 08 2011 19:13 RodYan wrote: The solution is: -Make Gateways start with warpgate -Gateways now have a warp in radius for the early game. Pylons cannot be used to warp in at this point. -Proxy pylon warp-in is a mid or late game upgrade I can just imagine proxying two gateways next to a ramp and warping in over a wall.
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I was talking about this with a friend and wanted to know what the community made of this idea: -Buff Zealot and Stalker damage/armor/shields -Make Warpgate cost an additional amount of minerals and gas when warped in at a proxy pylon instead of produced from a gateway
This way, if a protoss wants to four gate, yeah they will not have the same walking distance, but they will have less units because it costs more, so going for a heavy warpgate attack will actually be all in, as teching will be extremely difficult with the excessively used gas. But if they produce an army from gateways, then attack, they have to move across the map, and then the opponent will have the defenders advantage as described. Maybe there could also be a twilight council upgrade which removes the cost. This wouldn't affect the late game as much, as the heavy aggression player would be behind on tech due to the excess gas use.
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On September 11 2011 10:52 mprs wrote: I agree with the OP. I've been saying this for quite a while, and I think there is only one real solution if Blizzard is really keen on keeping their warp-gate mechanic. Give normal gateways a faster production time than warp-gates, and let people decide between offense and defense. If it takes 12 seconds from one natural to the other, then all you need to have is units to come out 4-8 seconds faster. You won't increase P's offensive power but significantly make them better at defending. Obviously these numbers should be changed according to testing and what not.
This adds a shit ton more depth to P strategy and adds another thing they (we) need to think about.
1) Pushes don't become any better as it is always faster to just warp in units with a proxy pylon (which will use the old warp-gate timings)
2) Defending timing pushes becomes much easier, allowing for more economic openings and more macro games.
3) Fixes PvP. Not "fix pvp like Blizz tried to do" but ACTUALLY fix PvP. You get the defender's advantage and reactionary 3/4 gates will be able to hold fast 4 gate.
4) Allows a dynamic for the players where they have to decide if they want to be agressive or defensive or maybe even both. How many gateways you want as warp-gate becomes a real decision throughout the game, and becomes more important as the game progresses.
5) P is the easiest race to macro in, and the chronoboost mechanic is much easier than larva inject or creep tumor because you can forget it and then catch up without problems. Even T has to think about if they want to save 50-100 energy for mules at a certain period of the game. This gives P another thing to do, switching between gateways and warpgates throughout the game to maximize production, according to your strategy.
I honestly don't see any negatives, but feel free to add/correct anything I might have said wrong.
It's an interesting idea but it would still affect aggresive warpgate pushes. You'd build up a standing army with your gateways, then go do a regular push, and the normal defenders advantage is that the opponent has more rounds of units than you, however at this point your warpgate finishes, your morph gates and get that extra round. So protoss units will still end up having to be somewhat inefficient. You need some way of having a very long warpgate morphing time without giving protoss a vulnerable time window & keeping the research worth getting.
Also no mules arent easier than chrono
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the reason toss has small defender advantage is that Forge usually isnt part of the opening, unless you FE vs zergs. but FF is the best spell in early game and no other races have an early spell casters. imo, warp gate mechanics doesn't really have any downside. maybe you can't queue things up, but zerg need to injects too. plus,you can just build more gates if you really can't keep up and chrono boost the buildings.
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On September 11 2011 12:13 shammythefox wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 10:52 mprs wrote: I agree with the OP. I've been saying this for quite a while, and I think there is only one real solution if Blizzard is really keen on keeping their warp-gate mechanic. Give normal gateways a faster production time than warp-gates, and let people decide between offense and defense. If it takes 12 seconds from one natural to the other, then all you need to have is units to come out 4-8 seconds faster. You won't increase P's offensive power but significantly make them better at defending. Obviously these numbers should be changed according to testing and what not.
This adds a shit ton more depth to P strategy and adds another thing they (we) need to think about.
1) Pushes don't become any better as it is always faster to just warp in units with a proxy pylon (which will use the old warp-gate timings)
2) Defending timing pushes becomes much easier, allowing for more economic openings and more macro games.
3) Fixes PvP. Not "fix pvp like Blizz tried to do" but ACTUALLY fix PvP. You get the defender's advantage and reactionary 3/4 gates will be able to hold fast 4 gate.
4) Allows a dynamic for the players where they have to decide if they want to be agressive or defensive or maybe even both. How many gateways you want as warp-gate becomes a real decision throughout the game, and becomes more important as the game progresses.
5) P is the easiest race to macro in, and the chronoboost mechanic is much easier than larva inject or creep tumor because you can forget it and then catch up without problems. Even T has to think about if they want to save 50-100 energy for mules at a certain period of the game. This gives P another thing to do, switching between gateways and warpgates throughout the game to maximize production, according to your strategy.
I honestly don't see any negatives, but feel free to add/correct anything I might have said wrong. It's an interesting idea but it would still affect aggresive warpgate pushes. You'd build up a standing army with your gateways, then go do a regular push, and the normal defenders advantage is that the opponent has more rounds of units than you, however at this point your warpgate finishes, your morph gates and get that extra round. So protoss units will still end up having to be somewhat inefficient. You need some way of having a very long warpgate morphing time without giving protoss a vulnerable time window & keeping the research worth getting. Also no mules arent easier than chrono
I agree with you? Maybe I wasn't clear, but I meant to say that mules have a higher thought process to them than chronoboost.
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On September 11 2011 12:15 HellionDrop wrote: the reason toss has small defender advantage is that Forge usually isnt part of the opening, unless you FE vs zergs. but FF is the best spell in early game and no other races have an early spell casters. imo, warp gate mechanics doesn't really have any downside. maybe you can't queue things up, but zerg need to injects too. plus,you can just build more gates if you really can't keep up and chrono boost the buildings.
Relying on a 100 gas unit in multiple numbers is much, much worse than 100 minerals bunkers or spines. If you were trying to hold your natural expansion on Xel Naga Caverns, which would you prefer - 1 sentry, OR a bunker with 2 marines in it? 2 sentries and a stalker, OR 2 full bunkers? And that's with gas valued at 1.5:1 ... which is conservative to say the least. Sentry production cuts into other unit production, requires gas and tech, and just isn't that great cost wise compared to the other race's defensive options. **unless theres a narrow natural ramp, etc etc
Again, if you want to defend an open expansion, you MUST have a lot of sentries. They take a long time to build and require a lot of gas, so you naturally must expand much later than the other races. Early defensive options simply are not as cost efficient for Protoss.
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Units being warped in have less starting shields (50%) than units from a Gateway. :S
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On September 11 2011 13:07 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 12:15 HellionDrop wrote: the reason toss has small defender advantage is that Forge usually isnt part of the opening, unless you FE vs zergs. but FF is the best spell in early game and no other races have an early spell casters. imo, warp gate mechanics doesn't really have any downside. maybe you can't queue things up, but zerg need to injects too. plus,you can just build more gates if you really can't keep up and chrono boost the buildings. Relying on a 100 gas unit in multiple numbers is much, much worse than 100 minerals bunkers or spines. If you were trying to hold your natural expansion on Xel Naga Caverns, which would you prefer - 1 sentry, OR a bunker with 2 marines in it? 2 sentries and a stalker, OR 2 full bunkers? And that's with gas valued at 1.5:1 ... which is conservative to say the least. Sentry production cuts into other unit production, requires gas and tech, and just isn't that great cost wise compared to the other race's defensive options. **unless theres a narrow natural ramp, etc etc Again, if you want to defend an open expansion, you MUST have a lot of sentries. They take a long time to build and require a lot of gas, so you naturally must expand much later than the other races. Early defensive options simply are not as cost efficient for Protoss.
unless terran builds his CC on the low ground, usually your expansion shouldn't be much delayed. you don't need to tech too quickly if terran is also expanding.stim also takes more time to finish now, and gateway units do ok against marines/marauders until the medivac is out. Also, i think most of the time, toss would take gas earlier simply because toss needs more gas and can chorno boost probes, whereas terran relies more heavily on mineral. i don't think its right to value the resources usage like that because of how the races are structured.
i think toss is doing bad because either players don't harass well enough or it needs a cheaper way to harass.
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On September 11 2011 13:14 Xpace wrote: Units being warped in have less starting shields (50%) than units from a Gateway. :S
You're missing the point of the thread. The point being made is that gateway units are balanced as offensive warp-ins. This means that in any context that is not an offensive warp-in, they underperform.
Nerfing offensive warpgates will nerf the only context where gateway units are balanced, making them ineffective in all situations.
It looks like some oblivious people think this is a "choose your flavor of Protoss nerf" thread, even though the race is doing badly by all accounts...
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your OP made a lot of fair and viable points and was interesting to read. i have no comment on any possible balance changes to the game myself, but all i will say is that if a shield battery was introduced to protoss in some way in HotS, i would not mind at all
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I just had an idea.
Ok, so gateways start as warpgates on cool down, and you warp units in. The difference is that you can only warp in on the powerfield that is powering the gateway. You can extend the powerfield by connecting it with other pylons, allowing you to warp in further away.
The cyber core researches "extended warp gate tech" or something like that for a high price. This would allow you to warp in on powerfields that aren't connected to the gateway. This tech should cost like 150/150 or 200/200 to help fix PvP allowing the defending protoss a 300/400 resource advantage. It would also keep Protoss warp in harass and warp prism use viable.
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making protoss weaker? good suggestion.. watching any games with protoss lately has already become boring with a high likelyhood of their opponent winning.
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What makes protoss weak isn't how they spawn gateway units, but rather how weak gateway units are, how much Protoss depend on colossus, the inability to harass or punish effectively, and the cost inefficiency off every protoss unit, etc.
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On September 11 2011 10:33 Gheed wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 09:39 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway. man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late. The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue. Banshees come out of the third tier of terran structures; they are tier 3. Cloak requires research. An observer comes out of the second tier of protoss structures; it is tier 2. Banshee requires Rax, Factory and Starport (techlab can be built at the same time as any previous building).
Observer requires Pylon, Gateway, Cyber Core, Robotics.
I am not sure how you count your "tiers" (there is no official definition) but obviously Banshee requires 3 builds in order yet Observer requires 4. The total build time to get to Starport is 170 seconds yet 205 seconds for robotics.
As for some AoE shield generator, it would be good addition to fix a bunch of stuff, especially in PvP which I think has the biggest balance problems. Terran and Zerg already has two defensive buildings.
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On September 11 2011 16:33 Sweeper8 wrote: What makes protoss weak isn't how they spawn gateway units, but rather how weak gateway units are, how much Protoss depend on colossus, the inability to harass or punish effectively, and the cost inefficiency off every protoss unit, etc.
I can't believe nobody is reading the OP. The reason the gateway units are weak is because warping in strong units would be OP offensively. That's the premise of the OP.
It's obviously not "how they spawn units" which is the weakness, but the consequence of balancing that for offense involves neutering gate units, to prevent offensive warp-ins from being OP.
So, outside of offense situations, gateway units don't really hold up because they are inherently weak (in terms of unit stats) but can spawn right at the enemy's doorstep. But when they're not spawning at the enemy's doorstep (e.g. defensive situation) then they don't really cut it anymore.
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You are wrong about the defendor advantage in my opinion, protoss with easy wall in, photon canon and force field has a better defense than zerg. The problem with warp gate lies in the strenght of it : since you can warp in a round of unit in a limited time anywhere on the map, protoss' timing attacks are godly. To balance that, protoss gateway army has been nerfed down (zealot with less shield, stalker low dmg, sentry nerfed back in the beta). So, in the end, protoss army is situationnal : at some point you have an advantage if you go for a timing attack (4 gate, 6 gate a really strong... but timing based of course) but overall if the zerg or the terran opponent build an army in time and don't play too greedy maccro wise, know the timing, then they can defend. But in big army vs big army, the gateway army act like a big wall of unit, with no dps : only templar, archon (well... a bit) comes from the gateways and deal some dmg. Mass stalker is also a good end game combination since it can almost deal with everything, is easy to replenish, with good HP and really nice mobility.
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On September 11 2011 19:05 Paladia wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 10:33 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 09:39 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway. man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late. The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue. Banshees come out of the third tier of terran structures; they are tier 3. Cloak requires research. An observer comes out of the second tier of protoss structures; it is tier 2. Banshee requires Rax, Factory and Starport (techlab can be built at the same time as any previous building). Observer requires Pylon, Gateway, Cyber Core, Robotics. I am not sure how you count your "tiers" (there is no official definition) but obviously Banshee requires 3 builds in order yet Observer requires 4. The total build time to get to Starport is 170 seconds yet 205 seconds for robotics. As for some AoE shield generator, it would be good addition to fix a bunch of stuff, especially in PvP which I think has the biggest balance problems. Terran and Zerg already has two defensive buildings.
You forgot the depo. Don't add in the pylon then leave out the depo just to make your point.
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So many people are just too dumb to understand the point the OP made. Many posts make me believe they haven't read the thread at all.
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I've been saying this for ages since before retail at least. A shield battery type ability was infact available pre-beta, on the dark pylon thing i believe. They didn't think about warp gate implementation at all apparently, the fact it breaks defenders advantage and removes rush distances. It's absurd.
You can't give an ability like teleport, chuck it right in at tier 1 and then balance the game around it. It's madness... BW maps were carefully made to be some exact number of seconds rush distance to ensure the best balance, it should be just as important now.
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I havn't read the whole thread but besides the differences of cooldown, the cost of a unit is another important factor of producing. Maybe its not the cooldown or producing time, that needs a bit of tweaking.
Just a sample: warpgate unit cost remains the same - gateway unit cost is slightly reduced. Zealot: 80/0 instead of 100/0 Stalker: 100/50 instead of 125/50 Sentry: 50/80 instead of 50/100 HT: 50/125 instead of 50/150 DT: 110/110 instead of 125/125
I don't know, if this would be too much or wouldn't affect the producing in any way. But no one mentioned it before.
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It's an interesting read but I don't think much will change this far into the game.
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I had honestly almost forgotten about the shield battery, but now that I think of it, I would love to see it return in SC2. I think it would work just fine, and serve the same role as it did in BW: I.E. an emergency defense, and nothing else... which is exactly what protoss would need to hold off all-ins better. Would really like to see it out on PTR to see what would happen.
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On September 11 2011 21:46 Numy wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 19:05 Paladia wrote:On September 11 2011 10:33 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 09:39 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway. man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late. The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue. Banshees come out of the third tier of terran structures; they are tier 3. Cloak requires research. An observer comes out of the second tier of protoss structures; it is tier 2. Banshee requires Rax, Factory and Starport (techlab can be built at the same time as any previous building). Observer requires Pylon, Gateway, Cyber Core, Robotics. I am not sure how you count your "tiers" (there is no official definition) but obviously Banshee requires 3 builds in order yet Observer requires 4. The total build time to get to Starport is 170 seconds yet 205 seconds for robotics. As for some AoE shield generator, it would be good addition to fix a bunch of stuff, especially in PvP which I think has the biggest balance problems. Terran and Zerg already has two defensive buildings. You forgot the depo. Don't add in the pylon then leave out the depo just to make your point. Doesn't matter. The point was that Banshee isn't tier 3 while observer is tier 2. If anything, they are the same tier.
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There could be many solutions that would help with differentiating offensive and defensive Protoss, and these are just a couple that came to mind that could be viable in my eyes:
1. adding a shield battery or equivalent structure - PvP or rather PvX defender advantage for that matter - would be funky if used offensively early game
2. changing the gateways/warp gates cooldowns - make warp gates cooldown 1/3 or 1/4 longer than gateway - requires 1/3 or 1/4 more production buildings respectively to keep production at the same level when warping in @ proxy, so it would give the defender that much defender advantage - not sure it would be a good idea to make the cooldowns lower than they already are
3. make warpgate upgrade at cycore warp in only next to gates - add proxy pylon upgrade at cycore that requires citadel/stargate/robo bay/buildingX to unlock - make maybe enable warp prism to warp in without proxy warp in upgrade
4. adding a "tax" for warping in at proxy instead @ gateways - hard to say how much, 10-15%(?) - tooltips could get confusing - maybe have proxy warp in upgrade from point 3. to remove the tax later in game - or making the tax inverse, making the units cheaper when producing out of gateways
5. any combination of above
I realize most of these affect PvP the most, but that is the goal, since other matchups don't have that many troubles of getting past early game. We still don't know how 1.4 will affect Protoss holding off the 3-1-1 all-in so I would be hesitant suggesting bigger changes that would turn pretty much every matchup at every stage of the game upside down.
Most of the solutions would make switching from gateways > warp gates and vice versa a decision, unlike the gimmick that it is at the moment, set and forget.
So here's to hoping that they will make some adjustments along those lines in HOTS or WitHitV (What in the Hell in the Void), I think it should make the Protoss race that more diverse and fun to play
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On September 11 2011 23:35. Jaiden Wrote: I havn't read the whole thread but besides the differences of cooldown, the cost of a unit is another important factor of producing. Maybe its not the cooldown or producing time, that needs a bit of tweaking.
Just a sample: warpgate unit cost remains the same - gateway unit cost is slightly reduced. Zealot: 80/0 instead of 100/0 Stalker: 100/50 instead of 125/50 Sentry: 50/80 instead of 50/100 HT: 50/125 instead of 50/150 DT: 110/110 instead of 125/125
I don't know, if this would be too much or wouldn't affect the producing in any way. But no one mentioned it before. I mentioned this on page 29, but i had them buff the units, then increase the cost of warping in.
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On September 11 2011 23:51 Paladia wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 21:46 Numy wrote:On September 11 2011 19:05 Paladia wrote:On September 11 2011 10:33 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 09:39 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway. man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late. The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue. Banshees come out of the third tier of terran structures; they are tier 3. Cloak requires research. An observer comes out of the second tier of protoss structures; it is tier 2. Banshee requires Rax, Factory and Starport (techlab can be built at the same time as any previous building). Observer requires Pylon, Gateway, Cyber Core, Robotics. I am not sure how you count your "tiers" (there is no official definition) but obviously Banshee requires 3 builds in order yet Observer requires 4. The total build time to get to Starport is 170 seconds yet 205 seconds for robotics. As for some AoE shield generator, it would be good addition to fix a bunch of stuff, especially in PvP which I think has the biggest balance problems. Terran and Zerg already has two defensive buildings. You forgot the depo. Don't add in the pylon then leave out the depo just to make your point. Doesn't matter. The point was that Banshee isn't tier 3 while observer is tier 2. If anything, they are the same tier.
There are no tiers. It's a pointless concept. So the point was your times were wrong.
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On September 12 2011 00:23 Numy wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 23:51 Paladia wrote:On September 11 2011 21:46 Numy wrote:On September 11 2011 19:05 Paladia wrote:On September 11 2011 10:33 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 09:39 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 06:02 Gheed wrote:On September 11 2011 05:48 iblink wrote:On September 11 2011 01:16 HolyHenk wrote: Warp gate is the big problem of protoss and it is probably extremely hard to balance for blizzard. The problem is that warp gates give a huge offensive advantage. Imagine terran or zerg having warp gates and instantly teleporting units to your base. This would be completely insane and thats why protoss units are made weaker. This way protoss might still have a small offensive advantage but the weaker units give a defensive disadvantage. Combine this with weak static defences and a lack of detection and you can see why protoss early game is so vulnerable. Protoss does have sentries to defend but the other races are figuring out ways to nullify them and they aren't that effecient on every map. The reason that the 1 - 1 -1 build is so strong is because it exploits the weaknesses of protoss. Forcefields are quite useless, you need observers and you need the power to defeat the opponents army. Give this man a medal. But seriously the problem when playing against 1-1-1 and the problem with protoss early game in general is exactly that: PROTOSS NEEDS DETECTION WITHOUT NECESSARILY GOING ROBO. Protoss needs more options for detection. Making your point bold and underlined doesn't make it correct. Cloaked banshees are tier 3 + upgrade, and not every 111 all-in uses them. It's perfectly reasonable to expect a player to have to build a tier 2 unit to detect a tier 3 cloaked unit. What would be the point of cloaked units if the effect of their cloaking was so easy nullified? That's not what the thread is about, anyway. man.. seriously what are you talking about? first of all what does tier 3+ mean? do you know at which time in the game you have cloaked banshees? that's right, very early. the same thing with colossus, it is considered to be 'tier 3' but it comes really early if you rush for it. the only true tier 3 units i can think about off the top of my head are ultralisk and broodlord - these two do come REALLY late. The most important thing you forget though is that protoss doesn't know if terran goes cloak or not on his banshees. that's why he has to get robo and detection even though terran maybe won't eventually go for cloak. and protoss just cannot afford to go robo AND have enough (weak) gateway units to deal with powerful unit compositions like marine tank banshee. it seems to me like you forget how flexible the terran race is with their swapping add-ons and stuff. if you don't play protoss, please do not post nonsense. no offence whatsoever but calling banshees tier 3 is just wrong and untrue. Banshees come out of the third tier of terran structures; they are tier 3. Cloak requires research. An observer comes out of the second tier of protoss structures; it is tier 2. Banshee requires Rax, Factory and Starport (techlab can be built at the same time as any previous building). Observer requires Pylon, Gateway, Cyber Core, Robotics. I am not sure how you count your "tiers" (there is no official definition) but obviously Banshee requires 3 builds in order yet Observer requires 4. The total build time to get to Starport is 170 seconds yet 205 seconds for robotics. As for some AoE shield generator, it would be good addition to fix a bunch of stuff, especially in PvP which I think has the biggest balance problems. Terran and Zerg already has two defensive buildings. You forgot the depo. Don't add in the pylon then leave out the depo just to make your point. Doesn't matter. The point was that Banshee isn't tier 3 while observer is tier 2. If anything, they are the same tier. There are no tiers. It's a pointless concept. So the point was your times were wrong.
The Cyber core is essentially the Tech Lab, or the Orbital command. If you insist on having a "tier" conversation, which is silly anyway, then you should leave the Core out.
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It messes up the basic fact of defenders advantage that most RTS thrive on to have longer more stable games
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On September 10 2011 17:57 susySquark wrote:Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 16:32 CaptTerrible wrote:On September 10 2011 15:58 MShaw006 wrote: The OP seems to imply that warp-ins make Protoss' defender's advantage weaker. Not true. The choice of where to warp-in can only help Protoss; it can't hurt it. Protoss always has the close rally perk in PvT and PvZ, because it has the close rally perk everywhere, whether attacking or defending. PvP is balanced by definition (both sides have the perk).
It seems to me that the best way to solve Protoss' lack of early defensive structure is to make the Photon Cannon weaker at the outset and include a midgame upgrade for it, bringing it to its current strength. Not only would this solve the problem of needing an early forge to expand, it would reduce the effectiveness of the ever-annoying cannon rush. Finally if we're talking about balance then it is hard for me to say if Protoss need help defending or should even have help opening up extremely economy oriented. I personally feel like you guys can keep up fairly well in terms of economy with chronoboost and sentries, and your two base timings are just so darn good that I would feel uneasy if Protoss had access to higher economy all ins with well fortified bases. If anything the changes that would be made would have to be very carefully thought out, it seems like it would be too easy to make something overpowered. First off, cannons are right where they belong, just like turrets and spores. Toss just has no bunker/spine equivalent, tech wise. Sentries fill this role of early defense... But by making sentries to defend, you have less attacking units, so the number of gateways you have to produce before expanding with a good defense is more than the other races. And its not like sentries are free! 50/100 is EXPENSIVE. Extra sentries means more gas, which means less minerals. More sentries means more gateways for other units, which means less minerals. Which all adds up to a later expansion. Also, Protoss has the slowest econ growth of the 3 races. Some chrono must be devoted to early units and warp gate for any defense to be viable at all, and MULEs and inject are much more efficient at growing an economy. Show nested quote +On September 10 2011 17:50 Truedot wrote: you're right, the race is inefficient. It needs to be streamlined so that you pay as little as possible for as much tech as possible. I mean, its not like there was ever the need for forge in brood war for the cannons. Its not like forge is needed for the upgrades for timing pushes which incidentally opens up cannons. And you've just gone into sarcasm mode. Great, how does anyone discuss anything at all anymore
Warp Mechanic does not make the defenders advantage weaker. THe defenders advantage is mosly comprised of travel time, vision, defensive structors, and concave. Tosses units are not weaker especially with sentries able to enhance all the defender advantages.
About the above post, u make an analogy where sentries are like a spine or a bunker, then whine about how u cant be offensive if you make sentries. Also last time i checked sentries could move and can block ramps of ur opponent.
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On September 11 2011 19:56 Brotocol wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2011 16:33 Sweeper8 wrote: What makes protoss weak isn't how they spawn gateway units, but rather how weak gateway units are, how much Protoss depend on colossus, the inability to harass or punish effectively, and the cost inefficiency off every protoss unit, etc. I can't believe nobody is reading the OP. The reason the gateway units are weak is because warping in strong units would be OP offensively. That's the premise of the OP. It's obviously not "how they spawn units" which is the weakness, but the consequence of balancing that for offense involves neutering gate units, to prevent offensive warp-ins from being OP. So, outside of offense situations, gateway units don't really hold up because they are inherently weak (in terms of unit stats) but can spawn right at the enemy's doorstep. But when they're not spawning at the enemy's doorstep (e.g. defensive situation) then they don't really cut it anymore.
How are Gateway units weak? Weak in what sense and with respect to what? People keep saying so that it seems to be becoming received wisdom, but I am not sure if this correct. If they are not weak, then the whole premise is wrong as is the focus on WG mechanic.
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On September 12 2011 10:40 aZealot wrote:
How are Gateway units weak? Weak in what sense and with respect to what? People keep saying so that it seems to be becoming received wisdom, but I am not sure if this correct. If they are not weak, then the whole premise is wrong as is the focus on WG mechanic.
How are gateway units not weak?
Of hatch tech, rax units, and gateway units gateway units lose every time.
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With the reduced vision when walking up ramps protoss should at least gain a little bit of a better defenders advantage.
I also cant really see an inherent disadvantage here. If anything its the fault of protoss getting either too greedy or too comfortable.
The op mentions zerg having the upper hand when defending by placing a spine crawler at their natural.. Well.. then what keeps the attacker from simply walking past that?
Protoss may have the biggest defenders advantage of all races: The ability to completely wall off with buildings and STILL being able to warp in units outside of their base to flank / counterattack.
I also dont think you can write cannons off simply because they require an "absurd deviation from normal tech" The only protoss builds that dont get a forge are the ones that rely on some form of all in timing push.. and those dont need any defense anyway.
Also trying to illustrate the defense of the xel naga natural and then giving the protoss 1 sentry just because it may cost the same as 1 bunker with 2 marines is not really the best example. How about 2 zealots? Or 1 stalker 1 zealot? (costs a bit more but still "achievable") But doesnt sound so impossible now against light pressure right?
Perhaps the point i am trying to make would be better explained by not calling it "defenders advantage" but rather "attackers disadvantage"
If i as a Terran or Zerg try to attack a Protoss, my reinforcements have to walk across the whole map. That takes a lot of time (varies obiously..). That means with or without warpgates, every other race is limited when it comes to maintaining constant pressure without overextending.
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On September 12 2011 14:56 Sweeper8 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 12 2011 10:40 aZealot wrote:
How are Gateway units weak? Weak in what sense and with respect to what? People keep saying so that it seems to be becoming received wisdom, but I am not sure if this correct. If they are not weak, then the whole premise is wrong as is the focus on WG mechanic.
How are gateway units not weak? Of hatch tech, rax units, and gateway units gateway units lose every time.
It was a serious question, not a rhetorical one. Basic Protoss Gateway units stacked up next to basic Terran Barracks and Zerg Hatch units are collectively stronger. If they do lose, and overall they do seem to do so, it's not because of their supposed weakness but because, I think, of the numerical strength of Terran units (through such mechanisms as Reactors) and Zerg units (through Larva Inject). These, especially with Terran, are then complicated by a range of other abilities like Stim and Concussive shell with which Blizzard has littered the game (meaning X beats Y but Y+Z beats X and then X needs W to beat Y+Z and so on) . But, at the basic level, Gateway units are not weak with respect to Barracks units and Hatch units.
If this is the case, the WG mechanism is the only thing keeping Protoss in the game; and such abilities as the Sentry FF/GS do not compensate for the weakness of Gateway units (an idea which does not make sense if you really think about it; why not just make Gateway units stronger and let them stand alone then without the Sentry?), but rather for the numerical superiority of Terran/Zerg in those early game engagements. FF allows for the splitting of armies, especially on ramps, and GS allows for minimisation of DPS thus allowing Protoss Gateway units to cut down the numbers of opposing units to a manageable size. Gateway units can't be buffed too much, because WG or not, if they were strong enough to match Zerg and Terran early game armies without relying on the Sentry they would be horrendously OP in the mid to late game.
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I've been saying it to myself since sc2 came out and now it seems there is some (debatable) concrete evidence to support my thoery of old...
Shield Battery, where art thou?
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What I don't understand is why warpgate is so cheap. If it were more expensive, gateway units wouldn't have to be nerfed so hard because shelling money into the upgrade would make any army post-warpgate that much smaller. It just seems ridiculous that such a powerful ability is given a 50/50 price tag and then everything is balanced around that.
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Warp is the most fun mechanic taking the boring drugery that was BW protoss mechanics and making it exciting.
Mechanically Protoss is easier than terran. Or at least thats how it feels to me.
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On September 12 2011 14:56 Sweeper8 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 12 2011 10:40 aZealot wrote:
How are Gateway units weak? Weak in what sense and with respect to what? People keep saying so that it seems to be becoming received wisdom, but I am not sure if this correct. If they are not weak, then the whole premise is wrong as is the focus on WG mechanic.
How are gateway units not weak? Of hatch tech, rax units, and gateway units gateway units lose every time.
200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of hatch tech units. 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded
200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of rax units (marine/marauder/reaper available. stim/shields/conc upgraded). 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded (roach burrow not allowed)
if anything, gateway units are STRONGER pound for pound than other races tier1 units. this is a signature strength of the protoss race. protoss has stronger units in a 200food battle
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Gateway units are not weak. Guys, they're fine in non-defensive engagements. Theres just no context in which a smaller force can kill a larger one other than chokes, and even then that requires a critical mass of sentries.
Put it this way, if you wanted to defend a natural on XNCaverns, which would you rather have off of tier 1? 2 fullish bunkers (6-7 marines), which can be repaired, and salvaged later 4 spines 2 sentries 1 stalker 1 zealot
costs about equal. On maps with a ramp, sentries are pretty good. Otherwise, 2 aint gonna do crap for you. Its obvious that the other races can defend early expos better. Is this balanced? Maybe. But it should be looked at.
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How about 2 cannons and 2 zealots?
Or switch from xel naga to the shakuras natural.
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On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something?
I'd have to disagree on the macroing part to be honest, keeping up with rallies to not loose units and constantly que like 10+ units is alot harder than holding either Z, S, E, D or T and spamming your mouse for 1 second. Not to mention how much more convinient it is during big engagements as protoss to keep up with your macro, assuming you have decent enough pylons spread out.
I can see how it might be easier for someone who is used to constantly queing units, having played other RTS games before, but it's not by any means an easier mechanic.
I play protoss aswell, and i would agree with most of that, apart from the macro comment, it's just ridiculous.
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On September 14 2011 14:52 roymarthyup wrote:Show nested quote +On September 12 2011 14:56 Sweeper8 wrote:On September 12 2011 10:40 aZealot wrote:
How are Gateway units weak? Weak in what sense and with respect to what? People keep saying so that it seems to be becoming received wisdom, but I am not sure if this correct. If they are not weak, then the whole premise is wrong as is the focus on WG mechanic.
How are gateway units not weak? Of hatch tech, rax units, and gateway units gateway units lose every time. 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of hatch tech units. 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of rax units (marine/marauder/reaper available. stim/shields/conc upgraded). 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded (roach burrow not allowed) if anything, gateway units are STRONGER pound for pound than other races tier1 units. this is a signature strength of the protoss race. protoss has stronger units in a 200food battle
50 zeals+50 stalkers will be raped hard by 100 marine+50 marauders. Test it if you don't believe. You may even do it without studder step micro. If you wanna add sentries, then you should consider couple of ghosts or medivacs, since we're talking about casters.
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"But what about Protoss? "
Force field Cannon Guardian Shield Hallucinated units
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On September 14 2011 18:44 bokeevboke wrote:Show nested quote +On September 14 2011 14:52 roymarthyup wrote:On September 12 2011 14:56 Sweeper8 wrote:On September 12 2011 10:40 aZealot wrote:
How are Gateway units weak? Weak in what sense and with respect to what? People keep saying so that it seems to be becoming received wisdom, but I am not sure if this correct. If they are not weak, then the whole premise is wrong as is the focus on WG mechanic.
How are gateway units not weak? Of hatch tech, rax units, and gateway units gateway units lose every time. 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of hatch tech units. 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of rax units (marine/marauder/reaper available. stim/shields/conc upgraded). 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded (roach burrow not allowed) if anything, gateway units are STRONGER pound for pound than other races tier1 units. this is a signature strength of the protoss race. protoss has stronger units in a 200food battle 50 zeals+50 stalkers will be raped hard by 100 marine+50 marauders. Test it if you don't believe. You may even do it without studder step micro. If you wanna add sentries, then you should consider couple of ghosts or medivacs, since we're talking about casters. Emm no, he is talking about basic units. Protoss has sentries as well when he builds the cybercore, you cannot just take those away. And they will allow protoss gateway units to rape any combination of basic barracks units (marine, marauder, reaper).
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make gateway build times quicker with warp ins slower....that way we get interesting mechanics
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I don't think that the warpgate tech broke toss...but more the combination of warpgate tech and tier 1,5 forcefields. Without sentries, toss in its current state would get roflstomped hard in the early game both vs zerg and vs terran. Not only the easy reinforcements, but furthermore the forcefields that allow for a much greater cost-efficiency are the reason why zealots/stalkers are pretty crappy units.
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On September 14 2011 18:59 -Archangel- wrote:Show nested quote +On September 14 2011 18:44 bokeevboke wrote:On September 14 2011 14:52 roymarthyup wrote:On September 12 2011 14:56 Sweeper8 wrote:On September 12 2011 10:40 aZealot wrote:
How are Gateway units weak? Weak in what sense and with respect to what? People keep saying so that it seems to be becoming received wisdom, but I am not sure if this correct. If they are not weak, then the whole premise is wrong as is the focus on WG mechanic.
How are gateway units not weak? Of hatch tech, rax units, and gateway units gateway units lose every time. 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of hatch tech units. 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of rax units (marine/marauder/reaper available. stim/shields/conc upgraded). 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded (roach burrow not allowed) if anything, gateway units are STRONGER pound for pound than other races tier1 units. this is a signature strength of the protoss race. protoss has stronger units in a 200food battle 50 zeals+50 stalkers will be raped hard by 100 marine+50 marauders. Test it if you don't believe. You may even do it without studder step micro. If you wanna add sentries, then you should consider couple of ghosts or medivacs, since we're talking about casters. Emm no, he is talking about basic units. Protoss has sentries as well when he builds the cybercore, you cannot just take those away. And they will allow protoss gateway units to rape any combination of basic barracks units (marine, marauder, reaper).
How about you actually test that. The 100 Marines alone will roll the 50/50 Zealot Stalkers or w.e Zealot/Sentry/Stalker combination
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On September 14 2011 18:59 -Archangel- wrote:Show nested quote +On September 14 2011 18:44 bokeevboke wrote:On September 14 2011 14:52 roymarthyup wrote:On September 12 2011 14:56 Sweeper8 wrote:On September 12 2011 10:40 aZealot wrote:
How are Gateway units weak? Weak in what sense and with respect to what? People keep saying so that it seems to be becoming received wisdom, but I am not sure if this correct. If they are not weak, then the whole premise is wrong as is the focus on WG mechanic.
How are gateway units not weak? Of hatch tech, rax units, and gateway units gateway units lose every time. 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of hatch tech units. 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of rax units (marine/marauder/reaper available. stim/shields/conc upgraded). 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded (roach burrow not allowed) if anything, gateway units are STRONGER pound for pound than other races tier1 units. this is a signature strength of the protoss race. protoss has stronger units in a 200food battle 50 zeals+50 stalkers will be raped hard by 100 marine+50 marauders. Test it if you don't believe. You may even do it without studder step micro. If you wanna add sentries, then you should consider couple of ghosts or medivacs, since we're talking about casters. Emm no, he is talking about basic units. Protoss has sentries as well when he builds the cybercore, you cannot just take those away. And they will allow protoss gateway units to rape any combination of basic barracks units (marine, marauder, reaper).
Well, you may not be aware but ghosts have already become basic unit in TvP. Ghost academy is not that hard to get, its cheap (relatively) and you can get it quickly right after building barrack. Its on the same level as cybercore. Ghost's gas cost is same as sentry, and it comes with EMP by default. The lack of ghost usage by terrans implies that they simply get away with just marine/marauder, which means MM is already strong enough. I'm sure u get the idea.
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how has this terrible thread not been closed yet? Lol if I posted something like this crying about balance (disguised as a discussion) I guarantee it would be shot down faster than an overlord that flew over 30 marines.
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On September 14 2011 20:02 th2pun1sh3r wrote: how has this terrible thread not been closed yet? Lol if I posted something like this crying about balance (disguised as a discussion) I guarantee it would be shot down faster than an overlord that flew over 30 marines.
Yes, I also think overlords should have more hitpoints!
OT: Always interesting to see these discussions, as long a they keep focus of the topic at hand. Some interesting points were made in this thread
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This article is ridiculous have can you have a bigger advantage than being able to almost instantly get units anywhere u have a pylon the defenders advantage remains the same except in PvP As the other races still have to rally accross the map of anything it negates the defender advantage for the other races as it allows the toss to insta reinforce, if this has been said i apologise but asking for a buff to warp gates is flat out retarded they just need a way of fixing PvP the other matchs toss already gets an advantage in regards to reinforcements etc
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On September 14 2011 20:02 th2pun1sh3r wrote: how has this terrible thread not been closed yet? Lol if I posted something like this crying about balance (disguised as a discussion) I guarantee it would be shot down faster than an overlord that flew over 30 marines.
We are very thankful for your great contribution to this thread. And we admire your attitude towards the game being man enough to forget about balance and learning to play. Thank you for helping moderators to do their job and pointing point out this terrible thread flooded with whining posts.
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On September 14 2011 20:16 bokeevboke wrote:Show nested quote +On September 14 2011 20:02 th2pun1sh3r wrote: how has this terrible thread not been closed yet? Lol if I posted something like this crying about balance (disguised as a discussion) I guarantee it would be shot down faster than an overlord that flew over 30 marines. We are very thankful for your great contribution to this thread. And we admire your attitude towards the game being man enough to forget about balance and learning to play. Thank you for helping moderators to do their job and pointing point out this terrible thread flooded with whining posts.
in my defense.. I haven't had the morning coffee yet ..grrr
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On September 14 2011 14:52 roymarthyup wrote:Show nested quote +On September 12 2011 14:56 Sweeper8 wrote:On September 12 2011 10:40 aZealot wrote:
How are Gateway units weak? Weak in what sense and with respect to what? People keep saying so that it seems to be becoming received wisdom, but I am not sure if this correct. If they are not weak, then the whole premise is wrong as is the focus on WG mechanic.
How are gateway units not weak? Of hatch tech, rax units, and gateway units gateway units lose every time. 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of hatch tech units. 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of rax units (marine/marauder/reaper available. stim/shields/conc upgraded). 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded (roach burrow not allowed) if anything, gateway units are STRONGER pound for pound than other races tier1 units. this is a signature strength of the protoss race. protoss has stronger units in a 200food battle
So wrong on so many levels... extreme examples like this make zero sense. Go make a equal COST army, not supply, and gateway units LOSE every time.
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On September 14 2011 20:20 izgodlee wrote:Show nested quote +On September 14 2011 14:52 roymarthyup wrote:On September 12 2011 14:56 Sweeper8 wrote:On September 12 2011 10:40 aZealot wrote:
How are Gateway units weak? Weak in what sense and with respect to what? People keep saying so that it seems to be becoming received wisdom, but I am not sure if this correct. If they are not weak, then the whole premise is wrong as is the focus on WG mechanic.
How are gateway units not weak? Of hatch tech, rax units, and gateway units gateway units lose every time. 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of hatch tech units. 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of rax units (marine/marauder/reaper available. stim/shields/conc upgraded). 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded (roach burrow not allowed) if anything, gateway units are STRONGER pound for pound than other races tier1 units. this is a signature strength of the protoss race. protoss has stronger units in a 200food battle So wrong on so many levels... extreme examples like this make zero sense. Go make a equal COST army, not supply, and gateway units LOSE every time.
Actually, I'm pretty sure 200/200 bio would destroy 200/200 gateway units. 200/200 Roach/Ling would lose because of the supply inefficiency of Roaches, but 200/200 Ling/Bling could do very well in a relatively open space.
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United Kingdom20157 Posts
On September 12 2011 18:11 aZealot wrote:Show nested quote +On September 12 2011 14:56 Sweeper8 wrote:On September 12 2011 10:40 aZealot wrote:
How are Gateway units weak? Weak in what sense and with respect to what? People keep saying so that it seems to be becoming received wisdom, but I am not sure if this correct. If they are not weak, then the whole premise is wrong as is the focus on WG mechanic.
How are gateway units not weak? Of hatch tech, rax units, and gateway units gateway units lose every time. It was a serious question, not a rhetorical one. Basic Protoss Gateway units stacked up next to basic Terran Barracks and Zerg Hatch units are collectively stronger. If they do lose, and overall they do seem to do so, it's not because of their supposed weakness but because, I think, of the numerical strength of Terran units (through such mechanisms as Reactors) and Zerg units (through Larva Inject). These, especially with Terran, are then complicated by a range of other abilities like Stim and Concussive shell with which Blizzard has littered the game (meaning X beats Y but Y+Z beats X and then X needs W to beat Y+Z and so on) . But, at the basic level, Gateway units are not weak with respect to Barracks units and Hatch units. If this is the case, the WG mechanism is the only thing keeping Protoss in the game; and such abilities as the Sentry FF/GS do not compensate for the weakness of Gateway units (an idea which does not make sense if you really think about it; why not just make Gateway units stronger and let them stand alone then without the Sentry?), but rather for the numerical superiority of Terran/Zerg in those early game engagements. FF allows for the splitting of armies, especially on ramps, and GS allows for minimisation of DPS thus allowing Protoss Gateway units to cut down the numbers of opposing units to a manageable size. Gateway units can't be buffed too much, because WG or not, if they were strong enough to match Zerg and Terran early game armies without relying on the Sentry they would be horrendously OP in the mid to late game.
Speedlings are cost effective against Zealots, Stalkers AND Sentries if you are not in a wall or a choke, and you dont allow him to get ahead of you in upgrades.
a 75/25 roach beats a 125/50 stalker with 3-3 and is also faster on ground
3 marines beat 1 stalker before stim (marines are 25 more expensive, but 0 of that is gas, and T has mules)
1 marauder trashes 1 stalker before stim, and conc shells, an upgrade that is done before warpgate in every marauder upgrade, allows them to kill zealots and sentries without taking damage. Charge comes out for 200/200 after a 140 second research from a 100/150 building and after that, a 100/25 marauder can still beat 2 or 3 chargelots at 100/0 each, even though it is anti-armor
Protoss gateway has the illusion of strengh largely due to Z/T just not having anywhere near their army size in units (mis-reaction to a warpgate push) or due to forcefields cutting up an army and forcing units away or out of range.
I am not denying gateway units are decent, but if you meet a 4gate with the exact same unit cost with just pure speedling... It is lights out for the protoss, maybe even GG. The reason we dont see this much is because people drone past 20 when defending 4gate since the timing change, whereas stopping at 20 and pumping pure speedling means you kill their entire force with very few losses, instant gg for toss, the risk is that they are doing some kind of funky expand, but the original point i am trying to make is that gateway looses to speedling unless in a choke or abusing ff's and speedlings are also so fast you cannot retreat.
In order to win, protoss has to do one of several things:
1. Hit a timing and take z/t off guard, getting a burst of units so that they simply have more stuff than their opponent, mostly seen in 4gates due to people droning a little too hard in order to be "economically safe", though this is not neccesary vs such a delayed expand (or allin)
2. Abuse forcefields in some way, isolating part of the army, blocking ramps, etc
3. Get a tech advantage, and do some kind of push before the correct counters are in place
That pretty much sums up my analysis of current pro games, if im wrong please say so, but it appears that protoss cant really play a harass based style or engage outside of timing windows without using heavy amounts of blink stalkers, which die straight up to marines, marauders, tanks etc without doing all that much damage, especially without a lot of zeal/sentry support, and no colossi/storms past 100 supply puts you in an extremely dangerous situation.
Infact if i have noticed one thing, it is that protoss can be 100 supply ahead and still loose if they are not VERY VERY careful. If an obs or two gets sniped, or you mess up slightly, you are blanked EMP'd so you loose all of your shields, cant blink, cant storm and if you loose colossi you just die. There is a similar situation for terran, they have troubles loosing army easily and reinforcing, but in general, 30 supply of MMM will kill a much higher supply count of gateway, easily double without tech support unless there are full energy sentries in the mix, allowing for comebacks in a lot of situations
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United Kingdom20157 Posts
On September 14 2011 20:25 Toadvine wrote:Show nested quote +On September 14 2011 20:20 izgodlee wrote:On September 14 2011 14:52 roymarthyup wrote:On September 12 2011 14:56 Sweeper8 wrote:On September 12 2011 10:40 aZealot wrote:
How are Gateway units weak? Weak in what sense and with respect to what? People keep saying so that it seems to be becoming received wisdom, but I am not sure if this correct. If they are not weak, then the whole premise is wrong as is the focus on WG mechanic.
How are gateway units not weak? Of hatch tech, rax units, and gateway units gateway units lose every time. 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of hatch tech units. 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of rax units (marine/marauder/reaper available. stim/shields/conc upgraded). 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded (roach burrow not allowed) if anything, gateway units are STRONGER pound for pound than other races tier1 units. this is a signature strength of the protoss race. protoss has stronger units in a 200food battle So wrong on so many levels... extreme examples like this make zero sense. Go make a equal COST army, not supply, and gateway units LOSE every time. Actually, I'm pretty sure 200/200 bio would destroy 200/200 gateway units. 200/200 Roach/Ling would lose because of the supply inefficiency of Roaches, but 200/200 Ling/Bling could do very well in a relatively open space.
200 supply of cracklings murders 200 supply of chargelots, im not sure how chargelot with stalker behind would hold out, but even in a choke the zeals cant hold out vs the massive ling dps, which is fine, because lings are paper and get 1shot by colossi at 2 or 3 weapons
Banelings being 0.5 supply is a complete JOKE, any toss army in the game can be blanked fungalled from some high ground you didnt see for example and it doesnt matter if you have 10k banked and 7-8 bases, if you are blanked fungalled and zerg has 2-300 banelings in overlords, you will loose your entire army and he will loose some 20% of his banes
Edit: I dont mean to be toss biased i just kinda let out my thoughts on the thread
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On September 14 2011 20:36 Cyro wrote: 200 supply of cracklings murders 200 supply of chargelots
Come on, please test such things before saying them. I just threw 150 supply of lings against 150 supply zealots, and it's pretty even with the lings barely coming out on top with adrenal. In a good choke it would a slaughter in favour of the zealots.
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Well if you just directly compare toss against terran here are the figures I got, based on what I directly anaylzed from Liquidpedia (Feel free to correct me if I am wrong).
On a typical matchup of Basic Tier 1 units allowing for their upgrades along that tier, we have as follows:
Terran has Stim (170 sec), Combat Shield (110 sec) and concussive shell (60 sec).
Protoss has hallucination (80 sec) and guardian shield ( 0 sec) and warpgate (160 sec).
Now with regards to what mix there is, its 1 zealot, 1 sentry and 1 stalker. For the terran its 2 marines, 1 marauder and 1 reaper.
Looking at it from the timings along, we can gather than terran doesn't have time already to get all three researches to compare against what the protoss need to research. So you would have to assume or leave one out of the equation (either combat shield or stim, never both)
Now from the data alone, Protoss has a total armor and shields or 390. (160 for stalker, 150 for zealot and 80 for sentry) For the Terran they have a total armor/life of 265 (285 with combat shield).
Now based on the DPS total I got from the math Protoss should deal 26.2 DPS regularly (29 dps if armored).
If it's terran, they would deal 28 DPS regularly (37.1 DPS if light, 47.4 DPS with stim against light, 34.7 DPS against armored, 48.3 DPS against armored with stim)
Now all units of terran are ranged, before the zealot and sentry even have a chance to attack or shoot the terran does 37.1 DPS to either of the two. Assuming you have guardian shield on that's 35.1 DPS dealt immediately to your protoss frontline. Before the zealot can engage anyone of the nearest units, he will need 2 starcraft seconds given he has a 2.25 movespeed and the nearest unit is the reaper, not the marine.
Within that time frame, only the stalker and the sentry have a chance to shoot/engage dealing around 12.9 DPS only for that time frame as its either the marine or reaper who are engaging closer. At 12.9 dps X 2 seconds, you get a total of 25.8 DMG only dealt to the front line for the protoss side, while the Terran has already dealt a considerable 70.2 DMG, almost enough either kill the sentry next shot or already half life's the zealot.
This already excludes kiting scenario as when we include that it is a no brainer and the protoss just flat out looses as the zealot will take a whole lot of time before he can engage and damage would be more than half his total life already.
Assuming no kiting, the zealot finally engages at the third second against the reaper to lower dmg against light, 25.8 DMG (2 sec mark) + 26.2 DPS = 52 DMG (@ 3rd second) = enough to finally kill the reaper. Also at the 3rd second mark, the terran has dealt 70.2 DMG (2 sec mark) + 35.1 DPS (@ 3rd second) = 105.3 DMG = enough to kill the sentry (40 HP/40 shield = 80 total) or lower the zealot to just 44.7 armor.
@ the 4th second, zealot engages the 1st marine, total DPS dealt now is 26.2 DPS, terran adds on 20.7 DPS. Both need 2.2 ~ 2.5 seconds to take out 1 marine and the zealot.
After the 6th second, we only have 1 marine + 1 marauder against 1 sentry and 1 stalker. Engaging the stalker, we now deal 20.4 DPS if we were to engage the stalker, or 13.7 DPS if we were to engage the sentry, less 2 DPS as long as guardian shield is up.
At this time, you have a total of just 55 + 125 for the terran and 160 + 80 for the protoss.
This might look like the advantage to the protoss and the units might look stronger if we just put it in this scenario but in order for this to happen, the terran shouldn't move and just stand there and fire. This whole arithmetic or how "weakened" the gateway units are because of the warpgate feature falls true just because you already put in user input (micro) into the equation, we haven't even considered what if he got stim yet.
If the whole terran group just stuttered step a bit then fired then it would take longer for the zealot to reach them, I'm assuming half a second addition to the DPS, every stutter step. I know this doesn't consider yet reinforcing variables such as reactors and pylon position, but just by looking at how the damage needs to be done in order for the protoss to come out on top means that the opposing team doesn't respond or give any input.
I didn't include zerg as it was impossible to consider for splash damage as it pretty much is an open variable, and I was confused at what liquipedia meant by DPS for the zergling and baneling damage, if it meant strictly just 1 or half the food count or both already and that the baneling damage doesn't appear to one shot non combat shield marines as the total shows 35 only in liquipedia.
Anyway, toss gateway units do appear and act weaker compared to their counterparts once you put in other variables just because they had to be weakened for the warpgate tech not to make them too strong and decimate the opponent.
I know the scenario doesn't consider yet conjuring up 2 zealots using the remaining energy of the sentry for hallucination but I think most would get the gyst of it of how relatively weak the units are compared their counterparts just because of the warp in design.
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On September 08 2011 19:25 Pzar wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something? Well, jus thinking out loud here, but I never understood why warpgates allowed for higher production throughput than gateways. It made more sense to me that you should be giving up -something- (resources or time) to gain the front-loaded anywhere there's a power field style of unit creation. Especially given that you can convert warpgates back to gateways. Plus it'd be cool to see gateways<->warpgates happening as protoss move between defensive and offensive =P
This is a really interesting point. Although if gateways were to be buffed, proxy gates would gain too much usage. Really dig your thinking though.
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On September 14 2011 18:11 Rutok wrote: How about 2 cannons and 2 zealots?
Or switch from xel naga to the shakuras natural.
I've said multiple times that narrow choke naturals are the most fair maps for Protoss.
Also for cannons you need a forge, have to add that cost/time in as well. So 2 zealots, 1 cannon 1 forge.
Its the early early early scales where Toss sucks, because of the forge cost.
Everyone comparing 150 or 200 food armies is missing the point. I'm talking about freakin 1gate expos. You have <30 food at that point. And in a defensive context. No creep or bunkers or spines, and no choke. Why should Protoss require map designers to make naturals with chokes?
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sorry, when i said 200food of gateway units beats 200food of hatch tech, i didnt intend for cracklings or speed banelings to be possible
200food of gateway units (zealot/sentry/voidray) beats 200food of bio units. stim/conc/combat shields upgrades, nothing upgraded for the protoss. 3/3/3 vs 3/3 or no upgrades the toss wins
what allows the toss to win is because even if the terran only stims his front units, each stim still takes so much health away from the terran units and with 200food of gateway units, the toss has unlimited forcefields and guardian shields and with average micro will destroy the terran easily
terran is not allowed to have any medivacs
200food of gateway units (zealot/sentry/voidray) beats 200food of hatch tech units. ling speed can be upgraded. 3/3/3 vs 3/3 or no upgrades the toss wins
what makes toss gateunits units powerful is they are very supply effective so they snowball alot. guardian shield makes marauders and marines do such low dps to zealots that as long as you have plenty sentries it makes the bio units do much less damage and then forcefields and zealots/stalkers rip it up
ive tested it in the unit tester about a dozen times with a few master terran friends as long as the toss isnt a retard with his FF's he will win
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Very well thought out post, I never considered Warp Gate in such a way. I can imagine a shield battery would make immortals suuuper useful and awesome defensive tools. Man I'd kill for a shield battery.
I think a problem lies with the absurdly low dps stalkers do. If they did more, it'd break timing pushes like 6-gate blink. But on the otherhand, Stalkers are so pathetic in the late game with their measley 17 damage vs armored. I really think little can be done about that unfortunately so I'll live with it.
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On September 15 2011 07:45 roymarthyup wrote: sorry, when i said 200food of gateway units beats 200food of hatch tech, i didnt intend for cracklings or speed banelings to be possible
200food of gateway units (zealot/sentry/voidray) beats 200food of bio units. stim/conc/combat shields upgrades, nothing upgraded for the protoss. 3/3/3 vs 3/3 or no upgrades the toss wins
what allows the toss to win is because even if the terran only stims his front units, each stim still takes so much health away from the terran units and with 200food of gateway units, the toss has unlimited forcefields and guardian shields and with average micro will destroy the terran easily
terran is not allowed to have any medivacs
200food of gateway units (zealot/sentry/voidray) beats 200food of hatch tech units. ling speed can be upgraded. 3/3/3 vs 3/3 or no upgrades the toss wins
what makes toss gateunits units powerful is they are very supply effective so they snowball alot. guardian shield makes marauders and marines do such low dps to zealots that as long as you have plenty sentries it makes the bio units do much less damage and then forcefields and zealots/stalkers rip it up
ive tested it in the unit tester about a dozen times with a few master terran friends as long as the toss isnt a retard with his FF's he will win
ummm this is so dependant on the unit composition of both races, that u cant really say 200 this beat 200 that all depends how many zealots sentries and stalkers u went, compared to how many maur and marine he went
different amounts of each will beat the other
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Well, jus thinking out loud here, but I never understood why warpgates allowed for higher production throughput than gateways.
im not saying it's a good idea or not but the reasoning is probably that warp gate tech is an upgrade and it's an expensive early-game upgrade so why not give it 2 buffs instead of one
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THIS is the way to talk about balance/game mechanics, well done.
I don't agree with everything you stated but certainly P's defenders advantage is relatively weak and there is a seeming lack of viable builds for P. I still believe HOTS will fix most of these problems even as the upcoming patch will help to balance the current game.
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On September 15 2011 07:37 susySquark wrote: Why should Protoss require map designers to make naturals with chokes?
this
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Protoss are the new Zerg of TL.
On September 14 2011 20:25 Toadvine wrote:Show nested quote +On September 14 2011 20:20 izgodlee wrote:On September 14 2011 14:52 roymarthyup wrote:On September 12 2011 14:56 Sweeper8 wrote:On September 12 2011 10:40 aZealot wrote:
How are Gateway units weak? Weak in what sense and with respect to what? People keep saying so that it seems to be becoming received wisdom, but I am not sure if this correct. If they are not weak, then the whole premise is wrong as is the focus on WG mechanic.
How are gateway units not weak? Of hatch tech, rax units, and gateway units gateway units lose every time. 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of hatch tech units. 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded 200food of gateway units (zeal/stalker/sentry) will completely rape 200food of rax units (marine/marauder/reaper available. stim/shields/conc upgraded). 0/0 upgrades OR fully upgraded (roach burrow not allowed) if anything, gateway units are STRONGER pound for pound than other races tier1 units. this is a signature strength of the protoss race. protoss has stronger units in a 200food battle So wrong on so many levels... extreme examples like this make zero sense. Go make a equal COST army, not supply, and gateway units LOSE every time. Actually, I'm pretty sure 200/200 bio would destroy 200/200 gateway units. 200/200 Roach/Ling would lose because of the supply inefficiency of Roaches, but 200/200 Ling/Bling could do very well in a relatively open space.
Correctly use sentry's and win.
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On September 15 2011 07:45 roymarthyup wrote: sorry, when i said 200food of gateway units beats 200food of hatch tech, i didnt intend for cracklings or speed banelings to be possible
200food of gateway units (zealot/sentry/voidray) beats 200food of bio units. stim/conc/combat shields upgrades, nothing upgraded for the protoss. 3/3/3 vs 3/3 or no upgrades the toss wins
what allows the toss to win is because even if the terran only stims his front units, each stim still takes so much health away from the terran units and with 200food of gateway units, the toss has unlimited forcefields and guardian shields and with average micro will destroy the terran easily
terran is not allowed to have any medivacs
200food of gateway units (zealot/sentry/voidray) beats 200food of hatch tech units. ling speed can be upgraded. 3/3/3 vs 3/3 or no upgrades the toss wins
what makes toss gateunits units powerful is they are very supply effective so they snowball alot. guardian shield makes marauders and marines do such low dps to zealots that as long as you have plenty sentries it makes the bio units do much less damage and then forcefields and zealots/stalkers rip it up
ive tested it in the unit tester about a dozen times with a few master terran friends as long as the toss isnt a retard with his FF's he will win
If protoss can have voidrays why cant terran have medivacs? also the terran can get ghosts out relatively early and they count as bio. Also, simulated engagements do not happen in this game. when do you go up against a toss who has 200 food worth of gateway units and zerg with 200 food worth of hatch tech with no upgrades. Shit like this is not even worth posting because it doesnt accomplish anything. Terran bio has emp quite early which makes sentries null and void. Also assuming 200/200 maxed armies , if the Terran micro's the zealots should only get one or two hits off when charge cd is used. maruaders have 6 range stalkers have 6 as well. Stalker--- shit ton of zealots ---6--- maruader stalker----------------~ greater than 6------------------- maruader distance between both is greater than 6 which means the stalker is not doing any dps
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On September 15 2011 10:10 spicyredcurry wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2011 07:45 roymarthyup wrote: sorry, when i said 200food of gateway units beats 200food of hatch tech, i didnt intend for cracklings or speed banelings to be possible
200food of gateway units (zealot/sentry/voidray) beats 200food of bio units. stim/conc/combat shields upgrades, nothing upgraded for the protoss. 3/3/3 vs 3/3 or no upgrades the toss wins
what allows the toss to win is because even if the terran only stims his front units, each stim still takes so much health away from the terran units and with 200food of gateway units, the toss has unlimited forcefields and guardian shields and with average micro will destroy the terran easily
terran is not allowed to have any medivacs
200food of gateway units (zealot/sentry/voidray) beats 200food of hatch tech units. ling speed can be upgraded. 3/3/3 vs 3/3 or no upgrades the toss wins
what makes toss gateunits units powerful is they are very supply effective so they snowball alot. guardian shield makes marauders and marines do such low dps to zealots that as long as you have plenty sentries it makes the bio units do much less damage and then forcefields and zealots/stalkers rip it up
ive tested it in the unit tester about a dozen times with a few master terran friends as long as the toss isnt a retard with his FF's he will win If protoss can have voidrays why cant terran have medivacs? also the terran can get ghosts out relatively early and they count as bio. Also, simulated engagements do not happen in this game. when do you go up against a toss who has 200 food worth of gateway units and zerg with 200 food worth of hatch tech with no upgrades. Shit like this is not even worth posting because it doesnt accomplish anything. Terran bio has emp quite early which makes sentries null and void. Also assuming 200/200 maxed armies , if the Terran micro's the zealots should only get one or two hits off when charge cd is used. maruaders have 6 range stalkers have 6 as well. Stalker--- shit ton of zealots ---6--- maruader stalker----------------~ greater than 6------------------- maruader distance between both is greater than 6 which means the stalker is not doing any dps
i meant stalker instead of voidray
i am only trying to make the argument that protoss gateway units are not weaker than other races T1 units
voidrays are not a gateway unit. i didnt mean voidrays, i meant stalker
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I think the argument that Zerg has more of a defender's advantage than Protoss is laughable.
You use the ramp as an example? When have you ever seen Zerg defending a push with a single base?
That ramp is what Protoss uses to crush the Zerg's chance of defense, i.e. forcefielding it to prevent reinforcements.
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Shield battery is a good idea. Offensively, I can imagine building shield batteries under warp prisms during battle. Oh shit!! That would be so cool!
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On September 08 2011 18:59 susySquark wrote:Disclaimer: This is not complaining about warpgates - this is examining how warpgates by design have lead to a smaller defenders advantage for Protoss, which makes safe, economic openers difficult to pull off.Each race in SC2 has its own mechanical quirks quite separate from individual unit balance. Terrans have their addon swapping and mules, Zergs have larvae injects and creep, Protoss have warpgates and chrono. The most profound effect of the warpgate mechanic is not defensive in nature, but offensive. To find out why, we must examine the concept of the defenders advantage. A primer of defenders advantageWhen playing as a Terran or Zerg, you naturally have several advantages as a defender before you even build a unit. First, your ramp - the narrow choke allows your units to have a concave against a bunched up pack trying to push its way up the ramp. Second, your production - your rally distances are much, much shorter than if you were out in the middle of the map, so you can produce less units and still defend, because your second wave comes quickly. Also, both Terrans and Zergs have access to a defensive structure after building their first basic unit production structure. The spine crawler only requires a spawning pool, and the bunker only requires a barracks. These structures can be produced as a reaction to a scouted push in order to provide you with an additional advantage as a defender, which can help mitigating the loss of the ramp advantage when you expand. Defending against a pushConsider what happens when defending - assuming perfect balance, the only way to survive a push with an inferior army is to abuse your defenders advantages: your quick reinforcements, your ramp, and any defensive structures. This is why as a fast expanding Terran (no ramp advantage) you construct bunkers against a Protoss gateway timing. Same goes for spines as a Zerg. But what about Protoss? Leveling offense and defenseThe warp mechanic, by its very nature, crosses "short rally" off of the defender's advantage list for Protoss. An attacking Protoss army and a defending Protoss army will be reinforced just as quickly. And here comes problem number one: in a PvP, the defender has essentially NO advantage besides the ramp (and on Tal Darim Altar, there is no ramp!). The only way to survive a gateway push is to match your opponents unit count or abuse the crap out of your ramp (sentries, hooo). This is how the 4gate v 4gate metagame evolved, especially on TD Altar. Cannons represent an absurd deviation from normal tech in order to provide a defender advantage, since there is no defensive structure after gateway. Scouting a forge + 2 cannons (450 minerals) can be responded to with a free expansion (400 minerals), since the cannoning player theoretically cannot attack with more units than the expanding one. But PvP, as a mirror matchup, is inherently balanced no matter the design flaws, so I'll ignore it for now. Still, there are other implications of the Protoss equivalency of offense and defense. The three types of engagementsThere are three fundamental types of engagements in SC2. It's basically common sense, but it'll help to give them names. When you do a (1) timing push, you have usually sacrificed a small amount of economy for a stronger army at a specific time in the game. Therefore, when you push and engage, you have a stronger army then your opponent. This is the first type of engagement. If you are (2) defending a timing push, your goal is usually to use your smaller army together with a defenders advantage to defend and later capitalize on your stronger economy. This is the second type of engagement. Finally, in the lategame, midmap engagements are commonplace, where both players have relatively evenly matched armies. We'll call this an (3) even fight. As mentioned before, Protoss has a natural advantage in timing pushes because of the warp mechanic. I feel that if a Protoss is engaging in a timing push, game feels well balanced - extremely strong Protoss timing pushes can punish greedy Terran or Zerg play, and well executed defenses can hold in safe play. A pushing Protoss, with a stronger army and a short rally, is meant to have a fair shake at attacking a smaller, but defensive structure and rally fortified Terran or Zerg.As a defender, Protosses have cannons for defense, a rally advantage, and a ramp / choke advantage. Cannons, because of their sometimes inconvenient tech, are missing from a Protoss defense in a lot of earlygame scenarios (4gate, 2 or 3rax, roach+ling aggression on expo). This reduces Protoss defensive options to a ramp or choke advantage, and a rally advantage. Protosses can defend using the choke advantage very well, by using forcefields. However, on maps with open expansions, this becomes extremely difficult. This is why Protosses prefer maps with narrowly choked off naturals, like Shakuras, or Anitga. On open maps, the choke advantage disappears almost completely. So what about the rally advantage? Here's the problem. Because of the warp mechanic, Protoss is balanced as if they have the rally advantage for a timing push engagement. In a defensive sense, the warpin mechanic provides no additional benefit compared to an offensive one. As the Protoss is playing defensively, they have a smaller army compared to the pushing player. The choke advantage is missing at the natural on many maps. Cannons are absent because of tech inconvenience. All that's left is the rally - which is designed to be fair for a PUSHING Protoss! A defending Protoss, with a weaker army at home, has no significant defender's advantage over a timing push from the opponent, making the battle favor the pushing player.The differences in the races amounts to basic units and their defenders advantage. A Zealot, Stalker, Sentry army is equally good on offense and on defense. A Marine, Marauder force is good on offense, but BETTER on defense, because of bunkers and a shorter rally compared to their offense. Same goes for Zerg - a force at home is BETTER than an attacking force because of creep, spines, and relatively short rally. This lets you open economically and defend with a smaller, but advantaged army. A defending Protoss army has no advantage compared to an attacking one, no edge to capitalize on. So, if a Protoss early expands, their weaker army cannot make up for their lack of size with any external forces like a Terran or Zerg one can, and is vulnerable to timing pushes from the enemy. It just comes down that unit efficiency. In a defensive context, a Protoss gateway army is weaker than a Terran or Zerg army. I'm not saying that gateway armies are weaker in general! Just in a defensive context, in terms of efficiency. As an example, if you were trying to hold your natural expansion on Xel Naga Caverns against light pressure, which would you prefer - 1 sentry, or a bunker with 2 marines in it? 2 sentries and a stalker, or 2 full bunkers? The options cost the same (1 gas = 1.5 min), require the same tech (actually toss requires more tech - gas and cybercore). I think its clear that the Terran options are extremely superior. As a result of this, Protoss expansion builds, in order to be safe to strong early timing attacks, must have one of the following characteristics to provide the necessary missing defenders advantage: - An early forge (FFE v Z, delays tech because of forge tech being out of the way... imagine expanding as Terran by going ebay+turrets... tech and units for your own offense are going to be slow!)
- A map with a choke for sentries to use (Shak, Antiga, this is by far the best option)
- A lot of units (3gate exp, sacs econ compared to other races expo builds)
TL;DR:
- An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance.
- Protoss timing attacks with large armies are balanced against defensive, economic Terrans and Zergs (both races have economic openings that are ahead after defending a Protoss timing, but there is potential to do damage against a greedy opponent).
- Because of these two points, a defensive Protoss with an small unit count and economic opener is weak because what is normally a defenders advantage is not a defenders advantage for them, it's a given in both offense and defense.
- The lack of a defensive structure after gateway adds to this problem.
- Therefore, the lack of a strong defenders advantage means Protoss has no safe, economic openers.
As an aside (not to be taken too seriously), To fix this: Add additional defensive building. A buffed shield battery could be awesome as a defensive tool if it were available after gateway. Not necessarily a clone of the BW one, maybe something more like a stationary medivac for shields only. ADDENDUM:+ Show Spoiler +Ok here, look at it this way - Expand vs Pressure builds.
A) Look at a Protoss timing push vs a Terran expand build. Protoss 3gate pressure (into expand), vs a Terran 1rax gasless expand into 3 rax.
Terran expands, scouts the 3gate pressure, and bunkers up. Would you say this is a fair fight? Protoss is probably going to get repelled, but theres a chance that they can break it if the Terran is sloppy. It can go both ways, theres tension in the matchup, and it feels balanced. If the attack fails, Protoss is behind, and Terran has defended well. If the attack does damage, the attack has succeeded, and the Terran is behind.
What's actually happening in this example is that the Terran is compensating for their smaller army (since they expanded first) by using a defenders advantage - the bunker with repair. The salient features are: Protoss has a larger army (expanded later, pumped units early) Protoss has a short rally (warpin) Terran has a small army (expanded first, units later) Terran has bunkers (defenders advantage) Terran has a short rally (home base)
And this SET of features creates a fair fight.
B) Now flip the roles. Terran's doing a 2rax pressure (12 + 16 rax, 1 tech 1 reactor, concussive researched) vs a Protoss 1gate expand into 4gates.
These are more or less equivalent builds to the previous example, except its 2rax+addons which is slightly cheaper than 3gates + cyber. Anyways, Protoss scouts the 2rax. The Protoss, on 1 base with a nexus building and 4gates on their way, cannot get cannons up in time. No defensive structure is available, and the natural is wide open. The Protoss expanded off 1 gate, so they have at most, 3 units when the push hits (Stalker Sentry x2 usually), with no repaired bunker to fall back on.
I think we're all familiar with this situation. MC lost in this exact situation to Polt. This fight is NOT fair, its almost a build order loss. You either sac your nexus and abuse your defenders advantage (ramp + sentry), or SEVERELY outmicro your opponent. (Or you could be on Shakuras and you can FF your natural. Which is why I stated in the OP that these maps are good)
Again, examining the salient features: Protoss has a smaller army (expanded first) Protoss has a short rally (home base) Protoss has no defensive structure after gate Terran has a larger army (units first) Terran has a LONG rally (attacking)
And this SET of conditions results in a Terran gaining an advantage the majority of the time.
My argument is that an economically focused, defending Protoss, when they engage, has essentially the same characteristics as a Protoss doing a timing attack with a small army... which is, of course, a terrible idea, and results in losses.
And how would you explain that in TvP one of the most common builds since release has been a 1 gate FE??? I hope by economic your not solely referring to a 16 nex.
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I agree with everything OP said. PvT is really the most affected matchup in this case. Without a reasonable early defensive structure toss is forced to be very unit heavy early, delaying most expand builds, putting any sort of terran expand at an economic advantage, not to mention that cloaked banshees are always a possibility so toss must either get a robo and delay expoing even further or take a big gamble. Don't say that chrono boost catches toss up because we're forced to dump it into warp gate research, and a mule is equivalent to ~5 probes, easily overcoming the first 2 chronos toss decides to spend on probes.
That said, a toss fast expo build is very weak for several reasons: 1. Terran units are better early game (stronger, cheaper, faster to build) so if terran all ins or does a very aggresive early game push you can just straight up build order lose 2. Many maps have wide naturals that you cannot force field well 3. You have to sacrifice even more units for detection unless you can steal terrans gas, since cloaked banshees in a detectionless toss base is gg
So, toss is forced to be offensive to make the most of the mechanics of warp gate. I don't have a problem with being offensive, but I just really dislike how playing defensively is so difficult as toss, especially with the 111 available to the terran.
Just think about it this way, warp gate is only really used to its fullest as an offensive mechanic, so toss should be the strongest attacking race, yet terran all ins are undoubtedly stronger than toss all ins, and since terran also has bunkers, they have both the offensive and defensive advantage. Once each player is on 2 base all of this is irrelevant but early game toss is certainly in a tougher situation in general.
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I have seen less than six games in BW progaming history when shield batteries actually paid off for itself, obviously the Boss Dragoon vs BBS was one of them. I remember Stork using a Shield Battery when opening 15 Nexus, didn't work out so well.
Anyways I understand your point of a better defensive building. Cannons without Forge seems to fix some problems, but again makes Forge FE overpowered and gives Protoss instant detection and thwart of Banshees and DTs.
I see something like a healing structure hard for itself to pay off. A Zealot could tank the same amount of damage you would have gained from healing during the 4 gate phase, and the warp-in cooldown is really not a big counterargument to it, as you rarely have excess minerals during a 20-Probe 4 gate.
Blizzard is trying its hardest, as you can see from the ramp vision patch (though I am not sure if it fixes anything major).
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I've also pondered how the effect of shield battery would if in case it were implemented. Some are saying that it in fact can be abused is a valid point.
I now think, what if they just made cannons available after gateway instead of forge but, limit its capabilities. One, you could make it a non detector on the on set and make it's detection ability as an upgrade through the cybernetics core. Another is similar to the increase dragoon attack range back in broodwar, you could lower the range of the cannon by a bit and extend it through research. It effectively weakens the cannons in the early game and prevents them from being too OP.
I'm not so sure how that affects the overall mid-late game, but that at least can help in balancing the defenders advantage that toss needs as cannons are available like bunkers. =)
Just a thought and expressing my opinion on the matter. It's a possibility I think can be considered as it shifts what is available around without affecting too much of the rest I believe, but I am open to correction. =)
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I can tell you put a lot of work into your post, but I think your reasoning is not sound.
The warp mechanic, by its very nature, crosses "short rally" off of the defender's advantage list for Protoss. An attacking Protoss army and a defending Protoss army will be reinforced just as quickly.
You made it sound like this is a weakness for Protoss. Even if Protoss did not have Warp gate mechanics they would reinforce at about the same rate in a defending battle. It only strengthens them offensively. The other player still has a longer rally distance when attacking the Protoss player. This is the point you glossed over when you used your PvP example, using that to validate your points and then dismissing it as automatically balanced.
I don't think the game was balanced in the nature that you think it was. I also think it is bad practice to look at a localized imbalance (differences in race mechanics) and claim a net imbalance. The presence of an imbalance must be determined by a lot of games being played, and I don't think there is sufficient evidence to support your claim.
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On September 15 2011 15:46 Carmine wrote:I can tell you put a lot of work into your post, but I think your reasoning is not sound. Show nested quote +The warp mechanic, by its very nature, crosses "short rally" off of the defender's advantage list for Protoss. An attacking Protoss army and a defending Protoss army will be reinforced just as quickly. You made it sound like this is a weakness for Protoss. Even if Protoss did not have Warp gate mechanics they would reinforce at about the same rate in a defending battle. It only strengthens them offensively. The other player still has a longer rally distance when attacking the Protoss player. This is the point you glossed over when you used your PvP example, using that to validate your points and then dismissing it as automatically balanced. I don't think the game was balanced in the nature that you think it was. I also think it is bad practice to look at a localized imbalance (differences in race mechanics) and claim a net imbalance. The presence of an imbalance must be determined by a lot of games being played, and I don't think there is sufficient evidence to support your claim.
Is anyone actually reading? He is saying that because of the warpgate, it is possible to traverse distances instantly and reinforce at your opponent's doorstep. Because of THIS, they have to make gateway units weaker. And he is saying, that this ruined Protoss.
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In general, your arguments are valid and well thought out, but there are several points I'd like to adress, that mitigate what you think broke Protoss:
1) First of all, the Warp-In is a fun and exciting ability that allows a diversity of different strategies to manifest. This point often gets overlooked, but It's IMHO a very important one. 2) Zerg for example has the ability to reinforce very quickly, much quicker than in SC:BW, at least in most cases and they have rather fast Units. That's mostly because of new macro-mechanics like Inject and creep tumors. 3) There are other things to consider when looking at the defenders advantage: - On the one hand, we have new advantages for defenders, like the Queen of the Zerg, creep adding speed, Terran being able to lower depots and get refunds for Bunkers if they don't use it anymore. Protoss has one of the strongest defensive Units, the Sentry etc. Those things weren't available in SC:BW and give the defender a clear advantage. - On the other hand, we have some defenders advantages, that were taken out of the game and are maybe equally as important as protoss warp-in's on the offensive side: There is no true highground-advantage (maybe with the upcoming sight-range up the ramp it will change a little bit) and many Maps are rather small (which will at least slow down the first Units from the Toss that was warped in in his base) 4) There is also a possibility to snipe offensive pylons, which are obviously more exposed than pylons that are safely tucked away in the tosses base, to heavily delay his push and maybe even supply-cap him. You can also snipe a Probe that is moving out. These strategies surely aren't easy to pull off, but it makes for an exciting game and rewards good scouting and skill. 5) Also, Counter-attacks, which always have been one way to punish an attacker for moving out, don't suffer at all from an offensive warp-in.
I see the warp-in's having a big effect on PvP though, but maybe the decreased sight up the ramp will help strenghtening the defenders advantage.
Also, we've seen in the recent future, that timing-attacks (which you consider one of the bigger Problems) won't be as effective for Protoss in the near future, cuz timings can get figured out by the opponent and reliable counters are often found quite quickly, which is IMHO one of the main Problems Protoss are underperforming nowadays - their timings with mass-warpgates (4 or 6gate) don't work as well anymore.
I don't think nerfing Gateway-Units really is the way to go, but maybe strenghten some of the other races' possibilities to counterattack or have better movement around the Map. One example would be the Nydus-worm. Although it's IMHO pretty expensive, we kinda see it used more often, but almost exclusively offensive. Why not give the Nydus some sort of benefit (make it cheaper for example) if you deploy it on creep or near a Hatch, so it can be used defensively, but so it wouldn't really change it's power offensively too much. I can't think of anythin for Terran, but they are more of a defensive race anyways, so it kinda fits.
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On September 15 2011 15:54 Bleak wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2011 15:46 Carmine wrote:I can tell you put a lot of work into your post, but I think your reasoning is not sound. The warp mechanic, by its very nature, crosses "short rally" off of the defender's advantage list for Protoss. An attacking Protoss army and a defending Protoss army will be reinforced just as quickly. You made it sound like this is a weakness for Protoss. Even if Protoss did not have Warp gate mechanics they would reinforce at about the same rate in a defending battle. It only strengthens them offensively. The other player still has a longer rally distance when attacking the Protoss player. This is the point you glossed over when you used your PvP example, using that to validate your points and then dismissing it as automatically balanced. I don't think the game was balanced in the nature that you think it was. I also think it is bad practice to look at a localized imbalance (differences in race mechanics) and claim a net imbalance. The presence of an imbalance must be determined by a lot of games being played, and I don't think there is sufficient evidence to support your claim. Is anyone actually reading? He is saying that because of the warpgate, it is possible to traverse distances instantly and reinforce at your opponent's doorstep. Because of THIS, they have to make gateway units weaker. And he is saying, that this ruined Protoss.
but gateway units aren't weak. they are the best units compared to t and z's early units (without updates). sure stim can change a lot, but blink can also change a lot. and to kill a toss with early agressive builds he needs to either be really greedy or just lack in scouting. same can be said for terran and zerg, if they dont scout or be to greedy, they will die to a good timing attack.
the important thing is: protoss units are the best and most resistant units out of the 3 races, and they have shields which regenerate very fast. p does not need defensive structures (that much) because the units are aleready pretty strong and defensive in their own way. z and t need defensive structures because their units are so weak in the early game. .
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They are absolutely weak inherently. Warp-in offense compensates for this, in an offensive context.
A stalker costs more than a marauder and loses to it. A stalker costs 125-50 and does slightly less dps than a 50min marine. A zealot costs twice as much as marines, and does less dps than 2 marines, while spending most of its time trying to get in melee range.
Stalkers, at range 6, can't even kite marines properly because they have (1) a slow attack animation and (2) a missile, which has transit time. Watch any pro using stalkers against marines, the stalkers always get hit when they take a shot.
Stalkers don't even benefit from +1/2/3 attack the way other units do. It's the lowest scaling unit in the game, I believe.
Shields are a non-factor in combat, they only regenerate out of combat.
Protoss units get pwned by T1 from other races.
This is not a whine; I think it's fine for Protoss units to have reduced stats so long as it balances warp-in. But P also needs a better option for non-offensive situations.
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On September 15 2011 17:54 kinglemon wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2011 15:54 Bleak wrote:On September 15 2011 15:46 Carmine wrote:I can tell you put a lot of work into your post, but I think your reasoning is not sound. The warp mechanic, by its very nature, crosses "short rally" off of the defender's advantage list for Protoss. An attacking Protoss army and a defending Protoss army will be reinforced just as quickly. You made it sound like this is a weakness for Protoss. Even if Protoss did not have Warp gate mechanics they would reinforce at about the same rate in a defending battle. It only strengthens them offensively. The other player still has a longer rally distance when attacking the Protoss player. This is the point you glossed over when you used your PvP example, using that to validate your points and then dismissing it as automatically balanced. I don't think the game was balanced in the nature that you think it was. I also think it is bad practice to look at a localized imbalance (differences in race mechanics) and claim a net imbalance. The presence of an imbalance must be determined by a lot of games being played, and I don't think there is sufficient evidence to support your claim. Is anyone actually reading? He is saying that because of the warpgate, it is possible to traverse distances instantly and reinforce at your opponent's doorstep. Because of THIS, they have to make gateway units weaker. And he is saying, that this ruined Protoss. but gateway units aren't weak. they are the best units compared to t and z's early units (without updates). sure stim can change a lot, but blink can also change a lot. and to kill a toss with early agressive builds he needs to either be really greedy or just lack in scouting. same can be said for terran and zerg, if they dont scout or be to greedy, they will die to a good timing attack. the important thing is: protoss units are the best and most resistant units out of the 3 races, and they have shields which regenerate very fast. p does not need defensive structures (that much) because the units are aleready pretty strong and defensive in their own way. z and t need defensive structures because their units are so weak in the early game. .
Well you have to consider two things when making your analogy. One you mentioned stim comparing to blink, but blink is not a readily accessible at the tech level you are comparing them.
Also true is that the toss may be the most resilient in terms of total "life" in game but their DPS is paltry compared to terran and zerg to compensate for the warp in mechanism design wherein the protoss gateway units revolved around.
Granted the force field of the sentry is really good in cutting chokes/armies but when battling all range units of the same level, they are weakened because they have more convenience in reinforcing when attacking as compared to the other race counterparts, with the available tech tree.
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I hope I don't come across as being rude, but it was practically ancient times in February 2010 when it became well-known that because of the unit deployment capability of Warpgates, warpgate units had to be weak to compensate, or else things like a 4gate would win every game.
To those who have not yet realized this, thank you OP for pointing it out and making a nice detailed thread on the matter .
But yeah, Protoss in a defensive stance (without amassed Tier 3) is not in a pretty scenario, as the OP details. Those weak units that are weak because early-mid game offensives would be too powerful otherwise are still weak when at home defending. This is why FFs exist, but even if your FFs are immaculate, you can still be in hot water and there's a still a fair chance you will die.
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i do agree that the game is broken for protoss. It seems that we toss is one tier1-unit behind terran and zerg. My suggestion is to give sentry additional ability to recharge shield. That would provide additional defense early game.
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Stalkers aren't bad, they're one of the most massable units in the whole game. To say that they're not as good as Marauders isn't saying much, Zerg doesn't have a fighting unit that good either.
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On September 15 2011 18:34 JudicatorHammurabi wrote:I hope I don't come across as being rude, but it was practically ancient times in February 2010 when it became well-known that because of the unit deployment capability of Warpgates, warpgate units had to be weak to compensate, or else things like a 4gate would win every game. To those who have not yet realized this, thank you OP for pointing it out and making a nice detailed thread on the matter . But yeah, Protoss in a defensive stance (without amassed Tier 3) is not in a pretty scenario, as the OP details. Those weak units that are weak because early-mid game offensives would be too powerful otherwise are still weak when at home defending. This is why FFs exist, but even if your FFs are immaculate, you can still be in hot water and there's a still a fair chance you will die.
Thanks for summing it up so perfectly *bows*
@Thread/suggestions: If the main reason to weaken Gateway units was, because it's a huge attackers advantage (but lacking on the defense, as pointed out), what do you guys think about a small idea to compensate: Warped-in units start with no shields at all. (but can still regen later if they aren't thrown into battle at once)
Sounds harsh at first, but that way warped--in units would be weaker for about 20-30 seconds (depending on shields) when compared to normally built units, but that's about the time to travel across the map anyways, so it would be the decision of the player. Do you want units to be warped in normally at any point, but needing to wait half a minue to get full shields....or pruduce em normally at home but walking across the map ?
In crucial situation you could still warp-in some units (sentries, perhaps stalkers), but it would be harder to pressure with zealots/stalkers early game, as those would be quite weakened if you throw them into battle as soon as they get warped in.
To balance for a weaker early push, warp-gate units could either be made slightly stronger/ cheaper or any of the proposed ideas could be applied (easier defending structures, e.g.) Not sure if it would work out perfectly, but on paper it look like a possible (and hypothetical, b/c blizzard won't listen to any ideas of us over here anyways ^^) solution. What do you think ?
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This is an idea I've had for balancing PvP
If Blizzard made the cooldown timer continue running when you transform a warpgate back into a gateway, which is currently not the case, reduce the cooldown on this transformation from 10s to 5s and reduce gateway build times by 3s, this could potentially (with a little more macro effort) balance the matchup and give protoss a natural defender's advantage against a 4 gate.
For example:
1 stalker warps in --> transform warpgate to gateway(5s) --> train a stalker (39s) --> transform back to warpgate (10s) and warp in another stalker.
that means 3 stalkers in 54s vs 3 stalkers from a regular warpgate in 64s
The defending protoss can produce units faster AT HIS BASE but not at the enemie's base, resulting in a natural defender's advantage.
What do you guys think?
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I actually agree that gateways should produce faster than warpgates. It would really help in defending.
As for the shield penalty when warping away/attacking then that would make the protoss ball simply strong in DPS that can be dealt but they easily fall. If you account for the fact you have to wait for the shields to "regenerate" before you can push, you have another cycle of units to deal with against the defender and thus the whole design thus makes the whole toss weak in attacking and ok when defending.
I'm still not sure about the cannon proposal if it needs to research detection but how about another idea. What if gateway unlocks cannon but doesn't make it as a detector. If you built a forge, you automatically gain a detection ability for the cannon. Some might view that as an unfair defenders advantage, but I would like to also raise, what if we reduced the cannons default range by 1 tile and make it a research to revert it back to its current range (similar to how terran upgrades the range of PF and turrets.)
At least the mechanic of what I am proposing gives an assist to the defender but not making it to great that both T & Z already have trouble attacking in the early game.
What about that? =)
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"The warp mechanic, by its very nature, crosses "short rally" off of the defender's advantage list for Protoss. An attacking Protoss army and a defending Protoss army will be reinforced just as quickly." doesn`t this assure that the better player wins. Whoever has the better timed out Buildorder, whoever has the stronger macro, whoever microes more precise will win the game and therefore it is very fair.
btw. dont forget "attack the is best defense" and no other race can attack and reinforce as fast as the protoss race.
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I might say something stupid but why not implement something like : when warpgate is researched, classic gateways produce units faster than warpgates. It would allow in some case a defender advantage. Maybe it will become too powerful as it will allow to have a bigger army faster... Or Maybe i'm just saying crap.
Btw, for people saying tier1 toss is too powerful, come on guys.... As someone said before, gate units are not cost efficient, compared to T at least.
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On September 15 2011 18:29 17Sphynx17 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2011 17:54 kinglemon wrote:On September 15 2011 15:54 Bleak wrote:On September 15 2011 15:46 Carmine wrote:I can tell you put a lot of work into your post, but I think your reasoning is not sound. The warp mechanic, by its very nature, crosses "short rally" off of the defender's advantage list for Protoss. An attacking Protoss army and a defending Protoss army will be reinforced just as quickly. You made it sound like this is a weakness for Protoss. Even if Protoss did not have Warp gate mechanics they would reinforce at about the same rate in a defending battle. It only strengthens them offensively. The other player still has a longer rally distance when attacking the Protoss player. This is the point you glossed over when you used your PvP example, using that to validate your points and then dismissing it as automatically balanced. I don't think the game was balanced in the nature that you think it was. I also think it is bad practice to look at a localized imbalance (differences in race mechanics) and claim a net imbalance. The presence of an imbalance must be determined by a lot of games being played, and I don't think there is sufficient evidence to support your claim. Is anyone actually reading? He is saying that because of the warpgate, it is possible to traverse distances instantly and reinforce at your opponent's doorstep. Because of THIS, they have to make gateway units weaker. And he is saying, that this ruined Protoss. but gateway units aren't weak. they are the best units compared to t and z's early units (without updates). sure stim can change a lot, but blink can also change a lot. and to kill a toss with early agressive builds he needs to either be really greedy or just lack in scouting. same can be said for terran and zerg, if they dont scout or be to greedy, they will die to a good timing attack. the important thing is: protoss units are the best and most resistant units out of the 3 races, and they have shields which regenerate very fast. p does not need defensive structures (that much) because the units are aleready pretty strong and defensive in their own way. z and t need defensive structures because their units are so weak in the early game. . Well you have to consider two things when making your analogy. One you mentioned stim comparing to blink, but blink is not a readily accessible at the tech level you are comparing them.
well it's only one building, and therefore u have a nice tech tree open up for u once u go for blink. you can go dt, ht, archons or chargelot afterwards. it's not like u would go in an one-way-street, like for example cloak banshee is most of the time.
On September 15 2011 18:27 Brotocol wrote: They are absolutely weak inherently. Warp-in offense compensates for this, in an offensive context.
A stalker costs more than a marauder and loses to it. A stalker costs 125-50 and does slightly less dps than a 50min marine. A zealot costs twice as much as marines, and does less dps than 2 marines, while spending most of its time trying to get in melee range.
Stalkers, at range 6, can't even kite marines properly because they have (1) a slow attack animation and (2) a missile, which has transit time. Watch any pro using stalkers against marines, the stalkers always get hit when they take a shot.
This is not a whine; I think it's fine for Protoss units to have reduced stats so long as it balances warp-in. But P also needs a better option for non-offensive situations.
lol, u completely ignore the biggest benefit, their health and shield 1. of course they dont do much damage, but they are tough, and stalkers can shoot air, and they are faster than t units.
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I don't think the warp mechanic broke protoss, the game is fine. Each races unique abilities and characteristics allow equally skilled players to be evenly matched.
Zerg have to expand early to keep their production (larva) up to scratch, giving up the ramp and spreading their early defenses over 2 bases. The larva mechanic didn't break zerg.
A better SC2 example is how terran can use pure mules for minerals and cut workers endgame, this doesn't break terran, it is compensated by all the other stuff going on with all 3 races.
If the protoss really was lacking a defenders advantage why aren't all PvX games won decisively by the opponent playing aggressively? I know you are saying that they even out the mechanic by weakening the units overall, but it is balanced out or we would see statistical evidence showing so.
And finally from a non protoss players point of view the main thing scaring me off over-aggressively engaging an economic protoss early is forcefields, which do work differently for an attacking or defending protoss.
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On September 15 2011 19:42 zul wrote: "The warp mechanic, by its very nature, crosses "short rally" off of the defender's advantage list for Protoss. An attacking Protoss army and a defending Protoss army will be reinforced just as quickly." doesn`t this assure that the better player wins. Whoever has the better timed out Buildorder, whoever has the stronger macro, whoever microes more precise will win the game and therefore it is very fair.
btw. dont forget "attack the is best defense" and no other race can attack and reinforce as fast as the protoss race.
That's cute in theory but in reality the nature of an RTS game does not lend itself to ATTACK ATTACK ATTACK in every situation.
The OP is pretty much entirely correct. Gateway units are inherently weak because of the warpin advantage they have. The side effect of this is that when they are defending they get no benefit and all of the penalties the mechanic grants them.
It forces you to play one way, because playing defensively as Protoss isn't the most efficient way to play the game. It's not even a very viable option at the top level because the entire warp in mechanic doesn't lend itself to that.
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On September 15 2011 19:45 kinglemon wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2011 18:29 17Sphynx17 wrote:On September 15 2011 17:54 kinglemon wrote:On September 15 2011 15:54 Bleak wrote:On September 15 2011 15:46 Carmine wrote:I can tell you put a lot of work into your post, but I think your reasoning is not sound. The warp mechanic, by its very nature, crosses "short rally" off of the defender's advantage list for Protoss. An attacking Protoss army and a defending Protoss army will be reinforced just as quickly. You made it sound like this is a weakness for Protoss. Even if Protoss did not have Warp gate mechanics they would reinforce at about the same rate in a defending battle. It only strengthens them offensively. The other player still has a longer rally distance when attacking the Protoss player. This is the point you glossed over when you used your PvP example, using that to validate your points and then dismissing it as automatically balanced. I don't think the game was balanced in the nature that you think it was. I also think it is bad practice to look at a localized imbalance (differences in race mechanics) and claim a net imbalance. The presence of an imbalance must be determined by a lot of games being played, and I don't think there is sufficient evidence to support your claim. Is anyone actually reading? He is saying that because of the warpgate, it is possible to traverse distances instantly and reinforce at your opponent's doorstep. Because of THIS, they have to make gateway units weaker. And he is saying, that this ruined Protoss. but gateway units aren't weak. they are the best units compared to t and z's early units (without updates). sure stim can change a lot, but blink can also change a lot. and to kill a toss with early agressive builds he needs to either be really greedy or just lack in scouting. same can be said for terran and zerg, if they dont scout or be to greedy, they will die to a good timing attack. the important thing is: protoss units are the best and most resistant units out of the 3 races, and they have shields which regenerate very fast. p does not need defensive structures (that much) because the units are aleready pretty strong and defensive in their own way. z and t need defensive structures because their units are so weak in the early game. . Well you have to consider two things when making your analogy. One you mentioned stim comparing to blink, but blink is not a readily accessible at the tech level you are comparing them. well it's only one building, and therefore u have a nice tech tree open up for u once u go for blink. you can go dt, ht, archons or chargelot afterwards. it's not like u would go in an one-way-street, like for example cloak banshee is most of the time.
That is true, it does open up a tech tree that opens up either of those possibilities available at gateway, one may then argue that it can be equated to getting ghost academy as it is the viable techtree. Even without cloak research or nuke, you get the EMP which nullifies shield and energy as it is the viable techtree already for the toss just to reach blink.
My apologies also for our Zerg Brethren, I know I'm not comparing with their race because they have a fellow melee unit on their tech tree (Zergling/Baneling) and thus the force field can serve the purpose of assisting in defendse, whether at a choke or even in open areas to limit the surface area of the attack.
The toss gateway units are generally weakened to compensate for the warpgate design offensive reinforcement when attacking and thus melt quicker than you can reinforce against the opponent when defending. Just go by DPS figures and you can see that. If you manage to focus fire against Toss, the "life bonus" they get is negated and it reduces the potential DPS that could've/should've been dealt.
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On September 15 2011 20:00 Jayme wrote: It forces you to play one way, because playing defensively as Protoss isn't the most efficient way to play the game. It's not even a very viable option at the top level because the entire warp in mechanic doesn't lend itself to that.
thats funny, because terran is much more forced to be agressive than p.
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On September 15 2011 19:45 kinglemon wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2011 18:29 17Sphynx17 wrote:On September 15 2011 17:54 kinglemon wrote:On September 15 2011 15:54 Bleak wrote:On September 15 2011 15:46 Carmine wrote:I can tell you put a lot of work into your post, but I think your reasoning is not sound. The warp mechanic, by its very nature, crosses "short rally" off of the defender's advantage list for Protoss. An attacking Protoss army and a defending Protoss army will be reinforced just as quickly. You made it sound like this is a weakness for Protoss. Even if Protoss did not have Warp gate mechanics they would reinforce at about the same rate in a defending battle. It only strengthens them offensively. The other player still has a longer rally distance when attacking the Protoss player. This is the point you glossed over when you used your PvP example, using that to validate your points and then dismissing it as automatically balanced. I don't think the game was balanced in the nature that you think it was. I also think it is bad practice to look at a localized imbalance (differences in race mechanics) and claim a net imbalance. The presence of an imbalance must be determined by a lot of games being played, and I don't think there is sufficient evidence to support your claim. Is anyone actually reading? He is saying that because of the warpgate, it is possible to traverse distances instantly and reinforce at your opponent's doorstep. Because of THIS, they have to make gateway units weaker. And he is saying, that this ruined Protoss. but gateway units aren't weak. they are the best units compared to t and z's early units (without updates). sure stim can change a lot, but blink can also change a lot. and to kill a toss with early agressive builds he needs to either be really greedy or just lack in scouting. same can be said for terran and zerg, if they dont scout or be to greedy, they will die to a good timing attack. the important thing is: protoss units are the best and most resistant units out of the 3 races, and they have shields which regenerate very fast. p does not need defensive structures (that much) because the units are aleready pretty strong and defensive in their own way. z and t need defensive structures because their units are so weak in the early game. . Well you have to consider two things when making your analogy. One you mentioned stim comparing to blink, but blink is not a readily accessible at the tech level you are comparing them. well it's only one building, and therefore u have a nice tech tree open up for u once u go for blink. you can go dt, ht, archons or chargelot afterwards. it's not like u would go in an one-way-street, like for example cloak banshee is most of the time. Show nested quote +On September 15 2011 18:27 Brotocol wrote: They are absolutely weak inherently. Warp-in offense compensates for this, in an offensive context.
A stalker costs more than a marauder and loses to it. A stalker costs 125-50 and does slightly less dps than a 50min marine. A zealot costs twice as much as marines, and does less dps than 2 marines, while spending most of its time trying to get in melee range.
Stalkers, at range 6, can't even kite marines properly because they have (1) a slow attack animation and (2) a missile, which has transit time. Watch any pro using stalkers against marines, the stalkers always get hit when they take a shot.
This is not a whine; I think it's fine for Protoss units to have reduced stats so long as it balances warp-in. But P also needs a better option for non-offensive situations. lol, u completely ignore the biggest benefit, their health and shield 1. of course they dont do much damage, but they are tough, and stalkers can shoot air, and they are faster than t units.
Stalkers are tough? Marauders eat Stalkers for breakfast. Even roaches are super cost effective versus Stalkers.
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mmm i wonder if it would have been warpgate in bw as well, when i read this thread surely it would have. T1 and 1.5 units are all super weak. But we can buff them :3. The toss buffs though are really damn strong compared to the other races ones. (Sorry stim take health that doesn't regenerate, so its not as stong as the toss abilitys) Thats why they are a bit more expensiv and take a lil longer. In bw everything was about getting those gateway buffs out as soon as possible. And they weren't as strong there as in sc2. Warp gates are actually there to enable a toss to attack before they have their upgrades out. And not the other way round. So the units are weak because their upgrades are the strongest.
So theoretical if they would remove the warpgate, they would have to buff the t1 units, but nerf their t2 upgrades. So charge wouldn't give the passive speed bonus anymore or only would last 2 seconds and blink cooldown would be doubled. Probably better for weaker players, since they wouldn't have to use skills anymore.
PS: dps might be a factor in games where you have to do 100+ hits to kill something. But in games were its unusual to go above 20 hits it says nothing. (a unit can have 2000 dps, but a unit with 20 dps might kill 10 units while the 2000 dps unit kills 1, and the 5 dps unit kill only 2 but doesn't receive damage while doing so)
It might have been a mistake by blizzard not to force a toss to tech like crazy. (in bw you got the robo + observatory just for obs, while getting the citadell for speed, unimportant if you went ht or reaver, you got both prereqs anyway since you needed them and they were way more expensiv)
edit: to the person above :3 you know why marauders eat stalkers alive, because zealots eat marauders alive. I wouldn't mind if the marauder had no bonus damage (50% of that to normal damage), since I wouldn't need marines against zealots anymore, which are eaten quiet easy by aoes. And no roaches aren't cost effectiv at all. Its more like endless amounts of roaches against 0 stalkers. Well with upgrades its a different thing. But stalkers still poke roaches quiet well with blink vs roach speed. Single units are worthless to compare unless they are only psy and have no bonus damage.
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I was wondering if some mapmacker could do the trick. Like i don't know. Invert building time between warpgates and gateway.
We could try it out ourselves and see if it's doing the trick. If not we are a bunch of idiot.. And if it works. You can send thousands replays to blizzard. Or ask em test the map
Maybe that's just silly but why not ? TL have a lot of good players romaing there. And in fact... a lot of players total.
But maybe i'm just being silly.
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You do realise that Protoss got a big defenders advantage against drops because of the warpgates. And they also can indefinitely stop armies from coming up a ramp for nothing but thin air (energy).
It's fine the way it is and picking on it by considering only a partial aspect of the game is nonsense. See the whole picture.
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The OP really has a point about the results the WarpGate Mechanic has had on Protoss. How its the ability to instantaneously reinforce that gives the Protoss is power.
Personally I believe we don't see enough Warp Prisms. Often the Protosses attempt to establish forward pylons, but as the pace of the game speeds up, it becomes increasingly difficult to hold a position, resulting in Protoss losing that pylon position.
I would like to see the Warp Prism replace the Forward Pylon during the Mid to Late Game. This will allow Protosses to have a forward pylon anywhere they go.
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Why was Protoss even given the Warp Gate mechanic? Were Blizzard so desperate to make changes from Brood War to appear original that they implemented it without thinking of the long term consequences or do they actually have some master plan?
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On September 08 2011 19:19 Detri wrote:I had never thought about Protoss in this way before, nice post and valid points. All I have to say though, is "Chrono boost, Guardian Sheild, Forcefields" Also protoss have the cheapest expand. I know hatcheries are cheaper, but you lose a drone, and need a queen for it to function effectively. And an Orbital is 550 mins. No other race gets spell casters at the lowest tier, and I don't think they need fixed. I'm no balance tester though, I just play for fun But I certainly agree that PvP needs to be more dynamic, instead of being a game of chicken to see who expands first.
Sorry but what you said about protoss expands is pretty funny. Protoss have the most EXPENSIVE expands. Orbitals are 550 but they pay for themselves so they are free if you can keep it up for one mules time, also they can be lifted/ made in the main so that you cannot easily lose them unlike a nexus that is just sitting there taking hits in the open without the ability to flee. Hatcheries do require the queen to function more efficiently but when you first make a expand you will not need that queen asap because you cannot actually fund 2 hatches worth of inject that early on. When you take your third and forth etc... you will have queens premade for spreading creap anyways. Queens are also the swiss army knife of defense and can spread creep to boot.
tl;dr.
Nexus sucks. it costs 400 Orbitals are free. Hatches cost 300. the queen is a bonus since it does stuff, unlike the extra 100 spent on the nexus.
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On September 15 2011 21:48 gkts wrote: You do realise that Protoss got a big defenders advantage against drops because of the warpgates. And they also can indefinitely stop armies from coming up a ramp for nothing but thin air (energy).
It's fine the way it is and picking on it by considering only a partial aspect of the game is nonsense. See the whole picture.
Actually if you look at it from a concept perspective, it is true. But in the implementation of said design, how many can you really warp in to defend your base if you've moved out? Because of the inherent "weakening" of the gateway units, you have a lower chance to fend off the drop play with just the warp in, in actual play.
The OP's point was in considering a partial aspect when it pertains to survivability of the race itself. The Toss gateway units have been weakened and it is a fact because of the warp in design incorporated to it. As such, the whole death ball concept applies whenever the warp in is to be intergrated into that deathball army. But in cases where it is separate, especially to the defend, the weakening causes the overall vulnerability. It may allow you to have warping units onto the defense zone, but warping in is not immediate and you are not really defending but simply either delaying/blocking or just absorbing the damage throughout the warp in stage.
This is considering the whole picture I believe. We are not saying we make the toss units stronger overall but we as toss users are considering an adjustment to the design aspect to allow for a balanced game where toss doesnt have an overwhelming attackers advantage just because we need to raise our defender's advantage.
I think how we are proposing this to be done clearly shows that we are considering balance issues if ever there is a redesign, albeit not radical like removing warpgate altogether from the game.
The shield battery concept is also a valid arguement in that bunkers can be repaired, spine/spores can be healed by the queen and only toss has no "repair/heal" option in battle unlike the other two races. This might help but again we haven't a way to test it out yet so we are theorizing and giving ideas how the said addition won't be abused in the game to cause the race to be IMBA.
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On September 15 2011 22:40 fighter2_40 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 08 2011 19:19 Detri wrote:I had never thought about Protoss in this way before, nice post and valid points. All I have to say though, is "Chrono boost, Guardian Sheild, Forcefields" Also protoss have the cheapest expand. I know hatcheries are cheaper, but you lose a drone, and need a queen for it to function effectively. And an Orbital is 550 mins. No other race gets spell casters at the lowest tier, and I don't think they need fixed. I'm no balance tester though, I just play for fun But I certainly agree that PvP needs to be more dynamic, instead of being a game of chicken to see who expands first. tl;dr. Nexus sucks. it costs 400 Orbitals are free. Hatches cost 300. the queen is a bonus since it does stuff, unlike the extra 100 spent on the nexus.
That's not entirely true. First of all, you forget the cost of the drone in making a hatchery, bringing the total cost to 350. One could argue that the 50 mins required to build the next, or replacement, drone - assuming the first one was mining - equals the cost of the two structures on its own. The queen's 'effectiveness' is another 150 on top of that, or 500.
Also, Nexii may suck but the Chronoboost ability easily accounts for the 50 mineral difference between hatch and Nexus by itself. Protoss don't have to spend 150 mins, or even 50 mins, for the Nexus to immediately start collecting energy. I know Chronoboost is sparsely used, if not misused, especially in the mid to late game. However, Protoss do not have it roughest when it comes to expanding.
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United States7483 Posts
On September 15 2011 22:53 Xivsa wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2011 22:40 fighter2_40 wrote:On September 08 2011 19:19 Detri wrote:I had never thought about Protoss in this way before, nice post and valid points. All I have to say though, is "Chrono boost, Guardian Sheild, Forcefields" Also protoss have the cheapest expand. I know hatcheries are cheaper, but you lose a drone, and need a queen for it to function effectively. And an Orbital is 550 mins. No other race gets spell casters at the lowest tier, and I don't think they need fixed. I'm no balance tester though, I just play for fun But I certainly agree that PvP needs to be more dynamic, instead of being a game of chicken to see who expands first. tl;dr. Nexus sucks. it costs 400 Orbitals are free. Hatches cost 300. the queen is a bonus since it does stuff, unlike the extra 100 spent on the nexus. That's not entirely true. First of all, you forget the cost of the drone in making a hatchery, bringing the total cost to 350. One could argue that the 50 mins required to build the next, or replacement, drone - assuming the first one was mining - equals the cost of the two structures on its own. The queen's 'effectiveness' is another 150 on top of that, or 500. Also, Nexii may suck but the Chronoboost ability easily accounts for the 50 mineral difference between hatch and Nexus by itself. Protoss don't have to spend 150 mins, or even 50 mins, for the Nexus to immediately start collecting energy. I know Chronoboost is sparsely used, if not misused, especially in the mid to late game. However, Protoss do not have it roughest when it comes to expanding.
Zerg's economy builds faster, and he typically has more workers available than protoss past the very early game. Thus, he has more resources overall available to him than protoss, thus can more easily afford to spend 400+ minerals on an expansion. It's easier for zerg to expand because zerg has more money.
This is a dumb argument anyway.
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with shield battery and warp ins i think protoss early pushes and contains would be nigh unbeatable, or at least a lot harder to break, its like a 2 rax rush with medivacs and the rax are at ur ramp
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On September 15 2011 23:07 alisru wrote: with shield battery and warp ins i think protoss early pushes and contains would be nigh unbeatable, or at least a lot harder to break, its like a 2 rax rush with medivacs and the rax are at ur ramp
Yes, it is possible, so from a design perspective, what limitation can be imposed on the shield battery. (1) its cost is to be considered, (2) placement in relation to the base and forward pylon or attack group. (3) Shield battery is immovable surely like BW and therefore the investment losses other than the attack units are the pylon and now quite possibly the shield battery (undefined cost yet). (4) viability in the initial push is all about timing and warp in time for the battery could be substantial, thus you have to wait for it to finish warping in (whose cost affected your overall army count as you invested on the structure), also, the shield battery won't be filled with energy when it arrives also like in BW, the question would be how much energy does it warp in with and what is the max energy it can store/keep.
A scenario would be what if shield battery has max 150 energy but warps in with only 50 energy. If battle engages immediately after the battery warps in, the healing potential is not as substantial and the intended push might even end up becoming, defend the forward shield battery (if he did warp it in).
Figures could adjust in this scenario.
Also, the discussion shouldn't be which race expands better/efficiently as this wasn't the OPs intention. That depends on the timing of the expansion, the quicker you get your FE, the quicker you recoup your resource investment for the long term. Any race will have the immediate risk of the FE falling because of being too greedy.
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I submit that stalkers are weak because of blink rather than warpgates.
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On September 15 2011 22:12 branflakes14 wrote: Why was Protoss even given the Warp Gate mechanic? Were Blizzard so desperate to make changes from Brood War to appear original that they implemented it without thinking of the long term consequences or do they actually have some master plan? I assume the idea was that they wanted every race to macro differently, and in SC1 toss did it exactly like terran. It's a good idea in theory, it just didn't turn out terribly well.
I have to think some of the current design flaws are a result of Blizz deviating from the original design for fear of imbalance. Originally, immortals were gateway units and were our go-to ranged ground unit, with stalkers being for AA and harass, and sentries being robo units. They realized this was too strong with warp gates, and swapped the immortal and sentry. The problem with this is that it pretty much leaves us with the weakest ranged ground unit in the game, forcing us to rely more on power units.
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On September 15 2011 19:45 kinglemon wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2011 18:29 17Sphynx17 wrote:On September 15 2011 17:54 kinglemon wrote:On September 15 2011 15:54 Bleak wrote:On September 15 2011 15:46 Carmine wrote:I can tell you put a lot of work into your post, but I think your reasoning is not sound. The warp mechanic, by its very nature, crosses "short rally" off of the defender's advantage list for Protoss. An attacking Protoss army and a defending Protoss army will be reinforced just as quickly. You made it sound like this is a weakness for Protoss. Even if Protoss did not have Warp gate mechanics they would reinforce at about the same rate in a defending battle. It only strengthens them offensively. The other player still has a longer rally distance when attacking the Protoss player. This is the point you glossed over when you used your PvP example, using that to validate your points and then dismissing it as automatically balanced. I don't think the game was balanced in the nature that you think it was. I also think it is bad practice to look at a localized imbalance (differences in race mechanics) and claim a net imbalance. The presence of an imbalance must be determined by a lot of games being played, and I don't think there is sufficient evidence to support your claim. Is anyone actually reading? He is saying that because of the warpgate, it is possible to traverse distances instantly and reinforce at your opponent's doorstep. Because of THIS, they have to make gateway units weaker. And he is saying, that this ruined Protoss. but gateway units aren't weak. they are the best units compared to t and z's early units (without updates). sure stim can change a lot, but blink can also change a lot. and to kill a toss with early agressive builds he needs to either be really greedy or just lack in scouting. same can be said for terran and zerg, if they dont scout or be to greedy, they will die to a good timing attack. the important thing is: protoss units are the best and most resistant units out of the 3 races, and they have shields which regenerate very fast. p does not need defensive structures (that much) because the units are aleready pretty strong and defensive in their own way. z and t need defensive structures because their units are so weak in the early game. . Well you have to consider two things when making your analogy. One you mentioned stim comparing to blink, but blink is not a readily accessible at the tech level you are comparing them. well it's only one building, and therefore u have a nice tech tree open up for u once u go for blink. you can go dt, ht, archons or chargelot afterwards. it's not like u would go in an one-way-street, like for example cloak banshee is most of the time. Show nested quote +On September 15 2011 18:27 Brotocol wrote: They are absolutely weak inherently. Warp-in offense compensates for this, in an offensive context.
A stalker costs more than a marauder and loses to it. A stalker costs 125-50 and does slightly less dps than a 50min marine. A zealot costs twice as much as marines, and does less dps than 2 marines, while spending most of its time trying to get in melee range.
Stalkers, at range 6, can't even kite marines properly because they have (1) a slow attack animation and (2) a missile, which has transit time. Watch any pro using stalkers against marines, the stalkers always get hit when they take a shot.
This is not a whine; I think it's fine for Protoss units to have reduced stats so long as it balances warp-in. But P also needs a better option for non-offensive situations. lol, u completely ignore the biggest benefit, their health and shield 1. of course they dont do much damage, but they are tough, and stalkers can shoot air, and they are faster than t units.
- P shields are not a benefit in combat. I addressed that already. In fact, shields ignore armor upgrades the P units might have. They only regen when outside of combat for a while.
- The health advantage is not proportional to the dps/cost advantage T units have. P units lose for cost, that is the outcome.
Instant reinforcement makes Gate units viable on offense. But in any other situation, they're a bit underpowered because of this.
Shield battery would help immensely.
Although, at the same time, I can't help but feel it's a band-aid fix. There's a fundamental design problem, with FF and Warpgates. It kind of turns P balance into a crapshoot.
I could be wrong of course, but this is how I see it (agreeing with the OP's premise).
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just throwing this out there, because it may just be retarded in the end...
But what if there was added incentive to keep gateways as gateways? Why is it that warpgates are a must in all situations for gateway tech? What if there were some change in the way the two work which allowed gateways to be more preferable for building armies within your base/defensive position and then have warpgates be used for mostly offensive reinforcement/sneaky infiltration.
I wouldn't know how to deal or approach this, but I have one idea, which could have possibilites or variations. But what if they removed the warpgate upgrade and just made the Cyber Core as the requirement to morph the building, so no research would be required to warp in units. Instead of the warpgate research, they swap it out for improved chronoboost on Gateways. Which would allow you get get faster warp ins on the short distance or maybe cut the energy cost of chronoboosting a Gateway, but nothing drastic, just intended to equalize the reinforce distance.
Or, what if they added a variable into the Warpgate cooldown. The further you warp a unit in from the Warpgate, the longer the cooldown.
Could this (or something like it) allow for more variability in protoss macro in the perspective of short v. long distance reinforcements?
Terrans can reactor swap to micro their macro, so would it be helpful or further protoss game mechanics to allow them the same thing.
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United States7483 Posts
On September 16 2011 02:56 getter1 wrote: just throwing this out there, because it may just be retarded in the end...
But what if there was added incentive to keep gateways as gateways? Why is it that warpgates are a must in all situations for gateway tech? What if there were some change in the way the two work which allowed gateways to be more preferable for building armies within your base/defensive position and then have warpgates be used for mostly offensive reinforcement/sneaky infiltration.
I wouldn't know how to deal or approach this, but I have one idea, which could have possibilites or variations. But what if they removed the warpgate upgrade and just made the Cyber Core as the requirement to morph the building, so no research would be required to warp in units. Instead of the warpgate research, they swap it out for improved chronoboost on Gateways. Which would allow you get get faster warp ins on the short distance, but nothing drastic, just intended to equalize the reinforce distance.
Or, what if they added a variable into the Warpgate cooldown. The further you warp a unit in from the Warpgate, the longer the cooldown.
Could this (or something like it) allow for more variability in protoss macro in the perspective of short v. long distance reinforcements?
Terrans can reactor swap to micro their macro, so would it be helpful or further protoss game mechanics to allow them the same thing.
Blizzard has said, officially, that they want warp gates to be required for all protoss players every game and they don't want people staying with regular gateways. That is their design vision.
So that's what's stopping them from implementing it: they don't want to.
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On September 16 2011 02:59 Whitewing wrote:Show nested quote +On September 16 2011 02:56 getter1 wrote: just throwing this out there, because it may just be retarded in the end...
But what if there was added incentive to keep gateways as gateways? Why is it that warpgates are a must in all situations for gateway tech? What if there were some change in the way the two work which allowed gateways to be more preferable for building armies within your base/defensive position and then have warpgates be used for mostly offensive reinforcement/sneaky infiltration.
I wouldn't know how to deal or approach this, but I have one idea, which could have possibilites or variations. But what if they removed the warpgate upgrade and just made the Cyber Core as the requirement to morph the building, so no research would be required to warp in units. Instead of the warpgate research, they swap it out for improved chronoboost on Gateways. Which would allow you get get faster warp ins on the short distance, but nothing drastic, just intended to equalize the reinforce distance.
Or, what if they added a variable into the Warpgate cooldown. The further you warp a unit in from the Warpgate, the longer the cooldown.
Could this (or something like it) allow for more variability in protoss macro in the perspective of short v. long distance reinforcements?
Terrans can reactor swap to micro their macro, so would it be helpful or further protoss game mechanics to allow them the same thing.
Blizzard has said, officially, that they want warp gates to be required for all protoss players every game and they don't want people staying with regular gateways. That is their design vision. So that's what's stopping them from implementing it: they don't want to.
Well under what I suggested, warpgates would still be required. Its just their usage is more on-demand for when the protoss is doing the attacking. But yeah, can't really debate blizzard stubbornness.
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Every race has its own pros and cons so get used to it guys, or change race.Imo warp tech is very usefull, u can just warp 4-5 units in your base when terran drops and dont have to move your army from other side of the map.When attacking you can instantly reinforce your army if u have a pylon nearby, and you dont wait 20 sec or more for your army to corss the whole map.
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On September 16 2011 03:07 ihug wrote: Every race has its own pros and cons so get used to it guys, or change race.Imo warp tech is very usefull, u can just warp 4-5 units in your base when terran drops and dont have to move your army from other side of the map.When attacking you can instantly reinforce your army if u have a pylon nearby, and you dont wait 20 sec or more for your army to corss the whole map.
your first point is a completely useless point. A Terran drop can wipe the floor with any 5 units that you instantly warp in from Warpgates since Terran units are significantly more efficient than Protoss Gateway units.
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I have an idea to change up the shield battery that would ensure it stayed defensive and open up PvP. Make the nexus somehow upgradeable to allow for it's energy to be converted into shields, therefore sacrificing chronoboost a little in order to survive an early push. It would prevent protoss from proxying a shield battery and also make PvP less volatile. Your welcome blizzard, I'll be expecting a cheque.
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true. The biggest defenders advantage is the distance between bases. Warp-in annihilates this. This is problematic in all PvX match-ups but especially PvP.
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What do you think of making the pylon have an upgrade that allows the warpgate mechanic to work instead of allowing any pylon do it. (this is only applicable to a single pylon such as an overlord and overseer
Say for example a 50 min 75 gas cost to upgrade and a 10-20 second upgrade time That way a protoss cant spam proxies everywhere in a map without much of a punishment for doing so. This makes for more strategic placing and choice on where to place proxies everywhere and encourage warp prism play
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On September 15 2011 19:48 zergrushkekeke wrote: I don't think the warp mechanic broke protoss, the game is fine. Each races unique abilities and characteristics allow equally skilled players to be evenly matched.
Zerg have to expand early to keep their production (larva) up to scratch, giving up the ramp and spreading their early defenses over 2 bases. The larva mechanic didn't break zerg.
A better SC2 example is how terran can use pure mules for minerals and cut workers endgame, this doesn't break terran, it is compensated by all the other stuff going on with all 3 races.
If the protoss really was lacking a defenders advantage why aren't all PvX games won decisively by the opponent playing aggressively? I know you are saying that they even out the mechanic by weakening the units overall, but it is balanced out or we would see statistical evidence showing so.
And finally from a non protoss players point of view the main thing scaring me off over-aggressively engaging an economic protoss early is forcefields, which do work differently for an attacking or defending protoss. The problem is not actually that the Protoss has a weak defender's advantage. It is that their attacks are too strong, which has forced blizzard to balance the game around their attack, rather than their defense. You don't see people crushing Toss with aggressive play because toss builds are currently designed to exclusively exploit offense, because a defensive game is inefficient. It's only balanced out because of the current meta--but it forces toss to only play one way.
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i thought about this alot before the fact of no defender advantage with warpgate the fact that a warpgate can turn back into a regular gate gave me an idea what if building units from a normal gateway took less time than warping in units that way there is an inherit advantage when defending but if you wanna go attack just switch your gateways u can warp in units at a little bit of a cooldown penalty i would also make the time it takes to switch back and forth from gateway to warp mode a little faster well just a thought :D
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I agree with the OP completely.
I find I can't really take SC2 very seriously as an esport with such a (in my mind) glaring design flaw.
At least addressing it with something like an increase in warp-in time depending on the distance of the producing structure or even just moving WG to a higher tech tier while adding another defensive ability (like the Shield Battery) where WG currently is.
If Blizzard wants all players always using WG and never Gateways.. why is the option to revert to Gateway even there?
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On September 16 2011 03:46 Dan885 wrote: i thought about this alot before the fact of no defender advantage with warpgate the fact that a warpgate can turn back into a regular gate gave me an idea what if building units from a normal gateway took less time than warping in units that way there is an inherit advantage when defending but if you wanna go attack just switch your gateways u can warp in units at a little bit of a cooldown penalty i would also make the time it takes to switch back and forth from gateway to warp mode a little faster well just a thought :D
This idea has been entertained multiple times. The only issue is that macro-ing with Warp-Gate has been practiced for over a year now... it would be a brutal change for all Protoss players to adjust to. Imagine if now you had to detach the techlab from the Barracks to make a Marine, but then reattach it to make a Marauder.
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On September 16 2011 03:49 QTIP. wrote:Show nested quote +On September 16 2011 03:46 Dan885 wrote: i thought about this alot before the fact of no defender advantage with warpgate the fact that a warpgate can turn back into a regular gate gave me an idea what if building units from a normal gateway took less time than warping in units that way there is an inherit advantage when defending but if you wanna go attack just switch your gateways u can warp in units at a little bit of a cooldown penalty i would also make the time it takes to switch back and forth from gateway to warp mode a little faster well just a thought :D This idea has been entertained multiple times. The only issue is that macro-ing with Warp-Gate has been practiced for over a year now... it would be a brutal change for all Protoss players to adjust to. Imagine if now you had to detach the techlab from the Barracks to make a Marine, but then reattach it to make a Marauder.
i disagree since the macro mechanic is the same as a regular gateway a stargate or a robo just selecting the building and a unit if your referring to the micro of transforming it back and forth from a warpgate to a gateway. this isnt something that should be done multiple times in a short time frame. only if your like im going to attack and set my proxy pylon then simply click to make them warpgates. your analogy fails short because the reattaching and detaching would be for the purpose of choosing a different unit to build while with warpgates u can always build the same units its just whether you click s once and wait for it to come out of s and then click into a pylon toss players have always done the as well as the fact i proposed it being faster the transformation which is already fast and takes one button to do to reattach a lab you have to lift and land taking 3 times as many actions so yea i dont see how this would be a big deal for the players especially diamond and above to adapt and benefit
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On September 16 2011 03:03 getter1 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 16 2011 02:59 Whitewing wrote:On September 16 2011 02:56 getter1 wrote: just throwing this out there, because it may just be retarded in the end...
But what if there was added incentive to keep gateways as gateways? Why is it that warpgates are a must in all situations for gateway tech? What if there were some change in the way the two work which allowed gateways to be more preferable for building armies within your base/defensive position and then have warpgates be used for mostly offensive reinforcement/sneaky infiltration.
I wouldn't know how to deal or approach this, but I have one idea, which could have possibilites or variations. But what if they removed the warpgate upgrade and just made the Cyber Core as the requirement to morph the building, so no research would be required to warp in units. Instead of the warpgate research, they swap it out for improved chronoboost on Gateways. Which would allow you get get faster warp ins on the short distance, but nothing drastic, just intended to equalize the reinforce distance.
Or, what if they added a variable into the Warpgate cooldown. The further you warp a unit in from the Warpgate, the longer the cooldown.
Could this (or something like it) allow for more variability in protoss macro in the perspective of short v. long distance reinforcements?
Terrans can reactor swap to micro their macro, so would it be helpful or further protoss game mechanics to allow them the same thing.
Blizzard has said, officially, that they want warp gates to be required for all protoss players every game and they don't want people staying with regular gateways. That is their design vision. So that's what's stopping them from implementing it: they don't want to. Well under what I suggested, warpgates would still be required. Its just their usage is more on-demand for when the protoss is doing the attacking. But yeah, can't really debate blizzard stubbornness. Yes, but maybe the existing issues can motivate them. Plus, that position conflicts with their overarching motto of strategic variety.
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On September 16 2011 06:21 Dan885 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 16 2011 03:49 QTIP. wrote:On September 16 2011 03:46 Dan885 wrote: i thought about this alot before the fact of no defender advantage with warpgate the fact that a warpgate can turn back into a regular gate gave me an idea what if building units from a normal gateway took less time than warping in units that way there is an inherit advantage when defending but if you wanna go attack just switch your gateways u can warp in units at a little bit of a cooldown penalty i would also make the time it takes to switch back and forth from gateway to warp mode a little faster well just a thought :D This idea has been entertained multiple times. The only issue is that macro-ing with Warp-Gate has been practiced for over a year now... it would be a brutal change for all Protoss players to adjust to. Imagine if now you had to detach the techlab from the Barracks to make a Marine, but then reattach it to make a Marauder. i disagree since the macro mechanic is the same as a regular gateway a stargate or a robo just selecting the building and a unit if your referring to the micro of transforming it back and forth from a warpgate to a gateway. this isnt something that should be done multiple times in a short time frame. only if your like im going to attack and set my proxy pylon then simply click to make them warpgates. your analogy fails short because the reattaching and detaching would be for the purpose of choosing a different unit to build while with warpgates u can always build the same units its just whether you click s once and wait for it to come out of s and then click into a pylon toss players have always done the as well as the fact i proposed it being faster the transformation which is already fast and takes one button to do to reattach a lab you have to lift and land taking 3 times as many actions so yea i dont see how this would be a big deal for the players especially diamond and above to adapt and benefit
Man..... kinda hard to read your paragraph without lack of punctuation. But I do admit my analogy is not perfect, I was more hinting at the difficulty of making such a drastic adjustment at this time. Nearly every timing (Gateway morph time) / strategy would be thrown off by this change and this would amplified 100 times over at the GSL Level. Another thing to consider would be the Map size and calculating unit travel distances in deciding which Gateway configuration to use. It would be unfair to ask Protoss players to accept such a change to their core macro mechanic. There would be so many additional factors to consider, and Protoss would get raped while they try to figure this out. It would not be received well and it doesn't make sense for a year old game being played competitively for large sums of money.
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Good read, it makes sense that protoss have to make an entirely other building and use more minerals for defense. Its something I would like blizzard to overlook in the future or maybe in the expansion coming out next year.
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Here's an idea from reading the OP. I haven't read the whole thread though.
Why not give Gateways an ability similar to the Shield Battery. Something that casts about once a minute, about siege tank range and can restore full shields to a stalker. This ability is disabled when the Gateway is morphed to a Warpgate.
Protoss would then have options of mixing Gateways and Warpgates for defense. 3-WG 1-GW defense? 2-WG 2-GW? 3-GW Robo?
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On September 16 2011 10:34 Don.681 wrote: Here's an idea from reading the OP. I haven't read the whole thread though.
Why not give Gateways an ability similar to the Shield Battery. Something that casts about once a minute, about siege tank range and can restore full shields to a stalker. This ability is disabled when the Gateway is morphed to a Warpgate.
Protoss would then have options of mixing Gateways and Warpgates for defense. 3-WG 1-GW defense? 2-WG 2-GW? 3-GW Robo?
That's actually quite interesting. Giving a Protoss the choice between being more offensive and being more defensive through the Gateway itself..
That's kind of a huge change. But.. two expansions left! Hope!
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Interesting way of thinking about the warpgate mechanic! While I mildly agree, I don't want to see a shield battery... I can't even remember which game it was with that hero dragoon (30+ kills)... maybe it was Bisu .. ?
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On September 16 2011 10:57 Temporarykid wrote: Interesting way of thinking about the warpgate mechanic! While I mildly agree, I don't want to see a shield battery... I can't even remember which game it was with that hero dragoon (30+ kills)... maybe it was Bisu .. ? Yeah because we definitely don't want to have even one epic game... Come on the shield battery is a no brainer addition to HotS. But with these patches, who knows what kind of brains Blizzard has
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what i feel they could do is change the way warpgate works. maybe by distance from warp in point to the warpgate. if it's closer, warp gate cd faster and vice versa. we might see less 4gate micro pvp and p might stand more chance against the much feared 1/1/1
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Dear lord, how many times have i wished to have the shield battery back. Why Blizzard, why oh why did you take it away?
I also kinda like the idea of nexus/gateways affecting warpins somehow, like maybe you can only warp in a certain (large) radius from a nexus/gate, or the farther you are the longer it takes, etc etc.
As it is now I agree that the warpin mechanic is kind of just bad and I don't like it very much.
BTW I am protoss.
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So no one found the idea of making a map with invert building times on warp and gates valuable ?
Thought that was a good one. So my bad.
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On September 16 2011 20:27 FFW_Rude wrote: So no one found the idea of making a map with invert building times on warp and gates valuable ?
Thought that was a good one. So my bad. 1) It would break early game - back to 2gate against Zerg and Terran would die without walling. 2) After early game, everyone would convert everything to warpgates and build one more of them to make up for the nerfed buildtime.
Also, it's been suggested a billion times despite it being obvious Blizzard wants gateways to disappear - the tech is only researched so you can't warp zealots into your opponents base in 2 minutes.
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The OP is right with most of what he says, but the conclusions are wrong. Protoss has four big defenders advantages as well:
-) (the biggest of all defenders advantages in all of the game) push timing: an attacking army always is an army, that doesn not implement recently mined ressouces. It can always only be so strong, as the ressources mined when the push started to move over the map, meaning usually that a defender is ~30+sec ahead in a battle. That's another round of units. That might be the difference between having a tech unit (storm, colossus, more forcefields), or not having them. -) workers: you can still pull your workers -) opponents reinforcements: they still have to run all over the map -) stray buildings: this one gets mostly forgotten, but whenever it is not open space,some units will start shooting buildings (or overlords, or whatever), which means the attacking army will lose some firepower, compared to fighting home or on open space.
ofc in PvP in warp gate fights, you lose some of those advantages
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On September 16 2011 20:33 Yaotzin wrote:Show nested quote +On September 16 2011 20:27 FFW_Rude wrote: So no one found the idea of making a map with invert building times on warp and gates valuable ?
Thought that was a good one. So my bad. 1) It would break early game - back to 2gate against Zerg and Terran would die without walling. 2) After early game, everyone would convert everything to warpgates and build one more of them to make up for the nerfed buildtime. Also, it's been suggested a billion times despite it being obvious Blizzard wants gateways to disappear - the tech is only researched so you can't warp zealots into your opponents base in 2 minutes.
Duh i forgot about the 2gate build
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Currently warp gates are designed to be better than gateways. What if instead there was a tradeoff?
Some ideas (each separately or might combine elements): 1) make warp gate upgrade very fast but warp gates build units just as fast or slower than building from gateways -> you trade the ability to warp anywhere vs faster build time and easier macro
2) make warp gates available from beginning of game. Time to change gateways into warp gates = time to build a unit -> tradeoff flexibility later for units now. Early game is more gate heavy and late game you might convert everything into warp gates when you have enough of an army (e.g. Before a push so you can reinforce)
I personally would enjoy these kinds of decisions more and they could allow for changes in Protoss gameplay.
Comments?
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Perhaps instead of trying to change the warp mechanic, a way of giving toss a defenders advantage in PvP would be to provide an ability that would cause any enemy pylon in range to be unable to be used as a warp in area.
Perhaps allow the Cybernetics Core while being Chrono boosted to create at aura with x range (siege tank range perhaps) that will do this.
This might help PvP since the attacking toss proxy pylon has to be further away. The chrono boost requirement will stop this from being a complete counter but also require micro and timing to block off the attackers warp ins.
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I think the viability of Protoss fast expands vs Terran are hindered by the marauder. So good vs cannons, it makes them a bad investment.
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When playing as a Terran or Zerg, you naturally have several advantages as a defender before you even build a unit. First, your ramp - the narrow choke allows your units to have a concave against a bunched up pack trying to push its way up the ramp. Second, your production - your rally distances are much, much shorter than if you were out in the middle of the map, so you can produce less units and still defend, because your second wave comes quickly.
Also, both Terrans and Zergs have access to a defensive structure after building their first basic unit production structure. The spine crawler only requires a spawning pool, and the bunker only requires a barracks. These structures can be produced as a reaction to a scouted push in order to provide you with an additional advantage as a defender, which can help mitigating the loss of the ramp advantage when you expand.
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This is absolutely retarded and another example of Protoss complaining because the ludicrous 3base deathball no longer works, also not taking into account how 1 thing balances against another, you mention that Terran and Zerg have an advantage in 'the ramp', first off, so do protoss meaning that comment is completely void, Second, The production advantage of being closer to your base, you say that T and Z have this advantage but protoss can warp up field meaning that actually Protoss have an offensive advantage, again balanced by the T and Z faster reinforcements while defending. Third, You mention that T and Z have a 'tier 1' defensive structure in which only a Spawning pool or a barracks have to be made, your again forgetting to take into account that Protoss have a defensive structure that shoots up, (yeah so does bunker but it requires units that shoot up so it balances in that regard) meaning that the reason your cannon requires a forge is because the forge is the equivalent to zergs Evolution chamber which zerg requires to build spores which are required to shoot up, then you go on to say that you can build these structures in response to scouting an attack, and remain strong despite losing your ramp for defence. This comment is pointless, you are the most stereotypical Protoss i've ever had the pleasure of correcting. L2P
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I really really like the idea others mentioned to only allow warp-ins around Nexi and Warp Prims. Why?
- Warp-in could still be used defensively but would require a midgame unit to be used on offense. This would eliminate the 4-gate and 6-gate before robotics. - Warp Prisms would suddenly be not just cute but actually indispensable to have with your army, like Medivacs. - The Shield Battery could then be introduced without it being overpowered if set up at a forward pylon - Warpgate Research would no longer monopolize the Cybernetics Core, allowing Hallucination to be researched much earlier. - To compensate in the early game, stalker and sentry build time from the gateway could be reduced.
I realize that this might be a bit radical even for an expansion pack, but other than that I think it is a really good idea. Thoughts?
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About the warpin rally point... I think you're looking at it a bit backwards.
Protoss DO have a rally advantage when defending. Defensive warpin is the exact same thing as shorter rallies for the other races.
Protoss on the offense have an EXTRA rally advantage that the other races don't have. This doesn't mean that they lose the defender's rally advantage because of this... they enjoy an advantage (in this regard) under both scenarios.
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On September 18 2011 00:33 SnNBroadcasting wrote:
When playing as a Terran or Zerg, you naturally have several advantages as a defender before you even build a unit. First, your ramp - the narrow choke allows your units to have a concave against a bunched up pack trying to push its way up the ramp. Second, your production - your rally distances are much, much shorter than if you were out in the middle of the map, so you can produce less units and still defend, because your second wave comes quickly.
Also, both Terrans and Zergs have access to a defensive structure after building their first basic unit production structure. The spine crawler only requires a spawning pool, and the bunker only requires a barracks. These structures can be produced as a reaction to a scouted push in order to provide you with an additional advantage as a defender, which can help mitigating the loss of the ramp advantage when you expand.
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This is absolutely retarded and another example of Protoss complaining because the ludicrous 3base deathball no longer works, also not taking into account how 1 thing balances against another, you mention that Terran and Zerg have an advantage in 'the ramp', first off, so do protoss meaning that comment is completely void, Second, The production advantage of being closer to your base, you say that T and Z have this advantage but protoss can warp up field meaning that actually Protoss have an offensive advantage, again balanced by the T and Z faster reinforcements while defending. Third, You mention that T and Z have a 'tier 1' defensive structure in which only a Spawning pool or a barracks have to be made, your again forgetting to take into account that Protoss have a defensive structure that shoots up, (yeah so does bunker but it requires units that shoot up so it balances in that regard) meaning that the reason your cannon requires a forge is because the forge is the equivalent to zergs Evolution chamber which zerg requires to build spores which are required to shoot up, then you go on to say that you can build these structures in response to scouting an attack, and remain strong despite losing your ramp for defence. This comment is pointless, you are the most stereotypical Protoss i've ever had the pleasure of correcting. L2P . You seem sort of like a troll... There are more decent ways to make your point. Also the OP claims that not only are ramps available to toss, but they become the "only hope" per say- using sentry micro. He lumps it with T&Z to be exhaustive about listing all of their options as compared to Protoss. So your first point is well thought out but a cheap shot nonetheless because you didn't give the OP a chance on your readthrough. Other issue is, when did he mention a lategame disadvantage? Otherwise, I agree with your static defense point entirely. Even though Marines are the first unit a Terran gets. Those marines make the cost of a bunker, what, double that of a cannon? Double and 50?
Last thing before I back off for fear you are a well known broadcaster and out of acknowledgement of my "small contribute" hypocrisy either way. You use the word "retarded" often enough and in such a way as to make me wonder if you are really very mature.
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On October 11 2011 05:25 PTZ.772 wrote: About the warpin rally point... I think you're looking at it a bit backwards.
Protoss DO have a rally advantage when defending. Defensive warpin is the exact same thing as shorter rallies for the other races.
Protoss on the offense have an EXTRA rally advantage that the other races don't have. This doesn't mean that they lose the defender's rally advantage because of this... they enjoy an advantage (in this regard) under both scenarios. This. I agree completely even having lost in exactly the way the op describes more than once. It is great for crisis response.
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On September 16 2011 20:33 Yaotzin wrote:Show nested quote +On September 16 2011 20:27 FFW_Rude wrote: So no one found the idea of making a map with invert building times on warp and gates valuable ?
Thought that was a good one. So my bad. 1) It would break early game - back to 2gate against Zerg and Terran would die without walling. 2) After early game, everyone would convert everything to warpgates and build one more of them to make up for the nerfed buildtime. Also, it's been suggested a billion times despite it being obvious Blizzard wants gateways to disappear - the tech is only researched so you can't warp zealots into your opponents base in 2 minutes. 1) It would break early game? Really? You just tweak the times a bit and it's fine. 2) Possibly, but you don't know that unless it is tested.
Besides, it doesn't matter if Blizzard wants gateways to disappear if it helps strategic variety and gives amazing macro players reason to not do warp gates.
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It just comes down that unit efficiency. In a defensive context, a Protoss gateway army is weaker than a Terran or Zerg army. I'm not saying that gateway armies are weaker in general! Just in a defensive context, in terms of efficiency.
This part of the OP's post i do not agree with one bit. A Defending protoss can abuse building chokes extremely well against Zerg in most situations even when Broods are out. because of their Cannon walls and better ranged units etc.
This is why a 3 base Protoss can sometimes Crush a 5 base Zerg... And if the Protoss Micro is Superb can Abuse that much more than a Zerg Army.
Protoss may not be good/or efficient at defending vs Terran but Zerg have to throw alot of units away....--- actually a ton if they want to break a Protoss who defends Properly
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On September 18 2011 00:33 SnNBroadcasting wrote:
When playing as a Terran or Zerg, you naturally have several advantages as a defender before you even build a unit. First, your ramp - the narrow choke allows your units to have a concave against a bunched up pack trying to push its way up the ramp. Second, your production - your rally distances are much, much shorter than if you were out in the middle of the map, so you can produce less units and still defend, because your second wave comes quickly.
Also, both Terrans and Zergs have access to a defensive structure after building their first basic unit production structure. The spine crawler only requires a spawning pool, and the bunker only requires a barracks. These structures can be produced as a reaction to a scouted push in order to provide you with an additional advantage as a defender, which can help mitigating the loss of the ramp advantage when you expand.
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This is absolutely retarded and another example of Protoss complaining because the ludicrous 3base deathball no longer works, also not taking into account how 1 thing balances against another, you mention that Terran and Zerg have an advantage in 'the ramp', first off, so do protoss meaning that comment is completely void, Second, The production advantage of being closer to your base, you say that T and Z have this advantage but protoss can warp up field meaning that actually Protoss have an offensive advantage, again balanced by the T and Z faster reinforcements while defending. Third, You mention that T and Z have a 'tier 1' defensive structure in which only a Spawning pool or a barracks have to be made, your again forgetting to take into account that Protoss have a defensive structure that shoots up, (yeah so does bunker but it requires units that shoot up so it balances in that regard) meaning that the reason your cannon requires a forge is because the forge is the equivalent to zergs Evolution chamber which zerg requires to build spores which are required to shoot up, then you go on to say that you can build these structures in response to scouting an attack, and remain strong despite losing your ramp for defence. This comment is pointless, you are the most stereotypical Protoss i've ever had the pleasure of correcting. L2P
Very True my friend well spoken ... in many Situations Zerg are at the Disadvantage vs protoss at the Ramp (depending on Army size and Composition)
But most of the time Zerg are at a Disadvantage in this Situation ... Not so much Terran.
But yeah i noticed that in the OP's Post as well..
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On October 11 2011 15:31 XRaDiiX wrote:Show nested quote +On September 18 2011 00:33 SnNBroadcasting wrote:
When playing as a Terran or Zerg, you naturally have several advantages as a defender before you even build a unit. First, your ramp - the narrow choke allows your units to have a concave against a bunched up pack trying to push its way up the ramp. Second, your production - your rally distances are much, much shorter than if you were out in the middle of the map, so you can produce less units and still defend, because your second wave comes quickly.
Also, both Terrans and Zergs have access to a defensive structure after building their first basic unit production structure. The spine crawler only requires a spawning pool, and the bunker only requires a barracks. These structures can be produced as a reaction to a scouted push in order to provide you with an additional advantage as a defender, which can help mitigating the loss of the ramp advantage when you expand.
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This is absolutely retarded and another example of Protoss complaining because the ludicrous 3base deathball no longer works, also not taking into account how 1 thing balances against another, you mention that Terran and Zerg have an advantage in 'the ramp', first off, so do protoss meaning that comment is completely void, Second, The production advantage of being closer to your base, you say that T and Z have this advantage but protoss can warp up field meaning that actually Protoss have an offensive advantage, again balanced by the T and Z faster reinforcements while defending. Third, You mention that T and Z have a 'tier 1' defensive structure in which only a Spawning pool or a barracks have to be made, your again forgetting to take into account that Protoss have a defensive structure that shoots up, (yeah so does bunker but it requires units that shoot up so it balances in that regard) meaning that the reason your cannon requires a forge is because the forge is the equivalent to zergs Evolution chamber which zerg requires to build spores which are required to shoot up, then you go on to say that you can build these structures in response to scouting an attack, and remain strong despite losing your ramp for defence. This comment is pointless, you are the most stereotypical Protoss i've ever had the pleasure of correcting. L2P Very True my friend well spoken ... in many Situations Zerg are at the Disadvantage vs protoss at the Ramp (depending on Army size and Composition) But most of the time Zerg are at a Disadvantage in this Situation ... Not so much Terran. But yeah i noticed that in the OP's Post as well.. . Also Terran can give Zerg a lot of grief should the Zerg attack too early. I think the OP is noticing a characteristic change between races and calling it IMBA for a large part of his analysis. Dissimilarity with an equal chance of victory is what separated Starcraft from "Warcraft in Space". So we occasionally run into differences that may seem unfair, such as slightly more difficult early defense for Protoss and slightly more difficult early aggression for Zerg. One could also complain about early detection for Zerg or... Or... Well I don't really know what Terran can complain about right now. But there's probably something. But warp tech is cool, useful, and oh, did I mention cool? Because coolness is a huge part of mainstream RTS fanfare, no? Still don't completely disagree with OP though. I want Sheild battery because I'm Protoss and therefore always want almost IMBA things given to Protoss.
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I honestly can't believe that this ridiculous thread got resurrected. Let it die. Not all races are equal in all regards, we should seriously stop discussing it because as it stands now, Protoss is the weakest race anyway, and the game itself is balanced for all intents and purposes.
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hahahah this is just pointless. let this thread die pls
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On October 05 2011 06:07 eugalp wrote: I really really like the idea others mentioned to only allow warp-ins around Nexi and Warp Prims. Why?
- Warp-in could still be used defensively but would require a midgame unit to be used on offense. This would eliminate the 4-gate and 6-gate before robotics. - Warp Prisms would suddenly be not just cute but actually indispensable to have with your army, like Medivacs. - The Shield Battery could then be introduced without it being overpowered if set up at a forward pylon - Warpgate Research would no longer monopolize the Cybernetics Core, allowing Hallucination to be researched much earlier. - To compensate in the early game, stalker and sentry build time from the gateway could be reduced.
I realize that this might be a bit radical even for an expansion pack, but other than that I think it is a really good idea. Thoughts?
Some interesting ideas for sure. However, the one problem I do see is that building frequent Warp Prisms (because let's face it, some are going to be destroyed over the course of a match) really would stress the Robotics Facility which already is over-stressed when you are already trying to build Colossus and Observers whenever they get sniped.
Aside from that, some neat points to be considered. =)
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United States15275 Posts
On October 12 2011 05:34 xlava wrote: I honestly can't believe that this ridiculous thread got resurrected. Let it die. Not all races are equal in all regards, we should seriously stop discussing it because as it stands now, Protoss is the weakest race anyway, and the game itself is balanced for all intents and purposes.
So a weakest race can exist yet the game itself is balanced? I can't take someone seriously when they contradict themselves in one sentence.
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I have a feeling that the Shield Battery may very likely be added in an expansion.
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To be honest i find the protoss v terran or zerg to be relitively balanced and defending to be fine on that front but i think oddly enough the most imbalanced thing about protoss is in its mirror match up. However, i dont think its really all to do with the warpgate mechanic because i think protoss has gained more form warpgates than lost over all (also you dont have to use them if you are really opposed to it).
I just find the protoss v protoss match up to basically consist of nothing but all ins or come down to one major fight and that end the entire game. Partly this is warpgate related also because as protoss we tend to warp units closer into combat and have them enter the fight right away, where as terran and zerg macro back at home and if their forward army is defeated they have a secondary army to defend with allowing them to macro up a new army and still be in the game.
-Ardure
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On September 08 2011 19:07 MCMXVI wrote: Good read, and I agree. Not only is it easier for terran to macro than for protoss and zerg (warp in and larva injects instead of queue queue queue), but to your question; how should they make offensive warp-ins weaker? Units spawn with less shields or armor or something?
So you haven't noticed a button called "W" on ur screen? Its a button only toss has. Generally macro as toss is considered easiest.
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Consider that: (maybe it has allready been mentionnend)
- Warp technology directly on Gateways. Warp cooldown to be adjusted accordingly to balance. - Gateways have a "warp power" radius around them. - Shorter Cooldown resercheable at Cybercore. - Pylon "warp power" resercheable at Forge (or at shiel battery? :p ) .
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Shield Battery won't change ghosts effect in PvT, maybe more likely in PvZ and PvP.
Regarding the mothership in my eyes you shouldn't be able to neutral parasite it, fungal it or emp it. It's a hero unit.
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Move warpgate tech to twilight council. Buff gateway units.
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I've been wondering about this.
What you say is true, but couldn't Warpgates be adapted to be a factor of territorial control? Like Siege Tanks in other match-ups. I imagine, if Gateway units were balanced defensively rather than offensively, so that they would be fine in defence but too powerful in offence, then the game would be about preventing the Protoss from getting his army with Pylon support into your territory. I figure this could lead to Pylon-pushes.
'Course, there are a few things that would need to happen for that, I think. First off, Warp Gate tech would need to be pushed to higher tech (say, Twilight Council or Templar Archives), since players may not have the map control early game to deny Pylon rushes, but normal Gateway production time would be brought back down to normal.
And Warp-ins need to be more vulnerable. Right now if a unit dies during Warp-in, it gives a full refund and resets the cooldown. That should be inverted so that once the warp-in begins, the unit is already bought, for good or ill. No refund at all. Warping-in directly to the battlefield should be riskier than back home.
Also, Khaydarin Amulet. Templar with Storm are extremely powerful defensively, but very slow and vulnerable on the offence. This would also reinforce the territorial control aspect of Pylon pushes.
Anyway, that's how it sounds to me in theorycraft, I'd like to know the thoughts of better players on this concept.
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mmm i still like warpgates and i think toss has enough defenders advantages. (i mean you get 10 second build time units when switching from gate to warp). The biggest is probably the stalker being able to outrun everything so you can basically siege the opponent from the start. The Other is force fields and shield regeneration. I like that the defenders advantage is so different from the other races . (not a static one)
But they could add a research to the core turning the nexus into a shield battery, would help defending and delay offensive as it delays the warp gate. Also 2 nexus 2 batteries . What i would find interesting is a small chronoboost that works on units in the energy grid that would activate shield regeneration asap, but would of course stop if the unit gets hit. But that would probably be to imbalanced late game hehe.
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On October 12 2011 06:29 eYeball wrote: Shield Battery won't change ghosts effect in PvT, maybe more likely in PvZ and PvP.
Regarding the mothership in my eyes you shouldn't be able to neutral parasite it, fungal it or emp it. It's a hero unit.
the mothership shouldn't exist in multiplayer. it's a joke unit. just make protoss not be terrible and one dimensional and remove the gd mothership.
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On October 12 2011 06:46 Fanatic-Templar wrote: I've been wondering about this.
What you say is true, but couldn't Warpgates be adapted to be a factor of territorial control? Like Siege Tanks in other match-ups. I imagine, if Gateway units were balanced defensively rather than offensively, so that they would be fine in defence but too powerful in offence, then the game would be about preventing the Protoss from getting his army with Pylon support into your territory. I figure this could lead to Pylon-pushes.
'Course, there are a few things that would need to happen for that, I think. First off, Warp Gate tech would need to be pushed to higher tech (say, Twilight Council or Templar Archives), since players may not have the map control early game to deny Pylon rushes, but normal Gateway production time would be brought back down to normal.
And Warp-ins need to be more vulnerable. Right now if a unit dies during Warp-in, it gives a full refund and resets the cooldown. That should be inverted so that once the warp-in begins, the unit is already bought, for good or ill. No refund at all. Warping-in directly to the battlefield should be riskier than back home.
Also, Khaydarin Amulet. Templar with Storm are extremely powerful defensively, but very slow and vulnerable on the offence. This would also reinforce the territorial control aspect of Pylon pushes.
Anyway, that's how it sounds to me in theorycraft, I'd like to know the thoughts of better players on this concept.
please don't spread misinformation, Protoss does not get a refund if a unit dies during warp. they only get a refund if the warp-in pylon dies before that or if you change the prism mode during warp.
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You make valid points but I still think that it's mainly impossible to attack a protoss at his base if he has sentries. Just by the layout he knows exactly where to place those forcefields and his army is already positioned to immediately throw the FF down and maximize the efficiency of his units. Even without a ramp all maps have somewhat narrow chokes and a well positioned protoss army with good forcefield can be ridiculously cost-effective. The problem IMO is that this is also an attacking advantage on some maps, which is why protoss has such strong timings. There is indeed a design flaw in my opinion but I doubt that's going to change. PvP is really broken because of this, too.
IMO they need to rethink this. Either push warpgate to higher tech, or make it so that normal gateways have slightly faster build times. This way warpgate would have the advantage of warp-in at any location but slower units whereas normal gateways would rally but come out faster. A lot are going to complain about drops and mutalisk but I mean they figured out a way to deal with those in BW and protoss wasn't really more mobile than they are now =/
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On October 12 2011 06:58 freetgy wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 06:46 Fanatic-Templar wrote: I've been wondering about this.
What you say is true, but couldn't Warpgates be adapted to be a factor of territorial control? Like Siege Tanks in other match-ups. I imagine, if Gateway units were balanced defensively rather than offensively, so that they would be fine in defence but too powerful in offence, then the game would be about preventing the Protoss from getting his army with Pylon support into your territory. I figure this could lead to Pylon-pushes.
'Course, there are a few things that would need to happen for that, I think. First off, Warp Gate tech would need to be pushed to higher tech (say, Twilight Council or Templar Archives), since players may not have the map control early game to deny Pylon rushes, but normal Gateway production time would be brought back down to normal.
And Warp-ins need to be more vulnerable. Right now if a unit dies during Warp-in, it gives a full refund and resets the cooldown. That should be inverted so that once the warp-in begins, the unit is already bought, for good or ill. No refund at all. Warping-in directly to the battlefield should be riskier than back home.
Also, Khaydarin Amulet. Templar with Storm are extremely powerful defensively, but very slow and vulnerable on the offence. This would also reinforce the territorial control aspect of Pylon pushes.
Anyway, that's how it sounds to me in theorycraft, I'd like to know the thoughts of better players on this concept. please don't spread misinformation, Protoss does not get a refund if a unit dies during warp. they only get a refund if the warp-in pylon dies before that or if you change the prism mode during warp.
Oh, there are two separate types of warp-in cancellations? Did not know that. But I still believe the cost should apply if the power source is removed.
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On October 12 2011 06:52 crms wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 06:29 eYeball wrote: Shield Battery won't change ghosts effect in PvT, maybe more likely in PvZ and PvP.
Regarding the mothership in my eyes you shouldn't be able to neutral parasite it, fungal it or emp it. It's a hero unit. the mothership shouldn't exist in multiplayer. it's a joke unit. just make protoss not be terrible and one dimensional and remove the gd mothership. Mothership is the only way to win lategame PvZ
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On October 12 2011 07:02 MattBarry wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 06:52 crms wrote:On October 12 2011 06:29 eYeball wrote: Shield Battery won't change ghosts effect in PvT, maybe more likely in PvZ and PvP.
Regarding the mothership in my eyes you shouldn't be able to neutral parasite it, fungal it or emp it. It's a hero unit. the mothership shouldn't exist in multiplayer. it's a joke unit. just make protoss not be terrible and one dimensional and remove the gd mothership. Mothership is the only way to win lategame PvZ
Assuming you are significantly behind upon arriving at this lategame.
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I already posted my solution to this in another forum post (designated balance discussion) In my eyes the problem could be at least decreased by doubling the warp in time ( +5 sec) and buffing protoss units (sentry 8 dps stalker attack 12(+4) ) and making protoss tech slightly less expensive ( charge 150/150, storm also includes +15 mana) I think then the matchup would be slightly more balanced
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by doubling the warp in time protoss units are no more "instant" so the opponent has more time to prepare. on the flipside protoss can expand behind pressure because their units are now stronger
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On October 12 2011 07:07 Brainiak wrote: I already posted my solution to this in another forum post (designated balance discussion) In my eyes the problem could be at least decreased by doubling the warp in time ( +5 sec) and buffing protoss units (sentry 8 dps stalker attack 12(+4) ) and making protoss tech slightly less expensive ( charge 150/150, storm also includes +15 mana) I think then the matchup would be slightly more balanced
I couldn't disagree more. Protoss units are devastating in the late game and Zerg/Terran has to get units SPECIFICALLY to counter tier 3 protoss units whereas protoss just generally has good units... I can't imagine getting a spire any earlier to counter that 2 base colossus push that Ace used repeatedly to win IEM. Now it's figured out, but it's so tight. This change is too much IMO.
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One crazy question : If cannons were available after gateway, would that break the game? I mean cannon rushes are easily defended by protoss who go forge themselves? and terrans obviously have no problem defending cannon rushes, and zergs always go for pool first so that is not a problem
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On October 12 2011 07:11 Steel wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 07:07 Brainiak wrote: I already posted my solution to this in another forum post (designated balance discussion) In my eyes the problem could be at least decreased by doubling the warp in time ( +5 sec) and buffing protoss units (sentry 8 dps stalker attack 12(+4) ) and making protoss tech slightly less expensive ( charge 150/150, storm also includes +15 mana) I think then the matchup would be slightly more balanced I couldn't disagree more. Protoss units are devastating in the late game and Zerg/Terran has to get units SPECIFICALLY to counter tier 3 protoss units whereas protoss just generally has good units... I can't imagine getting a spire any earlier to counter that 2 base colossus push that Ace used repeatedly to win IEM. Now it's figured out, but it's so tight. This change is too much IMO.
What are u saying? I dont buff protoss tier 3 just the main gateway units, you can deal with gateway pushes just as easily as their next wave comes later then usual.Moreover these changes are slight changes
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On October 12 2011 06:47 FeyFey wrote:mmm i still like warpgates and i think toss has enough defenders advantages. (i mean you get 10 second build time units when switching from gate to warp). The biggest is probably the stalker being able to outrun everything so you can basically siege the opponent from the start. The Other is force fields and shield regeneration. I like that the defenders advantage is so different from the other races . (not a static one)
How is that a defenders advantage when, Protoss gets only comparable build times to the T/Z Units? The Advantage and Balance of Warpgates is that when you have your whole Army at+the additional warp in the opponent can still hold.
In a defensive non all-in style you have now the same situation, you have less units as Protoss (because you have less Gateways), but no defensive structure that makes up for the lack of army supply, we can only hope to deley the push long enough to get an additional boosted warp-in cycles. What on maps where this is not viable?
That the core reason this thread exists.
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Well I think that warp in is good defensively because you can instantly reinforce your units and also if you are locked in your base all you need to do is sneaks a probe out to make a pylon or to get a warp prism to do a powerful drop, all while being able to defend your base. Also gateways are much more useful as walls now because of the warp gates, just press "Y" and you can instantly warp in as many units as you have ready gateways. Finally usually you won't have just gateway units, you will also have robo or stargate units backing them up.
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well your army supply is more efficient due to the units being stronger.
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On October 12 2011 07:12 Brainiak wrote: One crazy question : If cannons were available after gateway, would that break the game? I mean cannon rushes are easily defended by protoss who go forge themselves? and terrans obviously have no problem defending cannon rushes, and zergs always go for pool first so that is not a problem
Zergs wouldn't like having to patrol a drone at there ramp and contsantly having the threat of cannons blocking there expo every game, but with protoss FFE so much then it really wouldn't change too much imo. It's an idea I guess, I don't think cannons are really very good though. I feel like all it would solve is expoing early in PvZ without getting behind in tech.
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also consider my question about cannons available after gateway would break the game
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On October 12 2011 07:26 Lore-Fighting wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 07:12 Brainiak wrote: One crazy question : If cannons were available after gateway, would that break the game? I mean cannon rushes are easily defended by protoss who go forge themselves? and terrans obviously have no problem defending cannon rushes, and zergs always go for pool first so that is not a problem Zergs wouldn't like having to patrol a drone at there ramp and contsantly having the threat of cannons blocking there expo every game, but with protoss FFE so much then it really wouldn't change too much imo. It's an idea I guess, I don't think cannons are really very good though. I feel like all it would solve is expoing early in PvZ without getting behind in tech.
Yeah thats true. Its basicly an invitation to any protoss player to get a fast expo without sacrificing anything. I dont think that zerg can compete with such a protoss
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On October 12 2011 07:26 BlueIronGuy wrote: Well I think that warp in is good defensively because you can instantly reinforce your units and also if you are locked in your base all you need to do is sneaks a probe out to make a pylon or to get a warp prism to do a powerful drop, all while being able to defend your base. Also gateways are much more useful as walls now because of the warp gates, just press "Y" and you can instantly warp in as many units as you have ready gateways. Finally usually you won't have just gateway units, you will also have robo or stargate units backing them up.
Really? You think it's good because i can instantly reinforce my units? ANY race can do that while playing defense. Playing defense as zerg or terran your units pop out right in your base too. Point invalid. I could say the same about terran or zerg on the drop thing too. Drop 4 banelings in the enemies mineral line, do a rine/rauder drop, again point invalid. It's not press y and i can instantly make units. I have to wait 10 seconds for the gateway to change over. I also have a cooldown between warpins, it's not as if i can warp 20 zealots off one warpgate.
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Honestly, warpgate and forcefield are the 2 best defender's advantages in the game. I really don't know what all you guys are fussing about. You don't have to make units until a push is literally at your ramp. You can FF all day and continue warping in units faster than Z or T can reinforce. You have shields that quickly and fully regenerate. INSTANT UNITS, honestly how do you complain about that? At least Terran/Zerg are forced to make units preemptively because you know, it actually takes time to build units...
There are even more insane advantages to warpgate but its irrelevant to keep going... Of all the things people can complain about with toss and this is it? 50/50 for the best up in the game >.> be happy...
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I've never liked the warp-in mechanic : / removes a defenders advantage for the opponent too as well as the defensive issues for the protoss
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I'm not sure I think warp-in has broken protoss... But one thing it has ruined for me is how awesome it was in Brood War when you're playing protoss, you're in the middle of a big fight, and you go back to your main and you see 10 shiny new speed zealots charging single-file down your ramp, it just looks awesome
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On October 12 2011 08:38 SupLilSon wrote: Honestly, warpgate and forcefield are the 2 best defender's advantages in the game. I really don't know what all you guys are fussing about. You don't have to make units until a push is literally at your ramp. You can FF all day and continue warping in units faster than Z or T can reinforce. You have shields that quickly and fully regenerate. INSTANT UNITS, honestly how do you complain about that? At least Terran/Zerg are forced to make units preemptively because you know, it actually takes time to build units...
There are even more insane advantages to warpgate but its irrelevant to keep going... Of all the things people can complain about with toss and this is it? 50/50 for the best up in the game >.> be happy...
you obviously never played protoss higher than bronze league.
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I really don't get how people can say they agree with this. I'm sorry to burst the bubble, but the whole argument is wrong.
You say the protoss has no significant defender's advantage because of the warp gate mechanic, but consider this; When being attacked, the protoss warps in units at his base, meaning they are instantly ready for the fight while his opponent has units on the long rally move. This creates exactly the same effect as when a terran has units pop out of his barracks. Enemy reinforcements are still in transit while yours arrive instantly.
You must be able to see that the protoss does not lose anything because he warps in units in his base compared to them popping out of a gateway. Warp-in only messes with the offense of protoss.
The ONLY issue comes in PvP actually, which you disregarded. Here the attacker has no rally, meaning the defender's advantage of rally is negated.
Now to determine if protoss was balanced around being able to warp in units in the battle (and thus are weaker somehow, this could be the 5 sec warp-in period where units are vulnerable) is another matter and could be investigated.
TL;DR: OP is wrong, no defender's advantage is lost because you warp-in in your base (because enemies still have long rally). Warp gate is a purely offensive buff.
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On October 12 2011 09:01 UncleOwnage wrote: I really don't get how people can say they agree with this. I'm sorry to burst the bubble, but the whole argument is wrong.
You say the protoss has no significant defender's advantage because of the warp gate mechanic, but consider this; When being attacked, the protoss warps in units at his base, meaning they are instantly ready for the fight while his opponent has units on the long rally move. This creates exactly the same effect as when a terran has units pop out of his barracks. Enemy reinforcements are still in transit while yours arrive instantly.
You must be able to see that the protoss does not lose anything because he warps in units in his base compared to them popping out of a gateway. Warp-in only messes with the offense of protoss.
The ONLY issue comes in PvP actually, which you disregarded. Here the attacker has no rally, meaning the defender's advantage of rally is negated.
Now to determine if protoss was balanced around being able to warp in units in the battle (and thus are weaker somehow, this could be the 5 sec warp-in period where units are vulnerable) is another matter and could be investigated.
TL;DR: OP is wrong, no defender's advantage is lost because you warp-in in your base (because enemies still have long rally). Warp gate is a purely offensive buff. The point of the OP is that Blizzard purposely made gateway units weaker than core units of the other races because they can warp in far away. And if you are warping in at home to defend like a terran or zerg makes units, then you are at a disadvantage because your units are weaker than those terran or zerg units.
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On October 12 2011 08:58 chrissummers wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 08:38 SupLilSon wrote: Honestly, warpgate and forcefield are the 2 best defender's advantages in the game. I really don't know what all you guys are fussing about. You don't have to make units until a push is literally at your ramp. You can FF all day and continue warping in units faster than Z or T can reinforce. You have shields that quickly and fully regenerate. INSTANT UNITS, honestly how do you complain about that? At least Terran/Zerg are forced to make units preemptively because you know, it actually takes time to build units...
There are even more insane advantages to warpgate but its irrelevant to keep going... Of all the things people can complain about with toss and this is it? 50/50 for the best up in the game >.> be happy... you obviously never played protoss higher than bronze league.
Great post buddy. I played random up to high diamond league and had by far the most wins with protoss. Do you want to elaborate a bit? If not I'll just continue to assume that you are a troll or a bronze leaguer himself.
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Lol warpgate doesnt remove defenders advantage at all. If you want to compare the difference between warping in on a proxy pylon and warping in your base as "you have no defenders advantage", you are wrong. You lose nothing. You GAIN the ability to have defenders advantage in terms of rallying at any place on the map you choose.
Do tanks not give defenders advantage because when you siege the opponent's base theres no difference than when you siege behind your wall? NO you are imposing a defender's advantage remotely.
The point of the OP is that Blizzard purposely made gateway units weaker than core units of the other races because they can warp in far away. And if you are warping in at home to defend like a terran or zerg makes units, then you are at a disadvantage because your units are weaker than those terran or zerg units.
what? blizzard did no such thing. If you want to complain about protoss units being worse in 1:1 fights with the other races, go ahead, but you are stupid. The game is very balanced.
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On October 12 2011 09:33 SupLilSon wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 08:58 chrissummers wrote:On October 12 2011 08:38 SupLilSon wrote: Honestly, warpgate and forcefield are the 2 best defender's advantages in the game. I really don't know what all you guys are fussing about. You don't have to make units until a push is literally at your ramp. You can FF all day and continue warping in units faster than Z or T can reinforce. You have shields that quickly and fully regenerate. INSTANT UNITS, honestly how do you complain about that? At least Terran/Zerg are forced to make units preemptively because you know, it actually takes time to build units...
There are even more insane advantages to warpgate but its irrelevant to keep going... Of all the things people can complain about with toss and this is it? 50/50 for the best up in the game >.> be happy... you obviously never played protoss higher than bronze league. Great post buddy. I played random up to high diamond league and had by far the most wins with protoss. Do you want to elaborate a bit? If not I'll just continue to assume that you are a troll or a bronze leaguer yourself with no valuable input.
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On October 12 2011 09:35 Sveet wrote:Lol warpgate doesnt remove defenders advantage at all. If you want to compare the difference between warping in on a proxy pylon and warping in your base as "you have no defenders advantage", you are wrong. You lose nothing. You GAIN the ability to have defenders advantage in terms of rallying at any place on the map you choose. Do tanks not give defenders advantage because when you siege the opponent's base theres no difference than when you siege behind your wall? NO you are imposing a defender's advantage remotely. Show nested quote +The point of the OP is that Blizzard purposely made gateway units weaker than core units of the other races because they can warp in far away. And if you are warping in at home to defend like a terran or zerg makes units, then you are at a disadvantage because your units are weaker than those terran or zerg units. what? blizzard did no such thing. If you want to complain about protoss units being worse in 1:1 fights with the other races, go ahead, but you are stupid. The game is very balanced.
Obviously Protoss should be able to instantly create units anywhere they have psy with no downsides.... wtf blizz.
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On October 12 2011 09:10 Fig wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 09:01 UncleOwnage wrote: I really don't get how people can say they agree with this. I'm sorry to burst the bubble, but the whole argument is wrong.
You say the protoss has no significant defender's advantage because of the warp gate mechanic, but consider this; When being attacked, the protoss warps in units at his base, meaning they are instantly ready for the fight while his opponent has units on the long rally move. This creates exactly the same effect as when a terran has units pop out of his barracks. Enemy reinforcements are still in transit while yours arrive instantly.
You must be able to see that the protoss does not lose anything because he warps in units in his base compared to them popping out of a gateway. Warp-in only messes with the offense of protoss.
The ONLY issue comes in PvP actually, which you disregarded. Here the attacker has no rally, meaning the defender's advantage of rally is negated.
Now to determine if protoss was balanced around being able to warp in units in the battle (and thus are weaker somehow, this could be the 5 sec warp-in period where units are vulnerable) is another matter and could be investigated.
TL;DR: OP is wrong, no defender's advantage is lost because you warp-in in your base (because enemies still have long rally). Warp gate is a purely offensive buff. The point of the OP is that Blizzard purposely made gateway units weaker than core units of the other races because they can warp in far away. And if you are warping in at home to defend like a terran or zerg makes units, then you are at a disadvantage because your units are weaker than those terran or zerg units.
Frankly i've yet to see that opinion proven... Protoss units require a tad more micro than Terran units (less than zerg units on the other hand) but if they are microed they are just as strong in each phase of the game. If they are microed well (good forcefields, guardian shield and decent targetfiring with the stalkers) they are stronger than any Zerg or Terran unit at that phase. Unupgraded gateway units can trade cost effectively against any Terran barrack unit. Once the upgrades for Terrans start to kick in (conc shell and stim specifically) things get a bit more difficult until the twilight council upgrades can be researched then they lean towards the protoss side.
The Warpgate is a key mechanic to the protoss race, yes it "feels" as if protoss has less defenders advantadge because they are simply used to the fact that they always warp in units close to the battle. There is only a very specific timing window when Terran has researched stim and protoss doesn't have any Tech out themselves (colossi, archons, charge, blink) where protoss is vulnerable. But such timing windows are part of every matchup, you could list a ton of them for ZvP, TvP, TvZ as well if you look carefully.
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I would love to see gateways to get some sort of buff so you would actually have some benefit (faster production? Khaydarin Amulet for gateway only?) from not changing into warpgates.
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"Broke" protoss? I dont see how it broke it, seeing how the warp mechanic was introduced from the very beginning of starcraft 2 (or atleast the furthest back that is publicly known). If you are trying to compare protoss from bw to sc2, then that is just being unfair, since they are two different games (even though they are the same style, characters, objectives).
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On October 12 2011 09:50 Tula wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 09:10 Fig wrote:On October 12 2011 09:01 UncleOwnage wrote: I really don't get how people can say they agree with this. I'm sorry to burst the bubble, but the whole argument is wrong.
You say the protoss has no significant defender's advantage because of the warp gate mechanic, but consider this; When being attacked, the protoss warps in units at his base, meaning they are instantly ready for the fight while his opponent has units on the long rally move. This creates exactly the same effect as when a terran has units pop out of his barracks. Enemy reinforcements are still in transit while yours arrive instantly.
You must be able to see that the protoss does not lose anything because he warps in units in his base compared to them popping out of a gateway. Warp-in only messes with the offense of protoss.
The ONLY issue comes in PvP actually, which you disregarded. Here the attacker has no rally, meaning the defender's advantage of rally is negated.
Now to determine if protoss was balanced around being able to warp in units in the battle (and thus are weaker somehow, this could be the 5 sec warp-in period where units are vulnerable) is another matter and could be investigated.
TL;DR: OP is wrong, no defender's advantage is lost because you warp-in in your base (because enemies still have long rally). Warp gate is a purely offensive buff. The point of the OP is that Blizzard purposely made gateway units weaker than core units of the other races because they can warp in far away. And if you are warping in at home to defend like a terran or zerg makes units, then you are at a disadvantage because your units are weaker than those terran or zerg units. Frankly i've yet to see that opinion proven... Protoss units require a tad more micro than Terran units (less than zerg units on the other hand) but if they are microed they are just as strong in each phase of the game. If they are microed well (good forcefields, guardian shield and decent targetfiring with the stalkers) they are stronger than any Zerg or Terran unit at that phase. Unupgraded gateway units can trade cost effectively against any Terran barrack unit. Once the upgrades for Terrans start to kick in (conc shell and stim specifically) things get a bit more difficult until the twilight council upgrades can be researched then they lean towards the protoss side. The Warpgate is a key mechanic to the protoss race, yes it "feels" as if protoss has less defenders advantadge because they are simply used to the fact that they always warp in units close to the battle. There is only a very specific timing window when Terran has researched stim and protoss doesn't have any Tech out themselves (colossi, archons, charge, blink) where protoss is vulnerable. But such timing windows are part of every matchup, you could list a ton of them for ZvP, TvP, TvZ as well if you look carefully. no gateway composition beats mm cost for cost. period. the best you can do are forcefields to make the battlefield slightly more even, but those come in finite supply and are expensive.
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On October 12 2011 10:00 Shiori wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 09:50 Tula wrote:On October 12 2011 09:10 Fig wrote:On October 12 2011 09:01 UncleOwnage wrote: I really don't get how people can say they agree with this. I'm sorry to burst the bubble, but the whole argument is wrong.
You say the protoss has no significant defender's advantage because of the warp gate mechanic, but consider this; When being attacked, the protoss warps in units at his base, meaning they are instantly ready for the fight while his opponent has units on the long rally move. This creates exactly the same effect as when a terran has units pop out of his barracks. Enemy reinforcements are still in transit while yours arrive instantly.
You must be able to see that the protoss does not lose anything because he warps in units in his base compared to them popping out of a gateway. Warp-in only messes with the offense of protoss.
The ONLY issue comes in PvP actually, which you disregarded. Here the attacker has no rally, meaning the defender's advantage of rally is negated.
Now to determine if protoss was balanced around being able to warp in units in the battle (and thus are weaker somehow, this could be the 5 sec warp-in period where units are vulnerable) is another matter and could be investigated.
TL;DR: OP is wrong, no defender's advantage is lost because you warp-in in your base (because enemies still have long rally). Warp gate is a purely offensive buff. The point of the OP is that Blizzard purposely made gateway units weaker than core units of the other races because they can warp in far away. And if you are warping in at home to defend like a terran or zerg makes units, then you are at a disadvantage because your units are weaker than those terran or zerg units. Frankly i've yet to see that opinion proven... Protoss units require a tad more micro than Terran units (less than zerg units on the other hand) but if they are microed they are just as strong in each phase of the game. If they are microed well (good forcefields, guardian shield and decent targetfiring with the stalkers) they are stronger than any Zerg or Terran unit at that phase. Unupgraded gateway units can trade cost effectively against any Terran barrack unit. Once the upgrades for Terrans start to kick in (conc shell and stim specifically) things get a bit more difficult until the twilight council upgrades can be researched then they lean towards the protoss side. The Warpgate is a key mechanic to the protoss race, yes it "feels" as if protoss has less defenders advantadge because they are simply used to the fact that they always warp in units close to the battle. There is only a very specific timing window when Terran has researched stim and protoss doesn't have any Tech out themselves (colossi, archons, charge, blink) where protoss is vulnerable. But such timing windows are part of every matchup, you could list a ton of them for ZvP, TvP, TvZ as well if you look carefully. no gateway composition beats mm cost for cost. period. the best you can do are forcefields to make the battlefield slightly more even, but those come in finite supply and are expensive.
Zealot sentry is really strong and beats MM at many stages of the game with proper forcefields. Not to mention archons are techincally gateway units, and archon zealot is a staple of the matchup. I play gateway heavy most of the time vs terran.
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Personally i think its ok, yes we can't go crazy macro builds agaist an offensive player, but really a 4 gate with proper ff's will break a 1 rax expo. Whats important to remember is that warpgates have cooldown, and that is the drawback to them being able to warp anywhere since toss units build slower its half advantage half not in the sense that yes your units are there, but thats only warpgates how often is an army JUST zealot stalker sentry in the mid game, toss is favoring robo right now so it balances out imo.
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Not sure if anyone's had this idea yet but: What if warp-in time scaled proportionately to how far away the warp in was from a nexus? That way 1) even with the warp in mechanic there's a defender's advantage that can be tweaked using a single number/formula if it's not linear 2) now I can say the words 'proxy nexus'
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Regardless of how Protoss lacks a certain amount of a "Defender's advantage", it's unique offensive advantage clearly makes up for it. The defensive deficiency is not gamebreaking enough to cause a significant hinderance to the race itself, as we see many Protoss players being able to survive into the midgame and endgame, where they can indeed make use of perhaps some of the most powerful, underutilized offensive tactics brought about by the Warp Prism.
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On October 12 2011 05:57 CosmicSpiral wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 05:34 xlava wrote: I honestly can't believe that this ridiculous thread got resurrected. Let it die. Not all races are equal in all regards, we should seriously stop discussing it because as it stands now, Protoss is the weakest race anyway, and the game itself is balanced for all intents and purposes. So a weakest race can exist yet the game itself is balanced? I can't take someone seriously when they contradict themselves in one sentence.
Before you post such a hostile, flame baiting comment, actually read my post completely.
Yes, of course a weakest race can exist while the game is balanced for all intents and purposes. What I mean by that is that at all levels but the very highest level of play, ie. GSL code S, the game is balanced. I never contradicted myself, I qualified myself, please learn the difference.
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i believe that the op was pointing out that because of the warpgate mechanic blizzard didn't put in a defensive structure that was unlocked after the gateway was complete, such as the bunker and spinecrawler for terran and zerg. both of which are critical for holding off early agression. protoss has no such structure and is therefore weaker to early agression.
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On October 12 2011 10:40 Flamingo777 wrote: Regardless of how Protoss lacks a certain amount of a "Defender's advantage", it's unique offensive advantage clearly makes up for it. The defensive deficiency is not gamebreaking enough to cause a significant hinderance to the race itself, as we see many Protoss players being able to survive into the midgame and endgame, where they can indeed make use of perhaps some of the most powerful, underutilized offensive tactics brought about by the Warp Prism. Actually, this warpgate thing may be the reason why protoss are currently 'suffering' especially at the high levels. It does seem quite unfair that offensively every race is even, but when it comes to defending Protoss is weaker.
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On October 12 2011 10:07 Sveet wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 10:00 Shiori wrote:On October 12 2011 09:50 Tula wrote:On October 12 2011 09:10 Fig wrote:On October 12 2011 09:01 UncleOwnage wrote: I really don't get how people can say they agree with this. I'm sorry to burst the bubble, but the whole argument is wrong.
You say the protoss has no significant defender's advantage because of the warp gate mechanic, but consider this; When being attacked, the protoss warps in units at his base, meaning they are instantly ready for the fight while his opponent has units on the long rally move. This creates exactly the same effect as when a terran has units pop out of his barracks. Enemy reinforcements are still in transit while yours arrive instantly.
You must be able to see that the protoss does not lose anything because he warps in units in his base compared to them popping out of a gateway. Warp-in only messes with the offense of protoss.
The ONLY issue comes in PvP actually, which you disregarded. Here the attacker has no rally, meaning the defender's advantage of rally is negated.
Now to determine if protoss was balanced around being able to warp in units in the battle (and thus are weaker somehow, this could be the 5 sec warp-in period where units are vulnerable) is another matter and could be investigated.
TL;DR: OP is wrong, no defender's advantage is lost because you warp-in in your base (because enemies still have long rally). Warp gate is a purely offensive buff. The point of the OP is that Blizzard purposely made gateway units weaker than core units of the other races because they can warp in far away. And if you are warping in at home to defend like a terran or zerg makes units, then you are at a disadvantage because your units are weaker than those terran or zerg units. Frankly i've yet to see that opinion proven... Protoss units require a tad more micro than Terran units (less than zerg units on the other hand) but if they are microed they are just as strong in each phase of the game. If they are microed well (good forcefields, guardian shield and decent targetfiring with the stalkers) they are stronger than any Zerg or Terran unit at that phase. Unupgraded gateway units can trade cost effectively against any Terran barrack unit. Once the upgrades for Terrans start to kick in (conc shell and stim specifically) things get a bit more difficult until the twilight council upgrades can be researched then they lean towards the protoss side. The Warpgate is a key mechanic to the protoss race, yes it "feels" as if protoss has less defenders advantadge because they are simply used to the fact that they always warp in units close to the battle. There is only a very specific timing window when Terran has researched stim and protoss doesn't have any Tech out themselves (colossi, archons, charge, blink) where protoss is vulnerable. But such timing windows are part of every matchup, you could list a ton of them for ZvP, TvP, TvZ as well if you look carefully. no gateway composition beats mm cost for cost. period. the best you can do are forcefields to make the battlefield slightly more even, but those come in finite supply and are expensive. Zealot sentry is really strong and beats MM at many stages of the game with proper forcefields. Not to mention archons are techincally gateway units, and archon zealot is a staple of the matchup. I play gateway heavy most of the time vs terran.
Ghosts are a rax unit then too. Ghosts destroy any and all gateway units.
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i think the main problem is the main gateway units(zealot/stalker) are way to big, maybe not that zealot so much but the stalker. When you go and try to take on some marine/marauder, they can get their whole army attacking you while just trying to get all your stalkers and zealots attacking is impossible since everything is big and gets in eachothers way.
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On October 12 2011 10:56 ambrosiaa wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 10:40 Flamingo777 wrote: Regardless of how Protoss lacks a certain amount of a "Defender's advantage", it's unique offensive advantage clearly makes up for it. The defensive deficiency is not gamebreaking enough to cause a significant hinderance to the race itself, as we see many Protoss players being able to survive into the midgame and endgame, where they can indeed make use of perhaps some of the most powerful, underutilized offensive tactics brought about by the Warp Prism. Actually, this warpgate thing may be the reason why protoss are currently 'suffering' especially at the high levels. It does seem quite unfair that offensively every race is even, but when it comes to defending Protoss is weaker. I'm arguing that Protoss may have a slight (I'm probably underestimating it, actually) advantage offensively where the others have an advantage in the early game defense department. By having the ability to have a moving rally point, that can go behind opponent's defenses and immediately warp in units (no ~30 second tier one build times) that when fails, only yields a loss of 200 minerals (which is nothing in an endgame economy) versus a full medivac or overlord where the drop failing player loses a significant amount more, sometimes up to 600 minerals 300 gas and around 10 supply? I think this is an extremely unique function of both harass and immediate army reinforcement, anywhere on the map. I think that it's at least enough of an advantage offensively in the mid-late game to argue that Protoss AT LEAST has a slight advantage there where the other two races have a slight defensive advantage in the early-midgame due to structural functions (disregarding army unit functions such as the defensive capabilities of the siege tank and raven, forcefields, and perhaps even fungal growth).
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I can only really wrap my head around your logic in the context of PvP, where the defenders advantage is lost to any opponent of a protoss.
If we assume a perfectly macroing terran (Zerg) player (no supply blocks, constant production) versus a Protoss player, also perfectly macroing (not missing warp cycles, no blocks, etc), Protoss still has their defenders advantage, as things are warped in on-location, and Terran (Zerg) still has to rally.
The only notable difference is the lack of cannon-building at Gateway tech, but that's not a problem with warpgate, really.
Am I missing something?
I guess it seems to me that, while the reinforcement mechanic works defensively and (better) offensively (than compared to the other races), that doesn't detract from having the shorter rally as an inherent advantage. But it sounds like you implied that it wasn't, which is where I'm confused on your point.
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On October 12 2011 10:07 Sveet wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 10:00 Shiori wrote:On October 12 2011 09:50 Tula wrote:On October 12 2011 09:10 Fig wrote:On October 12 2011 09:01 UncleOwnage wrote: I really don't get how people can say they agree with this. I'm sorry to burst the bubble, but the whole argument is wrong.
You say the protoss has no significant defender's advantage because of the warp gate mechanic, but consider this; When being attacked, the protoss warps in units at his base, meaning they are instantly ready for the fight while his opponent has units on the long rally move. This creates exactly the same effect as when a terran has units pop out of his barracks. Enemy reinforcements are still in transit while yours arrive instantly.
You must be able to see that the protoss does not lose anything because he warps in units in his base compared to them popping out of a gateway. Warp-in only messes with the offense of protoss.
The ONLY issue comes in PvP actually, which you disregarded. Here the attacker has no rally, meaning the defender's advantage of rally is negated.
Now to determine if protoss was balanced around being able to warp in units in the battle (and thus are weaker somehow, this could be the 5 sec warp-in period where units are vulnerable) is another matter and could be investigated.
TL;DR: OP is wrong, no defender's advantage is lost because you warp-in in your base (because enemies still have long rally). Warp gate is a purely offensive buff. The point of the OP is that Blizzard purposely made gateway units weaker than core units of the other races because they can warp in far away. And if you are warping in at home to defend like a terran or zerg makes units, then you are at a disadvantage because your units are weaker than those terran or zerg units. Frankly i've yet to see that opinion proven... Protoss units require a tad more micro than Terran units (less than zerg units on the other hand) but if they are microed they are just as strong in each phase of the game. If they are microed well (good forcefields, guardian shield and decent targetfiring with the stalkers) they are stronger than any Zerg or Terran unit at that phase. Unupgraded gateway units can trade cost effectively against any Terran barrack unit. Once the upgrades for Terrans start to kick in (conc shell and stim specifically) things get a bit more difficult until the twilight council upgrades can be researched then they lean towards the protoss side. The Warpgate is a key mechanic to the protoss race, yes it "feels" as if protoss has less defenders advantadge because they are simply used to the fact that they always warp in units close to the battle. There is only a very specific timing window when Terran has researched stim and protoss doesn't have any Tech out themselves (colossi, archons, charge, blink) where protoss is vulnerable. But such timing windows are part of every matchup, you could list a ton of them for ZvP, TvP, TvZ as well if you look carefully. no gateway composition beats mm cost for cost. period. the best you can do are forcefields to make the battlefield slightly more even, but those come in finite supply and are expensive. Zealot sentry is really strong and beats MM at many stages of the game with proper forcefields. Not to mention archons are techincally gateway units, and archon zealot is a staple of the matchup. I play gateway heavy most of the time vs terran.
That's fine. But once ghost(EMP) or Medvacs(pickups) come into play the value of GW is greatly diminished due to the drop in FF effectiveness. That is if your playing at a reasonable skill level where Terrans will actually use ghost. If not not, yeah "Zeal Sentry good".
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On October 12 2011 11:46 Flamingo777 wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 10:56 ambrosiaa wrote:On October 12 2011 10:40 Flamingo777 wrote: Regardless of how Protoss lacks a certain amount of a "Defender's advantage", it's unique offensive advantage clearly makes up for it. The defensive deficiency is not gamebreaking enough to cause a significant hinderance to the race itself, as we see many Protoss players being able to survive into the midgame and endgame, where they can indeed make use of perhaps some of the most powerful, underutilized offensive tactics brought about by the Warp Prism. Actually, this warpgate thing may be the reason why protoss are currently 'suffering' especially at the high levels. It does seem quite unfair that offensively every race is even, but when it comes to defending Protoss is weaker. I'm arguing that Protoss may have a slight (I'm probably underestimating it, actually) advantage offensively where the others have an advantage in the early game defense department. By having the ability to have a moving rally point, that can go behind opponent's defenses and immediately warp in units (no ~30 second tier one build times) that when fails, only yields a loss of 200 minerals (which is nothing in an endgame economy) versus a full medivac or overlord where the drop failing player loses a significant amount more, sometimes up to 600 minerals 300 gas and around 10 supply? I think this is an extremely unique function of both harass and immediate army reinforcement, anywhere on the map. I think that it's at least enough of an advantage offensively in the mid-late game to argue that Protoss AT LEAST has a slight advantage there where the other two races have a slight defensive advantage in the early-midgame due to structural functions (disregarding army unit functions such as the defensive capabilities of the siege tank and raven, forcefields, and perhaps even fungal growth).
I'm having a hard time understanding where you are getting your math from...If you want to play the number game, I don't know why you are comparing a warp-in of... 2 zealots to .. a 2 medivac + 4 marauder drop? (The only thing I can figure that comes out to 600/300.. Now this ability to warp what, lets say you warp in 6 zealots into your opponents base which a) are vulnerable while warping in, b) actually don't warp instantly, it takes 5 seconds to warp them in. And whether you are or are not using a warp prism, with stimmed marines out on the field, unless your prism has speed, im gonna bet your units are pretty fucked. Now lets say your 5 rax production churns out 4 marauders and 2 marines at the same time this drop hits. With a little bit of micro this wave of production turns this 600 mineral investment that maybe killed like 2 or 3 scvs into a collosal waste of time, energy and money. Now lets take 8 stimmed marines stimming from outside a Protosses field of vision into a full saturated probe line. In like 2 seconds flat, 10 probes are dead, and you are scrambling to figure out what to do. You warp in some gateways and zealots which either die on warp-in or he just picks up when hes outnumbered and leaves. OK maybe you have blink and you catch his medivac and hes more careful in the future.
The only reason protoss has the ability to warp in and to place FFs is pretty much because their units just are not cost effective. I don't care how far you can warp in your 5 stalkers if your base is being overrun by 7000 zerglings. Without warp-in protoss wouldnt be able to move ANYWHERE around the map with stim/conc/and lightspeedlings. Has their sick nasty warp in advantage had them picking them up their fair share of tournament titles lately? -_-
TL:DR: Warp ins are not instant, and you need a pylon or a warp prism, which aren't always the easiest things to keep alive. Please stop pretending Terran drops aren't the best thing since sliced bread (I play Terran and ill admit it)
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On October 12 2011 07:02 MattBarry wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 06:52 crms wrote:On October 12 2011 06:29 eYeball wrote: Shield Battery won't change ghosts effect in PvT, maybe more likely in PvZ and PvP.
Regarding the mothership in my eyes you shouldn't be able to neutral parasite it, fungal it or emp it. It's a hero unit. the mothership shouldn't exist in multiplayer. it's a joke unit. just make protoss not be terrible and one dimensional and remove the gd mothership. Mothership is the only way to win lategame PvZ
On October 12 2011 06:52 crms wrote: the mothership shouldn't exist in multiplayer. it's a joke unit. just make protoss not be terrible and one dimensional and remove the gd mothership
guess you missed the bolded part. -,-
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On October 12 2011 13:21 ShamTao wrote: I can only really wrap my head around your logic in the context of PvP, where the defenders advantage is lost to any opponent of a protoss.
If we assume a perfectly macroing terran (Zerg) player (no supply blocks, constant production) versus a Protoss player, also perfectly macroing (not missing warp cycles, no blocks, etc), Protoss still has their defenders advantage, as things are warped in on-location, and Terran (Zerg) still has to rally.
The only notable difference is the lack of cannon-building at Gateway tech, but that's not a problem with warpgate, really.
Am I missing something?
I guess it seems to me that, while the reinforcement mechanic works defensively and (better) offensively (than compared to the other races), that doesn't detract from having the shorter rally as an inherent advantage. But it sounds like you implied that it wasn't, which is where I'm confused on your point.
Here's the way I look at it:
Because of the warp in mechanic, Protoss is designed to have EVERYTHING in a fight. You'll often hear commentators berate players for not building a more forward pylon before an engagement. Protoss seems to be balanced around the fact that they're assumed to be able to reinforce mid battle. Awesome ability to reinforce is awesome, but it's compensated by gateway units being generally weaker and less cost effective than other races units. (Possibly false vs Zerg, not really any question vs Terran). So, what's this mean in terms of defenders advantage?
Well, let's say it's a PvT and there's an engagement in the middle of the map. Both players are good, so they are of course keeping up with their macro. If Protoss wins, Terran (who is good at macro) will have reinforcements already built back at his base, with more on the way. Unless Protoss wins the battle by a large margin, they aren't going to be able to just waltz into their opponents base and win, there's still more fighting to do.
Now let's say Terran wins. The argument that this thread makes is that Protoss is designed to warp units directly into a battle, in fact, they're balanced in such a way that it's needed. So if Protoss loses the army, they have nothing back home. Even if they lose by a narrow margin, they've already committed all of their forces to the fight, and have nothing to stop their opponent from just killing them.
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On October 12 2011 13:29 GinDo wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 10:07 Sveet wrote:On October 12 2011 10:00 Shiori wrote:On October 12 2011 09:50 Tula wrote:On October 12 2011 09:10 Fig wrote:On October 12 2011 09:01 UncleOwnage wrote: I really don't get how people can say they agree with this. I'm sorry to burst the bubble, but the whole argument is wrong.
You say the protoss has no significant defender's advantage because of the warp gate mechanic, but consider this; When being attacked, the protoss warps in units at his base, meaning they are instantly ready for the fight while his opponent has units on the long rally move. This creates exactly the same effect as when a terran has units pop out of his barracks. Enemy reinforcements are still in transit while yours arrive instantly.
You must be able to see that the protoss does not lose anything because he warps in units in his base compared to them popping out of a gateway. Warp-in only messes with the offense of protoss.
The ONLY issue comes in PvP actually, which you disregarded. Here the attacker has no rally, meaning the defender's advantage of rally is negated.
Now to determine if protoss was balanced around being able to warp in units in the battle (and thus are weaker somehow, this could be the 5 sec warp-in period where units are vulnerable) is another matter and could be investigated.
TL;DR: OP is wrong, no defender's advantage is lost because you warp-in in your base (because enemies still have long rally). Warp gate is a purely offensive buff. The point of the OP is that Blizzard purposely made gateway units weaker than core units of the other races because they can warp in far away. And if you are warping in at home to defend like a terran or zerg makes units, then you are at a disadvantage because your units are weaker than those terran or zerg units. Frankly i've yet to see that opinion proven... Protoss units require a tad more micro than Terran units (less than zerg units on the other hand) but if they are microed they are just as strong in each phase of the game. If they are microed well (good forcefields, guardian shield and decent targetfiring with the stalkers) they are stronger than any Zerg or Terran unit at that phase. Unupgraded gateway units can trade cost effectively against any Terran barrack unit. Once the upgrades for Terrans start to kick in (conc shell and stim specifically) things get a bit more difficult until the twilight council upgrades can be researched then they lean towards the protoss side. The Warpgate is a key mechanic to the protoss race, yes it "feels" as if protoss has less defenders advantadge because they are simply used to the fact that they always warp in units close to the battle. There is only a very specific timing window when Terran has researched stim and protoss doesn't have any Tech out themselves (colossi, archons, charge, blink) where protoss is vulnerable. But such timing windows are part of every matchup, you could list a ton of them for ZvP, TvP, TvZ as well if you look carefully. no gateway composition beats mm cost for cost. period. the best you can do are forcefields to make the battlefield slightly more even, but those come in finite supply and are expensive. Zealot sentry is really strong and beats MM at many stages of the game with proper forcefields. Not to mention archons are techincally gateway units, and archon zealot is a staple of the matchup. I play gateway heavy most of the time vs terran. That's fine. But once ghost(EMP) or Medvacs(pickups) come into play the value of GW is greatly diminished due to the drop in FF effectiveness. That is if your playing at a reasonable skill level where Terrans will actually use ghost. If not not, yeah "Zeal Sentry good". High diamond matching vs masters players. please leave skill level out of this.
3/3 zealots and a few archons deal and tank a lot of damage vs marine/marauder. Even if somehow all your templar got EMPed (because you clumped them like a noob) it takes the MM a long time to actually kill charge lots in high numbers. Stalkers deal quite a bit of damage, and more importantly they should be used to snipe medivacs. Ghosts really aren't that good after EMP is gone. If you microd correctly and didn't get your templar EMPd (possibly by moving 1 templar forward to feedback approaching ghosts) you then are able to deal a lot of AoE damage.
Personally I play the match-up with both collosus and templar/archon, but stalker/zealot is still the meat of the army and is very powerful.
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is there a name for a build where you just crush your opponent
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On October 12 2011 11:00 MuseMike wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 10:07 Sveet wrote:On October 12 2011 10:00 Shiori wrote:On October 12 2011 09:50 Tula wrote:On October 12 2011 09:10 Fig wrote:On October 12 2011 09:01 UncleOwnage wrote: I really don't get how people can say they agree with this. I'm sorry to burst the bubble, but the whole argument is wrong.
You say the protoss has no significant defender's advantage because of the warp gate mechanic, but consider this; When being attacked, the protoss warps in units at his base, meaning they are instantly ready for the fight while his opponent has units on the long rally move. This creates exactly the same effect as when a terran has units pop out of his barracks. Enemy reinforcements are still in transit while yours arrive instantly.
You must be able to see that the protoss does not lose anything because he warps in units in his base compared to them popping out of a gateway. Warp-in only messes with the offense of protoss.
The ONLY issue comes in PvP actually, which you disregarded. Here the attacker has no rally, meaning the defender's advantage of rally is negated.
Now to determine if protoss was balanced around being able to warp in units in the battle (and thus are weaker somehow, this could be the 5 sec warp-in period where units are vulnerable) is another matter and could be investigated.
TL;DR: OP is wrong, no defender's advantage is lost because you warp-in in your base (because enemies still have long rally). Warp gate is a purely offensive buff. The point of the OP is that Blizzard purposely made gateway units weaker than core units of the other races because they can warp in far away. And if you are warping in at home to defend like a terran or zerg makes units, then you are at a disadvantage because your units are weaker than those terran or zerg units. Frankly i've yet to see that opinion proven... Protoss units require a tad more micro than Terran units (less than zerg units on the other hand) but if they are microed they are just as strong in each phase of the game. If they are microed well (good forcefields, guardian shield and decent targetfiring with the stalkers) they are stronger than any Zerg or Terran unit at that phase. Unupgraded gateway units can trade cost effectively against any Terran barrack unit. Once the upgrades for Terrans start to kick in (conc shell and stim specifically) things get a bit more difficult until the twilight council upgrades can be researched then they lean towards the protoss side. The Warpgate is a key mechanic to the protoss race, yes it "feels" as if protoss has less defenders advantadge because they are simply used to the fact that they always warp in units close to the battle. There is only a very specific timing window when Terran has researched stim and protoss doesn't have any Tech out themselves (colossi, archons, charge, blink) where protoss is vulnerable. But such timing windows are part of every matchup, you could list a ton of them for ZvP, TvP, TvZ as well if you look carefully. no gateway composition beats mm cost for cost. period. the best you can do are forcefields to make the battlefield slightly more even, but those come in finite supply and are expensive. Zealot sentry is really strong and beats MM at many stages of the game with proper forcefields. Not to mention archons are techincally gateway units, and archon zealot is a staple of the matchup. I play gateway heavy most of the time vs terran. Ghosts are a rax unit then too. Ghosts destroy any and all gateway units.
bull....
Ghosts DIE to any and all gateway units 1on1 unless you have enough energy for snipe. EMP can turn the tide of a battle but so can storms.
To the poster above it, zealot sentry deals with barracks units easily for cost as long as you forcefield behind them. If you can't forcefield behind them what are you doing engaging in open fields at that point of the game?
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IMO, if you scout accordingly, and now when you consider Blizzard's nerf on ramp-vision range. In offensive situations it is not an issue. I do understand where you're coming from, however I think that if it ever imbalanced the game it does not anymore.
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Id love to see some interactivity with the Gateway/Warpgates. Something like.. If you use a Gateway you can get Dragoons, if you get a Warpgate you can get Stalkers. Not sure how that would affect the balance exactly, but sounds cool (?)
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Blizzard just needs to buff gateway units, obviously warpgate all ins being unstoppable is a terrible idea but warpgate was nerfed by 40 seconds so it stands to reason that warpgate timings are less powerful which means blizzard has some wiggle room in that area.
Edit. Currently PvT is just vikings own the colossus, emp disables forcefield/ht/archon and cripples gateway unit, stim bio face roll gateway unit gg terran too good. HT vs Ghost just needs to be balanced and gateway vs bio needs balance and then the more skilled player wins i think.
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On October 12 2011 20:59 Tula wrote:Show nested quote +On October 12 2011 11:00 MuseMike wrote:On October 12 2011 10:07 Sveet wrote:On October 12 2011 10:00 Shiori wrote:On October 12 2011 09:50 Tula wrote:On October 12 2011 09:10 Fig wrote:On October 12 2011 09:01 UncleOwnage wrote: I really don't get how people can say they agree with this. I'm sorry to burst the bubble, but the whole argument is wrong.
You say the protoss has no significant defender's advantage because of the warp gate mechanic, but consider this; When being attacked, the protoss warps in units at his base, meaning they are instantly ready for the fight while his opponent has units on the long rally move. This creates exactly the same effect as when a terran has units pop out of his barracks. Enemy reinforcements are still in transit while yours arrive instantly.
You must be able to see that the protoss does not lose anything because he warps in units in his base compared to them popping out of a gateway. Warp-in only messes with the offense of protoss.
The ONLY issue comes in PvP actually, which you disregarded. Here the attacker has no rally, meaning the defender's advantage of rally is negated.
Now to determine if protoss was balanced around being able to warp in units in the battle (and thus are weaker somehow, this could be the 5 sec warp-in period where units are vulnerable) is another matter and could be investigated.
TL;DR: OP is wrong, no defender's advantage is lost because you warp-in in your base (because enemies still have long rally). Warp gate is a purely offensive buff. The point of the OP is that Blizzard purposely made gateway units weaker than core units of the other races because they can warp in far away. And if you are warping in at home to defend like a terran or zerg makes units, then you are at a disadvantage because your units are weaker than those terran or zerg units. Frankly i've yet to see that opinion proven... Protoss units require a tad more micro than Terran units (less than zerg units on the other hand) but if they are microed they are just as strong in each phase of the game. If they are microed well (good forcefields, guardian shield and decent targetfiring with the stalkers) they are stronger than any Zerg or Terran unit at that phase. Unupgraded gateway units can trade cost effectively against any Terran barrack unit. Once the upgrades for Terrans start to kick in (conc shell and stim specifically) things get a bit more difficult until the twilight council upgrades can be researched then they lean towards the protoss side. The Warpgate is a key mechanic to the protoss race, yes it "feels" as if protoss has less defenders advantadge because they are simply used to the fact that they always warp in units close to the battle. There is only a very specific timing window when Terran has researched stim and protoss doesn't have any Tech out themselves (colossi, archons, charge, blink) where protoss is vulnerable. But such timing windows are part of every matchup, you could list a ton of them for ZvP, TvP, TvZ as well if you look carefully. no gateway composition beats mm cost for cost. period. the best you can do are forcefields to make the battlefield slightly more even, but those come in finite supply and are expensive. Zealot sentry is really strong and beats MM at many stages of the game with proper forcefields. Not to mention archons are techincally gateway units, and archon zealot is a staple of the matchup. I play gateway heavy most of the time vs terran. Ghosts are a rax unit then too. Ghosts destroy any and all gateway units. bull.... Ghosts DIE to any and all gateway units 1on1 unless you have enough energy for snipe. EMP can turn the tide of a battle but so can storms. To the poster above it, zealot sentry deals with barracks units easily for cost as long as you forcefield behind them. If you can't forcefield behind them what are you doing engaging in open fields at that point of the game?
Well stim and conc shells make it hard to retreat and emp changes more battles than storm for the simple fact that ghosts 1 outranges feedback 2emp can not be microed out of other than spreading out,the same spread rule can apply to storm 3 ghosts move faster and can cloak to get perfect emps.
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I like the idea of a choice between WG and GW. Basically protoss is nothing without getting the wg research, and I think that there should be builds that delay it but still remain viable. I was thinking about having units be 10% cheaper from gw. This way you are paying a little more for the speed/location of the warped in unit. Might give incentive for early non-wg pushes.
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On October 14 2011 02:14 ThirdDegree wrote: I like the idea of a choice between WG and GW. Basically protoss is nothing without getting the wg research, and I think that there should be builds that delay it but still remain viable. I was thinking about having units be 10% cheaper from gw. This way you are paying a little more for the speed/location of the warped in unit. Might give incentive for early non-wg pushes.
Oh glorious proxy rushes!
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On October 14 2011 02:20 ilovelings wrote: Oh glorious proxy rushes!
Says the guy who can proxy rax and then float away.....
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It'd be hard to balance utility vs whatever bonus normal GW gives, and the bonus should only kick in after wg research finishes, but i would love to see it
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Well you could just make WG units 10% more expensive, and leave current costs as is. It was poor wording on my part. I didn't mean to necessarily make them cheaper than current, just have the wg units come at a more expensive cost.
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you just have to get used to scouting and defending accordingly and you will be perfectly fine
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The Immortal was originally meant to be a gateway unit. Why dont we just take the Immortal and make it only available on Gateways?
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On October 14 2011 02:32 ThirdDegree wrote: Well you could just make WG units 10% more expensive, and leave current costs as is. It was poor wording on my part. I didn't mean to necessarily make them cheaper than current, just have the wg units come at a more expensive cost.
Eww, protoss nerf? Maybe have non-WG units cost 10% less? like zealots for 90min and 100 out of a warpgate.
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Yea anything like this, but also you would need to remove the research of wg, or at least make it much shorter and less expensive.
And really I'm just spitballing ideas on how to make it so keeping a gateway is viable
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WG is inevitably a research that is crucial to any protoaa mid to late game build , so the cost of it is balanced , if you're complaining about the min and gas/ time cost its really pretty fast and cost effective in the long run , if you're going for an early rush WG is not even that crucial just crono out gateway units and have WG research during pressure to reduce down time , its al about multi tasking you can also you can sentry expand with just gateways and have more ready for WG research to complete , WG is not broken , just play the game like it is Stop QQing >
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remove colossus and warpgate and give me good gateway units plz.
or make warpgate reduce building time in gateway mode instead of of warpgate.
it's not like this is a new idea but i don't see why it has not been implemented in the game as of yet.
it is shockingly obvious that the protoss design is broken as it is
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I think that the huge flaw in the logic here is that if you're trying to attack into a protoss player, they have the largest defenders advantage in a straight up engagement, forcefields + sim city + warp-ins make it extremely hard even on maps with wide natural expansions to attack into a protoss player. Some protoss timing pushes are too powerful in my eyes simply due to the sheild mechanic, but that's a different story.
tl;dr: Attacking into a protoss with a decent spread and sentries is nearly impossible to do without an advantage of some sort (tech, army size or otherwise).
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lol i hate "birding" noobs that post "tree-tarded" "shitaki mushrooms" and waste my time.
If you think toss has the best early game defense your "tree-tarded" . The only reason toss is alive during the first 5 minutes of the game is due to walling up and hiding behind force-fields. Not to mention that if you miss one forcefield you lose, or put 1 building in the wrong place.
BUT WAIT not only are bunkers basically free, but you can salvage them and you dont have to kill a building jsut to leave your base. Not even gonna start that terran have the best starting unit.. marine. Then Emp at 7 minute mark is just ridiculousness
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On October 15 2011 04:31 eatmybunnies wrote: lol i hate "birding" noobs that post "tree-tarded" "shitaki mushrooms" and waste my time.
If you think toss has the best early game defense your "tree-tarded" . The only reason toss is alive during the first 5 minutes of the game is due to walling up and hiding behind force-fields. Not to mention that if you miss one forcefield you lose, or put 1 building in the wrong place.
BUT WAIT not only are bunkers basically free, but you can salvage them and you dont have to kill a building jsut to leave your base. Not even gonna start that terran have the best starting unit.. marine. Then Emp at 7 minute mark is just ridiculousness
....
Some perspective here. Bunkers cost 100 minerals and do not do anything at all by themselves. So basically what you can do is build a buff for your units that costs 100 minerals but cannot move (and takes a friggin long time to build nowadays).
EMP at 7 minute mark is possible, but you won't have anything except emp, no medivacs, no bio upgrades nothing.
Seriously, if you want to complain at least stick to facts.
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On October 15 2011 01:21 CatNzHat wrote: I think that the huge flaw in the logic here is that if you're trying to attack into a protoss player, they have the largest defenders advantage in a straight up engagement, forcefields + sim city + warp-ins make it extremely hard even on maps with wide natural expansions to attack into a protoss player. Some protoss timing pushes are too powerful in my eyes simply due to the sheild mechanic, but that's a different story.
tl;dr: Attacking into a protoss with a decent spread and sentries is nearly impossible to do without an advantage of some sort (tech, army size or otherwise).
guess thats why every terran player is so scared to use 1-1-1 Early / Mid game Terran can outproduce Protoss in the Damage Output easily. Protoss has to resort to opening to gain an economic lead to convert this into beeing able to sustain the damage output of Terran.
On October 15 2011 04:39 Tula wrote: Some perspective here. Bunkers cost 100 minerals and do not do anything at all by themselves. So basically what you can do is build a buff for your units that costs 100 minerals but cannot move (and takes a friggin long time to build nowadays).
EMP at 7 minute mark is possible, but you won't have anything except emp, no medivacs, no bio upgrades nothing.
Seriously, if you want to complain at least stick to facts.
yeah does nothing except giving your defensive units additinal 400HP (+Repair) thats alot, to defend early aggression.
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On October 15 2011 04:47 freetgy wrote:Show nested quote +On October 15 2011 04:39 Tula wrote: Some perspective here. Bunkers cost 100 minerals and do not do anything at all by themselves. So basically what you can do is build a buff for your units that costs 100 minerals but cannot move (and takes a friggin long time to build nowadays).
EMP at 7 minute mark is possible, but you won't have anything except emp, no medivacs, no bio upgrades nothing.
Seriously, if you want to complain at least stick to facts. yeah does nothing except giving your defense 400 more help per bunker, thats alot, to defend early aggression.
400 HP that you can repair !
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On October 15 2011 04:39 Tula wrote:Show nested quote +On October 15 2011 04:31 eatmybunnies wrote: lol i hate "birding" noobs that post "tree-tarded" "shitaki mushrooms" and waste my time.
If you think toss has the best early game defense your "tree-tarded" . The only reason toss is alive during the first 5 minutes of the game is due to walling up and hiding behind force-fields. Not to mention that if you miss one forcefield you lose, or put 1 building in the wrong place.
BUT WAIT not only are bunkers basically free, but you can salvage them and you dont have to kill a building jsut to leave your base. Not even gonna start that terran have the best starting unit.. marine. Then Emp at 7 minute mark is just ridiculousness (and takes a friggin long time to build nowadays).
Complaining about build time to the race which has Carriers is a bad idea.
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and put marines in... JUST SAYING highest dps in the game, for a starting unit. It shoots both air and ground.
AND IT DANCES
(and micro well)
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On October 12 2011 08:38 SupLilSon wrote: Honestly, warpgate and forcefield are the 2 best defender's advantages in the game. I really don't know what all you guys are fussing about. You don't have to make units until a push is literally at your ramp. You can FF all day and continue warping in units faster than Z or T can reinforce. You have shields that quickly and fully regenerate. INSTANT UNITS, honestly how do you complain about that? At least Terran/Zerg are forced to make units preemptively because you know, it actually takes time to build units...
There are even more insane advantages to warpgate but its irrelevant to keep going... Of all the things people can complain about with toss and this is it? 50/50 for the best up in the game >.> be happy...
Forcefield is a good defender tool if you can use it on your ramp. But what happens when you fast expand? Can you constantly put 7 forcefields to block off your natural? It's only good if you 1-base, and if you're 1-basing, you're either teching (the only situation when you need it) or about to timing attack (why would you need to defend?)
Shields regenerating does not = defender's advantage. Shields are made more fragile because they regenerate. So in actuality, it makes defender's advantage worse because the regeneration doesn't actually kick in fast enough DURING the fight, and units are more fragile.
You fail to understand the nature of Protoss units. P units are weaker because they can warp in anywhere/anytime. That cancels each other out.
Seriously, consider what other people are saying about you. Most people on these forums are ex-broodwar / masters league / good players. You should really listen to what people better than us are saying.
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why did you necro a thread to reply to a 3 month old post?
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On January 06 2012 19:49 adrenaLinG wrote: why did you necro a thread to reply to a 3 month old post?
Guess he used the search function and didn't notice? I mean it's an old topic but it's still pretty relevant. Hope it gets fixed somehow in HotS.
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On January 06 2012 20:42 Serelitz wrote:Show nested quote +On January 06 2012 19:49 adrenaLinG wrote: why did you necro a thread to reply to a 3 month old post? Guess he used the search function and didn't notice? I mean it's an old topic but it's still pretty relevant. Hope it gets fixed somehow in HotS.
Only if they somehow miraculously balance the arc cannon, and even then it's only good vs light units and for a short amount of time.
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One of the problem of warpgate which wasn't entirely addressed in this thread is that wg mechanic nullify any try to cut reinforcement route. So while it adds very little defensive capabilities, it allows you to stay in the middle of the map forever but you have no army to fall back on if your main army is destroyed because it was everything you had.
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aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah whoops
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I don't really understand what you're trying to say. I would consider it an advantage to be able to "instantly" warp in defensive units regardless of where your offensive army is.
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On January 06 2012 21:01 DarK[A] wrote: I don't really understand what you're trying to say. I would consider it an advantage to be able to "instantly" warp in defensive units regardless of where your offensive army is.
My friend that is not "defender's advantage" whatsoever lol. But seriously, what the OP says is quite logical and true. I been a forever toss player at Diamond almost Masters. And I pray for the day Warpgate gets removed so that Protoss T1-1.5 aren't so weak, and so we get a legitimate defender's advantage.
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i think you forget about the sentry. the sentry makes ramps stupidly scary (i play R) and slicing armies in half blocking ramps and running away all due to forcefield adds a huge dynamic to protoss. i think that yes you are right in that it's very hard to have an economic opener as protoss. but that is one of the restraints of the race, a two base protoss can beat a four base Zerg or a three base terran (but by that stage its looking very allin-ish and scary). i feel you neglect the raw power of protoss units.
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This is a good topic and I want to present you and idea which both tries to fix this problem AND introduces a interesting new dynamic to protoss play:
After researching Warp Gate, Gateway units are quicker produced by using normal Gateways instead of Warpgates (may also reduces swapping time between both).
This is done by either increasing Warpage cooldown time or reducing build time of units after the Warp Gate upgrade (not before or else early rushes would be too strong).
Now Protoss can produce faster on the defense and once they want to push / harass, they swap to Warp Gates and deploy anywhere but with a lower total production rate. In turn this means that in PvP a defending Protoss can produce faster than the pushing Protoss can warp in.
Thoughts?
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TL;DR: An offensive and a defensive Protoss have the same rally distance.
This is not a disadvantage for a defending Protoss, but an advantage for an attacking protoss. OP is bs, sentry gives enough defense power. Moreover, in the early game Protoss has the strongest units (until Stimpack finishes).
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On January 06 2012 21:05 deadmau wrote:Show nested quote +On January 06 2012 21:01 DarK[A] wrote: I don't really understand what you're trying to say. I would consider it an advantage to be able to "instantly" warp in defensive units regardless of where your offensive army is. My friend that is not "defender's advantage" whatsoever lol. But seriously, what the OP says is quite logical and true. I been a forever toss player at Diamond almost Masters.
I can't understand why you're denying it, because that's exactly what it is. The warp gate mechanics is both a defender's advantage and an ability that negates defender's advantage of the opponent.
And I pray for the day Warpgate gets removed so that Protoss T1-1.5 aren't so weak, and so we get a legitimate defender's advantage.
That made even less sense, considering the almost unanimous complaints about +3 armor zealots TvP and the mobility of warp prism and hatch sniping lategame ZvP. Also consider that archons are essentially gateway units too. and even with morph time can reinforce faster than zerglings and marines.
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necro ftw! btw, toss is still the same, so this thread is still ok imo
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nice read . I've often thought about this and i'd go that far and say, that protoss , the race that it's hardest to expand with, cause they have not defending sstructures as you pointed out. has the weakest early game pressure... the thing is, that the units are fkn expensive for early game pressure... you can't efford them without cutting probes... and still... in earlygame marines pwn zealots especially if there are marodeurs that also pwn very expensive stalkers.
my secon point is that the pvt earlygame is very imbalanced because of the facts you mentioned... without a bunker or a similar structure protoss just barely defends against terrans mass units. but even in pvz most zerg could easily crush you by pumping out units and overruning you till no ffs are left.
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On January 06 2012 21:30 Sadistx wrote:Show nested quote +On January 06 2012 21:05 deadmau wrote:On January 06 2012 21:01 DarK[A] wrote: I don't really understand what you're trying to say. I would consider it an advantage to be able to "instantly" warp in defensive units regardless of where your offensive army is. My friend that is not "defender's advantage" whatsoever lol. But seriously, what the OP says is quite logical and true. I been a forever toss player at Diamond almost Masters. I can't understand why you're denying it, because that's exactly what it is. The warp gate mechanics is both a defender's advantage and an ability that negates defender's advantage of the opponent. Show nested quote +And I pray for the day Warpgate gets removed so that Protoss T1-1.5 aren't so weak, and so we get a legitimate defender's advantage. That made even less sense, considering the almost unanimous complaints about +3 armor zealots TvP and the mobility of warp prism and hatch sniping lategame ZvP. Also consider that archons are essentially gateway units too. and even with morph time can reinforce faster than zerglings and marines.
You're missing the point. Gateway units have been made less cost efficient to compensate for warpgates. Terran units have been made more cost efficient because they have to walk out of their building.
When terran defends, they get the benefit of pretty fast reinforcements + cost efficiency. When protoss defends, they get fast reinforcements, but without the cost efficiency.
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On January 06 2012 21:30 Sadistx wrote:Show nested quote +On January 06 2012 21:05 deadmau wrote:On January 06 2012 21:01 DarK[A] wrote: I don't really understand what you're trying to say. I would consider it an advantage to be able to "instantly" warp in defensive units regardless of where your offensive army is. My friend that is not "defender's advantage" whatsoever lol. But seriously, what the OP says is quite logical and true. I been a forever toss player at Diamond almost Masters. I can't understand why you're denying it, because that's exactly what it is. The warp gate mechanics is both a defender's advantage and an ability that negates defender's advantage of the opponent. Show nested quote +And I pray for the day Warpgate gets removed so that Protoss T1-1.5 aren't so weak, and so we get a legitimate defender's advantage. That made even less sense, considering the almost unanimous complaints about +3 armor zealots TvP and the mobility of warp prism and hatch sniping lategame ZvP. Also consider that archons are essentially gateway units too. and even with morph time can reinforce faster than zerglings and marines.
What I said is true, and his understanding of defender's advantage is wrong. There is no advantage of "warping in defensive units," defender's advantage means your rally distance is short to defend.
Terran example: Protoss/zerg attacks your front, you can reinforce fast because your barracks are right there and right when they pop out they are ready to help you defend. Defender's advantage.
Zerg example: P/T attacks your front, your units pop out and you can reinforce almost instantly because you are at home and on creep. Defender's advantage.
The guy i quoted thinks you being able to warp in units at home to defend an an attack while your army is out on the map is a defender's advantage, which makes no sense. Terran and Zerg constantly pop out at home near their production (hatch/barracks/facts) while their armys are out on the map. So where is the advantage again? lol
If protoss did not have warpgate, their units would pop out at home anyway (short rally, which is the inherent benefit of defender's advantage) so warpgate does nothing to add to a supposed Protoss defender's advantage
The Underlying Message: The Original Post is saying that because Protoss Warpgate Units are balanced in a fashion that they have a fair shake in offensive fashion, with instant reinforcement (not having to rally across map) against a defending Terran/Zerg defensive position, when a Protoss is defending, they are already meant to have quick reinforcements at home with short rally like Terran / Zerg at home, so when Protoss are defending Warpgate gives them no benefit, and their units strength are balanced around the fact that they are meant to have a fair shake against a DEFENDING terran/zerg.
If anyone can explain the OP's concept in a more concise and clear fashion for people that don't understand it, please help me out, I can't shorten it for them. It's a hard concept to grasp for most.
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On January 06 2012 21:39 AndAgain wrote:Show nested quote +On January 06 2012 21:30 Sadistx wrote:On January 06 2012 21:05 deadmau wrote:On January 06 2012 21:01 DarK[A] wrote: I don't really understand what you're trying to say. I would consider it an advantage to be able to "instantly" warp in defensive units regardless of where your offensive army is. My friend that is not "defender's advantage" whatsoever lol. But seriously, what the OP says is quite logical and true. I been a forever toss player at Diamond almost Masters. I can't understand why you're denying it, because that's exactly what it is. The warp gate mechanics is both a defender's advantage and an ability that negates defender's advantage of the opponent. And I pray for the day Warpgate gets removed so that Protoss T1-1.5 aren't so weak, and so we get a legitimate defender's advantage. That made even less sense, considering the almost unanimous complaints about +3 armor zealots TvP and the mobility of warp prism and hatch sniping lategame ZvP. Also consider that archons are essentially gateway units too. and even with morph time can reinforce faster than zerglings and marines. You're missing the point. Gateway units have been made less cost efficient to compensate for warpgates. Terran units have been made more cost efficient because they have to walk out of their building. When terran defends, they get the benefit of pretty fast reinforcements + cost efficiency. When protoss defends, they get fast reinforcements, but without the cost efficiency.
Exactly, Protoss 1-1.5 are efficient when they are ATTACKING and able to reinforce instantly, they are balanced around this fact. But at home defending, you already have a short rally, warping in gives you zero advantage, also your units aren't as good because they are balance around the fact you are allowed to attack an opponent and instantly reinforce.
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Are you fucking dumb, anyone who agrees to this is fucking retarded as shit. Protoss gets no defense from a gateway because your units are stronger. What ever you smoked to rant on about this I want some, I'd love some "equal army" to come push me.
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On January 06 2012 21:50 deadmau wrote:Show nested quote +On January 06 2012 21:39 AndAgain wrote:On January 06 2012 21:30 Sadistx wrote:On January 06 2012 21:05 deadmau wrote:On January 06 2012 21:01 DarK[A] wrote: I don't really understand what you're trying to say. I would consider it an advantage to be able to "instantly" warp in defensive units regardless of where your offensive army is. My friend that is not "defender's advantage" whatsoever lol. But seriously, what the OP says is quite logical and true. I been a forever toss player at Diamond almost Masters. I can't understand why you're denying it, because that's exactly what it is. The warp gate mechanics is both a defender's advantage and an ability that negates defender's advantage of the opponent. And I pray for the day Warpgate gets removed so that Protoss T1-1.5 aren't so weak, and so we get a legitimate defender's advantage. That made even less sense, considering the almost unanimous complaints about +3 armor zealots TvP and the mobility of warp prism and hatch sniping lategame ZvP. Also consider that archons are essentially gateway units too. and even with morph time can reinforce faster than zerglings and marines. You're missing the point. Gateway units have been made less cost efficient to compensate for warpgates. Terran units have been made more cost efficient because they have to walk out of their building. When terran defends, they get the benefit of pretty fast reinforcements + cost efficiency. When protoss defends, they get fast reinforcements, but without the cost efficiency. Exactly, Protoss 1-1.5 are efficient when they are ATTACKING and able to reinforce instantly, they are balanced around this fact. But at home defending, you already have a short rally, warping in gives you zero advantage, also your units aren't as good because they are balance around the fact you are allowed to attack an opponent and instantly reinforce. If protoss units are "balanced around the fact you are allowed to attack an opponent and instantly reinforce", that means the standing protoss army at any point can engage the terran/zerg standing army even when supported by a short rally AND defensive structures. How does the same army have a *disadvantage* when the terran/zerg is attacking with no short rally and no defensive structures?
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I would give away warpgate and sentries if the units where not that fragile to terrans or zergs T1 and1.5 units - there is nothing more terrible if you know something is coming ,but you can not defend it because 2 forcefields are not gamechanging and your units melt to some all in - and with stim it gets even more scary
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Hey vega, if you could point out the fallacy of the logic behind it, i'd like to hear it, because unless you don't understand it yea, it should sound like the OP did smoke something, but if you understand the logic which makes sense, as many have explained, I don't know why you're so upset. Use some intelligent thought to get your message across yea?
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On January 06 2012 22:01 deadmau wrote: Hey vega, if you could point out the fallacy of the logic behind it, i'd like to hear it, because unless you don't understand it yea, it should sound like the OP did smoke something, but if you understand the logic which makes sense, as many have explained, I don't know why you're so upset. Use some intelligent thought to get your message across yea?
Are you fucking dumb, anyone who agrees to this is fucking retarded as shit. Protoss gets no defense from a gateway because your units are stronger. What ever you smoked to rant on about this I want some, I'd love some "equal army" to come push me, that is my "fallacy of the logic".
User was warned for this post
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Haha, we Protoss see warpgate, which renders our offensive and defensive armies equal in power, as our bane and the other two races as a huge advantage. But the fact is guys, Protoss pushes are holdable, and Protoss can still hold pushes from Terran or Zerg, so in the end it's somewhat fine.
But in the case that somehow Protoss timings were to become too powerful, Blizzard would not hesitate for a second to nerf things and destroy the entire race, whereas they would think hard before buffing if we couldn't defend Terran all ins or something. This is a scary thought. It's always easier to acknowledge that something is OP (basically because all the community will whine about it), rather than something being UP (example: the Carrier, which should have had its ridiculous build time fixed since a long time ago)
I would have liked warpgate to be perfectly balanced, but it's obviously very difficult to achieve, and it sometimes looks OP, and sometimes makes Protoss look incredibly easy to all in.
Edit: I don't understand at all this Vega08 guy btw, among the few posts he has in his history, several are whine about P (his race apparently) being underpowered as shit, and there he comes calling "our" units stronger. Probably just some joke poster I'd guess.
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On January 06 2012 22:08 ZenithM wrote: Haha, we Protoss see warpgate, which renders our offensive and defensive armies equal in power, as our bane and the other two races as a huge advantage. But the fact is guys, Protoss pushes are holdable, and Protoss can still hold pushes from Terran or Zerg, so in the end it's somewhat fine.
But in the case that somehow Protoss timings were to become too powerful, Blizzard would not hesitate for a second to nerf things and destroy the entire race, whereas they would think hard before buffing if we couldn't defend Terran all ins or something. This is a scary thought. It's always easier to acknowledge that something is OP (basically because all the community will whine about it), rather than something being UP (example: the Carrier, which should have had its ridiculous build time fixed since a long time ago)
I would have liked warpgate to be perfectly balanced, but it's obviously very difficult to achieve, and it sometimes looks OP, and sometimes makes Protoss look incredibly easy to all in.
Edit: I don't understand at all this Vega08 guy btw, among the few posts he has in his history, several are whine about P (his race apparently) being underpowered as shit, and there he comes calling "our" units stronger. Probably just some joke poster I'd guess.
I think what Vega means by protoss units being stronger is that, piece for piece, a protoss army vs a terran or zerg army of equal numbers (not supply) and equal tech will be stronger in general. Of course, that ignores cost, supply, and build time.
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How is warp in not good defensively? I have to wait 25 seconds for my marine to Pop out, Protoss has to wait 5 seconds. Give me a break, I'd take slightly weaker units for this insane build time.
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On January 06 2012 23:43 HypernovA wrote: How is warp in not good defensively? I have to wait 25 seconds for my marine to Pop out, Protoss has to wait 5 seconds. Give me a break, I'd take slightly weaker units for this insane build time.
You don't really make them in 5 seconds because warpgates have cooldowns. The real bonus isn't the production time, but the fact you can warp units in wherever you have pylons. So you save yourself the time of having to walk your units over to the necessary place.
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On January 06 2012 23:43 HypernovA wrote: How is warp in not good defensively? I have to wait 25 seconds for my marine to Pop out, Protoss has to wait 5 seconds. Give me a break, I'd take slightly weaker units for this insane build time.
It's not whether it's balanced around (and yes build times are worked around currently) it's the inherent design.
If a T defends, he gains a reinforcement distance and defensive structures like bunkers (compared to when attacking). If a P defends, he gains no reinforcement distance (due to warp in) and arguably weaker defensive structures (due to them requiring a forge as opposed to rax/pool).
In addition, to compensate for how P units have no reinforcement distance when attacking, they have to be weaker to balance that out, or P gateway timings would be too strong (currently it's somewhere in between - gateway units are somewhat weaker but low-tech timings are still stronger than Z/T equivalent mostly). That in turn has an effect again on P defending strength.
The biggest example of this is PvP. There's pretty much no way to safely expand and still win because of reinforcement distance (always equal) and defender's advantage (practically non-existant).
The way Blizzard handled this situation is the sentry, and especially when this topic was created the sentry was under a lot of scrutiny for being badly designed.
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Protoss has force fields. The map becomes bigger (harder for early pushes). If small map just late expand.
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Russian Federation4235 Posts
StarCraft 2 history looks very fun if you try to remember the beta times. Like:
Fan during beta: "Hey Blizzard, are you sure that mechanic X is gonna work out? Common sense says there will be fundamental problems with it." Blizzard: "We are the game developers, not you, so STFU because we know what you want better than you." A different fan today: "Hey Blizzard, mechanic X kinda doesn't work. If you think about it, common sense says there are fundamental problems with it." Blizzard: "FUUUUUU!!! I mean, we're working on the issue."
Back in the beta, we wondered if warpgates, medivacs, colossi, clumping unit pathing and megaunits could ever be made to function in a serious RTS context. It's 2012 now and they still don't work. Eagerly awaiting Diablo 3 to finally see if Blizzard has no clue how to make games nowadays otherwise than spend enormous budgets. Not that I'm very bitter, but things that make me shun the game today are EXACTLY the same things that made me worry in alpha/beta periods.
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On January 07 2012 00:08 BluzMan wrote: StarCraft 2 history looks very fun if you try to remember the beta times. Like:
Fan during beta: "Hey Blizzard, are you sure that mechanic X is gonna work out? Common sense says there will be fundamental problems with it." Blizzard: "We are the game developers, not you, so STFU because we know what you want better than you." A different fan today: "Hey Blizzard, mechanic X kinda doesn't work. If you think about it, common sense says there are fundamental problems with it." Blizzard: "FUUUUUU!!! I mean, we're working on the issue."
Back in the beta, we wondered if warpgates, medivacs, colossi, clumping unit pathing and megaunits could ever be made to function in a serious RTS context. It's 2012 now and they still don't work. Eagerly awaiting Diablo 3 to finally see if Blizzard has no clue how to make games nowadays otherwise than spend enormous budgets. Not that I'm very bitter, but things that make me shun the game today are EXACTLY the same things that made me worry in alpha/beta periods.
Both funny and true. :>
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On January 07 2012 00:24 Treble557 wrote:Show nested quote +On January 07 2012 00:08 BluzMan wrote: StarCraft 2 history looks very fun if you try to remember the beta times. Like:
Fan during beta: "Hey Blizzard, are you sure that mechanic X is gonna work out? Common sense says there will be fundamental problems with it." Blizzard: "We are the game developers, not you, so STFU because we know what you want better than you." A different fan today: "Hey Blizzard, mechanic X kinda doesn't work. If you think about it, common sense says there are fundamental problems with it." Blizzard: "FUUUUUU!!! I mean, we're working on the issue."
Back in the beta, we wondered if warpgates, medivacs, colossi, clumping unit pathing and megaunits could ever be made to function in a serious RTS context. It's 2012 now and they still don't work. Eagerly awaiting Diablo 3 to finally see if Blizzard has no clue how to make games nowadays otherwise than spend enormous budgets. Not that I'm very bitter, but things that make me shun the game today are EXACTLY the same things that made me worry in alpha/beta periods. Both funny and true. :>
i think the history is more like
beta fan: äh blizz this game is not broodwar WTF blizz: yeah intended its a game of its own in the starcraft universe if u like bw more play it fan now: OHMAGAWD its still not broodwar.... blizz: yeah exactly
what makes u think warpgate does not work? a huge esports community and general huge success and nearly perfect balanced tournament winrates (after only A year of balancing) disagree
i'm 10000% sure warpgate and the other things mentioned wont go away they may be changed a little but they are part of the game (the highly successful and balanced game nontheless)
my argument is kinda old and lame but true this is not broodwar and blizz themself said that this is sc2 and if you dont like it play broodwar its still awesome
arguments like "but broodwar was better" isnt an argument thats an opinion
sc2 is awesome to play and to watch sure bw was/is too but blizz didnt want sc2 to be bw and it isn't and I think thats good
Back in the beta, we wondered if warpgates, medivacs, colossi, clumping unit pathing and megaunits could ever be made to function in a serious RTS context can you explain how it's "not working" because i well i see it working pretty well sc2 is a game that stands on his own feet in the starcraft universe with huge professional success and is very good balanced (especially considering its age)
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On September 08 2011 18:59 susySquark wrote:
[*]The lack of a defensive structure after gateway adds to this problem.
It seems Toss is getting this in HotS with one of the new Nexus abilities. I'm not a fan of that though.
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On January 07 2012 00:08 BluzMan wrote: StarCraft 2 history looks very fun if you try to remember the beta times. Like:
Fan during beta: "Hey Blizzard, are you sure that mechanic X is gonna work out? Common sense says there will be fundamental problems with it." Blizzard: "We are the game developers, not you, so STFU because we know what you want better than you." A different fan today: "Hey Blizzard, mechanic X kinda doesn't work. If you think about it, common sense says there are fundamental problems with it." Blizzard: "FUUUUUU!!! I mean, we're working on the issue."
Back in the beta, we wondered if warpgates, medivacs, colossi, clumping unit pathing and megaunits could ever be made to function in a serious RTS context. It's 2012 now and they still don't work. Eagerly awaiting Diablo 3 to finally see if Blizzard has no clue how to make games nowadays otherwise than spend enormous budgets. Not that I'm very bitter, but things that make me shun the game today are EXACTLY the same things that made me worry in alpha/beta periods.
But most of those things (especially medivacs) have worked themselves out, except for WG somewhat. I think Blizzard has a clue on how to make a game - considering SC2 dwarfed every other game competitively this year and will probably continue to do so.
It's just like LoL where every player complained about the towers doing too much damage in beta, about click stuns being dumb, etc. and Riot not fixing it. So I don't know how you can even say that...
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On January 07 2012 00:47 AvAri wrote:Show nested quote +On January 07 2012 00:24 Treble557 wrote:On January 07 2012 00:08 BluzMan wrote: StarCraft 2 history looks very fun if you try to remember the beta times. Like:
Fan during beta: "Hey Blizzard, are you sure that mechanic X is gonna work out? Common sense says there will be fundamental problems with it." Blizzard: "We are the game developers, not you, so STFU because we know what you want better than you." A different fan today: "Hey Blizzard, mechanic X kinda doesn't work. If you think about it, common sense says there are fundamental problems with it." Blizzard: "FUUUUUU!!! I mean, we're working on the issue."
Back in the beta, we wondered if warpgates, medivacs, colossi, clumping unit pathing and megaunits could ever be made to function in a serious RTS context. It's 2012 now and they still don't work. Eagerly awaiting Diablo 3 to finally see if Blizzard has no clue how to make games nowadays otherwise than spend enormous budgets. Not that I'm very bitter, but things that make me shun the game today are EXACTLY the same things that made me worry in alpha/beta periods. Both funny and true. :> i think the history is more like beta fan: äh blizz this game is not broodwar WTF blizz: yeah intended its a game of its own in the starcraft universe if u like bw more play it fan now: OHMAGAWD its still not broodwar.... blizz: yeah exactly what makes u think warpgate does not work? a huge esports community and general huge success and nearly perfect balanced tournament winrates (after only A year of balancing) disagree i'm 10000% sure warpgate and the other things mentioned wont go away they may be changed a little but they are part of the game (the highly successful and balanced game nontheless) my argument is kinda old and lame but true this is not broodwar and blizz themself said that this is sc2 and if you dont like it play broodwar its still awesome arguments like "but broodwar was better" isnt an argument thats an opinion sc2 is awesome to play and to watch sure bw was/is too but blizz didnt want sc2 to be bw and it isn't and I think thats good Show nested quote +Back in the beta, we wondered if warpgates, medivacs, colossi, clumping unit pathing and megaunits could ever be made to function in a serious RTS context can you explain how it's "not working" because i well i see it working pretty well sc2 is a game that stands on his own feet in the starcraft universe with huge professional success and is very good balanced (especially considering its age)
When you think about it, the only thing that 'destroy' starcraft 2 is warpgate. It's very difficult to balance units when they can be instantly warp 10feet from the opponent's base, regardless of the map's size. The whole protoss race is balanced around it (colossus), which affects the other races as well.
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On January 07 2012 00:47 AvAri wrote:Show nested quote +On January 07 2012 00:24 Treble557 wrote:On January 07 2012 00:08 BluzMan wrote: StarCraft 2 history looks very fun if you try to remember the beta times. Like:
Fan during beta: "Hey Blizzard, are you sure that mechanic X is gonna work out? Common sense says there will be fundamental problems with it." Blizzard: "We are the game developers, not you, so STFU because we know what you want better than you." A different fan today: "Hey Blizzard, mechanic X kinda doesn't work. If you think about it, common sense says there are fundamental problems with it." Blizzard: "FUUUUUU!!! I mean, we're working on the issue."
Back in the beta, we wondered if warpgates, medivacs, colossi, clumping unit pathing and megaunits could ever be made to function in a serious RTS context. It's 2012 now and they still don't work. Eagerly awaiting Diablo 3 to finally see if Blizzard has no clue how to make games nowadays otherwise than spend enormous budgets. Not that I'm very bitter, but things that make me shun the game today are EXACTLY the same things that made me worry in alpha/beta periods. Both funny and true. :> i think the history is more like beta fan: äh blizz this game is not broodwar WTF blizz: yeah intended its a game of its own in the starcraft universe if u like bw more play it fan now: OHMAGAWD its still not broodwar.... blizz: yeah exactly what makes u think warpgate does not work? a huge esports community and general huge success and nearly perfect balanced tournament winrates (after only A year of balancing) disagree i'm 10000% sure warpgate and the other things mentioned wont go away they may be changed a little but they are part of the game (the highly successful and balanced game nontheless) my argument is kinda old and lame but true this is not broodwar and blizz themself said that this is sc2 and if you dont like it play broodwar its still awesome arguments like "but broodwar was better" isnt an argument thats an opinion sc2 is awesome to play and to watch sure bw was/is too but blizz didnt want sc2 to be bw and it isn't and I think thats good Show nested quote +Back in the beta, we wondered if warpgates, medivacs, colossi, clumping unit pathing and megaunits could ever be made to function in a serious RTS context can you explain how it's "not working" because i well i see it working pretty well sc2 is a game that stands on his own feet in the starcraft universe with huge professional success and is very good balanced (especially considering its age)
I agree that SC2 is a different game, and I hate when people asks for units from BW. For one, I think the warpgate mechanic is a very nice addition to the protoss race. But... If you watch BW, you realise that SC2 could be even better. In BW, battles last for minutes because you can hold ground (and units dont clump together resulting in a big battlefield), and most units have very good micro potential, and when used properly, they can change the game's outcome. SC2 lacks on this part. There is the marine vs baneling micro, and TvT where tanks spaced out well and marine drops are everywhere... but it's few and Protoss does not even have anything like that. It is not a coincidence that the best SC2 games resemble to the BW kind of games... That's why people compare SC2 to BW. We need some of the mechanics back, to make SC2 the best RTS ever made. (Also get rid of A-move units like the colossus. Even if it is working and balanced, e-sport is still about how exciting the game is for the crowd)
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Can anyone show any evidence that protoss gateway units are made weaker because of the warpgate mechanic? Or is this all just circumstantial conjecture?
I feel like there ought to be a decision to make between gateway and warpgate production instead of the current, I must get this tech, mindset, but I do not understand the call to arms against warpgate mechanic based on these assumptions. Late game protoss armies might have to contain more than just 1-1.5 tier units to compete with other armies, but so what? Is the expectation that if blizzard removed warpgate tech that they would then buff gateway units to the point that you could use them un-upgraded in mid-late to late game army compositions without any kind of support? Or that stim and concussive shells wouldn't be strong enough to pressure an early expand because of gateway unit buffs?
Protoss certainly have early game options with econ openings. FFE is standard on a lot of maps against zerg. 3 gate expand, 1 gate expand, etc. If you get hit with a stim timing or roach bust because you didn't build units it isn't any different than a fast expanding zerg losing to a 4gate timing or a zerg taking a third losing to a 6gate push.
You may not gain a special defender advantage with warpgates that you don't enjoy on offense in the early game, but nobody has proven that you lose the advantage specifically because of warpgate tech either. In addition to this, you still have a special defenders advantage with robo and stargate tech. Their rally points are still short, and that tech is something you'd need to invest in to stop timing pushes anyway. The sentry is still in the game to delay pushes or cut down the efficiency of opposing armies on your doorstep. The warpgate mechanic makes attacking far away third or fourth bases harder to kill with small, noncommittal groups of units giving protoss an advantage on defense of outlying expansions from things like drops as the game rolls on.
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On January 06 2012 23:28 MagmaRam wrote:
I think what Vega means by protoss units being stronger is that, piece for piece, a protoss army vs a terran or zerg army of equal numbers (not supply) and equal tech will be stronger in general. Of course, that ignores cost, supply, and build time.
If you do not consider supply, costs and buildtime and you go pure numbers against pure numbers you can say Protoss is much stronger because one marine dies to one colossi.
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Think the original post was close to right. Warp is a small part of why Protoss defense is weak, but if you look at how every unit is balanced, it's all the sentry.
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On January 07 2012 01:55 Tehweenus wrote: Think the original post was close to right. Warp is a small part of why Protoss defense is weak, but if you look at how every unit is balanced, it's all the sentry. But if you remove the sentry without adjusting protoss it is unwinnable against early pushes - on the other hand if you buff T1 units warpgatre gets too strong for Protoss timing pushes. I really would not want to be in charge of balancing this game, especially when HotS will change so many factors so that Blizzard has to revise the balance with the new units added.
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warpgates are just a broken mechanic (not imba).
as of now, i can't fathom to see why warpgates BUFF gatways in every way... there needs to be a tradeoff. if anything, warpgates should have a much higher cooldown time that gateways in exchange for being able to warp in anywhere on a big ass map. absolutely makes no sense.
in addition pylons being able to warp in is just ridiculous. having warp prisms (note WARP) being able to only warp in units would make the game much more balanced imo. obviously things would have to be tweaked, but that would make much more sense.
i wish we could just get rid of warpgates all together. that would also fix khaydarin amulet.
edit: unit clumping is the main reason the matchups are broken. almost everything i can think of that's wrong could be fixed by not having ridiculous unit clumping
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Late game warpgates are kind of crazy. Being able to instantly remake 40 supply worth of units is too much. After a big engagement toss is always one production cycle ahead.
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I agree with what you are saying. ***RIGHT NOW*** Toss simply cannot push out against other matchups effectively unless it is an all-in. It is tough, but we have to learn to adapt and evolve. There is a way to deal with this stuff, it just hasnt been discovered yet imho.
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On January 07 2012 02:26 intentionalgamer wrote: I agree with what you are saying. ***RIGHT NOW*** Toss simply cannot push out against other matchups effectively unless it is an all-in. It is tough, but we have to learn to adapt and evolve. There is a way to deal with this stuff, it just hasnt been discovered yet imho.
That is not what anyone is saying...
This is not the the case this post is presenting whatsoever, everyone please disregard this ignorance.
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On January 07 2012 02:26 intentionalgamer wrote: I agree with what you are saying. ***RIGHT NOW*** Toss simply cannot push out against other matchups effectively unless it is an all-in. It is tough, but we have to learn to adapt and evolve. There is a way to deal with this stuff, it just hasnt been discovered yet imho. If he means pushing out with warpgate tech that is the feeling a lot of protoss have. Also depends on your definition of an all in
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As a mapmaker I can tell you that warp-in ruins a lot of concepts~
Apart from that it obviously has numerous negative effects on actual gameplay. Would be happy if it was lategame tech or only worked at Warp-Prisms and the normal/early game production would be from normal Gateways.
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This total thread is complete utterly stupid.
Defenders advantage has many many factors to it, only one of them being the shorter rally vs longer rally. There are the defensive buildings, creep, sim cities etc. Someone playing agianst toss still has a large defenders advantage, in fact I think the defenders advantage is as big or even bigger then it is in SC:BW. - bunkers are salvageable thus a much easier and less costly investment. It's also much easier to wall with buildings. Compared to BW terran can use their buildings much better on defense. - zerg has queens so some free DPS when defending unlike in BW. Creep spread and speedlings also make it very easy to prevent or push away the proxy pylon - protoss has the sentry, an early game unit that is unmatched in it's ability to defend a ramp
Ofcourse PvP has been a trainwreck of a matchup for a long time but this is not only because of warpgate, it simply took a long time to nerf the various aspects of the 4 gate or buff the 4g defense without screwing up other matches. Blizz policy of slowly patching only changing small things at a time is good in theory but when they don't nerf hard enough it really stinks especially in mirror matches which balance wise are not a priority. This all-in or nothing some people claim about is also quite the nonsense, that is to an extent true for any race. Almost any timing attack will set you back significantly when it fails, this is true for zerg, protoss, terran or whatever. The only problem is that protoss does not have a dedicated harass unit that is not gimmicky as the DT. In PvZ air harass is already very common and blink styles are common too in PvP but agianst terran there are no safe harass units. This can lead to the turtle till deathball kind of style but there is ALWAYS one race that has a natural tendency to turtle in a matchup. The race with the slower units simply has more incentive to stay back as moving out has huge risks.
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Aotearoa39261 Posts
Yeah, this thread had run its course. Take any future discussion to the balance thread
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