I'd love to see island maps, could be a lot of fun. Obviously, simply deciding something like "oh we will just use an island map next MLG" would be a bad idea, but island maps should definitely be tried one way or another. There are tons of ways to influence island map balance via map design, i.e. island maps can be more than just something like Dire Straits from BW.
Would island maps really be that imbalanced? - Page 8
Forum Index > SC2 General |
Carnac
Germany / USA16648 Posts
I'd love to see island maps, could be a lot of fun. Obviously, simply deciding something like "oh we will just use an island map next MLG" would be a bad idea, but island maps should definitely be tried one way or another. There are tons of ways to influence island map balance via map design, i.e. island maps can be more than just something like Dire Straits from BW. | ||
LonelyCat
United Kingdom130 Posts
May fiddle in map editor but i'm pretty bad at shaping islands/bases etc. well | ||
Azzur
Australia6202 Posts
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Fatze
Germany1342 Posts
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Puph
Canada635 Posts
I think it would have something to do with destructible debris and natural expansions. all I can say at the moment :D | ||
Gl!tch
United States573 Posts
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Lazy_89
United States87 Posts
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Stropheum
United States1124 Posts
Protoss needs a warp prism to ferry a probe somewhere to build a nexus and then to ferry probes over to mine, or manually saturate it on its own Terran needs to make a command center, fill it with scv's and fly it where they want, where they can subsequently use those 5 scv's to surround the base with turrets due to no building restrictions like pylons or creep. Not to mention that once terran gets 3 orbital commands, they can fill a new base with mules. I think it's fair. User was warned for this post | ||
dbddbddb
Singapore969 Posts
screw island maps. i hate desert oasis. god damn terrans. | ||
Shamrock_
South Africa276 Posts
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LegendaryZ
United States1583 Posts
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Talin
Montenegro10532 Posts
Differences between maps should be important, but subtle. Not completely game changing (and potentially game breaking). You shouldn't have to re-learn the game and figure out a set of entirely different strategies and timings just to play on a few radically different, non-standard maps. I absolutely hated them in BW WCGs and would be happy if they never made an appearance in SC2. | ||
RebirthOfLeGenD
USA5860 Posts
On August 28 2011 14:32 Chairman Ray wrote: What about island maps that are separated by cliff rather than sea? Protoss can warp units through and walk colossi over, and terran can jump reapers over. This way early game is a bit more dynamic. You bone Zerg, and this is the retarded part. If it's a straight water island map they tend to be bland, the decent island maps on BW were basically gorky's island where your base was just a high ground island, and the low ground could be fought over for the rest of the game. This could NEVER work in SC2, it would be even more imbalanced against zerg, since they would have to go eco/macro builds, and any colossi/blink builds would RAPE them, even a 4gate blink with hallucination would rape so hard and punish the shit out of any greedy play. It would basically be like the map isn't an island for Protoss, Terran mass CC lifting is retarded, whose going to go triple CC and load away 10 workers to be idle for the minute it takes to actually get to another base? That's retarded. Reaper openings would rape on no-water island maps, so would un-scoutable banshee openings, both which would be annoying to deal with as Zerg. | ||
Breach_hu
Hungary2431 Posts
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WniO
United States2706 Posts
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The_Templar
your Country52795 Posts
On August 29 2011 01:24 WniO wrote: holy hell terran favored? really? haha. gl leaving your island with phoenixes or 1 base mutas... island maps are fun though. tbh i havent played too many times but its most certaintly not terran imba. Not that hard to get pheonix or spore crawlers... You're a good mapmaker, at least try making an island map. | ||
Mazer
Canada1086 Posts
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Whitewing
United States7483 Posts
On August 28 2011 14:40 Alzadar wrote: Well at least you aren't going on about lifting CCs... However I'm not sure your arguments are really that compelling. I don't really see how Medivacs being able to heal would be all that much more significant on island maps than it is on regular maps, and because your opponent would be anticipating drops, they might actually be less effective. The Raven isn't really a good harass unit and is easily killed if it has no supporting units, and there wouldn't be any supporting units if they're stuck on the home island. Part of the reason that makes Terran air strong is that it can pull back to the safety of a Marine ball if it is threatened, if that isn't available then Vikings, Banshees, Ravens, Medivacs and even Battlecruisers are all very vulnerable to enemy air, because they can't retreat. If you bring your Vikings close to the enemy and it turns out he has 2 more Phoenix than you, you will lose everything. Seeker missiles can take the role of the marine ball, keeping enemies away from your vikings. Once you get BCs, nothing protoss has in the air can deal with a viking/BC/raven ball. Vikings outrange void rays and snipe them down pretty quick (plus yamato one shots them), seeker missile prevents them from even getting close enough to use phoenix and can be used to prevent void rays from charging, and carriers get taken down pretty quick by the combo. Plus, terran is the only race that gets a cloaked air unit for their harass. Zerg is in even more trouble, mutas are strong against terran air but if he turtles until he's got ravens and seeker missile with missile turrets and building armor, your mutas won't help anymore, since you have to get so close to attack the air ball and frankly, mutas are bad in a straight up fight unless it's pure viking (PDD works on them too). Vikings beat corrupters with micro due to range advantage, and if used properly, seeker missile lets you control energy range movement. Note that I'm only harping about the seeker missile because it's an island map and you won't have a big ball of ground units underneath for the space control threat of: "Get close and take stupid amounts of damage." Seeker missile can fill that role though =p. Protoss and Zerg don't have an equivalent. Terran has the best Air, and the most air units. Other races balance it out in combination with their other units to make things work, but an island map makes ground units less powerful due to a huge lack of mobility. The other major issue is how easy it is to prevent drops as a terran: usage of planetary fortresses and missile turrets can make each island impenetrable to harass. | ||
DaemonX
545 Posts
1) Destructible rocks prevent any early lift-off abuse. 2) CC first has been proven to be inferior to fast OC - so terrans would 1-rax expand...just like they do on current maps. 3) Terrain that can be exploitable by Blink and Nydus play as well as lift-off and reapers. 4) As strong as vikings are, they lose to mutas and voids in equal resources. | ||
Eps
Canada240 Posts
Island maps would be an interesting change to play on, it might even be fun. But I wouldn't want them in my ladder pool. There's too many unexplored areas with them. To throw some viewpoints as a Terran player and how I view it. Looking pass the early-game shenanigans with CC lift off and such, and into the mid-late game battles. I see a lot of people saying that Terran would be imbalanced due to mass Turret drop. But wait..couldn't the other races do that? Both Zerg and Protoss have long range bombardment units. Terran does not. Broodlords make a joke out of Turrets and their superior range can be abusive on Island maps, keeping them effectively out of range of any ground. Similarly Protoss has their Carriers which can serve the same purpose, granted their interceptors can be shot down. For Terrans to deal with mass AA emplacement, they'd need PDD and Yamato. PDD's have limited range, and depending on how big the islands are, this is a big factor. BC's are a unit that are not meant to be massed due to their cost, slow speed and ineffectiveness without proper Viking support. In a normal match as is, Banshees take forever to take down 1 Spore Crawler, they'd need to have a significant number before that is possible without taking any loss. Proper sim-city and staggered Spore/Cannon placement would destroy Banshees. Battlecruisers aren't all that great as people make them out to be. There's a reason you don't see them often versus Protoss or Zerg. Blink-Stalkers and Void Rays destroy them, Carriers do a decent job as well. Zergs Corruptors just destroys BC's like they're nothing. The only time I ever feel comfortable using them is versus Terran. And only when I know I can control the sky with Viking-Ravens to cover my BC's. Basically when I won the Air-War to begin with. Banshees while being powerful Harassment-Cloaked Units, have a extremely long build speed. It takes 60s, that's the same time it takes to build a Raven or a Thor. The build speed alone prevents them from being massed. As pointed above, they are just paper-planes when any sort of AA structure is up. With proper detection, HT's can One-Shot them down. The last Terran Air-Unit, the only one in their arsenal that can be truly massed - Vikings. Mutas do a great job against them, in equal resource situation. Phoenix aren't talked about much against Vikings, but if I recall correctly, they can almost 1 on 1 a Viking by themselves. Voids are great units and before the Speed Upgrade removal, they could destroy Vikings as they could not kite them. Nowadays they require some Phoenix to help them. Every other race other than Terran has an option to pair up their superiority fighters with another Air unit that is more accessible to help in their battles. Mutas can be paired with Corruptors to make a deadly Anti-Air combo. Similarly Phoenix and Void Rays compliment each other and address each other's weaknesses. Terrans have Vikings alone, while strong offensively, they share the traits of other Terran units. They're glass cannons. 125 HP. There is no meat-shield unit in this situation for them, other than PDD's and those have limited range. The beauty of an air-battle is that they can reposition quite easily. I wanted to add in about Ravens, PDDs are great in Air battles and will be needed for Terrans so that they do not get their flimsy Vikings destroyed. Seeker Missiles might actually have a role in these maps as they'd be finally able to cast their ability without getting sniped as often. You have to keep in mind that Seeker Missiles only have 6 Range. Phoenix and Mutas can easily fly away from them with their speed. However the other two races have their own spell casters as well that can support them. HT's can just wreck a fleet of Banshees with Feedback, and storms are able to assist as well. Both abilities are at 9 Range. Likewise, Feedback can do up to an instant 200 damage on BC's. Infestors are able to Neural Parasite as there is no Terran air-unit that has a attack-range that is comparable to it's ability. BC's Yamato is at a range of 10, slightly over so that may be used to help combat this. However let's not forget the other Infestor abilities, Fungal which has been proven to effectively deal with Vikings already in normal combat situations. They'd be able to chain fungal down a Terran fleet before it has a chance to attack. Without Viking support, BC's are horrible units on their own. This is all theory crafting of course, and only hypothetically on the Air-Battle. This is not counting Ground combat units since that puts in a whole new set of variables. But I wanted to share my viewpoints on Terran. I wanted to point out that there's a reason why Sky Terran is almost exclusively used in TvT only, and it is still rare in that match up. | ||
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