-What did you think of the new macro mechanics (spawn larva, proton charge, mule)?
-What did you think of the macro casters (queen, obelisk, orbital command)?
-Were they fun to use?
-How often did you use them?
-What decision-making was involved with them?
- The new 150 mineral hatchery/anti air/tank that is the queen seemed broken. After you build your spawning pool you have access to make a queen through your hathery that doesn't require larvae to build. The queen doesn't have long build time and for 25 mana she adds 4 larvae to a hathery. She has a ranged attack that shoots air as well as ground. She had another ability as well but I didn't see much use for it. She can lay some kind of cacoon that speeds up nearby certain units (drones not included) on the creep. That whole package seems so much better compared to a 300 mineral in base hatchery.
-MBS..... was really helpful.However what was really annoying about it is that I couldn't find a way to set the default building. When I hit 55 to go back to my main it would end up going to some random hatchery.
-MBS..... was really helpful.However what was really annoying about it is that I couldn't find a way to set the default building. When I hit 55 to go back to my main it would end up going to some random hatchery.
-houseurmusic
- Obelisks are awesome, basically just make ur workers mine and gather way faster, and you can use it pretty common.
-Raydog
Things i didnt like though. The protoss proton charge thing just kinda seems like a gimick. I know its very useful but it doesnt feel like it belongs. Same with calling down mules. I didnt play with the zerg so idk about their larva thing. I feel that just because theres less macroing, you shouldnt replace that with awkward mechanics that dont seem to fit and dont really need to be there. Thats just me tho.
-pzea469
Everything is really starting to come together, and things just feel great. The units look good, the controls feel good, and the macro mechanics require attention without feeling tedious.
-Thingdo
On August 24 2009 03:35 Archerofaiur wrote:
Since allot of people are concerned about the new mechanics I thought it would be good to have one post were everyone who played the game can say how they felt.
-What did you think of the new macro mechanics (spawn larva, proton charge, mule)?
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Spawn larva was probably the largest impacting of the macro mechanics. A zerg without a queen spawning larva will not be able to keep up with his minerals. I used the mule a lot, but I just summoned it and turned away so I didn't really see how much that impacted my economy.
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-What did you think of the macro casters (queen, obelisk, orbital command)?
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The queen was pretty cool. A nice early defensive unit who can constantly spawn larva on your hatchery. She has some other skills too, but I never used them.
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-Were they fun to use?
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The queen was sometimes frustrating when my opponent managed to run in my base and assassinate her because then I'd have about half the larva until another one hatched.
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-How often did you use them?
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Constantly. The moment I finished my barracks or spawning pool, I'd upgrade my CC or start building a queen at my hatch. The queen, every single time I noticed that i had 4-5 larva at my hatchery I would tell my queen to make more, which would take another 30 seconds. There was no limit to her energy if all you did was make larva.
The obital command I spawned a Mule every time it had 50 energy unless I couldn't get a scout in their base in which case I'd save for a scan. If they were teching to DTs or something I'd just purely save energy for scans until I could get a detector (raven).
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-What decision-making was involved with them?
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For the queen, I really couldn't see any decision making. Spawn larva constantly, or go home. For the orbital command, you need to decide when to get money and when you have a comsat station. If you accidently get supply locked, you can use it on a supply depot to up your supply by 6. I didn't play toss much, but the obelisk also works as a shield battery for shields or energy, which I could only see being used to help against rushes.
-Alienalias
Like i said in my great wall o' text in the other topic, I played all 3 races throughout blizzcon, and i'm pretty sure every match-up at least twice, some a lot more.
Lets get down to the questions:
-What did you think of the new macro mechanics (spawn larva, proton charge, mule)?
Larva - in general, i'd like to know how long it takes for a larva to respawn. I found myself constantly spamming ssssss just because I didn't know the time tables. Now with the queen, that lady is just sick NASTY. If you have say an expo and your main, be prepared to make waypoints for her going back and forth casting W (the skill that allows 4 or so extra larva to hatch) for the duration of the game. One game I accidentally made 2 queens, which was kind of a benefit because my opponent had sneaked in a spire and I didn't notice it. I'd say 3 hatcheries can work well with 1 queen, and any higher might require 2 queens (depending on how far the hatchs are from each other). I can see this being used as a standard unit in high competitive play.
Proton Charge (I assume the obelisk thing) is pretty nifty as well. As protoss, I found myself Constantly reminding myself to use my obelisks at my expo and main. No complaints, they are quite useful. There wasn't a cooldown on the spell, so you could just keep using it until the energy ran out, which would eventually rejuvenate.
Mule, didn't really like it. after reading these above posts, it could be used as a scout yes, but only on areas that are currently visible, so you'd have to already have a unit in the opponent's base. For fun, (when the game was clearly decided) I brought down a mule or two into battle I got a lol out of my opponent. But only 1 worker unit doesn't make as big of an economy difference as all your workers moving faster, or way more larva.
But while playing terran, I felt that I didn't need those extra econ-boosters like the proton charge/more larva. I still was able to contain and outmass my opponents using 1 base dual rax m&m&m and eventually some hellions/tanks.
-What did you think of the macro casters (queen, obelisk, orbital command)?
For the Queen & Obelisk, if they aren't being hotkeyed, they aren't being utilized. I constantly found myself while in battle, double 4 (my hotkey for queen/obelisk) used the skill, double tap 1 and go back to battle. I got quite fast at it. With the mule, I'd use it if I wasn't busy doing something else. it costed a lot of energy for 1 worker unit, whereas the queen skill uses literally half the energy for 4 larva.
-Were they fun to use?
queen less than three. Obelisk was like giving temporary ling speed to probes.
-How often did you use them?
Kinda answered this earlier, Queen & Obelisk almost all the time. always used queen (never ran out of energy on 2 hatch), Obelisk i'd use every so often. Mule didn't really use.
-What decision-making was involved with them?
I think with the queen, the decision making would be on whether or not you can support those extra larva. If you barely have enough minerals to pump out units as it is with 3 larva, 4 more won't do anything. Or if you are stuck on food and 4 more larva come out at a crucial time, doesn't really help (had this happen to me once), was zvp i think. I lost most of my lings & he lost most of his units and i used banelings to blow up some of his econ. If I had made lings with all of those larva I would have won, but unfortunately "not enough overlords" TT
1 thing that messed me up was Probe keybind is E, not P. Mixed me up haha
Lets get down to the questions:
-What did you think of the new macro mechanics (spawn larva, proton charge, mule)?
Larva - in general, i'd like to know how long it takes for a larva to respawn. I found myself constantly spamming ssssss just because I didn't know the time tables. Now with the queen, that lady is just sick NASTY. If you have say an expo and your main, be prepared to make waypoints for her going back and forth casting W (the skill that allows 4 or so extra larva to hatch) for the duration of the game. One game I accidentally made 2 queens, which was kind of a benefit because my opponent had sneaked in a spire and I didn't notice it. I'd say 3 hatcheries can work well with 1 queen, and any higher might require 2 queens (depending on how far the hatchs are from each other). I can see this being used as a standard unit in high competitive play.
Proton Charge (I assume the obelisk thing) is pretty nifty as well. As protoss, I found myself Constantly reminding myself to use my obelisks at my expo and main. No complaints, they are quite useful. There wasn't a cooldown on the spell, so you could just keep using it until the energy ran out, which would eventually rejuvenate.
Mule, didn't really like it. after reading these above posts, it could be used as a scout yes, but only on areas that are currently visible, so you'd have to already have a unit in the opponent's base. For fun, (when the game was clearly decided) I brought down a mule or two into battle I got a lol out of my opponent. But only 1 worker unit doesn't make as big of an economy difference as all your workers moving faster, or way more larva.
But while playing terran, I felt that I didn't need those extra econ-boosters like the proton charge/more larva. I still was able to contain and outmass my opponents using 1 base dual rax m&m&m and eventually some hellions/tanks.
-What did you think of the macro casters (queen, obelisk, orbital command)?
For the Queen & Obelisk, if they aren't being hotkeyed, they aren't being utilized. I constantly found myself while in battle, double 4 (my hotkey for queen/obelisk) used the skill, double tap 1 and go back to battle. I got quite fast at it. With the mule, I'd use it if I wasn't busy doing something else. it costed a lot of energy for 1 worker unit, whereas the queen skill uses literally half the energy for 4 larva.
-Were they fun to use?
queen less than three. Obelisk was like giving temporary ling speed to probes.
-How often did you use them?
Kinda answered this earlier, Queen & Obelisk almost all the time. always used queen (never ran out of energy on 2 hatch), Obelisk i'd use every so often. Mule didn't really use.
-What decision-making was involved with them?
I think with the queen, the decision making would be on whether or not you can support those extra larva. If you barely have enough minerals to pump out units as it is with 3 larva, 4 more won't do anything. Or if you are stuck on food and 4 more larva come out at a crucial time, doesn't really help (had this happen to me once), was zvp i think. I lost most of my lings & he lost most of his units and i used banelings to blow up some of his econ. If I had made lings with all of those larva I would have won, but unfortunately "not enough overlords" TT
1 thing that messed me up was Probe keybind is E, not P. Mixed me up haha
-Raydog
In my opinion, macro was definitely not on par with SC Broodwar. I played zerg almost exclusively throughout the day, and I simply hotkeyed all of my hatcheries to 4, and during any fight, just pressed 4 zzzzzzzzzzuuuuuuuuuddddddddd and all of my units then rallied to where they needed to go.
I must say however, that the game was very fluid, and very welcoming to use. While macro in SC2 is still lacking, after trying out mbs for a while, it is very hard to go back. Blizzard will have to find more innovative ways to bring macro to the forefront.
It was also good to see how Blizzard implemented the automated building queue. This is how it works:
Say you have an SCV, and you want to build 3 supply depots. As soon as you tell it to build a depot, your 100 minerals are automatically deducted. You are refunded as soon as you tell the scv to move. Now if you want to use the auto build queue, you can also tell the scv to build more supply depots, while its building the first one. If you do this, the cost is deducted as soon as you give the order to build or queue up. It allows for ease of use if you are a casual gamer, but punishes you by taking away minerals that you could have used for something else.
The one thing i could live without; however, was automine. While convenient, it wasn't necessary.
I will be writing a long article tomorrow that will go in depth about SC2.
Lastly, let me end by saying SC2 is going to be awesome. The last game I played was a 50 minute ZvP going back and forth over 1 expo, and it was amazing.
I must say however, that the game was very fluid, and very welcoming to use. While macro in SC2 is still lacking, after trying out mbs for a while, it is very hard to go back. Blizzard will have to find more innovative ways to bring macro to the forefront.
It was also good to see how Blizzard implemented the automated building queue. This is how it works:
Say you have an SCV, and you want to build 3 supply depots. As soon as you tell it to build a depot, your 100 minerals are automatically deducted. You are refunded as soon as you tell the scv to move. Now if you want to use the auto build queue, you can also tell the scv to build more supply depots, while its building the first one. If you do this, the cost is deducted as soon as you give the order to build or queue up. It allows for ease of use if you are a casual gamer, but punishes you by taking away minerals that you could have used for something else.
The one thing i could live without; however, was automine. While convenient, it wasn't necessary.
I will be writing a long article tomorrow that will go in depth about SC2.
Lastly, let me end by saying SC2 is going to be awesome. The last game I played was a 50 minute ZvP going back and forth over 1 expo, and it was amazing.
-HDStarcraft
a lot of the new macro mechanics seem like they're going to be really interesting in terms of build order.
Most of the pro players (nada, savior) were playing P. imo, P is the most similar to sc1 units, and the progamers would like that because...well, they can't read english.
the queen basically gives you another hatch, and allows zerg to have way way too many larvae. Hotbid loved 1 hat hydra, and it seemed really really broken. Zatic (i think?) tried forge first fe, and hotbid had 30 hydra in front of P's base when the third cannon (before nex) finished.
I tried 1 base T against hotbid's Z, and I think that you could marine in bunker to fend off early agression, into sieged tank in mineral line. that assumes that you scout 1 hat 1 base hydra, and forces you to not be able to upgrade the mule. It didn't work for me though, as i accidently walled off my tank from my mineral line.
in general, the major takeaway point that i got from the sc2 stuff was that it still feels like sc. MBS and automine felt like they didn't really lower the skill ceiling, and it didn't really affect the game that much. I'm more worried about the hard counters of the game - 8 micro'd thors get trashed by 48 lings >.> and thors are something like 200 min 300 gas..?
It's a good build order macro mechanic. at the pro level, it's just going to be another task, and they'll have the timing down perfectly. It should make the build orders quite interesting, with the choices between the dark pylon thing, the gas's, and unit/gateway tech choice.
Charge btw (i saw this earlier in the thread) seems way too expensive, at something like 200 min 200 gas. Marine maruder is really good against protoss - as it's the easiest way to play, it feels like it's also the weakest.
you can build as many as you want i think. It feels like the optimal number (depending on base distances) is going to be 1 for every 2 hatches. The "increase larvae" mechanic requires the queen to be at a new hat once every 20 seconds. So if your queen can get to your nat in 10 seconds, and then back, you can spawn new larvae every 20...Although i bet you run into a mana problem.
for us anyway, it looked like you needed 1 queen per hat optimal.
well, because the queens give you so many larve, you can make it so that you reach saturation really really quickly. The hatches work a lot more like nex/cc's in that they allow you to get access to more patches/gas, and there are so many larvae that zerg can just get much much more supply. Apparently, chill/hotbid compared supply earlygame, and zerg was at like 60, and T was at 40 (I think? anyone can correct me if necessary).
Most of the pro players (nada, savior) were playing P. imo, P is the most similar to sc1 units, and the progamers would like that because...well, they can't read english.
the queen basically gives you another hatch, and allows zerg to have way way too many larvae. Hotbid loved 1 hat hydra, and it seemed really really broken. Zatic (i think?) tried forge first fe, and hotbid had 30 hydra in front of P's base when the third cannon (before nex) finished.
I tried 1 base T against hotbid's Z, and I think that you could marine in bunker to fend off early agression, into sieged tank in mineral line. that assumes that you scout 1 hat 1 base hydra, and forces you to not be able to upgrade the mule. It didn't work for me though, as i accidently walled off my tank from my mineral line.
in general, the major takeaway point that i got from the sc2 stuff was that it still feels like sc. MBS and automine felt like they didn't really lower the skill ceiling, and it didn't really affect the game that much. I'm more worried about the hard counters of the game - 8 micro'd thors get trashed by 48 lings >.> and thors are something like 200 min 300 gas..?
It's a good build order macro mechanic. at the pro level, it's just going to be another task, and they'll have the timing down perfectly. It should make the build orders quite interesting, with the choices between the dark pylon thing, the gas's, and unit/gateway tech choice.
Charge btw (i saw this earlier in the thread) seems way too expensive, at something like 200 min 200 gas. Marine maruder is really good against protoss - as it's the easiest way to play, it feels like it's also the weakest.
you can build as many as you want i think. It feels like the optimal number (depending on base distances) is going to be 1 for every 2 hatches. The "increase larvae" mechanic requires the queen to be at a new hat once every 20 seconds. So if your queen can get to your nat in 10 seconds, and then back, you can spawn new larvae every 20...Although i bet you run into a mana problem.
for us anyway, it looked like you needed 1 queen per hat optimal.
well, because the queens give you so many larve, you can make it so that you reach saturation really really quickly. The hatches work a lot more like nex/cc's in that they allow you to get access to more patches/gas, and there are so many larvae that zerg can just get much much more supply. Apparently, chill/hotbid compared supply earlygame, and zerg was at like 60, and T was at 40 (I think? anyone can correct me if necessary).
-GHOSTCLAW
I didn't get a whole lot of use out of mules because I always needed the energy for scans and none of my games went past 2 bases. It's impossible to keep an scv alive against zerglings on creep, and you're obviously not going to get any scouting done when speed finishes. Against protoss, dts are bitches without spider mines so scans are important. Actually, in the first game I really wanted to test mules, I used my first 50 energy on one and promptly got raped by a warp prism + dt warp-in. Fun times. If you don't need energy for scanning late game or you have a bunch of bases, you can make mules, but how useful are they at that point?
The queen spawn larvae ability was extremely useful. I don't know why everyone has been complaining about zerg because I found them to be very good. You can power drones so easily with queens and still be relatively safe, then run over your opponent mid game.
The obelisk was ok as well. It didn't really feel like a chore, and they definitely pay for themselves quickly. It's a good enough idea that opens up different build orders and keeps you from being able to play the game without ever looking back at your base, which was the point of the macro mechanics.
The queen spawn larvae ability was extremely useful. I don't know why everyone has been complaining about zerg because I found them to be very good. You can power drones so easily with queens and still be relatively safe, then run over your opponent mid game.
The obelisk was ok as well. It didn't really feel like a chore, and they definitely pay for themselves quickly. It's a good enough idea that opens up different build orders and keeps you from being able to play the game without ever looking back at your base, which was the point of the macro mechanics.
-ShadowDrgn
1. One Hatch is a very legitimate strategy for both teching and rushing, which gives zerg an incredible power to change things in a blink of an eye and keep opponent guessing. This is mainly due to the power of the queen and her larva spawn and grows extremely powerful as the number of queens and hatcheries grows. The ability to save up an extreme amount of larva forces the opponents of zerg to constantly scout, because playing in the dark vs these versatile zergs is asking to get run over.
-Pufftrees
I played all three races, and of the macro mechanics I agree - the queen is definitely the most overpowered and absolutely necessary for successful games. Terran and Protoss don't necessarily need an orbital command or an obelisk right away. In fact, by skipping it you essentially put yourself in a position to make a very successful early-game timing attack, as both are rather expensive and won't reward you until the mid game.
But Zerg absolutely needs a queen. Right after the spawning pool, in every single game. Or they will lose. Not only does the queen cost less than the obelisk or orbital command (I think), she gives the zerg something that neither of the other races get, extra units at the same time as your current units. The mutant larvae ability is just sooo key to keep up in macro with either of the other races. In fact, during mid and late game it really shines - if you three-hatch in base with a queen it's basically like you have 6 hatches. In games I played against zerg that got to mid game it almost seemed broken, as the sheer amount of units the zerg can build is so massive that it's really, really hard to keep up without running off of one or more extra bases ahead of the zerg.
Mainly I played protoss and the obelisk, I thought, was almost too easy to use. I would make one after the cybernetics core usually, or after the second or third gate, and if you can keep using it all game it would really allow the protoss to pull ahead. It cost 200 minerals, and allows all the units on your line and at your gas to take one extra mineral or gas per trip - so you start bringing in 6 minerals at a time and 4 gas at a time per probe. Therefore, it takes 200 mineral gathering trips to pay for itself. However, receiving gas 33% faster for the rest of the game is pretty important, especially because of my next opinion:
Gas is the deciding macro factor, at least for protoss and terran. To me, it really seemed like zealots and marines and hellions - gasless units - are very underpowered, even after upgrades. I won a game as terran with over 3000 minerals left, only building good units when I had enough gas to do so. The obelisk for protoss seemed to really even resources out, and I had less of a problem balancing minerals and gas as that race. It really seemed to me like terran needs a macro mechanic that will help both mineral income and gas income all at once, like the obelisk does for protoss.
-Meta
Slashdot: There has been some talk that the streamlining of commands has been moving the focus away from actions per minute [APM]. How important is APM as a metric for you and will we see a decline in the importance of this metric?
Dustin Browder: That type of feedback is incredibly important for us. We want players making smart decisions all the time and we want a lot of skill required to play this game at the highest levels. We absolutely want the best players to be the best players. We're not looking to even out or flatten the skill curve so that "everybody can be a winner." This is not the first grade. We want this to be tennis, baseball, football, whatever, we want this to be a game that requires real skill. But at the same time we don't want this to be a bunch of bogus skill. We have definitely gotten rid of some clicks, but we have also added some clicks back in. We got rid of some clicks in terms of how you had to select your buildings and how you had to give build commands, but we also made sure that we had the finest amount of control at the same time.
When we originally put it out there we said you could double-click the barracks and hit 'M,' and you get five marines, one from each barracks for instance. The fans were outraged and we kind of ignored them, saying, "Whatever, this is a better gameplay experience," but as we played it, we realized that it wasn't a better gameplay experience. Maybe when you hit 'M,' what you really wanted was three marines and two marauders, and you couldn't do that. Instead we have said you can select all of your barracks at once, but each click sends a build command individually to each of those barracks. So now you are able to hit "M, M, M, D, D." This gave us a decent amount of clicks, but actually the correct amount of control. That's actually the control you wanted as a player. We weren't looking to hurt you by giving you too many clicks or hold your hand by taking away some of the gameplay experience. We were actually giving you the controls that made you powerful by having the correct balance between the two.
Also we have a bunch of macro mechanics in the game to encourage players to control their economy better, because as you know in Starcraft, economy is king. One of the things that we loved about the original Starcraft was not so much that we want you to click a bunch, but that there was a lot of tension between players who were micro-oriented and players who were economy-oriented. For instance, if you are playing Zerg and are micro-oriented and I'm playing Zerg and I'm economy-oriented, we're kind of playing two different races — not exactly, but a little bit. We're having a very different experience, and that style difference now becomes the interesting problem for both of us, and that is what we're really pursuing with a lot of this stuff. So, we've definitely taken some clicks away, but we have added some back, and I think the fans will be fine with it. Certainly the hardcore fans I've spoken with, who have actually had a chance to play the game, seem to be very positive about the experience.
-Dustin Browder
SC2 was really fun, but i feel their may be a few advantages to races such as protoss, who have the thing that instantly sends reinforcements. I feel blizzard has done a good job on making the game and wont stop untill all of the races are perfectly balanced. The Graffics are great, The new upgrades are fun, The new Units are awesome but not very micro intensive, like losingID8 said the protoss macro late game is very easy, the games go much faster also because you can pump out units much faster and upgrade your workers to mine faster or carry more minerals. I really think they should nerf protoss a bit and make zerg a little better, the coloses for protoss is very good and requires no micro to kill up 15 units alone, MORE WORK ON ZERG. Otherwise great game and i overexagerated on how much they should nerf protoss.
-Installit
What did you think of the new macro mechanics (spawn larva, proton charge, mule)?
i mainly played zerg at blizzcon after building a queen for the first time because spawn larva is off the wall insane good
-What did you think of the macro casters (queen, obelisk, orbital command)?
the queen seems way stronger than both the obelisk and the orbital command. the queen keeps your options open and allows you to punish your oponnents weakness in their build order. with only costing 150 minerals you get a unit that can defend or be offensive and it can spawn 4 larva whenever, lol wut? the queen i believe was created so that a zerg player could keep up 1 base vs 1 base but it actually puts you ahead always, which doesnt seem fair
-Were they fun to use?
not really, it felt like i was cheating
-How often did you use them?
anytime casting spawn larva was possible
-What decision-making was involved with them?
do i need to build 4 more units per hatchery? oh, i do? ok.
i mainly played zerg at blizzcon after building a queen for the first time because spawn larva is off the wall insane good
-What did you think of the macro casters (queen, obelisk, orbital command)?
the queen seems way stronger than both the obelisk and the orbital command. the queen keeps your options open and allows you to punish your oponnents weakness in their build order. with only costing 150 minerals you get a unit that can defend or be offensive and it can spawn 4 larva whenever, lol wut? the queen i believe was created so that a zerg player could keep up 1 base vs 1 base but it actually puts you ahead always, which doesnt seem fair
-Were they fun to use?
not really, it felt like i was cheating
-How often did you use them?
anytime casting spawn larva was possible
-What decision-making was involved with them?
do i need to build 4 more units per hatchery? oh, i do? ok.
-CheeC[h]
The Orbital Command definitely forced you to balance between the MULE and SCAN and the supply depot made terran a more forgiving race. Can't really say they were very enjoyable; however, they definitely add depth.
-fnaticAugury
What did you think of the new macro mechanics (spawn larva, proton charge, mule)?
I think they work quite well. I only played a limited amount of the game (like everyone else here), so I'm not going to give it final judgment like many seem to be doing.
-What did you think of the macro casters (queen, obelisk, orbital command)?
To be honest I always forgot to make my queen. I played all my games without her (or I built her during mid game and was too busy doing other stuff to use her abilities). That being said, I beat every guy I face at the community tournaments with a makeshift 2-3 hatch muta and early zergling harass.
-Were they fun to use?
I killed other people's Queens quite quickly with just 5 mutas, they really aren't intimidating defenders, so I'm glad they aren't like heroes in that sense
-How often did you use them?
barely ever, because I was so new to the game
-What decision-making was involved with them?
im sure there will be many, but really I had such a limited time with the game that I don't feel comfortable commenting
I was very scared of SC2 and I didn't like a few things I saw in gameplay videos. However, after actually playing it for a bit, I was very pleased that this game is going to be very much life Starcraft:BW, but the new units and abilities are going to change the game into a newer, more interesting experience.
All the new abilities were very intimidating and I didn't know when to use them and didn't have time to think of strategies besides those I knew from BW. I don't feel anyone here has the right to talk about how balanced this game is when they only played a limited amount of time of the game and against players who had no idea how to bring all the new content together into solid strategies/counters.
All I can really say is that the game feels very nice, it's simple, and yet the depth is clearly there. It feels overwhelming, and some of the units seem uselss with so many new options, but this is simply because people still see it as an edited version of brood war, as opposed to a new game.
Can't wait to play the beta ^_^
oh, and in the brief time I used them, siege tanks were very effective.
I actually loved the double gas mechanic they implemented. It really helps the macro game IMO.
-eMbrace
Q: Are the macro mechanics working like expected, or do they get too repetitive after a while? What about their mineral-only aspect? Does that work late game, or the mineral-only units are getting smashed by superior tech, anyways? Won't the mineral/gas ratio skew gameplay to basic units and static defenses?
A: One thing I did not like about the game how it is, is the fact that while playing Protoss and using PC I got a TON of minerals, like a LOT!! And I could make a bajillion Zealots, Terrans "Mule calldown" is almost counter productive, you have to pay 150 minerals to have your command center stop doing anything for about 60 seconds at least just to upgrade to Orbital Command.
As for is the new econ stuff just a APM sink or is it effective, Mule felt like an APM sink because you didn't feel the minerals coming in, I'm sure you got a more then usual amount but you don't feel it, and hitting 1, E, and clicking on a mineral field is hardly APM sink. For PC you REALLY feel it, it adds 1 mineral for each trip for your probes, and it shows a LOT. Protoss gets so much more minerals than the other races (at least early-mid to early late game) that if you got the obalisk rather quickly for PC than you would basicly win every time because you can now make 1 Zealot for every 2 zerglings or 2 marines.
That being said it felt like since the Mule calldown was so poor for mineral gain, the Terran was VERY behind on the economy race. Zerg has the larva spawn which gets expansions up in about 3 seconds, and Protoss can kill people with numbers alone. I did actually test this theory and my body was able to make as ALMOST as many Zealots as I has marines in the space of about 10 minutes, Terran Econ just feels realllly slow, and it hurts them a lot because their units are not all that strong, and the new pathing helps melee units a lot.
As for gas, once you got an expansion or 2 it wasn't to too bad, it did feel just about balanced. What they need to do though it either take out PC, Mule, and possibly larva spawn out completely, or take a hard look at balancing the fact that Protoss can produce as much as Terran, but all their units are at least double the strength.
-Supersonic
yeah, honestly terran macro felt a lot like war3. Let the workers work, and just have all your production buildings hotkeyed and just tab through them to keep makin units
yeah I never meant to say it as a problem, just as a (what I consider myself to be) experienced war3 player, It was strikingly similar. The only difference is that when you have say 3 Raxs in a group, you have to hit mmm to make 1 marine in each rax. Whereas in war3 if you want to make a sorceress at each arcane sanctum, and both are in a group, just have to hit s once.
I like this macro in sc2 a lot more than original sc. I just wanted to say what it reminded me of, never meant to say it like it was a problem.
yeah I never meant to say it as a problem, just as a (what I consider myself to be) experienced war3 player, It was strikingly similar. The only difference is that when you have say 3 Raxs in a group, you have to hit mmm to make 1 marine in each rax. Whereas in war3 if you want to make a sorceress at each arcane sanctum, and both are in a group, just have to hit s once.
I like this macro in sc2 a lot more than original sc. I just wanted to say what it reminded me of, never meant to say it like it was a problem.
-Raydog
Protoss mechanic is the easiest to use (LoL). And it's also the most evident, that's why I played like 65% of the games with toss at blizzcon (out of like 30 games?).
The Mule calldown did seem a lot shittier, for the aforementioned reasons (Does the mule actually mine more per trip? I didn't really pay attention), and also that when you call it down, it takes like 3 seconds to hit the floor. Then you need to tell it to mine. Compared to Z or P you just click the unit/bldg and hit the hotkey and it's basically done. (well for zerg you have to wait a bit and then larva pop out but that's ok, it's like it doubles your hatch)
The main thing that pissed me off with this build is just the 'fix' to prevent easy macro since it's all MBS. On one hand its really good because you don't accidentally build 3 overlords when you just want 1 or two. You can designate how many according to how many times you press O once your hatches are selected. But on the other hand it makes zerg macro SOooooo much worse compared to protoss. Especially if you plan to make banelings or lurkers, because each ling/hydra also needs to upgraded 1 at a time when mass selected.
This was also kind of annoying when there were multiple structures selected that had minor differences. Example: Terran fortress thing and the terran comscan/mule thing if you had these upped and your CCs were all 1 hotkey it won't build SCV out of other CCs, just the ones that took priorty. So instead of making 3 scv- one at each base it would make 3 at the fortress. So in other words, to keep the game mechanically easier its probably actually better to avoid the CC upgrades and shit like that if you can (this is bad for game design if they actually want people to use the stuff they worked so hard on).
And same thing applied to barracks with addons or whatever bldg that had a modifier or upg. So like 3 normal barracks, one with a tech lab, and one with a reactor and you try to make a marine for all of them and you only get 5 marines at the tech lab or something. edit- you might have been able to tab through structures like you can in wc3 but I didn't try that and that sucks ass anyways, just adds even more clicks which is especially bad for zerg imo.
As it is now zerg requires like 5x the macro which totally sucks since they have fragile/melee units.
They both have their uses. Warp Gates I found to be a pain in the ass to use because every unit you throw down deselected your gates or something and I wasn't able to reproduce the videos where they throw down like units like bam,bam,bam bam in rapid succession.
In summary they require more macro to use and they shut down your production for a while (while upgrading). So it's not ideal to rush to even in the early game unless your strategy is going to exploit their mobility or something.
Just like I said in the above post, it's probably actually better to not even get them at all because the same reason as the CC upgrade. Mechanically, gateways are easier to use for late game macro especially.
They were really fucking good however, to have units appear right in battle or with a proxied pylon in the enemy base warping in DTs. It's fucking rape. So like I said, if your strat requires the warp gates then yea, get them, if not, you're probably better off sticking to regular gates.
What did you think of the new macro mechanics (spawn larva, proton charge, mule)?
Easiest/Best to Worst:
Protoss,Zerg,Terran
It is a good mechanic and fun to use. It requires timing and skill just like making more workers all the time does.
-What did you think of the macro casters (queen, obelisk, orbital command)?
Isn't this the same question as above? First couple of games I forgot to use the queen and my 9pool/speed (which I tried like 3 times) got stomped horribly vs 2 gate zeal. So it is important to say the least. The toughest decision is just when to start the macro up, with zerg it's easier because you get the defense unit but for terran or toss you need a certain amount of workers to decide when it is optimal to build the thing. And the dark pylon actually needs a regular pylon to power it so usually that required me to build a pylon near my nexus first since my first one was usually near my ramp or something. (so 300 mins and some time before it kicks in)
-Were they fun to use?
yea they were, I guess I answered this in the first one as well.
-How often did you use them?
A lot, it is important to use this as much as possible once you have it, to gain that macro edge in your game.
-What decision-making was involved with them?
Usually I played a standard BW BO then after a little harassment or early game skirmishing and more worker production and money (especially when you have more workers to benefit from proton charge) then I built the orbital command or dark obelisk. It totally felt much more important to get the +1 return on all your probes faster than to get up a faster tech/cyber core or something.
the proton charge was also the best because it wasn't a fixed bonus, you could use it on 1 or 100 workers, so just before u transfer to ur nat you boost them up. More larva or Mule don't have any gain obviously for something like this.
well for protoss probably about the same , it does depend if you are using warp gates however, as they require additional macro.
For zerg it totally feels like you need way way more macro because you can't select a hatch and SD once to make 3 drones and in fact need to select queen and do the spawn mutant larva. So instead of 3x4 of SD we have; q- ability x4, then hotkey(3) sd,d,d,d,d,d,d,d,d,d,d,d,
and even more if your trying to make lurkers or banelings because once you have your 12 lings/hydras you gotta select the group and go Lx12. I think this is a bit of a problem and might be imbalanced mechanically. But Like I said before it is great if you need to just make 1 overlord or pair of scourge (which isn't in the game) so you don't overcreate units.
The Mule calldown did seem a lot shittier, for the aforementioned reasons (Does the mule actually mine more per trip? I didn't really pay attention), and also that when you call it down, it takes like 3 seconds to hit the floor. Then you need to tell it to mine. Compared to Z or P you just click the unit/bldg and hit the hotkey and it's basically done. (well for zerg you have to wait a bit and then larva pop out but that's ok, it's like it doubles your hatch)
The main thing that pissed me off with this build is just the 'fix' to prevent easy macro since it's all MBS. On one hand its really good because you don't accidentally build 3 overlords when you just want 1 or two. You can designate how many according to how many times you press O once your hatches are selected. But on the other hand it makes zerg macro SOooooo much worse compared to protoss. Especially if you plan to make banelings or lurkers, because each ling/hydra also needs to upgraded 1 at a time when mass selected.
This was also kind of annoying when there were multiple structures selected that had minor differences. Example: Terran fortress thing and the terran comscan/mule thing if you had these upped and your CCs were all 1 hotkey it won't build SCV out of other CCs, just the ones that took priorty. So instead of making 3 scv- one at each base it would make 3 at the fortress. So in other words, to keep the game mechanically easier its probably actually better to avoid the CC upgrades and shit like that if you can (this is bad for game design if they actually want people to use the stuff they worked so hard on).
And same thing applied to barracks with addons or whatever bldg that had a modifier or upg. So like 3 normal barracks, one with a tech lab, and one with a reactor and you try to make a marine for all of them and you only get 5 marines at the tech lab or something. edit- you might have been able to tab through structures like you can in wc3 but I didn't try that and that sucks ass anyways, just adds even more clicks which is especially bad for zerg imo.
As it is now zerg requires like 5x the macro which totally sucks since they have fragile/melee units.
They both have their uses. Warp Gates I found to be a pain in the ass to use because every unit you throw down deselected your gates or something and I wasn't able to reproduce the videos where they throw down like units like bam,bam,bam bam in rapid succession.
In summary they require more macro to use and they shut down your production for a while (while upgrading). So it's not ideal to rush to even in the early game unless your strategy is going to exploit their mobility or something.
Just like I said in the above post, it's probably actually better to not even get them at all because the same reason as the CC upgrade. Mechanically, gateways are easier to use for late game macro especially.
They were really fucking good however, to have units appear right in battle or with a proxied pylon in the enemy base warping in DTs. It's fucking rape. So like I said, if your strat requires the warp gates then yea, get them, if not, you're probably better off sticking to regular gates.
What did you think of the new macro mechanics (spawn larva, proton charge, mule)?
Easiest/Best to Worst:
Protoss,Zerg,Terran
It is a good mechanic and fun to use. It requires timing and skill just like making more workers all the time does.
-What did you think of the macro casters (queen, obelisk, orbital command)?
Isn't this the same question as above? First couple of games I forgot to use the queen and my 9pool/speed (which I tried like 3 times) got stomped horribly vs 2 gate zeal. So it is important to say the least. The toughest decision is just when to start the macro up, with zerg it's easier because you get the defense unit but for terran or toss you need a certain amount of workers to decide when it is optimal to build the thing. And the dark pylon actually needs a regular pylon to power it so usually that required me to build a pylon near my nexus first since my first one was usually near my ramp or something. (so 300 mins and some time before it kicks in)
-Were they fun to use?
yea they were, I guess I answered this in the first one as well.
-How often did you use them?
A lot, it is important to use this as much as possible once you have it, to gain that macro edge in your game.
-What decision-making was involved with them?
Usually I played a standard BW BO then after a little harassment or early game skirmishing and more worker production and money (especially when you have more workers to benefit from proton charge) then I built the orbital command or dark obelisk. It totally felt much more important to get the +1 return on all your probes faster than to get up a faster tech/cyber core or something.
the proton charge was also the best because it wasn't a fixed bonus, you could use it on 1 or 100 workers, so just before u transfer to ur nat you boost them up. More larva or Mule don't have any gain obviously for something like this.
well for protoss probably about the same , it does depend if you are using warp gates however, as they require additional macro.
For zerg it totally feels like you need way way more macro because you can't select a hatch and SD once to make 3 drones and in fact need to select queen and do the spawn mutant larva. So instead of 3x4 of SD we have; q- ability x4, then hotkey(3) sd,d,d,d,d,d,d,d,d,d,d,d,
and even more if your trying to make lurkers or banelings because once you have your 12 lings/hydras you gotta select the group and go Lx12. I think this is a bit of a problem and might be imbalanced mechanically. But Like I said before it is great if you need to just make 1 overlord or pair of scourge (which isn't in the game) so you don't overcreate units.
-CharlieMurphy
Calling down mules onto mineral patches worked just fine. As for MBS with buildings with different add-ons/upgrades, you can tab through them. That wasn't very convenient for marines though, which frustrated me a lot.
-ShadowDrgn