So, the last patch nerfed the widow mine...what was the reasoning for this? The widow mine cannot even take out a single zealot now, nor a roach, etc.
Was this unit nerfed because of casuals and certain pros complaining? Was it nerfed because of a low sample size of games like this game?
After these games?
The widow mine was finally coming into it's own and proving to be somewhat viable late in the game...and it was nerfed with a very high lack of reasoning and a very low sample size of games.
My question is, why were things like blinding cloud, another ability shown to be just as "OP" not also tweaked for lategame? Why was the widow mine (a Terran unit, the only new one) singled out suddenly as being OP?
There should be some consistency here. You cannot just nerf one race's unit because it's OP, and leave the other "OP" things untouched. The widow mine was a balancing factor against the other "imba stuff" from the other races.
Widow mines at this point are broken in TvP, (not useful, or cost effective), and in TvZ I believe it takes x2 of them now to deal with a roach, not sure if it can kill a viper, but considering vipers are currently showing they can make siege tanks quite obsolete...once again, asking the question, why are all things Terran nerfed so quickly with such a low sample size of games, yet things like viper cloud, swarm host health, etc are arbitrarily buffed and not tweaked with corresponding Terran nerfs?
Terran at this point in the beta basically has no new units. There was hope after that one Terran "buff" patch, but they almost immediately re-nerfed everything.
Widow mines too tough to deal with, raising the skill cap? Nerf them. Viper cloud too tough to deal with on siege tanks? Terrans learn to deal with it.
There is a problem here. Not just in consistency, but Terran in general has nothing to look forward to in this expansion. I'm sure i'm echoing a lot of players's thoughts.
The latest "widow mine nerf" basically killed any other hopes of mech TvP as well.
So my question right now, and the community's should be "what incentive is there for Terran to buy this game?" Mech TvP is still not viable, the only new unit is nerfed to hell and already was teetering on "useless," and old units like the raven have been made worse in the last "buff" patch.
And to promote main discussion, how are people handling the widow mine nerf specifically? Do you feel the unit now is bad for the 2 supply cost? Are you using it in late game a lot? Early game? Discussion for widow mine efficienty post-nerf would be great.
Me personally, it seems like it's still decent in TvZ, but TvP the unit is basically terrible. TvT it got worse as well. Overall, it feels like it needs something else, it's underwhelming again.
Last edit: 2012-12-20 13:38:23
Sup
RavenLoud Canada. December 20 2012 13:44. Posts 1069
The only time I used it in TvAnything was for early harass. A fast 2 hellion 2 WM drop, or 4 mine drop across 2 bases. After that, it either became too easy to spot or too ineffective (without a huge gamble).
Facing it in TvT, it wasn't effective enough. I would just have a leading troop or 1-2 ravens and it would nullify nearly every mine on the map unless I was EXTREMELY careless.
captainwaffles United States. December 20 2012 14:11. Posts 845
Agree with much of the OP, the mine is still good vs Zerg and its okay vs Terran but its pretty shit vs protoss. I can be fine with the damage nerf if something is done that can make it useful vs protoss like making them 1 supply or shortening the recharge time or reducing the build time... theres a lot of things they can do to make it good again without touching the damage.
It is pretty fucking sad Blizzard is counting the hellbat as a new unit, its just a transformation ffs. If terran is really only getting 1 new unit it better be fucking good.
EDIT- Mech vs Bio TvT I find that just going mass factory old style BW mech with hellio/tank/mine is actually pretty damn good if you can position and control your units well.
Protoss Just laughs even harder at the mine than they did before... its infuriating.
The mine still feels okay vs Zerg, but it could be better without breaking anything thats for sure.
Last edit: 2012-12-20 14:13:54
Be excellent to each other. Party on, dudes!
codonbyte United States. December 20 2012 14:12. Posts 210
I agree, HotS is looking pretty grim for Terran. Unless it improves a lot by the time it's released, I don't think I'll be buying it. It's a shame. I got into BW just before SC2 came out. I sucked at it big-time, but it was loads of fun and it just felt really, really balanced. I got the impression that whoever made it really knew what they were doing when it came to game balance. What happened to the Blizzard that made BW? The more live-streams and pro-games I watch, the more it seems like Blizzard's radio just isn't quite picking up all of the channels. Here's to hoping they fix their antenna by the time Legacy of the Void comes out.
aoeuidhtnsnthdiueoaoeuidhtnsnthdiueoaoeuidhtns
SuperYo1000 United States. December 20 2012 14:15. Posts 717
On December 20 2012 14:12 codonbyte wrote: I agree, HotS is looking pretty grim for Terran. Unless it improves a lot by the time it's released, I don't think I'll be buying it. It's a shame. I got into BW just before SC2 came out. I sucked at it big-time, but it was loads of fun and it just felt really, really balanced. I got the impression that whoever made it really knew what they were doing when it came to game balance. What happened to the Blizzard that made BW? The more live-streams and pro-games I watch, the more it seems like Blizzard's radio just isn't quite picking up all of the channels. Here's to hoping they fix their antenna by the time Legacy of the Void comes out.
They got old and retired. BW is 15 years old
EleanorRIgby Canada. December 20 2012 14:15. Posts 3324
yea they just need to be 1 supply and should revolve more around splash. it should be, 1 supply, target unit is the center of the splash but no primary target damage, and it does 65(whatever is balanced) splash damage, range is the same. Maybe a upgrade for the 1 supply on the fusion core so you could only really get it late game.
I don't even think it's a numbers issue with widow mines. Lower the supply/buffing damage makes it way too cost effective while lowering the damage/keeping it as it makes it pretty bad. The problem is there's not a whole lot of player control in maximizing the potential of widow mine, you just technically set it and forget it so to speak.
I think widow mines need some sort of rework to introduce "skill" to the unit. Maybe return the big damage numbers but with the added factor of like a 3 sec. attachment before detonate (sorta like how the old WOL seeker missles were). Giving opponents a "safety switch" would justify its damage, but since WOL shows us that super slow seeker missles are easy to dodge, give the widow mine player the ability to detonate the attached mine. Auto-detonate will exist for the lower league players, but a huge micro battle will exist at higher leagues. Basically you get a race between the widow mine player trying to manually detonate vs the opponent trying to eliminate/isolate the bomber unit.
SolidMoose United States. December 20 2012 14:34. Posts 1111
Obviously I've only been playing this latest patch for a day, but I will share my initial experiences with the Widow Mine nerf.
It's not so hot for positioning alone vs any race as much as it was - to deny Medivac/warp prism drops, warp in harass, roach runby's. To elaborate, before you could put just Widow Mines on common drop locations, common runby paths, and on XNT's, and be content with the fact that this was a good investment of supply, because even if it didn't stop the harassment completely, it would at least trade supply/cost efficiently vs these things, and so you could be content with the fact that if the opponent did harass this area your supply invested was worth it, and if the opponent didn't move his units to these harder to defend/control areas, they were indeed defended/controlled (an important advantage, for Mech at least.). Now that Widow Mines tend to not trade supply efficiently (still good against Zergling harass ofc) by themselves, positioning them alone isn't a good investment of supply. Damaging units but not killing them isn't very useful as a Mech player trying to defend far away areas, because the units can do their damage or control a XNT if they are damaged, and if you have to move your army units to defend this harassment anyways, you aren't particularly concerned with how weak the units are as your strong Mech army is going to clean them up easily anyways. It's having to move it out of position and the time it takes to move in general that is what hurts you. So the Widow Mine not fulfilling this role as well as it did actually hurts quite a bit as a Mech player trying to use them to offset your weakness in mobility. That said, the Widow Mine still does weaken the units, so pairing it with something like a Siege Tank, or a Bunker, or a Missile Turret, or a Planetary Fortress achieves about the same result as it did pre-patch. The units are softened up a good amount and the other defenses can clean them up much easier. vs Protoss this is less true, because they usually harass with less, stronger units, so splash isn't as important, and not taking one unit out initially per Widow Mine is a pretty big hit to their usefulness. In general, I really don't think they are a worthwhile investment to defend against Protoss harassment anymore, because all you are ever going to do is weaken the units and not prevent them from getting in there and doing the damage in the first place. I would rather just use Vikings, or Turrets, or PF's, or Siege Tanks, or Battle Hellions to actually just stop the harassment I expect to come to that location.
A couple extra notes: It's not really useful to defend from early air harassment from T or P early on anymore, another Turret and saving some gas+supply is way better than just damaging the unit and watching it do it's damage afterwards with a Widow Mine.
It's still good for Bum Rushing the opponents army with, where the Splash is the big deal and where Overkill negated the big single target damage anyways. Would have liked to see that aspect nerfed instead of their strength in being a worthwhile investment of supply/resources away from your army.
p.s. Avilo I wish you would still try Mech TvP :D
Last edit: 2012-12-20 14:38:30
architecture United States. December 20 2012 14:48. Posts 555
1. Mines suck defensively against zeals, since they splash your hellions. 2. They are extremely cost efficient against stalkers/immortals, which is what they need to be targeted on. These are the units that the rest of the T army (tanks/hellions) are not efficient against.
IMPORTANT 3. In order to do so, you need to mass them and run them in. This is what Blizzard meant when they said "1s cooldown is for offensive mines". You use them like speedlings, run them in and burrow them right on top of the stalkers/immortals, so that they target only them. BARELY ANY mines should be preburrowed (except maybe like 3-4 to splash zeals as they run in).
Tanks/Vikings are only used in minimal numbers to poke/force engagement (like Tempest). Ghost is necessary against Archon. The point is that mines/hellions are cost efficient against everything P has, given proper targeting, EXCEPT that they have no range, so they require high ranged units to provoke fights.
Last edit: 2012-12-20 14:50:20
tpfkan
architecture United States. December 20 2012 14:52. Posts 555
As a separate point the nerf is not a huge deal with this use case of mines:
120 + 40 splash = dead stalker. So 2 mines still kill 2 stalkers, but 1 mine won't kill 1. 2 mines + 2*40 splash = 320 = dead immortal (300), so immortals are slightly buffed against mines (only needed 2 mines no splash before).
I believe this sort of use of offensive mines is what DKim means when he says people haven't figured out how to use mines/the new meta.
Last edit: 2012-12-20 14:53:00
tpfkan
Hattori_Hanzo Singapore. December 20 2012 14:57. Posts 972
On December 20 2012 14:12 codonbyte wrote: I agree, HotS is looking pretty grim for Terran. Unless it improves a lot by the time it's released, I don't think I'll be buying it. It's a shame. I got into BW just before SC2 came out. I sucked at it big-time, but it was loads of fun and it just felt really, really balanced. I got the impression that whoever made it really knew what they were doing when it came to game balance. What happened to the Blizzard that made BW? The more live-streams and pro-games I watch, the more it seems like Blizzard's radio just isn't quite picking up all of the channels. Here's to hoping they fix their antenna by the time Legacy of the Void comes out.
They got old and retired. BW is 15 years old
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Metzen He's doing quite well, Metzen is currently the Senior Vice President of Story and Franchise Development at Blizzard Entertainment and has assisted the company's projects by providing voice talent for a number of characters, as well as contributing to artistic character design.
James Phinney has gone onto develop Guild Wars series.
Cauterize the area
architecture United States. December 20 2012 15:04. Posts 555
don't you all think that one shotting drops and warp prism was pretty overpowered? (or in the sense that it makes drop play not so viable considering the risk and return) I reckon the nerf is too strong against toss but it is a good nerf against terran and zerg because nothing much has changed. It's good to have drop play back as well.
Blizzard just needs to figure out what changes are needed to buff it against the toss
Last edit: 2012-12-20 15:30:00
Insoleet France. December 20 2012 16:06. Posts 1402
The widow mine was a 20s build time originally, then they nerfed, buffed, and renerfed certain stats... i think the 125 damage is reasonable now, but it needs to be 30s build time and 1 supply if it is going to be weak.
EleanorRIgby Canada. December 20 2012 17:01. Posts 3324
what role is blizzard designing the mine for offensive or defensive? because i mostly use mines for defence(i put 2-5 mines at chokes around expansions and 1-2 with turrets at drop/harass spots in base), i only use them offensively when I'm going mech and doing a siege push have a bunch of mines available.
ledarsi United States. December 20 2012 17:11. Posts 399
Blizzard is deliberately trying to get terran players to run their mines directly into enemy forces and burrow them. This is ridiculous.
Blizzard should be actively trying to discourage using mines like banelings. The baneling never was a very interesting unit, and now they want to make another one that functions slightly differently? No. The mine should be a powerful positional defensive unit. And it should hurt a LOT.
Failing that, just scratch the mine entirely and give the siege tank the kind of damage it needs to do the same job of controlling area.
"First decide who you would be, then do what you must do."
xPabt December 20 2012 14:20. Posts 226
