I do not like Blizzard's idea of stealth mechanics. I didn't like it back in the days of Gnomish Submarines in Warcraft 2, and they've never changed the way they work it one bit since then.
Your marines stand there a-herpin' and a-derpin' while a solitary DT cuts them in two one by one. Not a single marine will ever think that maybe it would be a good idea to shoot in that direction where all those swishing psi-blade noises keep occurring as his buddies spontaneously fall apart. Then your magical detector comes along! And suddenly they can all shoot again.
This concept of invisibility equalling total invincibility, enemies absolutely unable to fight back in the slightest even when you are standing right next to them, or firing missiles with obvious muzzle flashes, or whatever...it's gimmicky and silly, and it's unfortunate they haven't thought of a single way to improve it in 15 years.
The whole detectors vs cloakers just feels like a shallow minigame unnecessarily shoehorned into a great strategy game.
what is your idea to improve it without making detectors unnecessary
A grab-bag of ideas:
1. Cloaked units reveal themselves momentarily whenever they attack. Half a second, or something. I would combine this with removing the wavy distortion you see when cloaked units are moving where you're looking, but you don't have a detector. You can gain a positioning advantage in a fight with the stealth power, but no longer have the "I am invincible unless he has a detector" power.
2. Cloaked units can be fired at without a detector around, but in that case they take massively reduced damage. (An "accuracy" penalty, so to speak.)
3. Cloaked units are targetable without a detector present but only manually (i.e. your units will not auto-attack something invisible).
4. 2+3 would be best in combination I think, 3 is not much on its own. But I wanted to separate them for clarity's sake.
in warcraft 2 you could tell siege weapons to attack ground and the splash damage would still hit submarines and invisible mages
I do not like Blizzard's idea of stealth mechanics. I didn't like it back in the days of Gnomish Submarines in Warcraft 2, and they've never changed the way they work it one bit since then.
Your marines stand there a-herpin' and a-derpin' while a solitary DT cuts them in two one by one. Not a single marine will ever think that maybe it would be a good idea to shoot in that direction where all those swishing psi-blade noises keep occurring as his buddies spontaneously fall apart. Then your magical detector comes along! And suddenly they can all shoot again.
This concept of invisibility equalling total invincibility, enemies absolutely unable to fight back in the slightest even when you are standing right next to them, or firing missiles with obvious muzzle flashes, or whatever...it's gimmicky and silly, and it's unfortunate they haven't thought of a single way to improve it in 15 years.
The whole detectors vs cloakers just feels like a shallow minigame unnecessarily shoehorned into a great strategy game.
what is your idea to improve it without making detectors unnecessary
A grab-bag of ideas:
1. Cloaked units reveal themselves momentarily whenever they attack. Half a second, or something. I would combine this with removing the wavy distortion you see when cloaked units are moving where you're looking, but you don't have a detector. You can gain a positioning advantage in a fight with the stealth power, but no longer have the "I am invincible unless he has a detector" power.
2. Cloaked units can be fired at without a detector around, but in that case they take massively reduced damage. (An "accuracy" penalty, so to speak.)
3. Cloaked units are targetable without a detector present but only manually (i.e. your units will not auto-attack something invisible).
4. 2+3 would be best in combination I think, 3 is not much on its own. But I wanted to separate them for clarity's sake.
that pretty much makes detectors unnecessary
getting the tech for cloaked units is already a huge investment, a much bigger investment than getting detection is for any race
you SHOULD auto-lose if you know your opponent is teching and don't prepare for detection just in case
Yeah, I don't see how this is different from losing because you let Zerg double expand and get like 15 mutas and weren't prepared.
Actually, I think mutas are worse. At least the cloaked units are super easy to kill once you have detection.
Just breaks my suspension of disbelief for the in-game world I guess. Getting steamrolled by a snowballing muta harass that I let my opponent do by failing to pressure him is really irritating, but on some level it at least makes more sense. It's not that I can't hit them because herp derp they're invis-incible, it's because they're too damn fast.
Anyway I'm going to go play now, lose to DTs, and shake both fists emphatically in the general direction of Blizzard HQ.
Don't be fooled into thinking that playing "the reactive race" means that you don't have a plan. You should always have a plan (in particular, a strong mid-game goal in mind). Unlike the other races, it means that you should have several plans in place to deal with what you opponent throws at you.
Speed ling/bling, muta(infestor), ultra/brood.
What am I missing?
Zerg isn't a religion you know...
A lot of things. Good play in general requires that you know what your responses to certain situations are and how they influence your goals. Zerg in particular needs these kinds of considerations because they can't control the tempo of the game until the mid-game where their production kicks in.
Assume that your mid-game goal is ling/bling/muta. A simple question is how you deal with blue flame hellions:
1) Do you drop a roach warren in response? If so, do you amend you mid-game goal to include roaches or do you stick with ling/bling/muta? Do you instead drop your bling nest earlier in response?
2) If you see BFHs, how does this affect your spire/bling speed timing? Do you prioritize a fast spire to gain map control? Do you prioritize bling speed to stop an early tank/marine follow-up?
3) When do you take your third? Do you wait until your spire is up before you go for it? Do you risk dropping the third even without map control if they commit to BFHs?
And all of this pivots on the amount of BFHs you see, the rest of the tech you scout, and the map, among other things. A good zerg will have responses in place for these sorts of possibilities.
I was trying to be ironic mate. Every race adapts to what they see, more or less. Zerg isn't special.
chuckleberryfinn on
No Protoss players were underpowered during this post.
0
VariableMouth CongressStroke Me Lady FameRegistered Userregular
explaining starcraft from scratch, explaining why you like it and explaining why its so challenging makes you garner an appreciation for just how much stuff you have to keep track of in this game
How the heck do you play PvP these days. I have NO idea how Im supposed to play it at all. People using archons has completely thrown me, I'm not at all sure how to respond to an archon timing.
Don't be fooled into thinking that playing "the reactive race" means that you don't have a plan. You should always have a plan (in particular, a strong mid-game goal in mind). Unlike the other races, it means that you should have several plans in place to deal with what you opponent throws at you.
Speed ling/bling, muta(infestor), ultra/brood.
What am I missing?
Zerg isn't a religion you know...
A lot of things. Good play in general requires that you know what your responses to certain situations are and how they influence your goals. Zerg in particular needs these kinds of considerations because they can't control the tempo of the game until the mid-game where their production kicks in.
Assume that your mid-game goal is ling/bling/muta. A simple question is how you deal with blue flame hellions:
1) Do you drop a roach warren in response? If so, do you amend you mid-game goal to include roaches or do you stick with ling/bling/muta? Do you instead drop your bling nest earlier in response?
2) If you see BFHs, how does this affect your spire/bling speed timing? Do you prioritize a fast spire to gain map control? Do you prioritize bling speed to stop an early tank/marine follow-up?
3) When do you take your third? Do you wait until your spire is up before you go for it? Do you risk dropping the third even without map control if they commit to BFHs?
And all of this pivots on the amount of BFHs you see, the rest of the tech you scout, and the map, among other things. A good zerg will have responses in place for these sorts of possibilities.
I was trying to be ironic mate. Every race adapts to what they see, more or less. Zerg isn't special.
In my opinion, zerg needs to pay special attention to this, moreso than the other races, precisely because of the drone mechanic. You can't "safely" drone unless you know how the game fits into your current plan. The other two races aren't so sensitive to deviations in game play. Terrans tend to control the tempo of the game with focused timings and protoss can naturally play defensively with sentries.
Kambing on
@TwitchTV, @Youtube: master-level zerg ladder/customs, commentary, and random miscellany.
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VariableMouth CongressStroke Me Lady FameRegistered Userregular
edited June 2011
I think zerg has to be able to vary more widely than the other races
though they are also able to do so more easily (functionally, not practically as it requires scouting and appropriate reads)
both due to how larva works re: droning or massing particular units
So the current SoTG/ITG/Incontrol/EG drama is causing some of TL's best posts ever:
On June 29 2011 10:25 LeLeech wrote:
On June 29 2011 10:23 jmbthirteen wrote:
I find it funny that people think they deserve full transparency in situations where they aren't involved in at all.
I think thats what they said about wikileaks, hmmmm.
How the heck do you play PvP these days. I have NO idea how Im supposed to play it at all. People using archons has completely thrown me, I'm not at all sure how to respond to an archon timing.
I present to you a Replay.
teach me!
You basically didn't do anything wrong. An archon timing is designed (or should be) to hit before you have 3+ collossi. In the late game, collossi will beat archons when they're in numbers.
The problem you had in your replay was that you stopped making probes at around 30 while your opponent didn't. Your late game army composition was kicking his arse, he was just able to throw way more units at you.
The one thing I noticed you do in the early/mid game (before the first major battle) was that after you scouted a heavy zealot army with an archon, you still added more stalkers. Stalkers DPS vs zealot/archon is reduced and if you have no room to backup, the stalkers will get melted really fast. Especially without blink.
Lastly, zealot/archon needs open space to be effective. Make it engage in narrow chokes and it dies to collossi everytime.
TLDR: See zealot/archon, stop making stalkers/sentries, force engagements in chokes.
Dhalphirdon't you open that trapdooryou're a fool if you dareRegistered Userregular
edited June 2011
been seeing that a lot on streams lately
seems like it is the absolute flawless counter for the current TvT style of spending all your gas on tech rather than army for the first 7-8 minutes of the game.
Is that the current style? I've been seeing a lot more early marine/hellion play lately with various timings and compositions meant to do as much damage as possible. Either they commit to that or transition into banshees or whatever.
mEEksa on
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Dhalphirdon't you open that trapdooryou're a fool if you dareRegistered Userregular
edited June 2011
Well not playing T myself at the moment I don't know what the current style is on NA ladder or whatever
How the heck do you play PvP these days. I have NO idea how Im supposed to play it at all. People using archons has completely thrown me, I'm not at all sure how to respond to an archon timing.
I present to you a Replay.
teach me!
Lastly, zealot/archon needs open space to be effective. Make it engage in narrow chokes and it dies to collossi everytime.
TLDR: See zealot/archon, stop making stalkers/sentries, force engagements in chokes.
I agree about the stalkers, but on Metal there are literally no good chokes to work with at my Nat (Unless I make some with buildings... Maybe I should build a mini pylon wall?).
I still feel like there's something Im missing about the relationship of Archons in the PvP matchup.
How the heck do you play PvP these days. I have NO idea how Im supposed to play it at all. People using archons has completely thrown me, I'm not at all sure how to respond to an archon timing.
I present to you a Replay.
teach me!
Lastly, zealot/archon needs open space to be effective. Make it engage in narrow chokes and it dies to collossi everytime.
TLDR: See zealot/archon, stop making stalkers/sentries, force engagements in chokes.
I agree about the stalkers, but on Metal there are literally no good chokes to work with at my Nat (Unless I make some with buildings... Maybe I should build a mini pylon wall?).
I still feel like there's something Im missing about the relationship of Archons in the PvP matchup.
With regard to Metalopolis, yes you'll need to simcity a bit vs zealot/archon and try to keep your collossi on high ground as much as possible so you can use the ramps to reduce the surface area of your army a bit.
Posts
in warcraft 2 you could tell siege weapons to attack ground and the splash damage would still hit submarines and invisible mages
Give each race a siege weapon...terran has one
Just breaks my suspension of disbelief for the in-game world I guess. Getting steamrolled by a snowballing muta harass that I let my opponent do by failing to pressure him is really irritating, but on some level it at least makes more sense. It's not that I can't hit them because herp derp they're invis-incible, it's because they're too damn fast.
Anyway I'm going to go play now, lose to DTs, and shake both fists emphatically in the general direction of Blizzard HQ.
Steam: badger2d
I was trying to be ironic mate. Every race adapts to what they see, more or less. Zerg isn't special.
absolutely
How the heck do you play PvP these days. I have NO idea how Im supposed to play it at all. People using archons has completely thrown me, I'm not at all sure how to respond to an archon timing.
I present to you a Replay.
teach me!
In my opinion, zerg needs to pay special attention to this, moreso than the other races, precisely because of the drone mechanic. You can't "safely" drone unless you know how the game fits into your current plan. The other two races aren't so sensitive to deviations in game play. Terrans tend to control the tempo of the game with focused timings and protoss can naturally play defensively with sentries.
though they are also able to do so more easily (functionally, not practically as it requires scouting and appropriate reads)
both due to how larva works re: droning or massing particular units
I've found the most idiotic corner of the internet, now I can retire.
Be sure to read all the comments too.
Guess we're still not at a stage where people feel they can live comfortably outside the closet.
you're obviously a beta
Gamertag: Cunning Hekate // League of Legends: FeroxPA
You basically didn't do anything wrong. An archon timing is designed (or should be) to hit before you have 3+ collossi. In the late game, collossi will beat archons when they're in numbers.
The problem you had in your replay was that you stopped making probes at around 30 while your opponent didn't. Your late game army composition was kicking his arse, he was just able to throw way more units at you.
The one thing I noticed you do in the early/mid game (before the first major battle) was that after you scouted a heavy zealot army with an archon, you still added more stalkers. Stalkers DPS vs zealot/archon is reduced and if you have no room to backup, the stalkers will get melted really fast. Especially without blink.
Lastly, zealot/archon needs open space to be effective. Make it engage in narrow chokes and it dies to collossi everytime.
TLDR: See zealot/archon, stop making stalkers/sentries, force engagements in chokes.
Yeah, laughed at how they interpreted his monotone voice as confident steady machismo personified.
I still have to get used to actually talking while streaming -_-'
watch fail-cheese at its most french!
Witty signature comment goes here...
wra
Wherein the 3reaper rush owns faces.
seems like it is the absolute flawless counter for the current TvT style of spending all your gas on tech rather than army for the first 7-8 minutes of the game.
but all the Korean Terrans seem to play that way
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Go go MKP. Time to win something in GSL.
'...well, I think it tastes great everywhere.'
Shillin' all day, err' day.
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I agree about the stalkers, but on Metal there are literally no good chokes to work with at my Nat (Unless I make some with buildings... Maybe I should build a mini pylon wall?).
I still feel like there's something Im missing about the relationship of Archons in the PvP matchup.
I'm not supposed to drink Pepsi but I prefer it to coke.
Best korean drink is the aloe thing with the floating things in it, delicious.
SC2: KillerCodeMk | LoL: KillerCodeMonky | FFXIV: Shea Demvas (Sargantas)
Ghost in the Linkshell Item Requisitioning
Let me know you are from PA, otherwise I will likely ignore you.
With regard to Metalopolis, yes you'll need to simcity a bit vs zealot/archon and try to keep your collossi on high ground as much as possible so you can use the ramps to reduce the surface area of your army a bit.
That is the most disgusting thing ever
If i wanted to drink water with tadpoles floating in it, I would just drink water with tadpoles floating in it.