ex-blizz employee reveals D3 secrets?

[1v0ry_k1ng]

You seem to forget that those units were in sc 1 which was perfectly fine with them. Some of them(medic) even came in an expansion. I'll go out on a limb and say that the next sc2 expansion will have new units for each faction in mp.

definately, nobody would buy the expansions otherwise

[Hoi]

The real problem with sc2 is that it wasn't designed. They didn't think about how the game should work, they even said that they just made the units that they thought would be cool and then mixed them.

The are so many enormous game and fun breaking design issues in starcraft 2 because they didn't even think about it. sc1 + brood war was great, because it was fair and fun. Sc2 isn't fun, it's only about finishing a game as fast as possible to get those stupid ladder points. Many units and tactics are imbalanced, again, because they didn't think about the game and how it should work at all.

[SwiftSpear]

You seem to forget that those units were in sc 1 which was perfectly fine with them. Some of them(medic) even came in an expansion. I'll go out on a limb and say that the next sc2 expansion will have new units for each faction in mp.

It will, but I doubt they will be units from SC1.

[SwiftSpear]

The real problem with sc2 is that it wasn't designed. They didn't think about how the game should work, they even said that they just made the units that they thought would be cool and then mixed them.

The are so many enormous game and fun breaking design issues in starcraft 2 because they didn't even think about it. sc1 + brood war was great, because it was fair and fun. Sc2 isn't fun, it's only about finishing a game as fast as possible to get those stupid ladder points. Many units and tactics are imbalanced, again, because they didn't think about the game and how it should work at all.

This is half true. Starcraft 2 was designed, but it was designed through brute force. It's not exceptionally elegant in it's balance, but it is balanced and fun.

[Hoi]

The real problem with sc2 is that it wasn't designed. They didn't think about how the game should work, they even said that they just made the units that they thought would be cool and then mixed them.

The are so many enormous game and fun breaking design issues in starcraft 2 because they didn't even think about it. sc1 + brood war was great, because it was fair and fun. Sc2 isn't fun, it's only about finishing a game as fast as possible to get those stupid ladder points. Many units and tactics are imbalanced, again, because they didn't think about the game and how it should work at all.

This is half true. Starcraft 2 was designed, but it was designed through brute force. It's not exceptionally elegant in it's balance, but it is balanced and fun.

Blizzard said at blizzcon that they didn't design it at all and that they just made some cool units.

How long have you been playing, and have you played sc1+bw? What race are you playing? Terran is the most finished race (still some very bad things like medivacs instead of medics and dropships). The other races are not finished.

I could talk about what's wrong with sc2 for hours, but that'll make this post too long. Sc2 is a rush game with only one race that is even close to finished, if you ever played the previous starcraft you'll understand how it's infinitively better.

[AF]

Hois Approach

Complain about Starcraft 2 imbalances endlessly on various forums to no avail

Preferable Approach

Exploit imbalances to win tournaments to pay rent

[Cheesecan]

Hoi I've played both Starcrafts but I don't think any one of them is clearly better. Starcraft 2 has a fun and engaging gameplay. I've played games that have lasted an hour where me and my opponent spent all our resources killing each other. Of course there are some rushing tactics that are imba but Blizzard is patching like crazy to finely calibrate the balance.

One thing you cannot say about Blizzard is that they just drop a game in the stores and then forget about it. They nurture every single game they make and while maybe the ladder play in Starcraft 2 is very stressful to the player it also works as a reward system to keep people playing whereas in Spring all we have is a dumbass gametime counter and a bunch of people who yell at you and call you a noob.

[smoth]

Hois Approach

Complain about Starcraft 2 imbalances endlessly on various forums to no avail

Preferable Approach

Exploit imbalances to win tournaments to pay rent

^this pretty much.

Gundam has REAL imbalances. Things like the G3 being too strong for it's cost.

[Hoi]

Hois Approach

Complain about Starcraft 2 imbalances endlessly on various forums to no avail

Preferable Approach

Exploit imbalances to win tournaments to pay rent

More like

My approach:
Buy starcraft 2, play a bit, find out game sucks, stop playing it, disappointed about what happened to blizzard and starcraft, sadface.jpg, complain on various forums because of disappointment

Preferable Approach:
Everyone follows my approach to force blizzard into making it a good game (bleh)

[smoth]

[reality]
Game get boycotted:
Developer take the fall, get fired
Pirates get blamed
Suits who ruined game get promotion for explanation and actions of firing devs
Suits keep doing the same shit

Game get bought
Developers keep job, feel dirty
Game gets pirated because people want to try it
Suits resolve to strip out moddability In sequel so they can charge for dlc
Suits keep doing the same shit
[/reality]

[Cheesecan]

D1 & D2 were never intended to be modded though. That was just a happy side effect of the nice way Blizzard made those games. They never officially supported those editors and in fact mods and cheats ruined D1 on b.net. Starcraft was the same story and it ruined online play since everyone had the map hack..

[smoth]

.<-the point
























Missed<-you

[Cheesecan]

I didn't miss your point, I just think it's not interesting to discuss so I ignored it and picked at what I thought was more interesting. Your point is really just speculation and generalization so I don't think it's worthy of a reply. Happy?

[smoth]

Funny because back in 98, it is what ruined shogo, and continues to plague the industry.

[SwiftSpear]

Hois Approach

Complain about Starcraft 2 imbalances endlessly on various forums to no avail

Preferable Approach

Exploit imbalances to win tournaments to pay rent

More like

My approach:
Buy starcraft 2, play a bit, find out game sucks, stop playing it, disappointed about what happened to blizzard and starcraft, sadface.jpg, complain on various forums because of disappointment

Preferable Approach:
Everyone follows my approach to force blizzard into making it a good game (bleh)

I love starcraft 2. I think I'd tweak Zerg a bit if I could, but the game is spectacularly put together and well balanced today. It's an extremely fun game to see played at the highest level. I think everyone should buy a copy.

You mistake "making a cool unit and then tweaking it to make it fit into the game" as an invalid alternative to "finding a gameplay hole and then imagining a unit that would fit to fix that hole"

The medivac, for example, is an extremely effective unit in it's place. It means that if the terran player is going for a big bio army, you have the option of not countering that army on the ground. If you can take air control and snipe off their medivac's when the battle comes the terran player can't stim as readily, and your inferior ground force can win the battle. Additionally, having the medivac as a healing unit means that in battles the terran bio force is more mobile, which is fitting as Bio is the mobile option in the terran big army mixes. The medivac fits in brilliantly into the game.

[Cheesecan]

Funny because back in 98, it is what ruined shogo, and continues to plague the industry.

Lol the sad thing is I know what game you are referring to..having played the demo as a kid. Kinda fun but hardly any kind of historical moment in gaming history

[KaiserJ]

anyone got an estimate on how many threads here turn into an argument about starcraft? it's gotta be at least 5%

[Cheesecan]

Just count most or all recent threads frequented by smoth and Hoi. :D

[Wombat]

disappointed about what happened to blizzard

nothing happened, its still the best company out there (says the guy who basicly enjoyed w3 only)

[Hoi]

The medivac, for example, is an extremely effective unit in it's place. It means that if the terran player is going for a big bio army, you have the option of not countering that army on the ground. If you can take air control and snipe off their medivac's when the battle comes the terran player can't stim as readily, and your inferior ground force can win the battle. Additionally, having the medivac as a healing unit means that in battles the terran bio force is more mobile, which is fitting as Bio is the mobile option in the terran big army mixes. The medivac fits in brilliantly into the game.

It really isn't. The medivac is the most dumb unit ever created.

(fyi I'm not some bronze noob, I played in masters for a while before I quit, and I played random.)

Because of the removal of the medic, terran marines and marauders needed to be buffed. Those became so strong with medivacs that terran mech is not needed in most cases. Result: terrans only play T1 with medivacs.

The new huge open space on the maps that is there for no reason, combined with medivacs mean drops are no longer an investment yet very effective. This means that drops are not an option, they are a fact. They're not something to surprise the opponent with like in sc1.

The medivac meant no more medics, which makes terran a lot less interesting. Because of the loss of the medic bio needed a buff, but it means less interesting play and the buffs were just wrong. Concussive shells (and forcefields/fungal, but those are protoss/zerg) are the most stupid things, they disallow the opponent to micro their units or retreat in an engagement, changing the game from a constant fight to two players maxing out (1% of the time), two players preparing for a rush and/or all in (99% of the time) and attacking. Marines with all their upgrades are too strong, etc etc. Nerf bio and buff mech if you ask me.

Now let's look at the colossus and viking mechanic thingy. Also really dumb. A summary: protoss players get either a 30-60sec timing window where they have colossi and the opponent has minimal vikings, or he gets many colossi for a one time all in attack later in the game. Again forcing and dumbing down the game to all in. The reaver was a far superior unit that was not so strong as the colossus but could actually be used more than 30-60 seconds in a game. It required micro with shuttles and some luck.

That was one of the things that made the game exciting, not only for the players but also for the viewers. Starcraft 2 is a rush game, the developers intend for this game to play out the same boring way 99% of the time. Look at the map 'design', race 'design', unit 'design'. How about the iconic units from sc1 that are nearly useless now? (hydralisk, archon, high templar, where are the lurkers and reavers?) Now this wouldn't be such a big problem if sc2 would actually work, if it would be fun and well designed, but it is none of those things.

And I've only talked about 10% of my thoughts about just the PvT matchup. I could write up 60x more than this if I had enough time. Meh.

/rant