Why Mass Appeal = Noob Appeal, A Short Dissertation

[luckywaldo7]

My thought experiment when I said "make mex more expensive". You could make mex cost more, which would slow down expansion and make it less "land grab"-y. So, theoretically you would see more action before people expand to the center. But changing such a fundamental unit will screw over the entire balance of the game.

[luckywaldo7]

My thought experiment when I said "make mex more expensive". You could make mex cost more, which would slow down expansion and make it less "land grab"-y. So, theoretically you would see more action before people expand to the center. But changing such a fundamental unit will screw over the entire balance of the game.

(Forum swallowed my original post?)

[Johannes]

To which I responded, that mechanic is already adjustable by map. Not in mex cost but mex output. You know, how a ccr mex gives 2.3m, geyser starting mexes give 1.6m and the rest on that map vary from ~0.5m to ~5m, speedmetal one gives 30m... Did ZK standardise each mex to give a set amount or something, this stuff should be obvious?

But mex cost is of course same everywhere.

[luckywaldo7]

Ah so that's what you meant by size.

That's not quite the same thing. You are just slowing the rate of income down; you won't be spending proportionally more on expansions then anything else. So while they take longer to pay off, they aren't really any more 'expensive'.

[hunterw]

I say, all BA team games are of a very linear nature, no matter what the map.
I see no (or little) difference in strategy between "noob maps" and "pro maps"

But I just pointed out to you why this is not true!! I just showed you the difference in strategy - lateral attack paths that are often underutilized.

This is why the fronts shift; one front can break or be non-existent which opens up many other routes and chokes. Those can be sealed with new porcs (as olive team tried to do there up in the northeast without success).

Yes looks like this to me too.
It still is a pretty linear movement though.

It doesn't have to be linear movement at all, and it frequently isn't.

Many times in early 4v4 Talus games, the northwest and southeast players would both be wiped 2v1 (as the terrain forces), and the game basically restarts as a 3v3 with the new front being diagonally split across the entire river.

Many people complained to me about the asymmetric nature of how the fronts split up. Just because noobs don't know how to attack using flanks doesn't mean it can't be done.

Hell, even in the posted match you admit:

Instead, it seems green just sent all his units to yellow's front line for the entire game.

I think players not always being aware of the whole game plays a huge role how things play out, yes.

All green had to do was attack laterally using the ravine. Nothing forces linear movement; quite the opposite on this map.

In conclusion,

I say, all BA team games are of a very linear nature, no matter what the map.

Arrows indicate non-linear attack paths of great win.

The ravine (and vag) are:
1. Devoid of resources, which discourages porcing
2. Surrounded by cliff ridge crests. These prevent excessive porc, and also block radar and LOS from detecting incoming attacks.

Talus also has more z-axis than almost every map. All of this promotes the use of unique strategies and units, and lateral, non-linear gameplay.

I dunno how you can argue any of that, sorry!

[knorke]

It's worth thinking about that what makes it possible in Starcraft for map control to switch back and forth so radically, and if that could be emulated into maps for BA.

this.
No time/dont want to respond to everything, so basically just this.

---

the crystal clear role every player has on its spot. [on DSD] It's not like that on other maps.

I think it is like that on other maps too. ie on Falsom Dam you have "the water guy." That is a role not needed on DSD and it is perhaps the most limited role.

What I liked about DSD: it gave me lots of time and opportunities to test out different strategies to the same situation:
* I learned teching @north-back

Think is, you did not learn "how to tech", you learned "how to tech when not having to worry about anything else."
Following a memorized buildorder from the start is not "teching" imo.
In a normal game you have to worry about balancing your expansion, economy, pressure on enemy and then, tech.

I agree that is maybe why dsd is popular: you pick one role and can become good at it. No having to worry about game awareness & multi tasking which are most difficult for new players in RTS. Though I dont see how playing like this is any fun.

SanadaUjiosan:
upload replays, I can quite quickly make those images.
preferably not games with first-time players but games where you think "this is how CT should play like"

or try yourself http://springrts.com/phpbb/viewtopic.ph ... ut#p421911

And you dismiss the dots in the sides much too easily, they are often the game changing stuff just as much as the roughly equal armies keeping check of each other in the middle.

Maybe.
Of course it is a bit like reading read tea leaves.
ie some bombers going around the map edges and killing a fusion would be quite game changing but hardly leaves dots.
But I think that shows also how you have the "middle bash" and then, like a "second game layer" you have stuff like air or nuke attacks.

Oh and there will ALWAYS be a big line from base to middle, just cause that's the only sensible place to set fac rally point 90% of time.

As I said:
where is the strategy if 80% of the map is just used for driving towards an narrow arena stripe in the middle?

[Forboding Angel]

Maybe I'm missing the point, but after reading hunterw's post, my first thought was "Well, duh."

[hunterw]

No having to worry about game awareness & multi tasking which are most difficult for new players in RTS. Though I dont see how playing like this is any fun.

Vet blindfold.

Noobs getting run over in 3 minutes on Talus from a single micromanaged AK is why they don't play it, and revert to DSD where they sit behind meatshields, safe from any ground attack for at least ~20 minutes, free to learn the resource aspect of the game.

So how could maps make games more unpredictable?
I think it would be different if the resources were more concentrated in fewer areas. (think starcraft) Then you would have satelite bases and movement/shifting front lines between those.

if only a map like that existed

More varied startpositions instead of left box vs right box would help too.

3v3 = a player can choose to start on the enemy "continent" by using either NW or SE corner spot, or all choose to stay on their own.



Pretty much, this:

Saying that a Talus game and a DSD game are very similar, is just taking it way too far. There's always more ways to attack on Talus. Yes, BA isn't a game where big armies very often drive around enemy territory, but instead it's a game where even 1 ak in the right place can do significant damage. And that sneaking ak has much better chance to find a good target on Talus than DSD.

Cliffs actually make a map seem bigger than it is, as routes have to snake around obstacles, and cliffs block LOS. Unlike CC, you cannot have radars omnipresent and simply react to an enemy blob by driving tanks straight toward the target. Unlike CC, T2 units happen nearly every game. It's not the kind of game vets like or are used to; it's more porcy with all the z-axis, but it's really all about slipping units (especially kbots) past chokepoints and dealing damage to enemy economy.

[Johannes]

Ah so that's what you meant by size.

That's not quite the same thing. You are just slowing the rate of income down; you won't be spending proportionally more on expansions then anything else. So while they take longer to pay off, they aren't really any more 'expensive'.

No, you always choose how much you spend on expansions in proportion to other things by how many cons you build and how much they concentrate on making mexes or turrets/radars/something else. And how quickly they pay back themselves and the mexes of course has great impact on how much you can put into expansion without dying before they pay themselves.

Oh and there will ALWAYS be a big line from base to middle, just cause that's the only sensible place to set fac rally point 90% of time.

As I said:
where is the strategy if 80% of the map is just used for driving towards an narrow arena stripe in the middle?

It's in all the subtle threats and possibilities you have to think about, scout and prepare for. Just because units tend to drive towards the middle a lot, doesn't mean it's the only thing they ever do... Damn I feel this is getting a bit repetitive :/


About the Talus game though, there's no guarantee that green was in a position to send much anything into the west. It looks like air play from red was quite significant on all fronts, but it's too hard to say about a 100 things based on the image. Overall it was a quick game where east quickly lost ground on all positions.
I really don't know why you would take these images as proof of something when a replay tells 50x more...

[knorke]

It's in all the subtle threats and possibilities you have to think about, scout and prepare for.

I know what you mean, it is like two guys fighting with knifes or something. They might now stab each other violently in the head from the start but instead circle each other etc. So even if not a lot of action is going on they watch each other very closely and as soon one makes a wrong step its on.

I really don't know why you would take these images as proof of something when a replay tells 50x more...

I dont "stick" to the but is there other information of similiar type? Sure we could all watch replays but I did not see one posted and it takes longer to watch and blabla.
So look at the pretty colors and lol when a commander walked a penis shaped path. Imo some stuff can be read from it but do not take it too serious.

Noobs getting run over in 3 minutes on Talus from a single micromanaged AK is why they don't play it, and revert to DSD where they sit behind meatshields

Imo 8v8 Talus offers as much noob protection as 8v8 DSD.
And even if not, players would just play it 10v10 to get the same meatshield effect.

Well, we are really just repeating the same stuff now.
I just know I have no interesst in trying out this new map:
http://springrts.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=25972

[Wombat]

Imo 8v8 Talus offers as much noob protection as 8v8 DSD.

ouch XD

[hunterw]

Imo 8v8 Talus offers as much noob protection as 8v8 DSD.

ouch XD

What a burn.

The topic went from 3v3 Talus to 4v4 Talus to 8v8 or 10v10 Talus, matches of which have probably never happened, and he would still be wrong for the reasons I've discussed at length. Terrain and resource distribution influence gameplay even under the porciest conditions.

I'm done arguing since this entire post was ignored:
http://springrts.com/phpbb/viewtopic.ph ... 41#p484706

[Wombat]

a match of which has probably never happened.

actually it did, especially in 0k, u should be happy !

anyway, problem with this pic u showed, is that all these paths of epic win are one time attack. its the matter of 1 llt and u are safe...

[knorke]

The topic went from 3v3 Talus to 4v4 Talus to 8v8 Talus, a match of which has probably never happened.

it was you who compared 3v3 Talus to 8v8 DSD:

Noobs getting run over in 3 minutes on Talus from a single micromanaged AK is why they don't play it, and revert to DSD where they sit behind meatshields

That does not even make sense to compare those. It only makes sense to compare games of equal player numbers.
Play 3v3 on dsd and noobs will have no meatshields and will be run over from a single microed AK.

but w/e fuck this, i already feel stupid enough for thinking this could be something else then a dsd baww thread

[hunterw]

The topic went from 3v3 Talus to 4v4 Talus to 8v8 Talus, a match of which has probably never happened.

it was you who compared 3v3 Talus to 8v8 DSD:

Noobs getting run over in 3 minutes on Talus from a single micromanaged AK is why they don't play it, and revert to DSD where they sit behind meatshields

That does not even make sense to compare those. It only makes sense to compare games of equal player numbers.
Play 3v3 on dsd and noobs will have no meatshields and will be run over from a single microed AK.

3v3 and 4v4 Talus are how Talus is (was) usually played, and 8v8 DSD is how it's usually played. I was explaining noob's actions and mindset of abandoning lower playercount games on complicated maps in lieu of:

-High playercount for meatshields.
-Porcy rectangular maps (ala the OP)

Comparing 3v3 DSD with 3v3 Talus is simple. 3v3 DSD is linear as can be, and 3v3 Talus is not. 8v8 DSD and 8v8 Talus are probably much more similar, but no matter what the playercount Talus is always going to have more routes to attack.

[hunterw]

a match of which has probably never happened.

actually it did, especially in 0k, u should be happy !

Not really, lol, 8v8 Talus sounds very boring to me. At least they're having fun though.

anyway, problem with this pic u showed, is that all these paths of epic win are one time attack. its the matter of 1 llt and u are safe...

For green's routes (attacking uphill) this may be true early game, but that's four separate one-time early-game attacks. More than enough opportunity to change the outcome of the game.

For grey's routes, one LLT cannot stop either of those routes, as both utilize the highest Z-axis of the whole map. Hammers, Thuds, and Mortys all have absurd range up there.

[knorke]

DSD was made for 4v4 too, not for 8v8.

8v8 DSD and 8v8 Talus are probably much more similar, but no matter what the playercount Talus is always going to have more routes to attack.

Maybe, but at this player numbers it does not matter much any more.

Imo there is little use to discuss the best map for a 8v8 RTS game full of noobs, it will be stupid no matter the map.

Also something new to think about:
Years ago there was alot of wishing for dynamic height map/neutral bases or creeps/lava/teleport/storms etc. but now that we have all that or could do it, what do we get?
"New 28 player map - Koom Valley v1"
(sorry Beherith, your new map just happend to be at top, no hard feelings )
Maybe those maps would be even bigger noob magnets but at least it would be something fresh!

And are there even maps made for non-BA?

[hunterw]

3v3's/4v4's seem pretty rare now if I'm not mistaken. The community seems to have a bimodal split between 1v1 vets who don't care that they never build 90% of the units in the game, and the 8v8 noobs who never get raided and play simbase.

A shame really, they are my favorite size games. I like a little of both porc and raid aspects, with some obscure units and strats possible, so that's what I tried to aim for with Talus. I was really happy when people simultaneously argued that tanks and kbots were overpowered on it.

[knorke]

Not sure about ba but xta is played (if it is played) in all forms from 1v1 over 5 ffa to 4v4. To me seems like all units are used too.
So try xta, not because the game is better then ba but because the players are less fail

[Johannes]

3v3 DSD is still more linear than 3v3 Talus, in terms of how much different ways you can use your gruond units. You've got a straightforward direction you make your units go, but well, you've still got to prepare for air and look for the right time to tech etc.

And Hunterw, there's not too many vets who specifically want to play t1 only, almost everyone calls longer games better, at least when they're not frustrated of losing in them.