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JohnKilltrane posted:Oof, yeah, that'd be brutal. Especially because at that point really the only tools you'd have to deal with them are Wraiths. Wraiths are definitely the intended counter, especially on that map - both cut maps had their terrain re-used for the Enslavers Campaign, and Biting the Bullet (the map in question) had its terrain re-used for the split-objective mission to either kill the Cerebrate on the center island, or go rescue the Protoss. You start in the same spot in both missions. All the Guardians are coming at you from the water. There's also a good number of Mutalisks and Overlord drops, but Guardians are present, and will go on the offensive.
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Mar 26, 2023 03:01
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RevolverDivider posted:Psi Storm is the most beautiful button in the game. poo poo goes crazy with them storms https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3IbwjeCx6U
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Mar 26, 2023 04:28
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Negostrike posted:poo poo goes crazy with them storms the screams are actually audio captured from the tanks
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Mar 26, 2023 04:30
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Unit Spotlight: Guardian The Guardian as seen in the manual. Overview: The Guardian’s cost is a little more complicated than other units - it’s 50 minerals and 100 vespene, but it’s better off to think of that as 150 minerals and 200 vespene because it has to be morphed from an existing Mutalisk. Morphing it does not take any extra supply, however. It attacks with Acid Spores that do 20 normal damage (~15.8 DPS) - which seems pretty underwhelming. The source of the Guardian’s power, though, lies in its range: with a range of 8, it’s got the second-longest range in the game. This means that it can outrange potential threats, yes, but it also means that the unit’s damage output is much higher in practice than it appears on paper because it doesn’t need to maneuver much - it can just sit there and level anything within its considerable range. This is helpful, because the Guardian is painfully slow - at 2.5 Speed it’s the same speed as a Battlecruiser. It’s also quite squishy - it’s got 150 HP and 1 armour - in theory an upgrade from the Mutalisk, but since the Mutalisk is Small and the Guardian is Large, and the majority of attacks that hit air are Explosive (and therefore deal 50% damage to Small targets), in actual practice the Guardian ends up being quite a fair bit less durable than the Mutalisk. The end result is one of the biggest glass cannons in the game, able to do huge amounts of damage at high range while also being highly vulnerable. You do, however, always have to beware of drift: For some reason, the Guardian has a tendency to very slowly float towards the target its currently attacking, meaning that even if they start firing from outside the opponent’s range, if left unsupervised they might slowly bob forward until they’re close enough to be retaliated against.  The Guardian as seen in an upcoming cinematic. Fluff: The Guardian is said to be based off the “nesting form” of the Mantis Screamer (the species the Mutalisk was developed from), and that’s about all we know. My reading of this is that the writers weren’t quite sure how to fit the Guardian into the Zerg fluff of assimilating existing species, so they went with something vague. Come to think of it, I’m not even entirely sure what they mean by nesting form - the way it’s written I assume it means “the form the Mantis Screamer takes while in its nest” but I suppose it could also mean “a secondary form nested inside the first form.” In any case, rather than glaive wurms, the Guardians spit globs of highly corrosive acid over a massive distance. They also, as seen in the manual picture above, have a surprisingly and aggressively crustacean vibe to them. Is a dead Guardian how House Redoran eventually gets into space? Dangerous questions. Tech Fluff: Sadly, the Guardian is one of only two Zerg units in the base game to not receive any tech upgrades, and therefore has no tech fluff (the other, if you’re curious, is the Scourge).  A big, beautiful illustration of the Guardian by Luke Mancini, one of Blizzard's artists. Campaign Usage: Guardians are an absolutely massive asset for us in the campaign. We have to be very cautious with them - their slow speed means that spells like Psi Storm and Irradiate will completely ruin their day - but so long as we are cautious, we can demolish huge swathes of enemy forces with ease. Guardians outrange any AA the enemy will have and will continue to do so until the expansion (remember way, way back in the unit spotlight for the Goliath, we saw that they’ll get an upgrade for their AA range?). The one thing to really watch out for is, funnily enough, the otherwise deeply-questionable Scout. Competitive Usage: Next to a unit we won’t see until the expansion, Guardians are the most niche - and therefore rarely seen - unit in Zerg’s arsenal. This might come as a surprise - after all, they’re incredibly powerful, and given that Mutas are a permanent staple in all three matchups, it’d be quite an easy transition to pull off. The problem is that Guardians are just too easily dealt with. The things that soft-counter Mutas hard-counter Guardians, which means too often they’re just too high-risk an option. See, Psi Storms melt Mutas, but also Mutas are fast enough that a skilled and attentive Zerg player can zoom away, taking only slight to moderate damage in the process. Ditto with Irradiate - if you catch it, fly the targeted Muta out and save the rest. It’s bad enough that it makes Mutas a less attractive option in the late game, but they’re still quite workable. Guardians don’t have that luxury. If Protoss Psi Storms your Guardians, you’re not moving them out of there in time. If Terran Irradiates a Guardian, by the time it gets away it’ll already have inflicted serious damage to its friends. And then there’s always air superiority to worry about - if Guardians start to show up more often, guess who’s also going to become more popular? Wraiths. So Guardians could be a high-risk, high-reward unit, but the other side of the issue is the same one the Queen runs into: Zerg needs gas, and lots of it, so a gas-heavy unit like the Guardian is a bad investment unless you know it’ll pay dividends. Versus Terran: If you see Guardians, it’ll normally be here. Marines have an incredibly difficult time against Guardians, so a Zerg player can morph their Mutas to punish a Terran player that is late in getting Science Vessels out. Of course, once those Vessels do come out, Guardians have a very limited lifespan as Irradiate can take them out in droves. There was a brief window where Jaedong (the Zerg GOAT) tried to make use of Guardians as harassment tools in this matchup, shredding Terran’s mineral line from a safe distance. He was able to get somewhat effective results because his incredible Scourge control was able to protect them from Vessels, but even he transitioned out of this, saying in an interview that any time he makes Guardians, he loses.  GomTVMSLS4_20080214_16r_2b_Jaedong_vs_Flash_2.avi - YouTube - 13-40.jpeg)  GomTVMSLS4_20080214_16r_2b_Jaedong_vs_Flash_2.avi - YouTube - 13-43.jpeg) Jaedong uses Guardians to annihilate Flash’s SCVs. Sorry for the awful quality on these screen grabs, but the most recent game I could find with Guardian play in it was from fifteen years ago, which… speaks for itself. Versus Protoss: Guardians really aren’t a thing here. Psi Storm alone is enough of a deterrent, let alone some of Protoss’ other tools - especially considering Protoss will very often have out at least some of its air superiority unit Corsairs, which will eat Guardians for breakfast. There’s just not much to recommend them in this matchup at all. Versus Zerg: Haha. No. ZvZ almost never makes it until Hive tech anyway, but even when it does - what use is a bomber in the Duel of the Mutas? To summarize… Well, okay, actually, no point. Don’t build Guardians in competitive multiplayer. Five Minutes Shorter: The Guardian hero and the Mutalisk hero are alike in two ways: They’re both named Kukulza, and neither of them make an appearance in any Blizzard campaign. With 400 HP, 4 armour, and 40 damage, the Guardian variant of the Kukulza is an exceptionally fearsome warrior - particularly since it’s a Zerg hero, meaning had they existed in a mission you’d probably be getting several of them. They’d be able to easily level a base themselves, so I suppose it’s no wonder that they never make an appearance.
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Mar 29, 2023 00:40
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I want to say a guy tried to do a Guardian push in the first round of the ASL recently, but it failed. I don't remember which match it was though.
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Mar 29, 2023 00:55
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Air units drift because they bunch up together. Any unit with overlapping sprites gets a random boost to a different direction (including ground units, which leads to weird bugs like dragoons walking up cliffs). The effect is just ultra pronounced with guardians because their hitbox is huuuuge, and their deceleration is super low so they're constantly bumping into each other and finishing movements well inside their own max range.
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Mar 29, 2023 01:40
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Guardian play is sooooort of in the meta right now, but in the same way as queens are. A recent series that Artosis cast featured a fair amount of Guardian play, I think the player implementing them the most was ZeLot That Jaedong quote is certainly something I hear casters reference a lot. The winning average for Z players using any Guardians isn't great
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Mar 29, 2023 04:02
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Guardians definitely have their place in the campaign. A lot of missions give the AI a pre-built base with a bunch of defensive structures, so Guardians can really shine as long-range artillery against static defenses. You also generally have a decently long build-up phase before you're ready to assault the enemy base, so the high gas cost is less of a limiting factor. That said, it was always irritating playing with them because they're so drat slow. If you're trying a combined forces attack+ground assault, you have to issue the Guardians' move order from your base to the enemy base well ahead of time, because otherwise your ground forces get there way earlier - enough so that the next planned AI "attack human base" wave would regularly blunder right into your waiting ground troops, thus blunting your assault.
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Mar 29, 2023 04:31
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How do guardians fly
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Mar 29, 2023 09:17
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ilmucche posted:How do guardians fly
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Mar 29, 2023 09:56
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I was hoping that would not be the answer
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Mar 29, 2023 10:07
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From their shape I'd imagine they have rigid lighter-than-air gas bladders keeping them afloat, modulating their height by producing and expelling the gas. So, yes, constant farting.
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Mar 29, 2023 10:29
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This is why Terrans keep their masks down when dealing with Zerg, everyting smells like butts.
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Mar 29, 2023 14:34
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Tenebrais posted:From their shape I'd imagine they have rigid lighter-than-air gas bladders keeping them afloat, modulating their height by producing and expelling the gas. It's hard to tell because its an SSLP but if you play the game in real time all you hear when guardians move is endless overlayed loops of fart.mp3
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Mar 29, 2023 15:20
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Mass Guardians and a smaller group of that one Zerg expansion unit, and you're set to kill poo poo in single player. That's how we did it back in the day!
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Mar 29, 2023 17:52
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Tarezax posted:I want to say a guy tried to do a Guardian push in the first round of the ASL recently, but it failed. I don't remember which match it was though. Aces High posted:Guardian play is sooooort of in the meta right now, but in the same way as queens are. A recent series that Artosis cast featured a fair amount of Guardian play, I think the player implementing them the most was ZeLot Interesting! I haven't had a chance to catch up on the most recent ASL. For anyone reading not familiar with the competitive scene, you'll normally see "unorthodox" plays like this from newer and less experienced pros - when you don't have the mechanics and experience to beat the most established players in a straight fight, your best bet is often try to win by throwing some curveballs and trying to eke out an edge that way. I'm assuming that's what happened here, too? Also the thing with Guardians is that they're such unbelievably badass units in the campaign, you just really want them to work. Tenebrais posted:From their shape I'd imagine they have rigid lighter-than-air gas bladders keeping them afloat, modulating their height by producing and expelling the gas. This is as good an answer as any, tbh. As we've seen, the amount of thought Blizzard puts into its units varies quite a bit. Once we've done all the more exciting units we'll hit the spotlight for the Overlord, where we'll discover that quite a bit of time has been put into thinking through how the unit actually works on a physical level. On the other hand, you've got units like the Guardian, where it's just "Look, the bat becomes a giant floating crab that shoots balls of acid further than SAM missiles can reach, I don't make the rules." My theory, then, is that the Guardian cocoon manages to hover in one place by just releasing one long, continuous fart the entire time the Guardian is morphing.
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Mar 29, 2023 18:57
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To be honest that makes their spaceflight less puzzling than the muta spaceflight, which is achieved by flapping their wings, while screeching.
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Mar 29, 2023 19:11
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SIGSEGV posted:To be honest that makes their spaceflight less puzzling than the muta spaceflight, which is achieved by flapping their wings, while screeching. Mutas just wanted it more than you did.
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Mar 29, 2023 20:34
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I've always assumed guardians were actually out in orbit of the planet, not actually in the 'air', just like battle cruisers or science vessels. But the scale has never been particularly consistent. A crashed BC is apparently actually as big as a flying one even if we see them in cutscenes the size of small cities.
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Mar 29, 2023 20:43
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GodFish posted:I've always assumed guardians were actually out in orbit of the planet, not actually in the 'air', just like battle cruisers or science vessels. But the scale has never been particularly consistent. A crashed BC is apparently actually as big as a flying one even if we see them in cutscenes the size of small cities. Thing is, if anything was actually in orbit you couldn't hold it still, it would just whizz repeatedly over the battlefield as it goes around the planet. Orbit isn't about being high enough up that gravity stops affecting you (that never really happens, and even the point where gravity is negligible is way too far away to be able to meaningfully affect anything on the planet), you have to be going fast enough around that it can't pull you in. Not that I really expect the Blizzard developers to have known or cared about that. They were just making cool space laser battles, not actual scientific accuracy.
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Mar 29, 2023 20:55
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Clearly it's just whizzing by so fast it matches the shutter rate of the players camera and just appears to be stationary if you aren't telling it to move.
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Mar 29, 2023 20:58
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Tenebrais posted:Thing is, if anything was actually in orbit you couldn't hold it still, it would just whizz repeatedly over the battlefield as it goes around the planet. Orbit isn't about being high enough up that gravity stops affecting you (that never really happens, and even the point where gravity is negligible is way too far away to be able to meaningfully affect anything on the planet), you have to be going fast enough around that it can't pull you in. Geosynchronous orbit is a thing. To stay in place the ship would just have to fly as fast as the planet rotated. (Please ignore that geosynchronous orbit is only stationary on one axis. We'll pretend they got both through scifi magic.)
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Mar 29, 2023 21:15
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Tenebrais posted:Thing is, if anything was actually in orbit you couldn't hold it still, it would just whizz repeatedly over the battlefield as it goes around the planet. Orbit isn't about being high enough up that gravity stops affecting you (that never really happens, and even the point where gravity is negligible is way too far away to be able to meaningfully affect anything on the planet), you have to be going fast enough around that it can't pull you in. Now I'm imagining a Guardian slowly building up momentum until it's zipping helplessly and repeatedly across the map, trying desperately to turn and aim at a target, any target at all, like it's stuck in a fart-powered game of Asteroids.
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Mar 30, 2023 00:26
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Was it not the case that SC1 was built entirely around the campaigns and the multi-player was sort of a throw-in? If so, that would explain a looooooooot.
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Mar 30, 2023 00:34
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JustJeff88 posted:Was it not the case that SC1 was built entirely around the campaigns and the multi-player was sort of a throw-in? If so, that would explain a looooooooot. It wasn't a throw-in, but it also definitely wasn't the main focus. Although, in the case of Guardians, I think the issue is more that in the first couple of years they weren't able to predict just how incredibly proficient people would become with spellcasters. If anything, Guardians probably skew to being overpowered in casual multiplayer, it's only once Terran and Protoss have got the micro proficiency to swiftly annihilate them with Irradiate and Storm that they become a bad choice.
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Mar 30, 2023 16:57
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Ironically, Guardians have seen a resurgence in competitive play recently because of a new Terran strategy that heavily utilizes Valkyries. Terrans have been experimenting with rushing to them in a similar way to how Protoss rush to their anti-muta flier. The new Zerg counter-strat is to get to Mutas and then use them extremely aggressively to destroy as much of Terran's economy as they can while losing as few mutas as possible. Meanwhile the Zerg swaps techs into Hydras and a Greater Spire. You now take your heavily damaged (but not dead) Mutas and morph them into Guardians, this heals them to full hp and then you instantly remount the pressure by attacking the Terran with them. If you killed enough of Terrans economy they wont have had enough time or money to build more than a handful of Valks. The Hydras protect the Guardians from these few units while the Guardians obliterate any Marines or static defense the Terran has. This relies on a lot of correct timing and execution from the Zerg; lose too many Mutas and it doesn't work, don't kill enough SCVs and it doesn't work. If the Terran out micros you it also doesn't work. The strat will probably drop off in a few months as Terrans get more practice defending it. But honestly this is one of those things about Pro SC1 that always draws me back to it. This new evolution had nothing to do with a balance change or patch. It was purely on the back of a new build a Terran dreamed up and perfected but that build has now spawned this counter build and the counter build will have spawned a counter-counter build and so on and so on.
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Mar 31, 2023 09:38
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Is teching up worth it in competitive play? It seems as though you need to pick a unit, spam it, and win through lots and lots of clicking. ... I'll bet this is why I've never gotten anywhere in RTS games.
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Apr 1, 2023 21:58
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painedforever posted:Is teching up worth it in competitive play? It seems as though you need to pick a unit, spam it, and win through lots and lots of clicking. When I played Warcraft 2, teching up was very much worth it for me. Every time I increased the level of my Town Hall, it opened new doors to create more powerful units. Every damage or defense boost I could apply at the Blacksmith or Foundry or Lumber Mill was also very much worth it. Magic, less so, but using magic to its full potential requires skills I do not have. That is true both then and now. I have never played WC2 competitively. Nor have I ever played Starcraft beyond a curiosity level. But I hope I have given a partially interesting answer to your question.
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Apr 1, 2023 22:25
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painedforever posted:Is teching up worth it in competitive play? It seems as though you need to pick a unit, spam it, and win through lots and lots of clicking. Without experience in competitive gameplay, I would think that it sort of depends on how successful your early rush is being. If they're just completely folding, you may as well just keep pushing. But if you're slowing them down, but they're surviving... balance the rush with teching up so that you can get upgrades, and if you need to, transition to or mix in higher-tier units.
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Apr 1, 2023 22:32
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painedforever posted:Is teching up worth it in competitive play? It seems as though you need to pick a unit, spam it, and win through lots and lots of clicking. Figuring out how best to spend your resources between increasing your economy (ie bases and workers), increasing your production, building your army and advancing your tech is the whole macro side of the game. There's no one right answer and you need to adapt to the strategies you've developed and the state of the battle. If you never tech at all and try to build an army consisting entirely of unupgraded marines, zerglings or zealots, you will most likely lose past the early game. On the other hand, if you're building every tech building and researching every upgrade for every unit, you are also wasting a lot of resources that won't affect the ongoing battle. Figure out what units and moves you want to use in your strategy, and research the tech you need for that - finding times you can do it without leaving yourself vulnerable is a skill to practice.
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Apr 1, 2023 22:33
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achtungnight posted:When I played Warcraft 2, teching up was very much worth it for me. Every time I increased the level of my Town Hall, it opened new doors to create more powerful units. Every damage or defense boost I could apply at the Blacksmith or Foundry or Lumber Mill was also very much worth it. Magic, less so, but using magic to its full potential requires skills I do not have. That is true both then and now. I also can't single out units and target spells with them. I've come to disdain RTS a lot in favour of TBS, because the latter is all about strategy and the former is just as much or more about reflex and raw physical ability. I'd love to play a turn-based Starcraft game, not including the crappy board game. It will never happen, but I would enjoy it. As for WC3 (I know that you said 2, I mean 3), spell micro was slightly more tenable, but I never liked creeping. I already have at least one enemy army out for my blood - I shouldn't have to go looking for more trouble.
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Apr 1, 2023 22:36
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Tenebrais posted:Figuring out how best to spend your resources between increasing your economy (ie bases and workers), increasing your production, building your army and advancing your tech is the whole macro side of the game. There's no one right answer and you need to adapt to the strategies you've developed and the state of the battle. It's usually worth it to plan to get high-tech units later in the match, if they're the right units. We've already seen Science Vessels and how they can be key to longer Terran matchups against the other races, while the other races each have a caster we haven't seen yet Defiler and Arbiter that has some nice use in certain matchups also. But then there are also a bunch of high-tech/expensive units that are just kind of rear end (e.g., Ghosts with Nuke as JohnKilltrane described).
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Apr 1, 2023 22:59
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painedforever posted:Is teching up worth it in competitive play? It seems as though you need to pick a unit, spam it, and win through lots and lots of clicking. Teching up is extremely important in competitive play, especially at the top levels. It is also entirely possible to cheese an opponent and beat them with a 4pool build, or building a barracks/gateway close to the enemy's base and flooding them. Because early rushes like that either succeed or fail, you won't see much tech happening because the match will usually be over before any research can finish. If your cheese failed, you may as well tap out, because you sacrificed most of your critical economy building time by going offensive instead, your opponent has more resources coming in and they just killed most of your attack force, you're boned 95% of the time. In the majority of matches outside of cheeses, your research actually plays a huge amount in the tempo of a match going forward, most especially for Zerg. Zerglings without their movement speed upgrade can easily be kited by marines and slaughtered with minimal losses on the marines, heck, even workers can kite slow zerglings. Marines and zealots can get by without tech, but their long term viability will be tied to upgrades, if you're Terran and you're going to do mech builds, you don't do anything for your marines outside of researching stims for the early game. Likewise, if you are just going to go bio, you build your factory and then move on to the starport and science facility, because vessels are way more important than tanks. The flow of a match can actually sway quite a bit depending on when upgrades finish, in fact the more technical casters are usually quick to point out critical timings during matches and if players are behind or on time with them.
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Apr 1, 2023 23:02
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JustJeff88 posted:I also can't single out units and target spells with them. I've come to disdain RTS a lot in favour of TBS, because the latter is all about strategy and the former is just as much or more about reflex and raw physical ability. I'd love to play a turn-based Starcraft game, not including the crappy board game. It will never happen, but I would enjoy it. I prefer turn-based games to RTS too for similar reasons. One thing I want to clarify. Addressing entire audience here, not yet one reader. I *can* single out units and target spells with them. Not much difference between that and targeting a single unit with a ranged weapon. But I can’t use spells on a higher level than that. Damaging a unit with a magic missile or fireball, I can do. Applying a single buff or debuff spell, I can do. Applying a second buff or debuff spell before the first wears off is beyond me. I also have trouble remembering a buff or debuff exists after I apply it much of the time. Using uncontrollable damage spells (Whirlwind in WC2 is an example of this, you can find others) effectively is also beyond me. I hope these words have increased your knowledge of your own limitations. They did for me. achtungnight fucked around with this message at 13:19 on Apr 2, 2023 |
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Apr 2, 2023 00:12
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RTS is an incredible cool and fun genre and pretty much up there with fighting games for the best in the business in competitive play, and it's even got an edge over fighting games in that it's way more possible to make a fun casual experience with custom maps and campaigns in an RTS then it is a fighting game. Actually being good at RTS games is fuckin hard though and it's a very very hard genre to design a full plate experience the way Blizzard used to do. I think the best I ever did with Starcraft was low platinum back when Wings of Liberty came out, and that was pretty much entirely off the back of being pretty good at 4Gate at a time when a lot of the player base would melt to a properly timed and executed 4gate.
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Apr 2, 2023 01:31
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I got to Diamond in Wings of Liberty but got overwhelmed by the mechanical changes and new units in the later expansions so I fell off of competitive play. Now I just watch pro matches. Trying to be good at competitive play is potentially exhausting
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Apr 2, 2023 01:45
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painedforever posted:Is teching up worth it in competitive play? It seems as though you need to pick a unit, spam it, and win through lots and lots of clicking. To an extent you're right. At lower level play, it's all about macro. Any unit composition can triumph over any other unit composition so long as you're sufficiently outproducing your opponent. In Starcraft 2 it's been said - correctly - that you can get up to Diamond rank building nothing but your basic unit: Marines, Zerglings, or Zealots. Get a build order down pat, execute it as efficiently as possible, and spend every mineral you've got. Things like that are what decide victory at lower ranks. At higher ranks, though, when you can count on your opponent generally being on equal footing to you when it comes to macro, then yeah, that's when the tech tree really starts to matter. Ultimately you want to be teching up as long as you can afford it, but the question of where you're teching up to and how you're going to divide your resources is a huge part of it. For example, Terran trying to balance churning out Siege Tanks with trying to afford Science Vessels. Actually, Terran's a great example here: At the pro levels, players will very often skip low tech entirely and jump straight to Factory tech - Vultures and Tanks. Also something that distinguishes Brood War in this respect is that superior macro won't get you nearly as far as it will in, say, SC2 or AoE 2. AtillatheBum posted:But honestly this is one of those things about Pro SC1 that always draws me back to it. This new evolution had nothing to do with a balance change or patch. It was purely on the back of a new build a Terran dreamed up and perfected but that build has now spawned this counter build and the counter build will have spawned a counter-counter build and so on and so on. I 100% agree with you and it's what keeps the game feeling fresh and interesting after all these years. Though incidentally, in this one case it might actually be the result of a balance change, albeit an accidental one: Valks were kind of a broken unit due to engine limitations causing a lot of their missiles to be "dummy" missiles that didn't actually do anything (the "Doesn't do what it's supposed to" kind of broken, not the "Obscenely overpowered" kind of broken). Expanding the engine in the Remastered means that the unit now works as intended, giving it an unintended buff.
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Apr 2, 2023 05:46
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Tarezax posted:I got to Diamond in Wings of Liberty but got overwhelmed by the mechanical changes and new units in the later expansions so I fell off of competitive play. Now I just watch pro matches. I scored Designer (highest rank) my first WC2 Orc campaign, played to completion without cheating. But I never got that rank again after that.
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Apr 2, 2023 13:21
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We saw the same evolution in both the Brood War and SC2 bot worlds. Very early on, the most dominant bots simply did well-executed worker rushes, then it shifted to bot armies composed entirely of basic units as the bots built up more situational awareness and unit control. Usually zealots. Now the top ranked bots go much further into the tech tree. Right now Brood War still has a single high ranking protoss bot that exclusively produces a basic unit and wins based on macro. SC2 recently had a tournament semifinals decided on the basis of repeated worker rushes and is generally still leaving the first era. That evolution is a strong indicator that the games are balanced so that tech counters basic units. Keep in mind that the defender always has the advantage - even if you have a thousand zerglings they can face a choke that means only one at a time can fight the enemy. Then they can defend for a fraction of the cost of your attack, and spend those savings on siege tanks.
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Apr 2, 2023 13:53
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| # ? Jun 6, 2024 09:51 |
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Mission 7: The Culling. Note the time stamp on our splash screen this time: One hour later. This is taking place immediately after the preceding mission.  Insufferable Protoss coward! Tassadar cannot evade my wrath forever! Calm yourself, Kerrigan. We must proceed carefully. Caution again, Cerebrate? You should know better. I have no need to be cautious of Tassadar. I shall find him and - Kerrigan, Cerebrate, Zasz is dead! Oh? It is a pity that Cerebrates cannot truly be killed. I expect that the Overmind will reincarnate him soon. No, he will not! The Protoss have devised some new attack! An attack powerful enough to nullify our reincarnation and give pause to the Overmind itself! How can this be? So. Tassadar’s plan was merely a diversion. I should not have underestimated him so. Cerebrate, our vengeance shall be swift. And final. So it shall be. No. There is a more pressing concern. Without its master, Zasz’s Brood has run amok and even now threatens the Hive cluster. Cerebrate, you must eradicate the rampaging Brood and stem any further damage it might cause. Very well. While the Cerebrate eliminates the Garm Brood, I shall be the agent of the Swarm’s fury. Both Zasz and your Cerebrate counseled you to be cautious; both times you ignored them and instead did as you saw fit, to the detriment of the Swarm. Kerrigan, you shall remain here and consider the harvest that your recklessness has sewn. I shall deal with the Protoss myself.Mission objectives: Eradicate every last remnant of the Garm Brood. Outside of a brief mention by the Overmind way back in mission 2, the immortal status of Cerebrates and death being just an inconvenience to them is something that hasn’t really been dug into by the game a lot, but suffice it to say that permanently killing a Cerebrate is something that the Zerg didn’t even know was possible. Also, I mean, they had to give us a Zerg vs Zerg mission somehow, right? Anyway, here’s our start:  Baseless starts. We’ve seen these before. Just move on up to our base location and…   …or not. This is something we haven’t seen yet this game but will be very familiar to anyone who’s played Beyond the Dark Portal: our initial base area is already occupied. We’ve seen rescuable start bases before, and of course there was that Terran mission where we had to fly in our base ourselves, but this is the first time we’ve had to take things by force. It’s always kind of a tense thing - you have to be very careful with your micro, because how much of your initial military survives this conquest sets the stage for how easy or difficult defending your base will be. Fortunately…      We manage to win it without casualties. We move in to establish our base.  One nice thing about fighting Zerg is it means that if we’re fast, we can build on top of their Creep before it recedes:   The real advantage to having our initial force intact as Zerg is that it means we can rely almost entirely on them for defense and devote the early bit to Droning up. We start to get our base established. Spawning Pool…  Macro Hatch…  Evolution Chamber…  Hydralisk Den…  And while all that’s happening, we send out our Mutas to scout:  Here's something we've not seen for quite a while:  It's the Ultralisk. We saw it back in the Terran campaign at New Gettysburg. It's a real beast.   They’ve also found a base breathing down our neck to our left there. Not only is that a strong forward attack post for the enemy, it’s also an ideal expansion spot for us. That’s going to have to wait, though. We’re being attacked on three fronts. A Mutalisk has flown in.   It’s not really a threat, but I realized we haven’t really had any opportunities to show the Spore Colony off. It shoots that green goopy ball there, doing 15 normal damage at a high rate of fire. It’s also got 400 HP, making it the beefiest defensive structure by a considerable margin. More interesting is the push on the right and left.  Our army happened to be stationed on the left. The right...     ...isn’t so lucky. This is the first time we’ve faced Zerglings with Adrenal Glands, and they’re a real force of nature. Our standing forces arrive, but not before we’ve lost a Sunken Colony and had a few Drones get picked off. So with our defenses strengthened...  ...we’re ready to make a push on that base there.            Unfortunately, they’re stronger than I’d hoped. Our forces are repulsed, and we have to run back to base. Trouble, Cerebrate? Zasz’s Brood is much stronger than expected. Well, it seems like you miss me already.Let’s run a post-mort on that. What went wrong? The short answer is we pushed with too weak a force. I decided to spend my resources on teching up so we can get our new unit up and out and start showcasing it and didn’t want to waste time building up more basic units. This is something I’ve been able to get away with up until now, using only token forces to seize expansions. But we’re in the back half of the game now, and things are ramping up. We’ll need to start being a bit more aggressive. Ironically, if we had waited for our new unit, this could have been handled extremely easily, so we kind of ended up with the worst of both worlds. Anyway, it’s time we commit a bit more fully.       Things go a bit better for us this time. We do need to stop to reinforce, but we push through and claim the expansion:  (Also, here's the Garm Brood refusing to accept defeat and trying to set up another Hatchery literally right next to mine):  We also plunk a Hatchery down here:  There’s no resources to speak of here, so why bother? Well, the issue that made that base so hard to take is that every time we came close to winning the day, a big horde of Hydralisks would come from the north and turn the tide of battle. Setting defenses up here will hopefully stop them in their tracks. Of course, while Terran can build anywhere, Zerg can’t. We’re forced to set up a Hatchery in order to spread Creep to set up Sunkens and Spores. This has always been true, but it’s the first mission where it’s become relevant. Anyway, with an expansion under our belt and our flank getting shored up, it’s time for us to to move up to Hive tech:  Doing so gives us a new building:   The Defiler Mound. It gives us access to the second and last Zerg unit that we never saw in the Terran campaign:  The Defiler. Every race has a unit that’s a strong contender for “Most Overpowered, Broken Nonsense In the Game.” For Terran, it’s the Vulture. But the Vulture, of course, isn’t individually all that earth-shattering. What makes it so absurd is the pairing of an incredibly potent unit at a crazy low price. For Zerg, it’s the Defiler. It’s Zerg’s ground spellcaster, and it is very much earth-shattering. Let’s take a look.  You see those Mutas flying in there? They’re giving us an excellent opportunity to test out the Defiler’s first spell, Dark Swarm:  It creates that orange cloud there. What’s it do? Any ground unit or structure under that cloud is impervious to ranged attacks. So long as our Hydras stay in its (huge) radius, the Mutas there can’t do a thing to them.   Needless to say, the Mutas are toast. Dark Swarm does have some limitations. It doesn’t prevent melee damage - but that’s actually mostly an asset. There’s only four melee units in the game - the Zergling, the Ultralisk, the Zealot, and a Protoss unit we haven’t seen yet (okay, okay, five - the Broodling is melee. Fine. Six, because the Infested Terran also technically counts as melee). Since Zerg definitely has the edge there, it means Dark Swarm can often be used offensively to cover an assault, where Lings and Ultras tear the enemy to shreds while being shielded from incoming fire. The bigger concern is that it doesn’t protect against splash damage or spells. If a Siege Tank fires a volley at our forces, the initial target won’t take any damage, but the units around it still will (okay it’s actually more complicated than that, but we’ll dig into the specifics in the unit spotlight). Even so, a single casting of this spell can completely alter the course of a battle and is alone enough to solidify the Defiler as a bonkers unit. But it’s not the only weapon in the Defiler’s arsenal. Not by a long shot. Let’s take a look at the second spell, Plague:      Plague brings huge pain to a reasonably-sized area, gradually sapping any units or structures within to the tune of roughly 300 damage. Again, there’s some limitations here. First, Plague can’t kill - it can bring a unit or structure down to 1 HP, but it can never finish them off. Second, it only depletes health - meaning that when it comes to Protoss targets, their shields are unaffected. Of course, that’s still enough to positively cripple Protoss armies, and leaving targets at one HP instead of killing them outright is no problem when you’ve got a flier with a bouncing attack:  Oh, and Plague is also a “goopy” spell, and reveals any cloaked (but not burrowed!) units in its area. So on the one hand we’ve got a spell that completely neuters ranged attackers, on the other hand we’ve got what’s essentially a substantially weaker but infinitely more practical version of Nukes. The only drawback is the cost - 100 energy for Dark Swarm, and a whopping 150 energy for Plague. That brings us to the Defiler’s third and final ability, the cherry on the top of this batshit insane sundae:  Consume. Remember this? Kerrigan has it too, we used it in mission 5? So not only does the Defiler have two incredibly powerful spells, you can feed it your other units - like, say, Zerglings - to effectively give it infinite mana. Dark Swarms everywhere! Plague everywhere! Honestly, I think the Defiler might be the most bonkers unit not just in Starcraft, but in all of RTS history. You could point to, I dunno, maybe Ogre-Magi in WC2, or Keshiks in OG AoE 2, but those were just a matter of the numbers being overtuned. The Defiler is completely insane at a fundamental design level. Things like this are part of what I really love about this game: By all accounts, it shouldn't be anywhere near as well balanced as it is. This shouldn't work at all, and the fact that it does makes for incredibly compelling gameplay. While this has been going on, our other spellcaster has been taking care of reconnaissance:    The presence of a Hive and so many tech structures indicates that this is the Garm Brood’s primary cluster. We can also see that they’re rocking almost the entire Zerg roster - Guardians, and as we saw earlier, even Ultralisks. Although they don't have any Defilers, oddly enough. Speak of the devil...   My theory is the game thought “Hey, we haven’t seen Ultralisks since Terran 9” and decided to send one in to attack alone so that people who’ve forgotten can remember what they look like. Anyway. We know where the enemy is, we’ve got all the tech we need, and our defenses are firmly in place. Time to assemble our attack force:  Any guesses as to what it is? I’ll give you a hint: It involves something we’ve had access to for one or two missions now, but that I haven’t really made use of. A particular something that only became available once we got a Hive. Here’s a further hint:  Oh yes. It’s time for true madness. Also, that reminds me - I meant to mention last mission that access to a Hive also gives us third level upgrades:   Here’s maybe roughly half of our attack force:  I decided to do all ten control groups of Zerglings. That’s 120 Lings. How do you think this will work out for us? Let’s find out:             I should really start turning the in-game timer on for things like this so you can see how fast it goes. The above battle for and eradication of the Garm Brood’s primary Hive cluster took roughly fifteen seconds. Curse Daggoth. How I wish I could take part in this slaughter. This is not something to be celebrated, Kerrigan. Regrets, Cerebrate? I do not know this concept. I do know that the Garm Brood are fierce warriors, and the Swarm is lessened by their culling. Not fierce enough. They fell to our Brood easily. Nonetheless, I feel there could have been another way. If only the Overmind were here to reassert control over them. Kerrigan… what sort of attack, what sort of power could silence the Overmind like this? I do not know. Maybe in death, Zasz finally accomplished something useful. I made the mistake of not taking our foes seriously enough. After this, it is not a mistake I will make again.We also bring up some Hydras to help deal with the Guardians and Queens that are hanging around:   This picture here shows our Zerglings coming across a secondary enemy base:  Unfortunately I was too preoccupied with directing the Hydras to get any footage of the battle there, but rest assured that it, too, was razed in record time. One of the Overlords we Parasite’d reveals the third and final base:  Unfortunately, it’s inaccessible by ground. So…  We throw down a Plague or two to soften things up, then…     …our Overlords transport our Hydras up there to wreak some havoc. All that’s left is a few scattered Spore and Sunken Colonies, and we’ve got just the unit to mop those up:     Finally, there’s only one Spore Colony left. Our Guardians head over to raze it, but before they do so, I brought over some Scourge. Scourge are quite fast, so they’re a great unit to use when it comes to scouring the map for the enemy’s few remaining buildings. Now that we’ve found them, let’s collide them with that big pack of Overlords:     BOOM! And…   Daggoth, it is done. Zasz’s children are no more. Return, then. There is much to be done.
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Apr 2, 2023 14:28
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