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wedgekree posted:The Wing Commander series had 'branches' that could go into 'bad' states by default if you failed missions/failed specific ones. I seem to remember that Wing Commander 1 had a speedrun strat where you eject from every mission up until the penultimate set, but then win all the missions on that which bumps you back onto the success track to win the campaign overall.
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Sep 6, 2023 13:19
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I liked Battlefleet Gothic: Armada having every defeat hit hard while still technically leaving you in a winnable state. You might wind up being called up to the final battle without upgrades or capital ships, but you can try to get by with a Goonswarm of tiny torpedo boats or something. Of course that game just needed to change dialogue from "This victory buys us time!" to "Oh no... that's a lot of dead Space Hobbits."
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Sep 7, 2023 04:48
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Grammarchist posted:I liked Battlefleet Gothic: Armada having every defeat hit hard while still technically leaving you in a winnable state. You might wind up being called up to the final battle without upgrades or capital ships, but you can try to get by with a Goonswarm of tiny torpedo boats or something. It also helps that BFGA2 is an all around solid game. I petered out before finishing it, but boy howdy does it scratch the "persistent campaign naval warfare" itch with how it models the actual space combat. Even if more than a few missions came down to me hiding my smaller fleet in dust clouds and baiting the enemy into a broadside they couldn't see coming. Though I think there's IRL precedent for that in naval warfare too...
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Sep 7, 2023 13:45
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Rebellion 1: The Great Train Robbery Before we get started, a quick jump back to the Non Canon Zone, thanks to Koorisch letting me know of a small thing. If you stare at the Ghost rifles for long enough...    Nova shows up! Meaning the Dominion assassin is just hiding on the Hyperion. For the rest of the game. Just a single order from Mengsk away from putting two in the back of Raynor's head. Video: The Great Train Robbery  Good thing we sided with Tosh!      It's on one of these trains - but unfortunately they're all scan-shielded so we can't tell which one. We'll have to hit as many as we can and hope we get lucky.      The mission starts with a fairly small base. On the plus side, we can see Micro-Filtering + Automated Refineries already starting to put in work.  And I now have MULEs, so both sides of my economy are getting a good early game boost.   Of course, they won't be worth much in the long run on this mission. All the mineral patches here are fairly small, and will mine out long before the mission ends if I try to fully saturate.  There's a several minute wait before the first train shows up, so I send my Marines out to scout.  Which is important, considering today's new unit is just... here.  Getting close makes it immediately start up and join my forces. In total, there's 6 free Diamondbacks scattered about, with three of them being revealed on the map. Now, we've seen the Diamondback before in New Folsom, but what does it do?   Diamondbacks! Man, I didn't think they made it past prototyping! Their rail guns'll be great for stopping those trains...no pun intended.They're an anti-Armored tank with the amazing ability to fire while moving. Also, uh... two missions ago posted:Don't ask how Diamondbacks are these super rare tanks that never made it to mass production while also having a whole fleet of them just sitting around on New Folsom.  We see the research bonus on the way to the other tanks.  Defilers still exist in the editor, but this is the closest they get to appearing in the campaign until Nova Covert Ops.  Since natural resources are tight, there are a good number of caches scattered about to help get me started.  More caches by the third tank.  There's an expansion up this way, but minerals are just as slim over there as they are in my main. Instead of making a second CC and more SCVs to mine, I'll wait for my main to mine out and float my starting CC over.  The fourth Diamondback is further north.  I get an Armory and Starport going.  While grabbing the second Defiler sample just before the first train arrives. This one is so close it's marked on the minimap at the start of the mission.  Diamondbacks cost four loving supply.  The trains have a decently long trip before they can escape.  There it is. Now tell me:  How often do you think we'll be dealing with highly mobile Armored targets after this mission?  Because the answer, unsurprisingly-  Is never. Diamondbacks are a hyperspecialized unit with a niche that's only relevant in their debut mission. They're the pinnacle of Wings of Liberty designing missions around a unit.  To make up for the slim mineral patches, each train will leave a bundle of caches when they're destroyed.  I built a Starport specifically to make some Science Vessels. Free repairs are strong.  I also get some Shadow Ops online to get a few Spectres out.  The remaining two Diamondbacks have a few enemies guarding them.   The last Defiler is to the south.   Like SC1, I need a separate building for each nuke. Unlike SC1, I don't need a whole-rear end Command Center for every silo, so stocking multiple nukes is much cheaper.  And I make the Spectres to go with them.  And the final Diamondback is just up this ramp.  Leaving me in the perfect spot to catch the next train.   After you take down one train, they'll start sending protection for the others.  We saw a bit of it in Breakout, but enemy terrans can and will use Armory and Research upgrades against us. Here, those Hellions have their boosted Light damage upgrade. Since I have my Diamondbacks out in front, it literally doesn't matter.  And the train blows up while I was checking up on my base.  My base is starting to mine out, so I take a moment to clear the expansion.   After two trains the Dominion will send an attack wave out.  At some point, I don't know when considering how long we spent Pondering, I finally hit tier 2 upgrades. A fun little detail is that if you unlock the Starport, but only have the Science Vessel/Raven or the Hercules, the Armory will get Starship Armor but not Starship Weapons.  The attack wave was one Goliath and three Firebats. This will be the only attack wave to reach my base.   Now, to do what the thread kept yelling at me to do:  It's actually fairly awkward to do, since you have to line up the train's speed and the launch delay perfectly.  Half of the train's escort can see the nuke radius, and refuses to move up.  Unfortunately where I targeted means the train is in the 50% damage part of the splash. And despite each train segment having their own health bar, you can't hit multiple segments in one hit. So if I wanted to blow up a train entirely using nukes, I'd need 10 Shadow Ops and 10 Spectres, costing 4,000 minerals and 3,000 gas.  Looks cool, though.   Okay, time to cheese the hell out of the rest of the mission.  After three trains, you have to deal with Bunkers being periodically built along the rails, forcing you to deal with more firepower while you chase a train.  See?  The solution to this mission is just... mass Siege Tanks.  The units that are meant to man those Bunkers come from this direction, so setting up shop around here can completely shut them down while also being in range of two sets of tracks.   The remaining half of the mission is just slowly building up more tanks.  Sure, they only have range for a short while, but when you're dealing 150 damage a shot at minimum you don't need long.  The base is practically mined out.  So I swap over.  More tanks.  Later trains will start sending out Ravens, so you can't completely ignore anti-air. Spartan Company's a good pick for dealing with them.  Enemy Ravens love tagging someone with a Seeker Missile the second they get into range. Now, while I could figure out who is being targeted and have them run away until the Missile times out...  Meh.   After five trains, the Dominion tries to really put the screws to you.  These Marauders will randomly wander around the map, and they have Concussive Shells. Try to kite them with the Diamondbacks and they'll just get slowed and torn to pieces. The intent is that you'd have to awkwardly slip around them when dealing with a train.   However: Siege Tanks lol.  Since I've basically won, I start blowing energy on Scanner Sweeps.  I'm so bored I throw a tank here for funsies. It can barely hit a train from there, with the train itself acting as a spotter.  The Dominion're boosting their trains' speed somehow! You'll need to use Diamondbacks to catch them. The next two trains are really speedy, but don't have an escort.  Tanks.  There's a small base to the east that's, like, there.     For the final train I get all my tanks into one big clump.  drat, whatever shall I do.  The first shot connects at 24:28.  The train dies five seconds later.      Meaning that adjutant redesign isn't a redesign, it's a full on retcon.   Fewer Hands, Bigger Cut - Complete "The Great Train Robbery" mission without building an SCV on Normal difficulty. BisbyWorl fucked around with this message at 19:12 on Feb 5, 2024 |
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Sep 9, 2023 04:07
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Time to finish the game with the best unit, now that we have it. Mass diamondback force go
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Sep 9, 2023 04:25
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The Diamondback isn't a bad unit, per se -- their damage is less specialized than, say, the Hellion, so a small mass of 'em will absolutely cut through most any opposition whether armored or not, and they're definitely speedier than Siege Tanks even without the fire-on-the-move ability. However, they have a very high supply cost for the output -- honestly, just a little expensive overall -- and Siege Tanks WILL do more damage to goddamn everything. They're definitely an overspecialized unit, but the problem is less them being strictly terrible and more that their mission is SO built for them, and no other mission is, that they come across as even more niche than they might be otherwise. Though for the record, if you're doing all the missions roughly as they appear, there's no way you'll HAVE Siege Tanks at this point -- remember, Siege Tanks come from the Relic storyline, which is the only time gated one, and as we've seen Matt will bring up this opportunity well before then. It's not just possible but likely that you can have the Diamondbacks wind up as your actual first Factory unit, and possibly the only thing you have that really hits Armored at all. Redeye Flight fucked around with this message at 05:02 on Sep 9, 2023 |
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Sep 9, 2023 05:00
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Diamondbacks are an extremely powerful unit on paper because they have the extremely rare property of being able to attack and move at the same time. Diamondbacks in reality are a middling unit because very few fights involve taking advantage of their gimmick in any way - almost every engagement is a static slugfest, and while their damage is decent, an equal investment of Marauders will do the same job cheaper and more effectively. Kith fucked around with this message at 06:44 on Sep 9, 2023 |
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Sep 9, 2023 06:39
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Kith posted:Diamondbacks are an extremely powerful unit on paper because they have the extremely rare property of being able to attack and move at the same time. The fact they are the only unit with that property more or less nullifies the niche because it can't synergize with anything else. This might be cool on an early game harassment unit (like reapers!) except that... well, it's not an early game unit and the campaign doesn't reward harassment.
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Sep 9, 2023 06:50
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Especially when the campaign AI’s usual tactics are typically “fight to the last man no matter how obvious a meat grinder it is” instead of making a fighting retreat when it’s clear that the skirmish is lost.
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Sep 9, 2023 06:54
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Fun Fact: The Killteam Marauders in this mission use a special texture for no apparent reason! There's also a Medic version, but I can never remember if it gets used or not. Either way, neither of them appear outside of this mission. Kith fucked around with this message at 07:08 on Sep 9, 2023 |
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Sep 9, 2023 07:00
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Warmachine posted:The fact they are the only unit with that property more or less nullifies the niche because it can't synergize with anything else. This might be cool on an early game harassment unit (like reapers!) except that... well, it's not an early game unit and the campaign doesn't reward harassment. Would they be better with better micro, i.e. keep moving them around while firing? Do units get a penalty to shooting at moving units? I'm thinking of Dawn of War that had a bunch of this stuff... Is it the price versus performance that makes the Diamondbacks a middling unit?
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Sep 9, 2023 07:55
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This seems like a really fun, gradually evolving mission that outright refuses to address what I thought Diamondbacks were for, given the way the unit is described: getting up in the grill of emplaced siege tanks and kicking their teeth in while they can't fire at the too-close enemy, and defending themselves with firing on the move on the way there. They even throw in siege tanks as guard for the trains, but they never have any time or good placement to set up! Is this actually a viable strategy? Because the game sure doesn't seem to care. I'm so confused.
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Sep 9, 2023 08:43
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painedforever posted:Would they be better with better micro, i.e. keep moving them around while firing? Performance-wise Diamondbacks are fine. Costwise, 4 supply is a killer for weird reasons. Damage/HP/Unit numbers per supply below 200 doesn't entirely matter provided you're still on top of your supply limit and therefore building limits, but the minute you hit the hard cap, damage per point of supply matters a lot and Diamondbacks are among the worst. The fact that nothing else shares their gimmick of being able to shoot while moving and that it will never be required simply consigns them to the awkward space of 'unit that has one map you use them for and never again (certain exceptions apply).' The weird thing is that they share a very specific niche with two other units we have yet to see and Reapers in having maps with very little income and some sort of gimmick related to that, but it would probably behoove me to wait until those other units get revealed to talk about it in more detail.
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Sep 9, 2023 10:55
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Really, units that fire while moving would be good in three scenarios: 1) killing a unit that's going to a certain place somewhat quickly and needs to be finished off before it gets there, exactly the niche this mission offers. 2) kiting... you know, if you have another unit that's going to move towards the Diamondback at the same speed the Diamondback moves away (unless you are willing to do the most frustrating micro ever as you zig-zag the Diamondback away to keep it at a relatively constant distance from the thing you're kiting) and a relatively long pathway along which to run it while it dies. 3) hit-and-run tactics where damage to the Diamondback is minimized due to it being in range of the enemy for the smallest amount of time while damaging it constantly, generally useful against something like a psi tempest that targets an area rather than a unit or something with a short attack range (since otherwise if you're attacking a static unit it's going to be in range to attack you more or less as much as you're in range to attack it). All three of those scenarios are going to be vanishingly rare in the campaign. There's nothing wrong with the unit exactly, it's just never going to win you a mission faster than other things you can build and maintain for less cost.
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Sep 9, 2023 10:55
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The Diamondback would be one of the strongest units in Ladder simply because it would be so punishing to try to counter. There are a handful of other units that can attack while moving and handling them without risk is a big investment.
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Sep 9, 2023 11:13
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As far as I remember, outside of artillery, most attacks in SC2 are hitscan, which also somewhat lessens the Diamondback's utility. If most units fired at where a unit was when they launched the attack, and those attacks could miss if the unit kept moving, then Diamondbacks would suddenly be units where a lot of micro could provide huge payoff. But since that's not the case... anti-artillery feels like their only real niche.
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Sep 9, 2023 11:25
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So this brings us to the final zerg tech, right? Preemptive vote for the emulator because it's just more fun and can do silly things to the final map.PurpleXVI posted:As far as I remember, outside of artillery, most attacks in SC2 are hitscan, which also somewhat lessens the Diamondback's utility. If most units fired at where a unit was when they launched the attack, and those attacks could miss if the unit kept moving, then Diamondbacks would suddenly be units where a lot of micro could provide huge payoff. But since that's not the case... anti-artillery feels like their only real niche. Also, 1/3 of the artillery units are a flying unit so that niche is even more niche.
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Sep 9, 2023 11:35
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PurpleXVI posted:As far as I remember, outside of artillery, most attacks in SC2 are hitscan, which also somewhat lessens the Diamondback's utility. If most units fired at where a unit was when they launched the attack, and those attacks could miss if the unit kept moving, then Diamondbacks would suddenly be units where a lot of micro could provide huge payoff. But since that's not the case... anti-artillery feels like their only real niche. Yep exactly this. A unit like the Diamondback would be insanely good in, say, Age of Empires 2.
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Sep 9, 2023 11:58
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Diamondbacks also showed up a lot in early previews of SC2 where they were fully intended to be part of the regular Terran roster. Early previews made a big deal about units needing time to turn around or stop moving, and they'd only be able to engage units in front of them for units without turrets. Diamondbacks were hyped up as being able to kite ultralisks and colossi, zoom past siege tanks too quickly for their turrets to track and kill the diamondbacks, and similar. When Blizzard quietly dropped or severely downplayed that element of SC2's gameplay, the Diamondback lost its job and was relegated to campaign only (and one co-op commander who has some heavily modified diamondbacks to serve a different role).
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Sep 9, 2023 13:09
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I always liked to stall this one until you unlock Banshees for real instead of just in the Tosh mission. I do like to use air units excessively, though.
Oberndorf fucked around with this message at 13:44 on Sep 9, 2023 |
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Sep 9, 2023 13:41
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Kith posted:Fun Fact: The Killteam Marauders in this mission use a special texture for no apparent reason! There's also a Medic version, but I can never remember if it gets used or not. Medics are there on Brutal (along with an entire second kill team of Marauders).
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Sep 9, 2023 15:40
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Cythereal posted:Diamondbacks also showed up a lot in early previews of SC2 where they were fully intended to be part of the regular Terran roster. Early previews made a big deal about units needing time to turn around or stop moving, and they'd only be able to engage units in front of them for units without turrets. Diamondbacks were hyped up as being able to kite ultralisks and colossi, zoom past siege tanks too quickly for their turrets to track and kill the diamondbacks, and similar. Isn't just about them being an un-balanceable mess for multiplayer? I would assume that developers wouldn't understand the implication of their design until actual pro-players started playtesting with them.
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Sep 9, 2023 16:19
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MiddleOne posted:Isn't just about them being an un-balanceable mess for multiplayer? I would assume that developers wouldn't understand the implication of their design until actual pro-players started playtesting with them. More or less. It's been 13 years, so my memory is fuzzy. But my recollection is that despite being a new unit they were removed from multiplayer for precisely the reason that they are impossible to balance and their playstyle was a niche looking for a problem. They more or less existed for a vision of StarCraft 2 that the developers had but just didn't playtest well. One of the things I'm looking at when I say this: PurpleXVI posted:As far as I remember, outside of artillery, most attacks in SC2 are hitscan, which also somewhat lessens the Diamondback's utility. If most units fired at where a unit was when they launched the attack, and those attacks could miss if the unit kept moving, then Diamondbacks would suddenly be units where a lot of micro could provide huge payoff. But since that's not the case... anti-artillery feels like their only real niche. As far as I recall, ALL attacks are hitscan. If a unit is targeted or in the splash when something hits, it takes damage, no save. This is almost exactly the same as StarCraft 1 with the exception that StarCraft 1 actually did have a primitive cover and miss system and StarCraft 2 did away with this. Blizzard essentially ran into the problem that any radical changes to the multiplayer/competitive systems were unlikely to be accepted by playtesters. Mechanically, only the cover/miss chance change, the ability to select everything, and units that were able to traverse cliffs made the cut as mechanical changes. I guess rich mineral fields too if you can count that. Units that could move and shoot did not pass playtesting.
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Sep 9, 2023 17:12
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Personally I kinda prefer the old 'cover' mechanics (we're talking about high ground, right?) to the new ones. Being able to fight back, if poorly, I feel is better than "can't fight back at all unless something provides high vision, then you're fine". It feels very weird to have pulsing vision/no-vision when the dude in front gets killed and then everyone has to edge up, then the next dude gets killed and everyone edges up, etc. Eminently solvable on the player side, but after you notice it on your side, you start noticing it on the enemy side and the jerky movement is just really weird-looking.
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Sep 9, 2023 17:23
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Off the top of my head, the only two units Diamondbacks seem like they could have been useful against were Stalkers… and Diamondbacks. 
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Sep 9, 2023 17:28
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Felinoid posted:Personally I kinda prefer the old 'cover' mechanics (we're talking about high ground, right?) to the new ones. Being able to fight back, if poorly, I feel is better than "can't fight back at all unless something provides high vision, then you're fine". It feels very weird to have pulsing vision/no-vision when the dude in front gets killed and then everyone has to edge up, then the next dude gets killed and everyone edges up, etc. Eminently solvable on the player side, but after you notice it on your side, you start noticing it on the enemy side and the jerky movement is just really weird-looking. There were also trees in Starcraft 1 that units could stand under to have a dodge chance. On the platform maps they looked like solar panel/antennae sort of structures.
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Sep 9, 2023 18:40
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MiddleOne posted:Isn't just about them being an un-balanceable mess for multiplayer? I would assume that developers wouldn't understand the implication of their design until actual pro-players started playtesting with them. almost every unit in starcraft 2 has to stop moving to fire diamondbacks don't, and it's their defining feature as a unit this means they will be effective against any unit that they can outrange, or outrun, and especially both, and that they will scale well marines already scale better than every other unit in the game, they're instahit with a really fast fire rate, they can be massed and microed really effectively they cover a lot of each other's respective weak points too well, both in terms of raw game mechanics and player micro and whatnot, can kite stuff with db while shooting with marines, can do AA with marines, can cover siege tanks with db, siege tanks cover marines, etc. it's why the cyclone has been so hard for them to balance in mp, and phoenixes kept oscillating between insanely good and useless, anything that can move and cause damage is hard to balance for all 3 matchups without it being either useless or way OP in at least one of them Cythereal posted:Diamondbacks also showed up a lot in early previews of SC2 where they were fully intended to be part of the regular Terran roster. Early previews made a big deal about units needing time to turn around or stop moving, and they'd only be able to engage units in front of them for units without turrets. Diamondbacks were hyped up as being able to kite ultralisks and colossi, zoom past siege tanks too quickly for their turrets to track and kill the diamondbacks, and similar. there's no tracking (except lurkers) but units do still have varying inertia and turn times, it's just really fast for all the units that get microed and the slow ones don't get microed, so it's not that noticeable if you're watching but if you're playing stuff like zealot turntime vs zerglings is exploitable with micro to get extra hits in by running whichever ling it turns to hit away and getting the other ones behind the zealot & repeating, attacking a planetary fortress from alternating sides makes it shoot slower because the turrets gotta rotate, queens turn really slowly etc. i think marines are the only unit that doesn't have any non-RoF related delay before turning and firing when they stop FirstnameLastname fucked around with this message at 22:57 on Sep 9, 2023 |
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Sep 9, 2023 22:21
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FirstnameLastname posted:there's no tracking (except lurkers) but units do still have varying inertia and turn times, it's just really fast for all the units that get microed and the slow ones don't get microed, so it's not that noticeable if you're watching but if you're playing stuff like zealot turntime vs zerglings is exploitable with micro to get extra hits in by running whichever ling it turns to hit away and getting the other ones behind the zealot & repeating, attacking a planetary fortress from alternating sides makes it shoot slower because the turrets gotta rotate, queens turn really slowly etc. A lot of units now have turret tracking (e.g., immortals, tanks) where they can keep on an acquired target while moving and/or not firing. This was generally hailed as a good set of changes. Units that don't have multiple parts (e.g., marines, reapers, hydras) can grossly minimize the time they take to activate their firing mode through proper micro. Stutter stepping with move/hold position is the most efficient; the move/attack move is less good, but still OK with good timing. There are some other tricks, like move/patrol which allow flying units to maintain their momentum while flying (hello muta/banshees) and attacking, but they're much more niche. The only attacks that spring to mind as generally missable attacks in competitive MP are lurker spines. There are some very specific counter micro tricks to avoid projectile attacks or spells (e.g., stalker shots, mine shots) that involve either blinking away or loading the targeted unit into a structure or unit transport just before impact. Those are not easily accomplished most of the time. There are also spells (primarily zerg spells) that can be dodged.
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Sep 10, 2023 02:18
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Synastren posted:A lot of units now have turret tracking (e.g., immortals, tanks) where they can keep on an acquired target while moving and/or not firing. This was generally hailed as a good set of changes. Units that don't have multiple parts (e.g., marines, reapers, hydras) can grossly minimize the time they take to activate their firing mode through proper micro. Somehow I never considered the projectile style attacks, or that you could defeat them by getting in a transport. Probably because that kind of micro seems insane to me.
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Sep 10, 2023 02:40
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Warmachine posted:Somehow I never considered the projectile style attacks, or that you could defeat them by getting in a transport. Probably because that kind of micro seems insane to me. It's an exceptional level of micro that basically only happens reliably at a Master 1/Grandmaster/Professional level generally speaking. The most common thing you'll see at more normal levels of skill is immortal/warp prism micro against roaches. Technically roach attacks are projectile attacks, so if you jump into the warp prism after they shoot, then drop immediately after, there is a window where the roaches are just standing around confused while their attacks come off of a lengthy cooldown.
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Sep 10, 2023 02:47
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Intermission 14        User status. Criminal. Access denied. Playin' hard to get, huh? We'll see about that.   We got the final zerg research!  >Examine New Folsom sign.  For whatever reason the game just never flags the sign on this side. >Watch news.  And now we're just directly riffing on Fox News.   Ever so conveniently leaving out the fact that Mengsk continued his rebellion after the war started, and even used it to form the Dominion in the first place.   >Talk to Tychus.   Almost got us killed when they smartened up and started using outriders to chase us. Never was a man of 'em could keep up with you on a Vulture, Jimmy. Just added to the fun. How the hell you got a job as marshal after all that I'll never know. >Examine Zerg Tank.  >Talk to Hanson.   Our revolution began that day - the day Mengsk murdered a whole planet and called it justice. My God. Billions of innocent people. That's...that's just...monstrous. No wonder you hate him so much.Now, you can click on the Adjutant, but all she says is: User status. Criminal.~ Submit access codes.>Use Research Console.   Once you finish a research line the game will toss you a bit of cash for every excess point you get. In total there's around 40-ish of each type of research, netting close to 300K credits for getting every last one. Not a bad haul!  The final set of upgrades for zerg research is a pair of buildings. I can pick between the Hive Mind Emulator and get some zerg of my own-  -Or take the Psi Disrupter, which is basically a permanent Concussive Shell against any nearby zerg.  For Reasons, I leave the option open for now.  >Use Armory Console.  Diamondbacks get +1 range and +50 life (90K credits). The really hilarious thing is that the demonstration video for the range upgrade is... a Diamondback mirror match. Something that can never happen in Wings. Hell, I think the only time you ever fight an enemy Diamondback is in Ghost of a Chance.  Since I'll never use Diamondbacks again, I choose to not buy anything this time so I can get the other Siege Tank upgrade later. >Talk to Horner.   I told you before - If I knew what the prize was, I never woulda' joined that card game! There's just something about a lovers' reunion that chokes me up. *grumbles*  If our intel's right, he should still be based at the merc—haven at Deadman's Port. He's not very trustworthy, but he's our best bet of breaking that encryption.Holy poo poo, a new mission on the Star Map! Remember when we actually got those?   These two are still here too, I guess. 
BisbyWorl fucked around with this message at 16:50 on Sep 15, 2023 |
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Sep 10, 2023 03:26
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I'm just gonna keep voting for supernova without any A2A unlocked.
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Sep 10, 2023 03:34
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I'm voting haven, if only cause I don't think the Doc has any more dialogue for many if any future missions.
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Sep 10, 2023 04:02
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Get Jimmy his bikes back!
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Sep 10, 2023 04:30
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Warmachine posted:More or less. It's been 13 years, so my memory is fuzzy. But my recollection is that despite being a new unit they were removed from multiplayer for precisely the reason that they are impossible to balance and their playstyle was a niche looking for a problem. They more or less existed for a vision of StarCraft 2 that the developers had but just didn't playtest well. They were also removed from multiplayer because they technically shoved out part of the siege tanks niche. Of course, no one runs siege tanks for that niche, but well, the siege tank is iconic and you're not replacing it, and giving the Terran both is just... kinda dumb. Honestly, the starcraft II engine and UI is responsible for so much more change than a lot of the mechanical things. And yet they still made units that could move and shoot later. Felinoid posted:Personally I kinda prefer the old 'cover' mechanics (we're talking about high ground, right?) to the new ones. Being able to fight back, if poorly, I feel is better than "can't fight back at all unless something provides high vision, then you're fine". It feels very weird to have pulsing vision/no-vision when the dude in front gets killed and then everyone has to edge up, then the next dude gets killed and everyone edges up, etc. Eminently solvable on the player side, but after you notice it on your side, you start noticing it on the enemy side and the jerky movement is just really weird-looking. They were really banking around Cliff Jumping/Blink Micro being a thing, and that both answers the vision issue and really saps the power of high ground defence/Walling overall. Definitely a conscious choice by Blizzard, although success rate is somewhat up to interpretation.
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Sep 10, 2023 05:25
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Voting for Reuniting Matt with the missus. Because it is increasingly funny to me to just keep putting off saving the Haven colony as long as possible. Too bad Hanson has no reaction dialogue for it. Donny there of course is wildly incorrect, as Mengsk did in fact rebel while humanity was facing a possibly extinction -level threat from two alien species as well. Writers are in the ballpark of good parody there.
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Sep 10, 2023 05:44
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They Donny parts register as a bit too on the nose right now, but they're nearly all good anyways.
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Sep 10, 2023 06:02
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Hubby Horner is just too funny an idea not to vote for.
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Sep 10, 2023 06:12
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Get those drat bikes back. Horner's questline rules, this cannot be debated, and it needs to be seen, but I have WORDS about the Vulture in SC2's campaign. Hell, about its representation in SC2 in general, which is basically the same thing because the iconic Vulture is another one of the units restricted to campaign and co-op. But we can't cover my big words about the Vulture until we actually see it. The one that I can say right off the bat, right here right now, is that you're already seeing a big, big problem with the Vulture -- where it is in the campaign. The Vulture was the first Factory unit you unlocked in SC1, which made perfect sense because it was a fragile scout bike but was tougher in the immediate sense than Marines because it could be repaired and took different damage channels that were marginally less vulnerable to the Zerg. It ran out of usefulness real fast once you started getting better options (apart from making use of its party piece in the Spider Mines), but by showing up right at Evacuation Day, it had its window. The Vulture in WoL shows up at the second mission in the optional Horner chain. The earliest you can actually get it is at least six missions in. And for the record, I'll go with Haven after this one, but we gotta see that Vulture.
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Sep 10, 2023 06:32
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| # ? Jun 1, 2024 10:20 |
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Vultures! 
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Sep 10, 2023 06:46
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