I have returned: StarCraft II

[Maguspk]

In 2v2 you can stay in game without any buildings, but I don't think you can share money.

You can share money no matter what.

[Kaylia]

Man Broodlords are just so good. I won a match just by feigning defeat by rushing my tiny Hydralisk army mid-combat while I snuck in 5 Broodlord's and I just destroyed his base before he could even react.

Gotta love the that get you a win. It's so much more satisfying to win like this.

[GRT]

anybody wanna play some practice matches or 2v2s?

[Maguspk]

What's your name GRT, I'll add you.

Mine is magus.magus

[GRT]

i'll add you, not sure if i should post the name here since it's not my account lol


edit: ahh wtf, maintenance on authentication server

tomorrow i guess, should be sleeping by now anyway, damn starcraft 2 ruining my life

[willriker]

I see a lot of complaining about a loss in the micro aspect of this game. But, then i go to see the commentaries on You Tube and became a bit confused as to what those people are complaining about. From watching the commentaries, i see that there is a lot of micro going on in the game. You guys are playing it, what can you tell me?


Then again, i think that some of these comentaries are faked. I mean, i saw one with those protoss nullifiers. The protoss player was able to place two of these barriers, to block the zerg players troops as the protoss retreated. The thing is that these two barriers went up pretty much instantaneously AND in the perfect spots (side by side) to block a choke point well enough for the protoss to escape. It was so fast and accurate that i cant imagine anyone being able to micro that well... with two differant units... But, then i read something about SMART CAST. I am thinking that this SMART CAST might have something to do with how some of this micro work is happening, but no one elaborates on what this is. what is SMART CAST and how does it work?

[Misterjingles]

I believe if you have multiple units with the same ability instead of having to select them individually for more precision targeting, only one of the units would use said ability. For example I have 6 battlecrusiers selected and want to yamato a target, instead of all 6 of them firing only 1 would.

[willriker]

Oh, thats fantastic. Now i see how you can micro that much easier. it would just be an issue of pressing the hotkey and then the location.

Thats much faster than finding a unit that has enough energy before hitting the hotkey then picking the location... and repeating the proccess if you needed to use this more than once. And its much less wastefull than accidentally having all your ghosts locking down... one Carrier...

I aprove of this addition to the game.

[geno]

Nullifier is called the Sentry now, and from descriptions it sounds kinda like you are watching the old battle reports released by Blizzard pre-beta.

As for the 'death of micro' argument. I wouldn't go so far to say as it is dead, it is just changed. The techniques and tactics that constituted micro in SC1 are more or less gone, from cloning, to positional advantage, to overcoming the terrible unit ai pathing, SC was a game of people overcoming its flaws with micro. Now, most of those flaws are fixed in SC2 with smartcasting making cloning simple, units auto-surrounding and having smarter targeting and knowing where to go or what to do when a path is blocked. Additionally, SC had a hotkey limitation of 12 units, so you saw a lot of speed and skill neccesary to control a large army, while now anyone can at least make sure their entire army is attacking at once by putting them on the same hotkey.

But certainly micro itself isn't dead. They compensated for a lot of this. Its still more efficient in most cases to have multiple hotkeys of units for flanks and for a more spread out army that will form an arc quicker. While battle positioning is being handled by the ai, they've increased the number of units with abilities that you absolutely must cast to help you win battles or retreat (ie forcefields).

Overall, its honestly not too bad. Its different, but not necessarily bad. The micro of the game could probably be said to be closer to WC3 than SC in a lot of aspects, but thats not bad. The game really does bring both communities together because of it, as it certainly has accepted the concepts of macro from SC1 as a guiding principle.

There is only a couple things I'd like to see changed about the basic system functionality right now. Smart targeting in mineral lines is really way too strong right now and can mean whoever has units fighting in their opponents mineral line will win the game (even if its like 6 lings vs 12 zealots) because its just too damaging to their economy.

The other thing I'd like to see changed is their high ground system. I don't mind the "need vision to attack uphill" system and it is awesome (in fact, I'd like to keep it), I just don't think its enough to encourage positional play. Right now elevation differences are countered by a single air unit (protoss has an invisible obs, terran has scans and zerg has infinite overlords). This just doesn't do imo. The high ground advantage should last all game and it should be significant, like it was in SC1.

A miss rate, damage reduction, or whatever needs to be added on top to encourage defensive play a little bit from time to time. The game is really about being offensive right now because you can pretty much always tell if you're army is going to win just by seeing their army, regardless of position. It makes fast expanding a really stupid strategy (except for zerg) because you can't really use your high ground to defend yourself; if they see it and build the units, they'll win the game. It wasn't like this in SC1, games could bounce back and forth without the necessity of every battle being a tie because the defenders advantage actually meant something. Static defense was fairly strong and high ground positions were extremely advantageous, making it dangerous to push too far on your opponent even if you had a much larger army. Not really the case right now in SC2. The only games I've had that went really late game and were fairly competitive were the ones where each battle ends in a tie or in a very small lead for the one player (not enough for the other to instantly capitalize). Wasn't like that in SC1 and thats been bugging me.

[Kaylia]

Overall, its honestly not too bad. Its different, but not necessarily bad. The micro of the game could probably be said to be closer to WC3 than SC in a lot of aspects, but thats not bad. The game really does bring both communities together because of it, as it certainly has accepted the concepts of macro from SC1 as a guiding principle.

Personally, I think microing is much closer to old starcraft, with the exception of roach and sentry maybe. Unit still die pretty damn fast, and big unit need to be microed like before.

There is only a couple things I'd like to see changed about the basic system functionality right now. Smart targeting in mineral lines is really way too strong right now and can mean whoever has units fighting in their opponents mineral line will win the game (even if its like 6 lings vs 12 zealots) because its just too damaging to their economy.

This is one of the biggest issue I have atm. Gatherer get killed way too fast by the new units. It's easy to just suicide on your opponent SCV and do hundred of mineral damages. I also miss how you could block the path with SCV/probe/drone. It was fun and smart microing.

I agree with the high ground issue as well. Personally, i would prefer a 50% miss rate on behind tree and on high ground, with small vision. I liked being able to fight back with little unit and smart management.

[geno]

Personally, I think microing is much closer to old starcraft, with the exception of roach and sentry maybe. Unit still die pretty damn fast, and big unit need to be microed like before.

I think the pace and size of the batttles most certainly is closer to starcraft, but the actual actions the player takes during a battle is not. It's a lot less about posturing/positioning and controlling multiple spellcasters at once (like blanketing storms) and a lot more about using individual units efficiently and making use of all the abilities they offer. Like I said, a lot of this has to do with the improved mechanics of the game like auto-surround, smartcasting, etc., but it certainly does feel different to me. If you want to micro in a battle, its a lot more about individual unit abilities and control than the overall positioning of your army.

In the future, I'm sure we'll see a lot of that with blinking damaged stalkers back, burrowing damaged roaches, picking up damaged marines/marauders w/ medivac, on top of the already common force field positioning, gaurdian shield casting, storming, and all the equivalents for the other races. This all reminds me a lot of how battles went down in high-end WC3 games more than how they happened in SC, even if the clashes were smaller and longer.

[geno]

I agree with the high ground issue as well. Personally, i would prefer a 50% miss rate on behind tree and on high ground, with small vision. I liked being able to fight back with little unit and smart management.

I don't know if 50% is even necessary. Something like 25% would still go a long way towards greatly increasing the power of a defensive position in certain situations. All it needs to do is put that doubt in the offensive players mind, make him realize that just because he has a larger army doesn't mean the game is over. Just needs to be enough to let a player retreat without losing all their units because they have nowhere to retreat to. I dunno, I feel like this was a really important part of SC, and I loved the dynamic play that was encouraged by elevation or the lack thereof in some of the most popular maps. Feels like a lot of that is gone now

[geno]

Those of you that got into the beta, check your e-mails. They sent out a bunch of 'invite-a-friend' beta keys to current beta holders, I got one earlier today (already gave it out so don't ask).

[Meian]

Really lol, if anyone has one that they don't have a friend to give it to... I wouldn't mind taking it off their hands <3

[Correction]

Those of you that got into the beta, check your e-mails. They sent out a bunch of 'invite-a-friend' beta keys to current beta holders, I got one earlier today (already gave it out so don't ask).

Hahaha this makes my 3rd beta key.

[Trocian]

Hahaha this makes my 3rd beta key.

FUUUUUUUUUUUUU

Still at 0

[Uzor]

Hahaha this makes my 3rd beta key.

Give one to me pretty please?

[izembo]

yeah im still checking my battle.net account daily with no luck, heres to hoping soon :/

[SilverBreeze]

I still have my invite a friend key.

If none of my friends want it, I'll probably give it to a BGer if you're actually going to use it. ONLY IF YOU WILL USE IT. If I log on and see that you're like playing 2 games a day, we're gonna fight.

[izembo]

id use it