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On November 13 2007 15:31 Plexa wrote:Show nested quote +On November 13 2007 09:23 garmule2 wrote: I hope that firebats are the counter to Zealots' charge ability.
Of course, it wasn't really Firebats' low hp that made them useless. It was the fact that literally every T army involves siege tanks, and siege tanks kill your firebats.
I would like to see Firebats be immune to traditional splash damage. Not only would this explain why your Firebats don't kill eachother, it would allow them to actually attack enemy units without your own tank-splash killing them instantly. I think the only other unit that would be affected is the Colossus, with its thermal lance, against which perhaps the bat could take reduced damage. All of this can be explained simply by Firebats' new big armor, which is a type of metal specifically designed to be heat-resistant. are you serious? firebats aren't used because vultures do the job so much better and cost no gas (ie saving it for siegetanks) and against dragoons they suck sooo bad (and storm).. and against zerg they are completely useless vs lurker (and mutalisk). i don't like the idea for another special armor (immortal anyone?) and simply adds to the confusion... personally i don't see the firebats gaining much use in sc2, they arrive in at the same time as the Cobra (its still in right? just ability changed) and is just a stepping stone away from tanks. Meanwhile, you have the infinitely more agile and effective reapers (vs immortals at least) which more than cover the aspect of the game that the firebats are trying to fill. Tank/Reaper and later adding further tech seems much more viable than firebats - based purely on knowledge from SCI, as range units are generally preferred in terran. However, against a hypothetical zerg their uses will probably be again quite limited. Zerglings will primarily be most feared in the early stages of the game - where the firebat will no longer be placed. The firebat will be too far up the tech tree to adequately counter zerglings. Depending on HP of banelings however, they could be useful (or absolutely dreadful). The may have some use if there is a dark-swarm spell still in the game, as the new improved firebat would be much more capable of dealing the damage to the late game zerglings.. although i think (and i'm sure many protoss's will agree) that you would still wantto engage away from the swarm dispite your splash - so once again the use will probably be quite limited... sorry blizzard, i think that the firebat adds nothing to the terran arsenal as its current position makes its niche overlap with many other terran units - most of which would probably do a better job. They may yet be a viable counter to zealots, we'll see. No, your hypothesis doesnt hold really since the firebat of sc1 had to be weak due to coming so early and being a splash unit. In sc2 he comes later so he will be a lot stronger, this makes blizzard able to make the bats strong wo removing the weak earlygame of the terrans.
Dont think on firebats from starcraft, think on archons instead and they could be a very strong addition to the terran force. Its all about how they balance him.
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Hawk/Aphelion: can you tell what's going on in the videos? It's pretty damn easy when it's animated, which is what counts. Most 3D gameplay shots look cluttered like that... I can look at a screenshot of WoW or War3 and it'll still look fucking weird, but when you watch it live it's fine.
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No Plexa is right. SC never had "early units must be weak" paradigm in many other games. Marines, zealots, zerglings, are some of the most useful units in the game. Its not about late tech - > powerful units, but rather you must gain units which fit a unique role and do a specific job. That is the same reasoning why the reaver is taken over by the colossus, and hence his argument has merit.
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Aotearoa39261 Posts
On November 14 2007 02:24 Klockan3 wrote:Show nested quote +On November 13 2007 15:31 Plexa wrote:On November 13 2007 09:23 garmule2 wrote: I hope that firebats are the counter to Zealots' charge ability.
Of course, it wasn't really Firebats' low hp that made them useless. It was the fact that literally every T army involves siege tanks, and siege tanks kill your firebats.
I would like to see Firebats be immune to traditional splash damage. Not only would this explain why your Firebats don't kill eachother, it would allow them to actually attack enemy units without your own tank-splash killing them instantly. I think the only other unit that would be affected is the Colossus, with its thermal lance, against which perhaps the bat could take reduced damage. All of this can be explained simply by Firebats' new big armor, which is a type of metal specifically designed to be heat-resistant. are you serious? firebats aren't used because vultures do the job so much better and cost no gas (ie saving it for siegetanks) and against dragoons they suck sooo bad (and storm).. and against zerg they are completely useless vs lurker (and mutalisk). i don't like the idea for another special armor (immortal anyone?) and simply adds to the confusion... personally i don't see the firebats gaining much use in sc2, they arrive in at the same time as the Cobra (its still in right? just ability changed) and is just a stepping stone away from tanks. Meanwhile, you have the infinitely more agile and effective reapers (vs immortals at least) which more than cover the aspect of the game that the firebats are trying to fill. Tank/Reaper and later adding further tech seems much more viable than firebats - based purely on knowledge from SCI, as range units are generally preferred in terran. However, against a hypothetical zerg their uses will probably be again quite limited. Zerglings will primarily be most feared in the early stages of the game - where the firebat will no longer be placed. The firebat will be too far up the tech tree to adequately counter zerglings. Depending on HP of banelings however, they could be useful (or absolutely dreadful). The may have some use if there is a dark-swarm spell still in the game, as the new improved firebat would be much more capable of dealing the damage to the late game zerglings.. although i think (and i'm sure many protoss's will agree) that you would still wantto engage away from the swarm dispite your splash - so once again the use will probably be quite limited... sorry blizzard, i think that the firebat adds nothing to the terran arsenal as its current position makes its niche overlap with many other terran units - most of which would probably do a better job. They may yet be a viable counter to zealots, we'll see. No, your hypothesis doesnt hold really since the firebat of sc1 had to be weak due to coming so early and being a splash unit. In sc2 he comes later so he will be a lot stronger, this makes blizzard able to make the bats strong wo removing the weak earlygame of the terrans. Dont think on firebats from starcraft, think on archons instead and they could be a very strong addition to the terran force. Its all about how they balance him. Okay, lets run with the idea of the firebat being analogous to the archon. Strong splash damage unit for a large price. However, the purpose of the firebat was always a cheap low hp high damage unit. By buffing the firebat's HP up its been somewhat strengthened to the point where it could essentially be a flame tank. Think archon. Thus giving terran essentially two 'tanks' to chose from - siege and flame (remember the initial seige tank only had 150hp - x3 that of the firebat). An interesting scenario.
However, it seems that this new bat is not meant to be a 'new tank' for the terrans - it's being designed as a anti-zealot/vulture replacement unit. Why? A slight hp buff should bring its hp to around 75 (vulture hp). With the cobra's role changing to a dryad-esque unit (which imo is rather lame) its doubtful that it will deal enough damage to zealots for them to be effective. So what's the answer? Shove in a new tier 2 unit to compensate for the cobras shortcomings.
So we must ask ourselves, does the firebat represent what terrans want/need at this stage in the game? Splash damage easily dispatches mass melee unit (check) HP buff increases its viability and durability (check) Can be healed by medics (check) Can easily engage with zealots (check)
Awesome, the firebat is a great counter to zealots. What about stalkers? Splash damage (close range) isn't exactly that great vs range (not check) HP buff increases its durability (check) Can be healed by medics (check) Can easily engage with stalkers (not check)
So basically blizzard is giving the zealot a send off, and out of tier one it's usefulness rapid decreases.
Again, with no tier 2 units adequetly counter air of any kind (cobra is somewhat AA right?) terrans must up the tech tree to tier 3 to fight protoss air. Atleast at tier three protoss still uses a combination of units (ie HT, and probably Stalkers... maybe...) in conjunction with their own air.
So, im summation, what am i trying to say? - Firebat limits the zealots use in tier 2 to the point where they are no longer viable - Introduction of this unit will promote a stronger sense of linear tier progression - The consequence of the above is that many may find that the best (and only) solution is to tech 'rush' - It's use may still be limited against stalker/immortal combo
And as a side point, the terrans at this stage seem to becoming a much more reactionary race than they have ever been before. It seems that the protoss essentially gets to call the shots, and decide the direction and flow of the game leaving the terran to react to it. Whereas, in SCI protoss were the reactionary race - reacting to whatever the terran (or zerg) did.
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I keep staring at ghost's bums in the first screenshot, their kneeling pose isn't exactly convincing.
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On November 13 2007 01:57 Last Romantic wrote: I finally realized why the nexus looks so strange to me - it lost those four pillars at the corners.
That being said - my GOD, bring back the old Protoss color scheme. The old SC1 models left most units as blue/yellow, with some tribal coloring. These new ones are way too colorful.
Actually I just find the whole thing a bit too colorful - it is actually counterproductive and makes things quite confusing. [It's harder to tell what things are, since everything is the player color. whereas retaining more of the native look per unit whilst having less player colorization would be less confusing.]
Agreed on all, especially the Protoss look silly with the far out colors.
On another note, I like the Templar having some sort of attack. I imagine it should be off by default like the BW Ghost, using hold position to activate it, etc.
I agree the Nomad is fairly ugly, but the sci vessel was never much of a looker, so it wouldn't kill me to stay in it's current form. It seems obvious to me they wanted something that took up less screen space and blocked ground level units, hence the open design. Same thing for Carriers. Good move I think for gameplay.
Finally, yeah wow, those are some huge firebats. Wow.
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I think the change to the Factory for the firebat is more for "ease" of teching than anything. In other words, you make marines a while, then medics, then you build factories... you can go firebats if they are needed, or tanks if they are needed. It basically forces you to tech smoothly, instead of the all or nothing barracks or factory type options we had with Terran before.
Now you'd expect Terran in TvZ can have factories earlier without putting yourself at risk. If Z is going ground, you pick the appropriate unit. If Zerg goes air, you can make firebats to counter the lings, while still building marines/medics nonstop, while you tech to starport. No more "semi-useless" factory against heavy muta while you go to sci vessels. Yeah yeah, if it plays like you'd expect, etc.
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On November 13 2007 10:16 lololol wrote:
Actually pretty often in pro games the HT move in front of the army(since attack-move is just move for them) and get killed, because of that, so having an attack will definitely be benefical.
Actually, I withdraw my previous statement, as lololol has a good point. I'd change it to, if they are standing around they will not attack, but if they are attack moved they will. Or something close to that, so that while standing they aren't hindered by attacking when you need to quickly cast storm, etc. But they won't auto-stoopid die when attack moving in a grp.
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I think the templar having an attack is detrimental, as in Starcraft 1 units would not auto target them, because of no attack they are an extremely low priority AI unit, forcing people to either dodge storms/lose army, or manually target (unless you just completely overwhelm or something) With an attack, they may be placed a bit higher on the AI priority attack list, and if it's above zealot priority I think it will be really hard - then again we've got the smartcasting... w/e we'll see when the game comes out
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I don't know if this has already been said but the buildings in teh screenshot are: refinery, factory, bunker, turret, seige tanks..., CC, supply depots, and the one in the middle is just an unfinished depot.
Wow, I really like that idea of HT being able to create those hexagon shield walls.
And the fact that HT attack will make it easier to pick off temps (without having to surround micro each one to death)
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On December 04 2007 09:29 Superiorwolf wrote: I think the templar having an attack is detrimental, as in Starcraft 1 units would not auto target them, because of no attack they are an extremely low priority AI unit, forcing people to either dodge storms/lose army, or manually target (unless you just completely overwhelm or something) With an attack, they may be placed a bit higher on the AI priority attack list, and if it's above zealot priority I think it will be really hard - then again we've got the smartcasting... w/e we'll see when the game comes out Well, I guess you will have to remember to put your templars on cease fire in those cases.
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AHa! Can't wait... firebat looks awesume.
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i'm gonna get a seizure playing this game
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United States20661 Posts
Is it bad that the only reaction I have is "SUPERMAN HOMAGE!"
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Gah, I hope they don't go over the top with the graphics.
Looked very War3; lots of flashy lights but you have nfi what's going on.
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