Relic vrs Blizzard, go relic go

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[salan]

lol acker...

in star craft you ignore your terrain and it basically comes down to who can MICRO (aka: press the mouse button) the fastest.

[acker]

I can't tell if you are joking or not. I really can't.

Terrain is one of the principal ways a Starcraft map is balanced, and selected for official use in the Korean progaming scene. There's a reason why those temples, cliffs, and jungle templates exist, and why some of the maps are so convoluted (Katrina). To say that players ignore terrain is ridiculous.

Your mouse button example is also faulty. Starcraft programers typically cap out APM at around 200-250. It isn't uncommon in ICCUP to find D+ players who have 300-350 APM. Clicking the mouse button the fastest doesn't win Starcraft games.


I don't think that you have ever played Starcraft. Well, you might have played, but certainly not much.

[TheDeadlyShoe]

comparing starcraft terrain to coh terrain is ridiculous

starcraft isn't within an order of magnitude of COH's battlefield complexity.

[Akranadas]

It's Activision/Blizzard, not just Blizzard. They got that hideous exploiting growth on them now.

[acker]

comparing starcraft terrain to coh terrain is ridiculous

starcraft isn't within an order of magnitude of COH's battlefield complexity.

I agree with you on both counts.

Starcraft's battlefield complexity is not, indeed, within an order of magnitude of that of COH's. It would be ridiculous to claim otherwise. Hell, even the words "order of magnitude" are completely insufficient to describe the discrepancy between Starcraft's battlefield complexity and COH's battlefield complexity.


I'm neutral about Blizzard's takeover. Don't know enough about it to know the consequences.

[puddin]

I still Play Warcraft 3 and use map settings, i still play Starcraft Brood war and the use map settings, I can play persistancy maps for both games and gain vet just like in EIRR.  The ability to mod is easier and more widly uused in WC3 and SC.  

Oh and Diablo 3..... 30 second trailor makes me cream  my pants in a way only porn used to make me.  

I say i like my Blizzard better.  No other gammign company has made me want to buy the same exact game 3 different times...  And enjoy it every friggan time.

[acker]

Wait...which way did Demonic mean his sentence?

I'm assuming that he meant that Starcraft was more complicated on the battlefield than COH, but it looks like he could mean it the other way around. Bloody english language on the Internet. Microsoft should include a "sarcasm" button on IE, too...

[TheDeadlyShoe]

I doubt Activision has touched Blizzard's operations. They will be content to roll around in the money pile.   

[Mysthalin]

I'm wondering how 4-5 clicks of a mouse per second doesn't mean the game is about click-spamming the fastest...

That said, I enjoyed starcraft, and it's modability endlessly, and am buying SC2 for sure.

[DemonicTruism]

It's not a clickspamfest because clicking into and unto itself doesn't achieve anything. You have to click units in a variety of places in specific ways.

[Mysthalin]

It's still clickspam, no matter if it's a clickspam in a specific algorythm.

[DemonicTruism]

Spam implies that the clicks are worthless or unimportant, when in actual fact each one is highly important. Micro is so intensive in SC because the game is built from the ground up to do as little for you as possible.

[Mysthalin]

PIAT spam - is it worthless? Hardly.
Is it unimportant? Tell that to the enemy that's getting raped by them.
But it's still a PIAT spam when you pull on 8 squads of sappers.

Micro is using your units, micromanaging them to their full effectiveness. Starcraft is about following a specific algorythm of building units, and the high APM ensues due to only being able to select 12 units at a time. When you have 300 zerglings, you need to click at a retarded rate(not micro manage, blobspamattack with clicspam) to use them, resulting in not good micro, but clickspam and high APM.

[DemonicTruism]

I think where spam is tied to a unit (riflespam, piatspam, grenspam) it implies that minimal skill is needed, but others might see it differently.

And Starcraft's build orders aren't anywhere near as rigid as people seem to believe. They are rigid for about the first 5 minutes, then diverge quite rapidly. Different players also use different unit compositions, for example Savior has always produced more Scourge than other Zerg players, while Bisu has always used more Corsairs.

[Phil]

I love how people who don't like Starcraft believe that they know exactly what it's about, better than those who like it.

Sure, the game has been out 10 years, so I think the game mechanics are pretty fucking well known by now. It has been enough time for players to find the most effective strategies for given maps. But never is that that "blob spam". Micro is critical against good players. Just because you never got past the "omg lets build 12 battlecruisers" stage, doesn't mean a higher level of play doesn't exist.

[Unkn0wn]

For me, its COH that introduced "real" micromanagement, requiring you to use cover and terrain to your advantage, positioning your tanks and whatnot. Traditional RTs are simply about having better/more units on the field than your opponent, being faster in building, harvesting, etc imo. Hence why I consider vCOH the best RTS ever made, too bad Relic ruined it with OF though.

[Phil]

SC had no "cover" in the way COH does. But taking advantage of the map (high ground, narrow passages, shit like that) was definitely very critical.

However, building a perfect base, as quickly as possibly, will always be a part of RTS games. That's why I prefer RTT.

[acker]

I'm wondering how 4-5 clicks of a mouse per second doesn't mean the game is about click-spamming the fastest...

Because that isn't the definition of "click-spamming the fastest"? Once again, why do pros have around 200-250 APM, while semi-noobs can have 300-350 APM? There's a difference between playing quickly, and spamming the mouse/keys.

Micro is using your units, micromanaging them to their full effectiveness. Starcraft is about following a specific algorythm of building units, and the high APM ensues due to only being able to select 12 units at a time. When you have 300 zerglings, you need to click at a retarded rate(not micro manage, blobspamattack with clicspam) to use them, resulting in not good micro, but clickspam and high APM.

I'm confused. Are you defining an algorithm as a build order? In which case, why would you ever penalize Starcraft for having specific build orders? There's a 50-page list of common build orders/branches at Teamliquid, and that's just for the beginning, the middle and endgame don't even have a build-order list. In COH, algorithms are even more limited. The British, as I recall, have exactly 1 build order. Add in unit production/upgrade choices to both games, and SC's build orders become even more complicated.

Your knowledge of Starcraft is pretty awful,too. No A/B player in his right mind would ever build 150 popcap worth of Zerglings, when the game itself has a maximum popcap of 200 (including peons). Secondly, just because you (or me. or anyone else here) can't micro that many Zerglings doesn't mean that it isn't possible. Pros like July and Yellow micro Zergling masses readily, and make a ton of money because they can. But the average player doesn't even know about Magic Boxes (a micro trick discovered a couple years ago), let alone use them...

For me, its COH that introduced "real" micromanagement, requiring you to use cover and terrain to your advantage, positioning your tanks and whatnot. Traditional RTSes are simply about having better/more units on the field than your opponent, being faster in building, harvesting, etc imo.

In Starcraft, high ground and jungle template grant a 30% miss chance; cliffs/ramps are absolutely critical to combat. When Siege Tanks typically kill each other in two shots (and reload in less than four seconds), SC tank positioning makes COH tank positioning look soft. The effects of terrain on air/ground units is...beyond me. Especially if you add in the metagame. I really wish that more mappers would use mud templates, though.

The definition of RTS is also complicated. I'd consider COH and DOW to be RTTs not RTSes, as base/economy management is nearly nonexistent in comparison to that of traditional RTSes. In both COH and DOW, the player spends the majority of his time commanding his army, not managing his resources. It's very, very, fun. And very different from a RTS. I would attribute the cover/battle micro of COH/DOW to Close Combat, though. Close Combat was brilliant at this. Pity that their online play sucked even worse than pre-OF Relic Online.





That said, I didn't vote Blizzard. Relic still commands a ton of respect for such a small company, even after DOW2.

[panzerjager1943]

Relic won!

[SgtGriff]

Relic WINS Not they are in the Final Super 8 Voting from 3-30/3-31