**** Original Starcraft 2 Thread ****

Trend of pc games being the cheapest time and time again leaves people feeling bitter when they need to pay anywhere near a console game price...

for a game with scope for patching, expansion, masses of hours of brilliant online play.. varied resolution and graphics options..

Sacrilege eh!
 
I definately think it is worth £30, but would have much preferred to pay the pre-order price of £23.99 that I ordered at months ago. That will teach me for using a small rubbish games retailer!
 
I might be just a terrible RTS player but I've found it not fun at all playing multiplayer in beta where all ppl do is just build 3x barracks as soon as they can, make 17028371832 of the most basic unit and just go straight for base.
In all of over 20 games that I've played, exactly after around 5-6 minutes after start I would get attacked by 30+ of w/e basic unit and destroyed.

You can call me a terrible player but I find it no fun to just zerg ppl at start with basic stuff without even building anything, why make stronger units and buildings in the game when everyone just zergs at start with the basic unit ?? What's the point and where is fun in that ?

That's why I'll only do a campaign and single player in SC2. I feel too old for competitive RTS gaming.
 
PhoenixUK said:
I might be just a terrible RTS player but I've found it not fun at all playing multiplayer in beta where all ppl do is just build 3x barracks as soon as they can, make 17028371832 of the most basic unit and just go straight for base.
In all of over 20 games that I've played, exactly after around 5-6 minutes after start I would get attacked by 30+ of w/e basic unit and destroyed.

You can call me a terrible player but I find it no fun to just zerg ppl at start with basic stuff without even building anything, why make stronger units and buildings in the game when everyone just zergs at start with the basic unit ?? What's the point and where is fun in that ?

That's why I'll only do a campaign and single player in SC2. I feel too old for competitive RTS gaming.
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I don't see the fun in 200/200 battlecruiser battles personally.

Learn to defend the first attack then you can tech up all you want.
 
Yeah, half the fun in my opinion is learning to beat these sorts of early rushes. After that the advanced units come into play and there is a lot more you can do.
 
H2F Scott said:
I don't see the fun in 200/200 battlecruiser battles personally.

Learn to defend the first attack then you can tech up all you want.
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Yeh, the few times I've managed to defend the first attack, 2min later I'll get zerged by another same amount of basic unit. They didn't even bothered upgrading anything or building anything, just mass spammed the basic unit all the time and wouldn't let me build anything because everytime I'd get a nice new building or start an upgrade I'll get zerged by whatever amount of basic units and get destroyed : ). The only way to counter this would be to do the same but then whats the fun in endless fighting with the use of basic unit and not even building anything ?
 
Most early rushes can be defended against quite easily with basic buildings and units. You just need to learn how and aside from experience, watching replays is a good way to learn.
 
Games progress naturally into higher tech once the low tier units become a stalemate. The game isn't about who can build the highest tech units first - you're playing the wrong RTS if you think that, Starcraft is far more fast paced. Winning with low tier units is entirely possible and you need to have an equal amount of them if you want to safely tech.
 
phoenix, you've just described my pet hate..! i played the original starcraft for many many years, enjoyed the game loads. the biggest problem i had was that, all anyone ever seemed to do was spam basic units and rush, defending such attacks became a matter of routine. the problem is so many RTS games promote such tactics, it becomes more difficult in games like supreme commander, sins of a solar empire where the maps are so big you'll spend loads of time actually finding your opponant, and by then they've already made sturdy infrastructure, expanded, etc. to be honest as much as im going to enjoy starcraft II i will rarely be playing it online with anyone but friends, since i can't be bothered with the constant rushing and 'clinical' build orders all these so called top players come up with. my personal opinion on the situation is RTS games are too over-simplified, even the original supreme commander was needlessly simplistic (and they had the cheek to say the second was dumbed down to make it more simple...), theres nothing to really exploit like supply lines or anything like that.

i think RTS developers need to stop being such pussies and make a proper strategy game, that requires clever thinking, has proper style of infrastructure: mining, transport, refinement, machining, etc. these would add so many more tactical opportunities and slow down the 'rush machine', it'll never happen though sadly since too many people prefer the 'simple' RTS over anything that actually promotes thought...:(
 
Gashman said:
phoenix, you've just described my pet hate..! i played the original starcraft for many many years, enjoyed the game loads. the biggest problem i had was that, all anyone ever seemed to do was spam basic units and rush, defending such attacks became a matter of routine. the problem is so many RTS games promote such tactics, it becomes more difficult in games like supreme commander, sins of a solar empire where the maps are so big you'll spend loads of time actually finding your opponant, and by then they've already made sturdy infrastructure, expanded, etc. to be honest as much as im going to enjoy starcraft II i will rarely be playing it online with anyone but friends, since i can't be bothered with the constant rushing and 'clinical' build orders all these so called top players come up with. my personal opinion on the situation is RTS games are too over-simplified, even the original supreme commander was needlessly simplistic (and they had the cheek to say the second was dumbed down to make it more simple...), theres nothing to really exploit like supply lines or anything like that.

i think RTS developers need to stop being such pussies and make a proper strategy game, that requires clever thinking, has proper style of infrastructure: mining, transport, refinement, machining, etc. these would add so many more tactical opportunities and slow down the 'rush machine', it'll never happen though sadly since too many people prefer the 'simple' RTS over anything that actually promotes thought...:(
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Exactly. Sure you can defend yourself by doing the same spam but then its spam vs spam and actually neither is advancing because if you decide to upgrade or make a new building instead of making 6 more basic units you'll loose coz you get outnumbered and destroyed ...

Also the first thing that I've noticed when launching SC2 was the size of maps !! Why are they so small ? It takes like 20-30seconds from one base to another.

I miss the sort of Age of Empires 1 size of maps and gameplay where sometimes it will take hours of progress and exploring before the final battles.
 
I think the game is fine the way it is. If you try to rush up the tech tree then you should have less units on the field than someone who makes a lot of low tier units. What you need to do is scout the enemy so you know what he is doing, and then counter that. If you counter what the enemy has you will have the upper hand and so can advance. Even if both sides are equal a lot of what it will come down to is timings and micro skill, because someone who can time things to construct at optimal times, or has great micro skill can have a big advantage.

It's just the way the game is, no matter what skill level there will always be matches that last 5 min and matches that last 30 min. The reason that people focus on low tier units at the start is because that is the most important part of a match, where killing just a couple units, or a drone/scv/probe can make a big impact on the rest of the game.
 
This is my bigest problem with games like starcraft. I also found rts a lot more fun when you have time to build your base up and get decent battles going. Me and my friend often play rts against the cpu and some of the games take hours to win. I rather play one epic game of a hour plus then several shorter games. Me and my friend often play rts games against the a.i as we find it much more fun that way. Maps can take many hours to win on some games.

Plus the ammount of people who have played the beta it really put me off buying the game, as i know i am gonna be totally useless at the game and have no clue how to defend rush.The way starcraft records stats and the leaderboards and stuff it almost encourgaes people to win as fast as possible and by any means and move on to the next match. Starcraft is going to be a popular competive rts for that reason you are going to have to put many hours into it perfecting build orders watching replays and learning to counter your enemy, to even get remotely good at it.

I am hoping i can play this with a friend or 2 against the a.i and have big epic battles but from what i have seen and heard about the game it doesnt look to be the case. I am hoping for a demo at some point.
 
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PhoenixUK said:
Yeh, the few times I've managed to defend the first attack, 2min later I'll get zerged by another same amount of basic unit. They didn't even bothered upgrading anything or building anything, just mass spammed the basic unit all the time and wouldn't let me build anything because everytime I'd get a nice new building or start an upgrade I'll get zerged by whatever amount of basic units and get destroyed : ). The only way to counter this would be to do the same but then whats the fun in endless fighting with the use of basic unit and not even building anything ?
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RTS games are very punishing to people who aren't atleast a good proportion of the way up the learning curve -- that is you have your hotkeys reasonably well down, you have a reasonable grasp on macro, can micro at a pinch etc. Doing that alone would take quite a bit of dedication, probably a fair bit of work on it outside of the game also. All that just to be at the entry level and have the bare essentials of online play down; it's pretty much why RTS games in comparison to other genres are very low in terms of online population, there has been no 'modern warfare' of RTS games made for low skill players to pick up and play and do as well as anyone else, and as long as you have more than one unit to control and a bigger picture to follow there probably never will be.

What you're describing though, sounds like two things:
- You didn't build up your economy enough at the start
- You didn't scout properly to know what your opponent was going for

If you do those two things; you can have your nice buildings by the truck load as you have a strong income and you are able to build up a decent enough counter for your opponents build to keep you in the game long enough for tech to occur naturally.
 
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What do you mean by build up my economy ?
I thought I've mentioned how long the games took, there wasn't much time to build anything up really.

I'd start with few extra SCVs, as soon as I can build barracks, then few supplies, gas, and by the time I'd make a first normal building or put some upgrade up the guy will instead attack me with a zerg of basic units and as I have spent my resources on the xyz new build or upgrade I'd have low defense and hence loose.

I knew exactly what they were doing as well and I can tell you.

All of the games were exactly the same.
As soon as the game starts, they build barracks, then they build 2nd barracks and 2-3mins later they attack with whatever amount of units they manage to make. Those guys dont spend resources on SCVs, on upgrades or on new buildings, all they do is put everything into basic units and rush for the base as soon as game starts.

The only way to counter this would be to do the same and then the game will end up with zerging each other with basic units because you won't have resources to build up something else as I said before : ).

The maps are so small that there isn't such a thing as countering or planning. It takes less than 30seconds to get from base to another.

I'm by no means a bad player but I just don't like this type of gameplay anymore. 5-20minute games aren't fun for me.

Imagine if you played an MMORPG where you loose xp when dying and they shrinked the world to the size where it takes 30seconds to get from your faction to the opposite faction, you try to lvl up and progress, go outside, kill 1mob, get 30% lvl then a guy from opposite faction shows up 5seconds later and kills you and you loose that xp and start all over again - would that be fun ?

Ever played any of the HoMM series ? You think it would be fun if they put your starting castle 1 turn away from the opposite one and on 2nd turn already you'd get attacked ?
Fine, you managed to win, you're left with 1 unit, then the same turn guy buys new hero and next turn attacks you again, you loose and start over again and keep on going like this.


They really have to make some bigger maps, if you have scouts in enemys base this should give you a proper advantage - ie it should take him say 2minutes to get to you so you can prepare defense. There should beb advantage in having scouts, when it takes less than 30seconds to get from one base to another ( on some maps more like 15seconds ) having a scout doesn't even give you any advantage and is totally pointless because all you can manage to do is move your units a bit in that time, you wont even be able to build anything or make an extra unit for defense.


The maps gotta be bigger with more tactical points and ways to get to your oponent etc, that's all to it tbh. There is no strategy whatsoever in zerging someone with basic units within first 5minutes of the game.

Also I think the top end units should be a bit stronger, it's silly how you can kill best units in the game with just a few basic starting units. I know it's not supposed to be realistic but common, a few 5foot tall protons with inc long blades destroying 50 foot huge robot of doom with armor thicker than all of them together ? It's like guy trying to destroy a tank with assault rifle. Those top end units have 20x bigger cost than basic units and it takes ages to advance to them and then another age to build them and then like 5-6 basic units can destroy them ? Silly imo.

As the game stands now, there's no point in upgrading into better units, the ultimate IWIN is just to build 10 gazilion of barracks and zerg the map with 10 bilion of basic units.
 
PhoenixUK said:
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You should always have SCVs building, never queued though - just one rolling at all times. Building a couple of extras at the start isn't enough. If they just used their starting SCVs and spent 100% of their minerals on tier1 units they won't have been able to make very many and if you had of wiped that first group out you would have won.

The map thing just sounds like you played on small maps? play bigger ones when the game comes out. 2v2 maps usually lend themselves to 20-30 min games. But I guess we can only wait and see to what the maps of choice will be for competitive play, although I suspect they will just be replicas of the classics.

Every mineral mined, as fast you can mine it counts; making super tight early builds that correctly layer economy production, building and unit production down to the mineral as it comes in isn't easy to pull off and if you watch replays of top players literally having their minerals count to the exact requirement for whatever they want to build at the exact second they intend to build it is just insane -- I can't imagine you being at that level so surely you can see your early macro needs work?
 
Well i just got the e-mail from GAME saying its been despatched however as its sunday im guessing their just shipping em off the system and actually posting them tommorow!
 
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