StarCraft News & Notes

There have been five posts from Blizzard since my last news digest, so in order:

-August 14th: with Koreans finally using the raven-centric mech that's existed in the foreign scene forever, there's a balance panic about it (rather than realizing the GSL is using an old map pool that allows for that kind of play); unfortunately the thought of doing something with the moribund Swarmhosts is suggested--what will it take to get this unit out of the game?  It's a poorly designed and conceived even in LOTV.  The biggest element of the post were planned changes to macro mechanics in the beta (the removal of MULEs, chrono, etc), about which more below.

-August 19th: automated tournaments were added to the LOTV beta, which I think is fantastic

-August 20th: macro mechanics were removed in the beta, which lead to a wide range of reactions--I like the general idea, although admittedly it's not balanced yet.  Qxc offered his thoughts shortly afterwards and concludes:

The most interesting parts of Starcraft have to do with unit design, map control and micro. Without good macro, players cannot really experience those other aspects. By reducing the macro requirements, Starcraft can become a game that’s less about producing as much stuff as possible and more focused on the more compelling parts of the game at all skill levels. Newer players will have less to worry about in terms of production so they can focus on the more interesting parts of Starcraft while more skilled players will be able to expand their army movements and multitasking. In addition, the increase in multitasking and army movements will help improve the overall viewer experience as there’s more conflict and interaction between the players during the game. Although the balance involved in their removal might not be there yet, there’s still plenty of time to tweak the numbers. Overall, the removal of macro mechanics helps push Starcraft to be a game more about army positioning, strategy, micro and more rather than a game that’s more focused on who can make the most stuff.

I agree with his sentiments.

-August 21st: changes to the Swarmhosts were put in a balance map because Blizzard wants me to hate watching ZvP again--I'm not sure why it's been so hard for the designers to realise the unit simply doesn't function as designed--they were created to break siege lines and I'm not sure I've ever seen that actually happen as envisioned; now it's a bizarre, Frankenstein-unit half-built to harass and half-built to battle tanks--the moment it becomes affordable Zerg players will just start massing them again in unintended ways.  The other element here discussed were thoughts on Protoss design--look, Blizzard, the ship has sailed on the perception of Protoss--people are going to whine about the race even when they start producing marines out of barracks--just ignore the white noise and focus on keeping the flavour and making things balanced.

-August 28th: they acknowledged the balance issues with the macro changes and are taking the approach of autocasts for the other races--it's a decent idea and should help balance things a bit.  There were also thoughts on getting Protoss balanced and they seem like steps in the right direction (Theo's post below is a bit more meaty).  One other note: they're (finally) talking about moving overlord drop to Lair-tech.

One thing that's become apparent in reading the feedback is how much more the opinions from Korea mean to the developers:

We agree with the Korean pros/community on this point - that because Starcraft 2 is already one of the most difficult games to master by far out there, and LotV added much more skill needed to play, helping out on this end looks to be the correct move.

I wonder if this understandable tunnel vision is part of the reason responses to issues in the foreign scene have taken so long (Brood Lord/Infestor, Swarmhosts, region lock, etc).

Speaking of feedback, Theo has a fantastic post about LOTV balance with suggested unit changes etc.

Mr. Bitter was unhappy with the viewership for the Red Bull BattleGrounds Archon tournament over the weekend (whose peak average was 8k; my favourite part was this), which surprises me.  It was scheduled against both WCS and the MSI tournament, featuring a secondary element of the beta (archon mode) topped by various semi-retired/second-tier pros (I'm also not a fan of the tournament format--it's distinctive, but not very interesting).  I've seen people complain about the hosts, but I don't think that was an issue.  The best case scenario for Red Bull is to steer clear of competing tournaments and recognize that archon-mode won't achieve the viewership of standard SC2 any time soon (perhaps in the future, but not now).  Even running a normal LOTV tournament makes little sense right now because the balance just isn't there.

I didn't see much of the MSI tournament, but there were good games and I liked the casters (Rotti/ToD).

Hell it's Aboot Time has come and gone and I really enjoyed it (ZombieGrub posted her thoughts yesterday--apparently they were disappointed with the views for the event, which surprises me--perhaps they were expecting HomeStory Cup levels?).  Wardii got the English B-stream, and while I still find him a bit laconic I was glad to have options for which game I was watching (Taketv provided German language coverage).  Rifkin and ZombieGrub went out of their way to make the event amazing for those who attended and certainly repaid the good will they've built up in the community.  The only criticism I can offer is that the tournament would have been much more distinctive as either a NA-only or foreigner-only event; there hasn't been a major, non-national event without Koreans since (I think) TotalBiscuit's ShoutCraft America (back in 2013).

Cyan offers a retrospective on StarCraft on the TL website and comes to the logical conclusion that WCS needs a real region lock:

When it comes to eSports in general, this data suggests that the most important thing to stimulate growth is to ensure that the professional scene is locally involved. Try to base your scene as locally as possible. If you want to grow your scene in one region, focus your efforts and attention in that region. A European team winning an American tournament won’t stimulate as much growth in America as if an American team were to win. It does seem like fairly common sense.

Thorin interviewed Stuchiu to talk about the great players of SC2 and it's well worth the read.  Stuchiu also just posted an article looking at the historical state of the various match-ups in SC2.

Farhad Manjoo looks at the impact of Ad Block on the Internet.  It's a long article, but in essence concludes:

in the long run, there could be a hidden benefit to blocking ads for advertisers and publishers: Ad blockers could end up saving the ad industry from its worst excesses. If blocking becomes widespread, the ad industry will be pushed to produce ads that are simpler, less invasive and far more transparent about the way they’re handling our data — or risk getting blocked forever if they fail.

The ad industry certainly won't get rid of Ad Block except through the cold, dead hands of consumers (streamers complaining about it don't help their cause--rather than attacking viewers, encourage them to watch your ads or support you in other ways).  Less intrusive and more interesting ads are (hopefully) the wave of the future.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)