Thor as LOS Blocker

Credit goes to DS a few threads down. It's been thrown about for some days now, and I think the idea merits its own thread.

Why I love it: it's an incredibly intuitive, SC-esque way to go about a more complicated problem. The Thor is supposed to tank damage for smaller units, right? Like the MG does for Night Elves in WC3? Well, the MG has an ability called "Taunt." But we play SC, we don't like Taunt (because it's too gimmicky, it's arbitrary, it takes control away from your units, and so on). Thor as LOS blocker accomplishes the same feat -- enemy ranged units will ALWAYS go for the Thor first, and as long as your units stay directly behind them, they will be mostly safe from enemy fire, while perfectly able to dish it out.

A walking line of Thors with a mass of MM behind it would absolutely demolish Siege Tank clumps, which is what the unit was initially made for. It'd also take advantage of a fun new SC2 mechanic by giving control of it to the player. Thor would probably have to lose his cannons to compensate -- but, really, they're a very arbitrary ability that adds nothing to his role as meatshield. We won't mind.

Thoughts?

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Originally Posted by pure.Wasted

Credit goes to DS a few threads down. It's been thrown about for some days now, and I think the idea merits its own thread.

Why I love it: it's an incredibly intuitive, SC-esque way to go about a more complicated problem. The Thor is supposed to tank damage for smaller units, right? Like the MG does for Night Elves in WC3? Well, the MG has an ability called "Taunt." But we play SC, we don't like Taunt (because it's too gimmicky, it's arbitrary, it takes control away from your units, and so on). Thor as LOS blocker accomplishes the same feat -- enemy ranged units will ALWAYS go for the Thor first, and as long as your units stay directly behind them, they will be mostly safe from enemy fire, while perfectly able to dish it out.

A walking line of Thors with a mass of MM behind it would absolutely demolish Siege Tank clumps, which is what the unit was initially made for. It'd also take advantage of a fun new SC2 mechanic by giving control of it to the player. Thor would probably have to lose his cannons to compensate -- but, really, they're a very arbitrary ability that adds nothing to his role as meatshield. We won't mind.

Thoughts?

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Well seing various artworks i noticed that comparing a Thor and a Marine,they aren't that big to be LOS blockers,Hell,in some artworks ultralisks are even larger than Thors....

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Originally Posted by arthas

Well seing various artworks i noticed that comparing a Thor and a Marine,they aren't that big to be LOS blockers,Hell,in some artworks ultralisks are even larger than Thors....

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And Colossus aren't really so much taller than Thors/Ultralisks that they ought to be hit by AtA fire while those units ... aren't. It's a gameplay mechanic. The Colossus is balanced around being incredibly vulnerable. The Thor's purpose is to soak up damage, and I think LOS would go about that in a very creative but intuitive way.

Read and commented on the same post - I think its a great idea; Mothership has cloak, Zerg had their LoS mechanic (which I think still fits.) I cant see why this couldn't be implemented.

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A walking line of Thors with a mass of MM behind it would absolutely demolish Siege Tank clumps

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Throw in 2-3 unsieged tanks. :) I like it.

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Its nice to know I'm not completely insane.

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Its nice to know I'm not completely insane.

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Yeah just partially >_<

Seriously, it could add the uniqueness and the deepness the Thor need. You should post this on Battle.net forum.

I think it would be fine if it had this and the Siege ability.

I think it's an interesting mechanic. If it passes a balance test, why not?

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Originally Posted by DemolitionSquid

Its nice to know I'm not completely insane.

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Well, let's not jump into hasty conclusions :p

This reminds me of a joke you may not heared: A guy is driving his car, when suddently a wheel goes off. He exits the car and finds the wheel, but not the bolts.
He doesn't knows what to do for some time, until he hears a voice that says: "Hey! You, there! Just unscrew a bolt from every remaining wheel, and you can keep 3 bolts per wheel!".
He looks up, and notices the guy saying that is inside a madhouse, so he says to him: "That's brillant! Why are you inside a madhouse??".
"Because i'm crazy, not stupid".

:D

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Originally Posted by pure.Wasted

Credit goes to DS a few threads down. It's been thrown about for some days now, and I think the idea merits its own thread.

Why I love it: it's an incredibly intuitive, SC-esque way to go about a more complicated problem. The Thor is supposed to tank damage for smaller units, right? Like the MG does for Night Elves in WC3? Well, the MG has an ability called "Taunt." But we play SC, we don't like Taunt (because it's too gimmicky, it's arbitrary, it takes control away from your units, and so on). Thor as LOS blocker accomplishes the same feat -- enemy ranged units will ALWAYS go for the Thor first, and as long as your units stay directly behind them, they will be mostly safe from enemy fire, while perfectly able to dish it out.

A walking line of Thors with a mass of MM behind it would absolutely demolish Siege Tank clumps, which is what the unit was initially made for. It'd also take advantage of a fun new SC2 mechanic by giving control of it to the player. Thor would probably have to lose his cannons to compensate -- but, really, they're a very arbitrary ability that adds nothing to his role as meatshield. We won't mind.

Thoughts?

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Actually it might be a nice idea, but couldn't it be a double-edged sword if the Thor also prevented your own ranged units from getting close enough to do their job?

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Originally Posted by phazonjunkie

Actually it might be a nice idea, but couldn't it be a double-edged sword if the Thor also prevented your own ranged units from getting close enough to do their job?

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Absolutely. So you can't just A+click your army and hope it all goes according to plan. I don't think that was the idea with the Thor to start, but I think it's regressed to that as they've run out of ways to make it do what it was intended to do.

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Originally Posted by phazonjunkie

Actually it might be a nice idea, but couldn't it be a double-edged sword if the Thor also prevented your own ranged units from getting close enough to do their job?

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God forbid Blizzard include Thor micro in SC2.

It's really just a matter of choice: do you attack with just your Thors from range, or move in closer and make them take more tanking heat.

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Originally Posted by DemolitionSquid

God forbid Blizzard include Thor micro in SC2.

It's really just a matter of choice: do you attack with just your Thors from range, or move in closer and make them take more tanking heat.

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Heh..looks like Pure.wasted beat you to it, but I guess I hadn't considered that.
It probably would make sense that you'd have to manually move your Thors relatively close to the enemy to take full advantage of it w/o it backfiring. But then The Thor's movement speed would have to be rather fast...much moreso than it is now to avoid bogging down your advance.

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Originally Posted by phazonjunkie

Heh..looks like Pure.wasted beat you to it, but I guess I hadn't considered that.
It probably would make sense that you'd have to manually move your Thors relatively close to the enemy to take full advantage of it w/o it backfiring. But then The Thor's movement speed would have to be rather fast...much moreso than it is now to avoid bogging down your advance.

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Not necessarily. That might be the easiest solution given the stats the unit's sitting on now, but there are other (possibly preferable) ways to go about it. For instance, if we take down the Thor's damage but beef up its HP considerably, even a slow-moving army with the Thors in the lead would be perfectly capable of getting within range of the enemy.

This sounds like a very cool idea to me.

Bump! Come on guys, more discussion. This idea has potential. Y/N?

Almost everyone here likes it. Just needs to be posted somewhere the Devs can see it.

I myself refuse to visit the B.Net forums cesspool under any circumstance, so someone else will have to do the honors.

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Originally Posted by DemolitionSquid

Almost everyone here likes it. Just needs to be posted somewhere the Devs can see it.

I myself refuse to visit the B.Net forums cesspool under any circumstance, so someone else will have to do the honors.

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You owe me. For this? A lot.

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Originally Posted by pure.Wasted

You owe me. For this? A lot.

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I owe no one anything. I've given up on changing SC2. Blizzard's blind implementation of craptastic gimmicks like the Thor, Roach, and APM sinks has created a disappointed apathy in me I hoped I would never feel. As far as I'm concerned, Blizzard betrayed me, and betrayed the original SC. I'm done fighting. Its time for others to take a sword.

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Originally Posted by DemolitionSquid

I owe no one anything. I've given up on changing SC2. Blizzard's blind implementation of craptastic gimmicks like the Thor, Roach, and APM sinks has created a disappointed apathy in me I hoped I would never feel. As far as I'm concerned, Blizzard betrayed me, and betrayed the original SC. I'm done fighting. Its time for others to take a sword.

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Oh, yeah, 'cause I've been sitting on the sidelines all this time. :p

Here's the thread for anyone who wants to show their support on those distant shores: http://forums.battle.net/thread.html...290&sid=5000#0

Speaking of LOS blockers, what if a unit could throw a smoke grenade that would act as an LOS blocker? Much like forcefield but blocks sight instead of pathing?

Thor or reaper maybe?

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Originally Posted by don

Speaking of LOS blockers, what if a unit could throw a smoke grenade that would act as an LOS blocker? Much like forcefield but blocks sight instead of pathing?

Thor or reaper maybe?

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The Overseer had an ability like this, called "Spore Cloud."

I think it'd be really interesting if each race had some different way to take advantage of the LOS mechanics. The Thor would be a LOS block unit, the Overseer's Spore Cloud would be a castable LOS block area, and for the Protoss... uh... I'll get back to you on that one. ;)

Just wanted to repost my suggestion here, because the post on B.net is already off-topic...

I think it would be a great idea to toy with. I'd really like the Thor to have the role of a massive machine that soaks up damage, and this seems like a cool way to make that happen. Maybe even think about giving it a different sort of attack, something with a shorter range?

Just throwing ideas out there, we could even take this a step further to make the Thor more of a unique unit. We could take the outfitting idea from Battlecruisers and give them to the Thor, e.g. you could give one Thor extra armor and maybe flamethrowers, and have another Thor with AA batteries on it's back. The Thor with flamethrowers would have a shorter range, and naturally block line of sight for the Marines behind it.

Count me in. I also like the idea as well as I felt the Thor needed something to make it a more effective tank. It would certainly need some tweaks to the stats and some testing to get the balance right, but it's one of the more nicer solutions I've read.

Dustin Browder:
Yes. Or if you were mean you could call it the »super goliath«, because it's a very powerful anti-air weapon. I build it for a couple of reasons. I'm using it largely against other Terran players where its all-round nature helps me against marauders and banshees which are a pretty significant threat in Terran versus Terran games. I have also gotten some use out of the Thor against Zerg opponents who go for Roaches and Mutalisks. Because the Thor's powerful cannons can break a roach line and its anti-air-missiles can thrash a Mutalisk threat. But when I'm facing a lot of Zerglings or a lot of marines or a large force of zealots and immortals, I'm not feeling a lot of love for the Thor. Still, it's got a lot of uses. So if you have a lot of factory units and a lot of money, it's never a bad idea to build some Thors........






So Dustin Browder has admitted that in it's current incarnation it's not very popular. The 'still has it's uses' bit seems to be a bit resigned of this fact.


He also didn't mention whether or not it was effective against tank lines....