Beta Request Lounge: Setting up first SC2 RPG Game

[Gifted]

While preparing a thread for the Beta request lounge, I found their 1000 character limit restrictive. So instead of spamming the forums with another thread like this, I'm going to place it here.

Origin:

The idea came from good discussion in the "Build/Strategies to try" thread in the Beta Request Lounge and "Let's learn counters" thread in SC2. I will act as mediate/report on a forum fabricated battle between two individuals on an SC2 map. It will involve some responsibilities which will be written as follows and require a basic understand of the game play mechanics and tools available.

While some might not understand how this will truly work, you need to consider that Starcraft at it's root core is making decisions, performing the decisions and reacting to the opponents decisions based on an environment that you've been put into.

Personal Thought: If you keep the perspective that this is a fun match to examine, not "this person should win", you will get the most out of this experience.

Responsibilities:

1. As GM, I have the responsibility to:

• Calculate all the resources daily and provide them to players
• Receive actions from players and interpret how the gameplay will play out.
• Use any tools neccessary to help depict the facets of their interaction.
• Keep up to date with the discussion thread
• Write the report daily based on the results. Do so in a manner that is fun, entertaining, fair, and accurate as possible.
• Attempt to write the report in a way that is easier for the players to enjoy their roles as well. (Keeping secret information secret until scouted.)
  

Personal Thought: I'm not a professional writer, but I can step back on my ability to write walls of text. ^_^ Remember that I'm still human, please don't grill me if you feel I made a mistake or don't agree with my call. I'm offering to do this voluntarily.

2. As a player, they have the responsibility to:

• Send PMs to the GM with their actions and resource usage daily by 6pm
• If a player can't make a deadline, they can nominate someone to take their turn.
• If a player can't find someone, they must give some sort of notice to the GM so he's aware.
• Attempt to keep knowledge correct for their actions. This means any taking of information outside of their PMs can be on the same terms as "hacking" and therefore would make the game less entertaining.
• Be willing to enjoy the experience and not care about "wins" or "losses" as much.

3. As an observer, you have the responsibility to:

• Discuss the battle in the discussion thread.
• Offer advice/opinions to the GM if he's having a difficult call for a certain day.
• If requested, offer advice/opinions to the players who are also welcome to discuss the matter.
• Understand that the final call is up to the GM, even if it is opposed to all advice/suggestions given.
• If the GM is doing his job right... enjoy the project.

Resources and Tools:

• Minerals
• Vespene Gas
• Supply / Control / Psi
• Build Time
• Actions
• Larva

Personal thoughts: I think this covers the majority of what we'll need. Feel free to suggest something else if needed.

Actions

At this time, I'm testing out the limits and needs of actions. I'm considering many forms as you can see in the examples below. Some are basic macro abilities are self explanatory and I feel that using MBS, queuing and other abilities should help consolidate actions into a single action.

In terms of micro, you can have active micro and reactive micro, The only major difference is if you are making the action or expecting an action. For this reason, reactive micro is always prefixed by an if.

As a GM, you can look at the overall balance of actions in a round and make judgements of their focus based on what you perceive. An example is that a person with majority reactive abilities will focus mainly on defense that round, while someone who has less reactive abilities and more active abilities will show more aggression. Macro abilities can derive from both and can show circumstances where aggression can take advantage of them.

This can also show the pace of a battle, people who focus on being reactive won't be moving around as much and can be considered passive. This can be to the point of turtling and will be broadcasted as such if it's a trend.

At this time, I'm considering 8 actions a turn, providing 40 build time as well. By effective use of actions, even if our players aren't professionals, they can have a semblence of accuracy of professionals. This means that even if their skill is lowkey in reality, this sort of game can be more entertaining as a whole.

Examples of Actions

• Spawn 6 Larva into Zerglings
• Warp in Pylon, Pylon, Pylon at [main]
• Navigate Marines to cliff south at [11]
• Setup half circle defense at top of my [main] ramp
• Micro: If needed, react defensively
• Scout for enemy expansions with probe at [6], [7], and [3].
• Micro: If tanks in middle unseige, attack with Zerglings and Hydra in middle.
• Micro: If Roaches advance at [main] choke, focus fire
• Micro: Continue Focus fire on roachs from last turn
• Send SCV from [main] to [3] to build command center
• Maynard 5 drones to [7] from [9]

Personal thoughts: Imagine having some of these actions from both sides each day, you should be able to write up some activity based on that. The hardest part is the math and external circumstances to consider and using personal judgement based on the data. I personally will enjoy it.


Final thoughts:

• No flaming and keep it constructive. We're all on the same side, even the players at the core. This is just a friendly theorycraft project which has the potential of a lot of fun.
• I am human and will make mistakes, sometimes to keep something going, you have to have faith in a call and move on. This will not be fully fair and we should accept that. Any incident that may frustrate a person should instead be looked at as an opportunity to explore why it frustrated you, and discuss the origin in a constructive manner. That is how I will approach it at least.
• I suspect I'll do some basic photoshops and communication throughout the day if possible to make sure I understand the actions of both sides. I'll also consider basic photoshops to help illustrate the reports during interesting portions of the game.
• I'd appreciate any feedback on this basic structure and let me know how you feel about it. As you can see I can polish things rather swiftly.

Well, to put it simply... What do you think?

[SaharaDrac]

Sounds excellent!

[Gifted]

I hate to do a shameless bump, but honestly, If I'm going to do this, I'd like to start soon. If I don't get another person who's willing to step up, I'm considering just scrapping the idea

[SaharaDrac]

I er... ummm...

[Islandsnake]

Syrilus seemed interested, give him a whirl?

I like the format, sounds pretty fun and hard work on you ;d

[Gifted]

Syrilus seemed interested, give him a whirl?

I like the format, sounds pretty fun and hard work on you ;d

I was in chit chat in PMs with him and he realized he wouldn't have the time for this. Kudos to him for being honest though. So thus I'm down to Sahara only That's the issue

[RonaldC]

I'll observe the first game.

[Gifted]

Moving ahead with IslandSnake (Terran) versus SaharaDrac (Protoss), first actions will be setup tomorrow. I'll figure out how to setup reports by tonight.,

[Gifted]

Alright, quick question before I proceed, What do you feel should be the resource I reference: SC wiki or SC2armory? I'm curious.

[Islandsnake]

Sc2armory imo.