What quirks do you still not like about Starcraft 2?

[RamiZ]

I don't think it will be abused. It's most useful when the enemy is moving over a choke, doesn't damages anything by itself, and the Disruptors costs a lot of gas for that tier. The only way you're going to be owned by this, is if the enemy completely closes a choke after half your army has moved over.
It lasts 15 seconds, and has only range 3. You should be able to see the Disruptors before it's too late.

They cost a lot of gas, but you will always be able to make 2 of them, and that is enough to close the choke 4 times :/ As I said, it needs higher energy cost.

[Justamonster]

So I would like to discuss my main concern about SC2 and what I seem like undeveloped, unappealing and shallow in it: the Zerg.

It has been said numerously – Zerg doesn’t have anything new or game braking. Moreover, the Zerg lost many things, which were viable choices for Zerg, while hasn’t gain anything really worthwhile:
Muta>Guardians transition; Muta or Lurker choice on T2; heavy T2 or fast T3; detection by default; Zerling rush; Defilers anyone?

Additionally, SC2 Zerg doesn’t have potentially good and strategically deep units/abilities combinations compared to SCBW:
Defiler’s Dark Swarm +Lurkers/Zerlings/Ultra/Hydra (against heavy air); Defiler’s Plague + 1 Muta or Hydra (vs mech or air)/Hydras or Lurkers (vs infantry); mass Hydra + Lurkers (it’s actually viable in BW compared to SC2); Queen’s Ensnare + Lurkers (yes, you read it right: Jaedong proved its effectiveness vs Fantasy); Zerlings + Ultra (in SC2 Zerlings not so important in this combo); Muta + Scourges, etc.

It all can lead to strait lined tech path for Zerg players each game, which can made Zerg pretty predictable, shallow and unappealing.


To elaborate:

Zerling:
received Baneling upgrade (which is cool), but it’s a whole new unit, nothing new for Zerling itself.

Why not to give it some new and interesting abilities/upgrades (for example: Zerling could have bigger collision factor/volume, which would restrain Zerlings’ movements and ability to insta surround, but give it instead of speed upgrade (or additionally) an upgrade, which would have “wings” like effect: Zerlings would gain a passive ability to surpass some obstacles (like other friendly units or even foes) to some extent by leaping after the upgrade, which would allow insta surround and unrestrained movement (we saw something similar in-game, when Zerlings still had wings))


Hydralisk:
Absolute epitome of boringness in one unit – not a tiny spec of originality, while having so much potential to improvements (to make thing worse, Lurker upgrade has been moved to T3, which limits hydra even more).

Why not to give Hydra some interesting quirk, which involves skill (for example, Hydra could have real Melee Type of attack, which would have some advantageous properties and would activate as it’s now (when Hydra is close enough to its target): skilled player could use move-&-shoot micro to close in, while opponent would try to not get hit by Hydras’ melee etc.).


Roach:
Was designed for purpose of “tanking” for early and mid game. But in all of its incarnations failed to do so (Roach was used like main battle unit or wasn’t used at all). Now, it’s chilling out at T2 trying to replace Lurker.

To the point, Roach by itself has pretty good potential while having high regen rate (burrow/unburrow and removing from combat possibilities for purpose of regeneration), but lacks some strategic depth and overall effectiveness (detectors would kill burrowing and low HP would render Roaches useless in mid-late game).

Why not to concentrate on “tanking” abilities of Roach, specializing it mainly for support role (give Roach high armor, return its high regen, give it some HP bust, but reduce it’s attack potential, but add non stackable acidic effect to it’s attack (reduces armor and/or slowly reduces HP per second of mecha/building) – it should tank and support, but not to kill an opponent; additionally, for strategic depth it can be morphed from Hydra; etc.).


Lurker:
T3 Lurker limits Zerg’s strategic variability drastically. Even it’s “siege” upgrade doesn’t cut it: Zerg needs Lurker at T2 (“siege” upgrade can stay at T3). Moreover, Lurker can utilize some viable and deep mechanics, which will add some variability of strategic choices for the Zerg (for example movement (slow) underground (it can be additional upgrade)).


Infester:
Don’t get me started on Infester – except improved looks and underground movement it got nothing as good as Defiler’s abilities…


Mutalisk:
Really godly unit in SCBW lost its potency and depth in SC2: inability to stay stacked long enough and abundance of strong AA units made usefulness of this unit quite questionable. Fire on the move may improve performance of Mutas, but it may kill any depth in the unit (mass Muta “1a” to the opponent’s base). To make things worse, Mutalisk has been deprived of its morphing capabilities. Too many nerfs for one unit, don’t you think?

I’m not a huge fan of War Craft, but ability to morph into cocoon in the air and then reborn into newly Mutalisk (for purpose of healing) would be at least decent on Muta.


Corruptor:
Bland AA flyer with potentially good passive ability, but implementation doesn’t have any depth: created “spore-turrets” (or whatever it’s called) have timed life, very fragile, and don’t have impressive attack/damage. Only useful thing about them it’s an ability to fire not only AA but AG also. But necessity to kill opponent’s flyers for “spore-turrets” pretty much kills the whole point about it.

Why not to revamp the ability and allow Corruptor to transform flyers into “spore-turrets” for a certain period of time without killing it after set amount of spores on ANY target aircraft and not after Corruptors kill the targeted flier (for example any flyer would be able to take 10 spores, before transformation into “spore-turret”, thus big flyers would fail vs Corruptors, while smaller ones would win (so you need to kill them with different AA units)). And/Or there can be different forms of transformation for each flyer (for example infested Carrier instead attacking could produce scourges (not my idea) etc.).

Broodlord:
Completely unchanged Guardian with a new skin and silly attack animation. Except, it morphs from Corruptor and not from Muta, which deprives Zerg of another tactical choice (even if it seems logical to kill everything in the air than transform to anti ground – transformation Muta>Guardian represents much stronger and deeper strategic choice).

Nydus worm/Network:
In current incarnation Nydus Network system is no more than Nydus Canal system (slightly upgraded), while initial idea behind Nydus Worm was much broader and effective strategically.
Why not to revert it to the way it was intended (Nydus Worm was able to “pop up” everywhere with vision)? Considering absence of cliff-jumpers what so overpowered in that mechanics for Zerg? Why do you need to use crutch like creep drop system to relocate you units while Protoss can do it much faster and easier while having cliff-jumpers? Was Zerg supposed to be the most mobile race?

And if it’s really so crucial for balance why not to give a player an option: Nydus Worm can pop up anywhere with vision, but will wither like any other Zerg building without the Creep; so if a player wants to preserve it, he/she needs to Creep Drop it. Moreover, for a defending player there will be still more than one way to counter Nydus Worm.

Just like that - simple and elegant.

Queen:
One of the most interesting and original initially unit has been cut down pretty badly (what so bad in Queen’s Morphing?). And ‘her’ abilities still are uninspiring and shallow.

Spawn Larvae – crutch like ability witch heavily overlaps with Hatchery’s one: actually to spawn larvae. Everyone is so fond of it only because it’s really powerful macro ability (compared with other race unique ones). But in fact it’s the same ability that Hatchery has and you can gain it by building additionally Hatchery. So the ability isn’t even slightest original or strategically deep: it’s just powerful (Queens cost less than Hatchery obviously).

Amplified by inability of other Queen’s abilities to compete with Spawn Larvae, it creates additional amount of strategically unjustified clicks (or busy work if you will).

Why not to differentiate Queens from Hatcheries by revamping Spawn Larvae to extent when other Queens abilities could compete with it (for example, Queen could actually spawn 1 or 2 larvae from ‘herself’ directly at battlefield or on the creep etc.)

Btw, Queen spawns from Hatchery directly and not from larvae? Why so? If it’s so crucial for balance at least there should be additional visuals (for example: visually different larva spawns from hatchery and starts morphing into the Queen).

Creep:
The most beautiful thing about the Creep is practically infinite amount of possibilities for creativity. And Blizzard can’t though anything better than to give the Creep ‘speed-up’ ability which overlaps with Nydus Worm btw. Moreover it gives Zerlings ability to insta-kill all scouting workers and an opponent can do nothing about it (no more epic probe survival by Bisu or ninja SCV by terrans etc.).

In other words the ‘speed-up’ ability of the Creep not only lacks strategic depth and variability of uses, it’s even works against the core (and without a doubt important) elements of the game, amplifying shortcomings of already imperfect game engine.

So, if an ability of Creep must be focused around ‘speed’, why not to revert it to the way that it would ‘slow down’ enemy non-hovering units? Creep will retain its anti harassing capabilities without scouting restriction (workers are hovering units); moreover it will open many interesting strategic possibilities for the Zerg (Creep Tumor via Creep Drop at the choke points etc.).

Buildings (Morphing):
My main gripe with the Zerg’s building is cluttered main base, which provides un-zerg-ish feeling, reduces race diversity and lowers efficiency of ‘tech drops’ (drops with purpose of killing Zerg key structures for the sake of reducing macro efficiency: it’s good for the Zerg but not necessary good for the game, coz it’s an additional limitation).

As a solution more building could morph into each other, not only Spire or Hatchery: Spawning Pool for example could be morphed into Baneling Nest; Hydralisk Den could be morphed into Deep Warren and/or Roach Cavern etc.



Aaaand, it’s only the Zerg’s `quirks`. I’ll spare you from another 2 walls of text about Terran and Protoss lol.

As you can see, there are solutions (in form of examples) for each `quirk` I don’t like in SC2 now. In other words: it is constructive criticism. Thus I expect the same approach in your responses.

[Noise]

I very much agree with you with regards to the Lurker, Roach, Mutalisk and Infestor. Because of either their nerfs or tech tree placement have lost a lot of their power.

[Ulkesh]

Really the only thing I don't like is the look of the Hellion. I haven't played the game so graphics is the only thing I can really judge.

All the other stuff... well that's what beta is for. Blizz knows that Zerg need a bit more work and I think they will look into every reasonable remarks the beta testers make.

[Iceman_jkh]

They cost a lot of gas, but you will always be able to make 2 of them, and that is enough to close the choke 4 times :/ As I said, it needs higher energy cost.

Something needs to happen. Make it channeling?

[RamiZ]

Something needs to happen. Make it channeling?

Nah it would lost its purpose, I would say energy cost higher for sure! And the another thing can be shorter duration, destructible Forcefield with about 150 hp or more, so its good early game, but lost it effectiveness mid/late game, since it is pretty much stupid that Army of 20 Ultralisks and 50 hydralisks, can be countered on the Choke, by 4 Disruptors and 5 Colossi or 6 High Templars or whatever, you get my point.