DemolitionSquid Reviews HotS Multiplayer Changes

[DemolitionSquid]

I would disagree just with Observer, since Replicant comes from Robotic Facility, it is much easier to just make one Observer instead, it is much cheaper, it would be in really rare situations, where your Observer is dying, and you see enemy Observer, and quick you Replicant to copy it. So I would put Observer in Borderline.

And we still don't know if Warhounds are considered as massive, my assumption is that it is massive unit, since Terran needs something to crush Force Fields, and that thing is still pretty big, at least bigger than Archon that is also massive.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3Bh6UBQ1Y8 In game look if you hadn't seen it already.

Observer was in wrong category, thanks for pointing it out.

Edit: Upon reviewing the video, I'm comfortable putting Warhound in the Massive category.

[MulletBen]

I'm comfortable putting Warhound in the Massive category.

From Crota's topic.

[DemolitionSquid]

From Crota's topic.

Well ain't that interesting. Back to the Borderline we go... for now.

[RamiZ]

Yeah, I just remembered that picture, I still think that they are going to make it massive, Terran has no massive ground units except for Thor but I doubt that we will see much of a new Thor in competitive play.

[DemolitionSquid]

Just as a thought, do Terran really NEED a Massive ground unit? All their units are ranged, and the Terran forces most commonly caught in Force Fields are M&M bioballs, whom are supported by Medevacs which can lift them anyway. The only other effect Massive has is cannot be lifted by Phoenix, and since Warhounds are designed to kill Mutaballs, they should be just as effective vs Phoenix anyway.

[Hamshank]

In that picture, the Terrans are pretty prepared (even if outnumbered), yet how the hell are they going to counter this if they don't have air? Proto air can just hide out of range and mineral strike and get back out

W/O starport, terran=screwed

[Drake Clawfang]

Somewhat on topic, anyone else curious what impact it would have on the game if the Queen was a massive unit? Zerg wouldn't lose all their Queens in one drive-by Phoenixing, and maybe an offensive Queen or two in the early-mid game to break a FF? Carry in an Overlord, drop in the heat of a battle.

[Todie]

In that picture, the Terrans are pretty prepared (even if outnumbered), yet how the hell are they going to counter this if they don't have air? Proto air can just hide out of range and mineral strike and get back out

W/O starport, terran=screwed

it can be tricky to handle air harassment without one or two vikings out, but i suspect warhound+marines will do well enoguh even thoguhw arhounds can be lifted, tehy cant realyl be lifted from far away... then there s the option t have ghsots out adn land EMP on ome of the energy suing P air units (phoenix/oracle).. and as always, as long as vikings have cover by marines, they reign supreme with range, even if you just have one out, the tactical advantage of that 9 attack-range is tremendous.

... then again, if you dont preempt such heavy ai-harass-play with getting a viking out & positioning it safely, oracles are capable of delaying that viking production quite alot if you arnt careful...

[Cotcan]

For the most part I agree with Demolition Squid.

The battle form of the hellion sounds like a cool idea, but sounds like they are trying to bring back the firebat without bringing him back.

The Thor being a super unit, will turn the Thor into what the Mothership was, unused.

Although I do believe toss needed a better anti air, the Tempest is not the way I would have liked to go. It sounds like they toke the viking made it toss looking, and then called it a capital ship with a couple additions.

Toss does need a harassment unit, but not another one that is from the stargate. Terran can use the hellion to harass, the zerg can use mutas to harass. The Oracle is just giving toss another way to harass at the end of the game, not where it was needed. That defeated the purpose, and forces you to go air to harass at all. We need to be able to harass from the gateway or robo, not another harass unit in the air. It also can't kill workers, which makes harassing with it only good for the short term. You would have to attack very soon. Being able to kill workers is a much better way.

The replicant makes toss sound like they can't play well without using the other two races units. It also sounds like the sentry's hallucination ability, except it does damage. Thank you Blizzard for duplicating and modifying an ability into a unit.

The Mineral Siphon ability is just another way for zerg to get more money, as if they had problems getting money in the first place.

The Viper's ability to yank units to it sounds op to me. Why? Imagine you have a nice group of stalkers and collsi. You attack the zerg, and are on the verge of winning the game. Your collsi are cutting right through their lings. Then out of no where you collsi are pulled towards the zerg army, and then killed by the massive amount of lings. Your army is quickly crashed and you lose the game. Why? Because you used a single ability and you lost the game. If that ability makes it to the real game, all the bronze people will start complaining, and that they are losing because of one little ability.

[DemolitionSquid]

Few opinion updates:

The more I think about it, the more I lothe the Replicant. I play Protoss to play Protoss. If I wanted to play Zerg or Terran, I would play Zerg or Terran. Just as Mind Control was high tech in SC:BW, and Neural Parasite is limited in use in SC:WoL, I think the Replicant's role and power should be minimal.

Replicant should not be required to be competitive. Even Hallucination was altered from SCBW to SC:WoL to only phantom Protoss units. Forcing Protoss to use the other races units in this manner makes Protoss seem unable to compete on their own merit. Its a needless gimmick.

I really, really think the Oracle should be a Robotics unit. Protoss needed an alternate harrassing unit other than Phoenix. What we got was a unit that's in the exact same tech placement as the Phoenix. It just doesn't seem to solve the issue nearly as well as it could. Going for your main harrassing unit shouldn't curb you into such a strict tech path (Stargate). Putting it at the Robo gives it more flexibility because of the wider array of units you already get there.

As for the Viper's "Get over here!," I think having it with a very high energy cost should limit its power enough to be balanced. A "one use per major engagement" ability.