StarCraft II 0.8.0.14593 Patch Notes

[Aldrius]

If the Stalker was at least cost-effective vs Roaches, the Protoss player could use other tech paths.

They are cost-effective against roaches... and in your base photon cannons actually do work. Not on their own, but with a zealot wall or something they can bring down roaches pretty quickly. And of course they're detectors so they put an end to any burrow-shenanigans. (Though in this case you need to micro, because the unit versus burrowed units AI is stupid. Burrowed roaches have a lower priority than unburrowed roaches so they change targets. They fixed this for Infestors but didn't for Roaches for some reason...)

The Zerg also have a problem with Roaches themselves, why is it so common to go mass Roaches? Massing one kind of unit shouldn't be considered good gameplay.

Because they're effective? There's obviously a way for Protoss to beat them without Immortals because people do it.

Come on! That's the new Blizzard speech, but taking a look at BW's damage system and the units, a lot of them are hard counters:
Firebat: hard counter against Small Ground units.
Goliath: hard counter against Large Air units.
Vulture: hard counter against Small Ground units.
Valkyrie: hard counter against Small Air units.
Siege Tank: hard counter against Large Ground units, but in mass they can wipe pretty much everything before they get close.
That's from 9 Terran combat units, excluding spellcasters (and i should had excluded the Ghost also, as it's mostly an spellcaster)

Those are all Terran units. Terran by far have the most hard counters of any race. Protoss are kinda in-between. (Though out of everything you've listed, I'd say only the firebat and vulture are all that hard. Siege tanks too I suppose.)

And Zerg by far have the least hard counters.

I never said they nerf the Roach, i said they focus their attack. If instead of 16 dmg, they get 8 +8 vs Light, or whatever combination is deemed fair

How is that NOT a nerf? Zerg units generally don't have damage bonuses ANYWAY. But if you just lowered the Roach's damage versus armored targets (especially if you cut it in HALF) then it's going to become super-vulnerable even to stuff like hellions and whatnot.

I wouldn't mind if they gave it a small damage cut, like down to 14 or something (and then raised their attack speed so their overall DPS stays the same, but is more affected by armor), or maybe traded one of their armor points for some thing else. (Like some slight regen above ground)

, they will continue to rape Zealots the same, but won't rape the Stalkers, and so the Protoss player won't be forced into going Robotics, and could choose Starport, or Council, depending on the situation.

Archons, Chargelots (with +1 weapons), Blinkers and Void Rays are all really good against Roaches anyway. Phoenix can even take some of the edge off a roach army as well. And if you go something like Chargeray, then you can just go down to Phoenix if he starts massing Mutalisks.

You're only in trouble if he starts getting burrowmove Roaches or something.

[Norfindel]

You must micro Siege Tanks to make them useful. Put them in the right place and Siege up, and they become powerful. Don't Siege Mode them, and just A-move them like an idiot, and they'll die quick and bloody to anything.

Oh, yes, agreed. I imagined a guy telling Tanks in siege mode to attack-move

It happens all the time, in both SC1 and SC2. Roaches force a player to either micro or tech. Those who can't micro, tech. For a Terran, the Immortal screws up Factory tech. They can either build a bunch of Marines and A-move, or micro Ghosts and keep most of their tech pattern intact.

But don't you think there's a problem when that happends because of a unit that costs almost nothing? The Protoss have 3 units in T1: the Zealot, the Sentry, and the Stalker, and none of them can handle Roaches.

I see Zerg players using Roaches in all matchups, isn't that too one-dimensional? Isn't it a clear indicator that something is wrong about that unit?

Also, i never seen a video where Stalkers can actually win a battle against Roaches for cost.

That still constitutes a nerf. Turning a unit that can handle more units into one that can handle fewer makes it less useful. And therefore is a nerf.

Ok, it can be seen like that, but IMHO tanking units aren't supposed to handle most units easily, they should have weaknesses. Hell, all units must.

Just to leave clear what's my view on balance: all units should counter something, and be countered by something. The advantage should be pretty strong, as to require heterogeneus armies to be used, but should not get close to the point that the countered unit cannot operate in it's presence.

For example: i have the opinion that BW's air units ruined air balance completely (yeah, still more), including the Corsair, of course, that ripped small air units like there was no tomorrow. More expensive air units, actually.

They are cost-effective against roaches... and in your base photon cannons actually do work. Not on their own, but with a zealot wall or something they can bring down roaches pretty quickly. And of course they're detectors so they put an end to any burrow-shenanigans. (Though in this case you need to micro, because the unit versus burrowed units AI is stupid. Burrowed roaches have a lower priority than unburrowed roaches so they change targets. They fixed this for Infestors but didn't for Roaches for some reason...)

I never seen a video where Stalkers are effective for cost vs Roaches. You can build 1.66 Roaches per the cost of one Stalker. When i see an army of 10 Stalkers defeating an army of 17 Roaches, i will believe they're effective.

How is that NOT a nerf? Zerg units generally don't have damage bonuses ANYWAY. But if you just lowered the Roach's damage versus armored targets (especially if you cut it in HALF) then it's going to become super-vulnerable even to stuff like hellions and whatnot.

Maybe you didn't read the part when i say "or whatever ratio is considered fair"? Anyways, a tanking unit is supposed to have pretty strong counters. All tanking units have, because if they're resistant to damage vs everything, and it's attack is effective vs everything, you shouldn't be surprised when the players start to use that unit against everything, ruining any gameplay richness the game could had.
Zerg generally don't have bonusses, and generally don't have 16 dmg in a unit you can mass like crazy with 145 hp and 2 armor. Look, only the Guardian, the Ultralisk and the Lurker had more than 16 attack, and look at their cost: http://classic.battle.net/scc/zerg/zstats.shtml

I wouldn't mind if they gave it a small damage cut, like down to 14 or something (and then raised their attack speed so their overall DPS stays the same, but is more affected by armor), or maybe traded one of their armor points for some thing else. (Like some slight regen above ground)

It doesn't even needs to be a cut, add a +x vs Light bonus for any damage you take out from the base dmg.

Archons, Chargelots (with +1 weapons), Blinkers and Void Rays are all really good against Roaches anyway. Phoenix can even take some of the edge off a roach army as well. And if you go something like Chargeray, then you can just go down to Phoenix if he starts massing Mutalisks.

You're only in trouble if he starts getting burrowmove Roaches or something.

Archons don't seem reasonable to me to counter Roaches. They cost too much, and are too late in the tech tree.
Zealots with Charge and +1 attack seems like they could be a cost-effective counter.
Stalkers w/Blink, would be cost-effective if they can beat 1.66 times the amount of Roaches. Last time i checked, all units that require heavy micro to beat it's own cost of another unit cannot be said to be cost-effective. For example: nobody would say that Vultures are cost-effective vs Dragoons, even if progamers can do their magick with mines to make them explode like if they were. You cannot make a game that is balanced around progamers, unless your game is intended to be played mostly by them.
Void Rays, i suppose it's a matter of who can blow each other's base first.

[Nicol Bolas]

The Protoss have 3 units in T1: the Zealot, the Sentry, and the Stalker, and none of them can handle Roaches.

Let's assume that this is true. Reasonable use of Force Field and micro throws this into heavy doubt, but let's assume this is true.

All you need is one building more, for a Robo Facility, and all that goes away. At which point, the arrow swings the other way.

A Zerg player cannot afford to blindly make Roaches vs. a Protoss. If they do, Immortals will own them. And since any decent Protoss can keep a Zerg player from scouting their tech pattern with Overlords, there isn't much more than a guessing game until Lair tech and Overseers.

Of course, by then, it's too late.

Zerg generally don't have bonusses, and generally don't have 16 dmg in a unit you can mass like crazy with 145 hp and 2 armor. Look, only the Guardian, the Ultralisk and the Lurker had more than 16 attack, and look at their cost:

And what are the weaknesses of Roaches?

1: Incredibly slow.

2: Weak to any high-damage attack.

3: Not much actual damage output.

16 damage seems very impressive until you actually look at how it works out with their cooldown.

For example: nobody would say that Vultures are cost-effective vs Dragoons, even if progamers can do their magick with mines to make them explode like if they were.

Actually, they are. Even in unskilled hands, all you need to do is make a minefield, and unmicroed Dragoons can do nothing until Ovservers come out. You don't need anything more than "move to location" and "press button."

[newcomplex]

No, SC was never intended nor designed to work like that, it just happened to work like that, but it's ok, because planting Mines next to Dragoons also required a lot of micro form the Terran player, compare that with Roaches, and it should be obvious why there's a balance issue. Skill should also be balanced, you cannot ask for a player to micro and the other not to.

No. This isn't how SC is balanced, and it can't be balanced this way. It is only problematic if micro caps unevenly. The learning curve for the micro can be relatively imbalanced, this game is not balanced for copper leagues.

Unless the micro learning curve is absolutely absurd, SC has always been balanced with uneven learning curves among different strategies.

Mutalisk stacking is incredibly micro intensive, and an integral part of basic zerg play in SC1. Zerg in general was just significantly more micro intensive then both Toss and Terran. Their is no problem because once the steep learning curve is overcome however, all three races have scaleable micro components.

[Aldrius]

Ok, it can be seen like that, but IMHO tanking units aren't supposed to handle most units easily, they should have weaknesses. Hell, all units must.

Roaches are slow and have short-range.

For example: i have the opinion that BW's air units ruined air balance completely (yeah, still more), including the Corsair, of course, that ripped small air units like there was no tomorrow. More expensive air units, actually.

Well, the air model was screwed in general. Mutalisks could counter Corsairs in small numbers, though. The problem was that when you got lots of corsairs they countered lots of Mutalisks due to the AoE attack. I think that's why they experimented with overload for the Phoenix. Something that could be overcome with micro, but that would defeat Mutalisks if they got caught in the web.

I never seen a video where Stalkers are effective for cost vs Roaches. You can build 1.66 Roaches per the cost of one Stalker. When i see an army of 10 Stalkers defeating an army of 17 Roaches, i will believe they're effective.

That's not how it works. With force-field, Stalkers are effective. With some zealots, stalkers are effective. I mean, there's a reason terran players wall off their choke. Stalkers get killed by Roaches when roaches attack them, stalkers will deal a lot of damage to Roaches when they're not. So figure out some way to keep them off your stalkers. Or make use of guardian shield to cut down the roach's damage.

The problem a lot of people have in this instance is with zerglings, because it's hard to micro against them and they kill stalkers really quickly.

Maybe you didn't read the part when i say "or whatever ratio is considered fair"? Anyways, a tanking unit is supposed to have pretty strong counters.

It's a nerf no matter how much of it's damage you turn into +light damage.

All tanking units have, because if they're resistant to damage vs everything, and it's attack is effective vs everything, you shouldn't be surprised when the players start to use that unit against everything, ruining any gameplay richness the game could had.

It's not resilient to 'everything'. Anything with an armored bonus is going to kill it really fast. Anything with a lot of range is going to kill it really fast. Even marines kill them pretty quickly when you get stim.

Zerg generally don't have bonusses, and generally don't have 16 dmg in a unit you can mass like crazy with 145 hp and 2 armor.

16 damage with a slow rate of fire. The biggest problem is the armor. If they were going to improve protoss units against them, that would be the place to start. But they'd need to be compensated in some other way.

Honestly, 16 damage isn't all that much, it's mostly that they'll all survive to attack you a bunch of times that's problematic. I'm pretty sure zealots have better DPS for a lower cost. And they have almost as much survivability. And they move faster. And they're light, so they take bonus damage from less common things. (Generally more specialized units)

Look, only the Guardian, the Ultralisk and the Lurker had more than 16 attack, and look at their cost: http://classic.battle.net/scc/zerg/zstats.shtml

Lurker had AoE and 6-7 range, Ultralisk attacked about 3 times as fast and weren't nearly as slow. Guardians had 8 range.

It doesn't even needs to be a cut, add a +x vs Light bonus for any damage you take out from the base dmg.

No! No damage bonus. It doesn't need it.

Archons don't seem reasonable to me to counter Roaches. They cost too much, and are too late in the tech tree.

They counter them if you get them.

Stalkers w/Blink, would be cost-effective if they can beat 1.66 times the amount of Roaches. Last time i checked, all units that require heavy micro to beat it's own cost of another unit cannot be said to be cost-effective.

The more stalkers you have, the more effective against Roaches they become. That hasn't changed. When you get 12+ stalkers you start one-shotting Roaches. When you get blink you can start to kite them a lot more easily.

Void Rays, i suppose it's a matter of who can blow each other's base first.

...no it isn't. Void Rays kill Roaches very quickly. And the Roaches can't fire back. If you've got sufficient zealots you'll be able to hold them off long enough for the Void Rays to kill them.

[Skyze]

well, after 20ish games (Platinum division 8 - rank 11 with 13-5 record) I can say that the balance is getting close.

I can definately feel the stalker boost, and the roaches nerf.. but It was needed I guess.. stalkers seem pretty strong now, not overpowered strong but strong enough that they are worth buying. The changes seem pretty good.

I dont see any major issues so far, im quite impressed with the balance actually. I just need to stop sucking and take top 5 in this division.. I lose games from my stupidity, like getting too much econ/drones and they push in with a force I thought I could hold off with afew roaches.

I know it wasnt in the patch notes, but did they nerf the roaches normal regen? Like not burrowed? They feel weaker for some reason.. I dunno..

[Nicol Bolas]

The learning curve for the micro can be relatively imbalanced, this game is not balanced for copper leagues.

Yes, it is. There simply aren't as many options.

A Protoss player facing Roaches can either get Immortals or micro Stalkers. If he can't micro Stalkers well enough, then he can go for the safer tech. As Protoss players become more skilled, skilled players will be able to avoid having to use Immortals and thus be freely able to combine Stalkers with things like Phoenixes, Stalkers with Blink, Zealots with Charge, or even High Templar/Void Rays or even Carriers.

The important part is that the Immortal still allows the Copper player to survive. It's not the most tech efficient counter, but it works for them.

And you can bet that Blizzard has, is, and will be making balance changes to make sure that, to a reasonable degree, the lower skill levels are balanced.

Mutalisk stacking is incredibly micro intensive, and an integral part of basic zerg play in SC1.

You have a strange notion of what constitutes "basic play." And knowing a trick that took people half a decade or more to find isn't "basic".

Muta micro is integral to C or better ranking ICCUP play. But it is far from "basic" for those of lower skill levels.

That's part of the problem with a group that becomes cloistered for so long. They start thinking that what's normal for them is normal for everyone.

[TheRabidDeer]

You have a strange notion of what constitutes "basic play." And knowing a trick that took people half a decade or more to find isn't "basic".

Muta micro is integral to C or better ranking ICCUP play. But it is far from "basic" for those of lower skill levels.

That's part of the problem with a group that becomes cloistered for so long. They start thinking that what's normal for them is normal for everyone.

Terran walling does not classify as basic play to you? If I remember right, it took at LEAST a few years for people to discover walling.

[Skyze]

since blizzard added in depots that can be raised/lowered, they are trying to gear people into using more walls.. Therefor, walls in SC2 is pretty close to basic.

[protoswarrior]

Terran walling is basic play now. In SC2 and in BW, walling in has many uses and advantages. Denying early scouting can yield a lot of surprises by the time Protoss or Zerg get their detectors/scouting units (Overseer changeling) into the Terran base. That is why it is basic play now.

Walling with depots is not the only way you can wall in, but in SC2, it is the best way (with rax initially of course).