MULE’s and Mining

[ArcherofAiur]

Not my fault you're spewing nonsense.

Dont be rude even if I am spewing nonsense (which i wasnt). It doesnt help your arguement in the slightest.

No, its not. You need the minerals. The minerals do not need you. Without minerals, there are no units, no buildings. Without units and buildings, there's still minerals. The minerals came first, fool. Just like the egg.

How can you harvest minerals without SCVs which come from production buildings? Its a positive feedback loop. Anyway this is gettting off topic.

As K757 said: too many minerals is better than no minerals.

too many larvae is better than no larvae.

I have to bike 80 miles tomro so I have to get some sleep but post and ill reply tomro.

[Kimera757]

Kimera757 are we in disagreement that minerals require choice on how to spend them? (and i meant to put minerals in that quote instead of MULE. My mistake)

We are in disagreement that there is a choice on how to use MULEs, it seems. Or something. There is only one way to use MULEs -- to harvest minerals.

Because minerals are so important to the game, a player who uses MULEs always beat a player who doesn't, if their skill levels are anywhere close to each other. (It doesn't help that busywork is boring; people who are playing for fun will lose so often they'll leave battle.net, never to return.)

Or maybe not. Perhaps the player who isn't spending time macro-ing by making MULEs can win through reaper raids or what not (one reason why I'm not as convinced as Demolition Squid that MULEs are terrible; I'm trying not to project this on overly-macro-heavy StarCraft I) but it's entirely possible that Demo Squid is right and that the MULE-user always wins. And even if they don't ... there's still only one way to use MULEs.

What do larvae get you? Each one can give a drone, overlord, zergling, roach, corruptor, mutalisk, hydralisk, infestor, or ultralisk.) Note that you can use drones to get more minerals (if you don't mind paying up front for them) but you still have potentially eight more options.)

If you have two players, each using Spawn Larvae, they may come to different decisions. One may make drones, one may make zerglins, one may make hydralisks. Neither is guaranteed to win (it would be interesting to see if you can make enough drones to get an overwhelming economic advantage though). Or you can not use Spawn Larvae, and instead expand your creep (+30% speed; I don't think it's all that but lots of people would love creep highways) or use the queen as a combat monster, continually summoning Razor Swarms to back up her decent combat statistics. Or you can skip making queens altogether and simply make more hatcheries which will give you more larvae anyway (and maybe more drones). Even is spawning extra drones is "broken" it may still match making extra drones with extra hatcheries. Any of those strategies can give roughly equivalent benefits.

What options do MULEs give you? More minerals. That is all. What you do with the MULEs is busywork as it requires next to no thought.

With Spawn Larvae you have nine options if you've ascended the tech tree, and that's per larva, every time you make one, and you get 3-5 extra ones each time so that's 3-5 decisions per use (and they need not all be the same; eg make 4 zerglings and 1 hydralisks, or 6 zerglings instead). At minimum you have three choices: drones, overlords, or zerglings, since you need a spawning pool to make the queen in the first place.

So what's the problem with permanent MULEs? You no longer have the fast and constant screen switching that some fans consider exciting.

too many larvae is better than no larvae.

I disagree. Energy I wasted on larvae I'm not using can be spend on creep tumors (you have to have those, and I'd rather spend energy than drones on more permanent creep) or on Razor Swarms (great for base defense). Also, if you fill up a hatchery with extra larvae, they stop generating, and every 20 seconds (or however often a larvae automatically spawns for free) you've basically wasted one of the summoned larvae. Unlike minerals, where (if you're a poor player) you could store for half the game before using.

[DemolitionSquid]

Dont be rude even if I am spewing nonsense (which i wasnt). It doesnt help your arguement in the slightest.

Discrediting the author of the counter argument is always a viable strategy.

How can you harvest minerals without SCVs which come from production buildings? Its a positive feedback loop. Anyway this is gettting off topic.

You just don't get it. You need to mine minerals. Minerals don't need you to mine them. The minerals are in control, not you.

too many larvae is better than no larvae.

Except when you can't have any more larva, or when you have larva but no minerals and thus can't do anything either way.

[Triceron]

Theoretically

You could take off 5 SCV's off of minerals and make 5 facilities given that you've got enough minerals. Then you call down MULEs to replace the SCV's taken off for production. By the time the production is done, the SCVs can go back to work, and MULEs temporary effect will probably wear off

Essentially you're not going to lose out on production facilities by having Mules in play; you simply make more buildings to compensate. You're going to get the same amount, if not more minerals coming in due to MULE support, so why not spend it on more production facilities? There's no reason why not to have 3+ barracks if you can afford it and are getting more minerals in temporarily.

When you have a good number of production buildings, every other time you use MULE will give you extra resources to create many units at the same time, given you have enough supply. This would be perfect after sending some units off out to harass, which the Terrans seem to specialize at.

[unentschieden]

The MULE creates opportunity costs due to the need for Orbital Command energy. The alternative uses would be call supply (booring, I don´t even care if it´s balanced) and Scan is absolutely vital.
That would be the more important angle. Rather than expanding the MULEs role it should be REDUCED to make the alternatives stronger. The first layer would be the desicion between Planetary Fortress and Orbital Command. I´m not shure right now how good the PF is but I expect at least 50/50 if not more OCs.
Then the abilities in the OC itself. Scan is obvious, it´s need will depend on the importance of mobile detection (I expect the Raven to be gas heavy so you wouldn´t be able to compensate the lack of scan with more minerals)
Finally the 3rd one. Karune mentioned before that the main difference between PF and OC is local and global advantage. The OC is supposed to have abilities discoupled from it´s position. I think it would be more realistic to come up with something new here instead of changing the MULE concept (well they could make it permanent at least...).

[Crazy_Jonny]

I dont think the Mule should be given another ability. The whole point of it is it IS an ability... in unit form... hence why its timed.

One of the reasons Im not really against the mule atm is because of the drop pod, I just think itll be really useful to expanding (which was demonstrated in BR2), so I find the apm sink argument bogus. What they need to do is make the other abilites compete with the mule, the same way abilites on a unit compete with eachother. Minerals dont mean everything if... lets say: a bunch of dts are attacking you. Are you gonna cast another mule, no. So it helps break it from the monotony.

Proton Charge is another story.

[DemolitionSquid]

Scan is absolutely vital.

Assumption.

As I have stated many times before, most pros will keep enough energy for an emergency scan, and all other energy will be relegated to MULES. No one will use Supply calldown. Do not forget that Terran still have detection on their Missile Turrets, and they now have the Sensor Tower.

I´m not shure right now how good the PF is but I expect at least 50/50 if not more OCs.

Again, pro games, 100% OC, 0% PF. The extra minerals gained from having OC MULES will outweigh the defense provided by the PF, because those extra minerals can be used for other static defenses, and anything else you may want.

[unentschieden]

Assumption.

As I have stated many times before, most pros will keep enough energy for an emergency scan, and all other energy will be relegated to MULES. No one will use Supply calldown. Do not forget that Terran still have detection on their Missile Turrets, and they now have the Sensor Tower.



Again, pro games, 100% OC, 0% PF. The extra minerals gained from having OC MULES will outweigh the defense provided by the PF, because those extra minerals can be used for other static defenses, and anything else you may want.

Last we heard only Sensor Towers get Detection. Still what you bring up are balance issues. If the alternatives to MULEs are useless they need to be improved or replaced, simple as that. If scan is unimportant the enemys possibly have lacking ability to stop scouting.


Your suggestion actually makes the MULE worse, why bother with anything else given that?

True the ability to drop anywhere is underutilised - intentionally. Karune stated that initially each drop pod carried 3 MULEs but that was to powerfull as scouting tool.

The actuall reason for the mapwide drop is that a OC in your outmined main can still provide a benefit for other expansions. And since the 3x while saturated Mining really speeds up mining that might occur more often.

If you want mines anywhere on the map why not drop them directly via OC instead of giving it to the MULE?


The idea isn´t to simply assume what youre predicting as truth. Shure it would end up like that in a "proper" game but that never happens, no plan survives contact with the enemy.

PF need to be viable in vulnerable positions. OCs not. That is the primary balancing requirement. Secondary is to make non-MULE abilities attractive.
If Blizzard doesn´t get this to work they should let the CC produce MULEs directly.

[DemolitionSquid]

Last we heard only Sensor Towers get Detection. Still what you bring up are balance issues. If the alternatives to MULEs are useless they need to be improved or replaced, simple as that. If scan is unimportant the enemys possibly have lacking ability to stop scouting.

Last I heard Turrets still had detect.

Your suggestion actually makes the MULE worse, why bother with anything else given that?

True the ability to drop anywhere is underutilised - intentionally. Karune stated that initially each drop pod carried 3 MULEs but that was to powerfull as scouting tool.

The actuall reason for the mapwide drop is that a OC in your outmined main can still provide a benefit for other expansions. And since the 3x while saturated Mining really speeds up mining that might occur more often.

If you want mines anywhere on the map why not drop them directly via OC instead of giving it to the MULE?

Please ensure its clear this is directed at the OP, not me.

[Kimera757]

Last I heard Turrets still had detect.

Check the Korean info at StarCraft Legacy news... can't wait for beta, so we can be sure that everything reported is correct.