Suggestion to chagne frenzy: buff spread on kill

[Todie]

So there seems to be general agreement on the infestors newest spell Frenzy being a one-trick pony; since it can only target one unit, and the unit that has by far most use of the spells arguably gimmicky features of preventing Neural parasite and Thor-stun-abillity (+ marrauders concussive shells which ultras are immune to anyway).

what has generally been proposed is to just make the ability area of effect. this would probably make it better and feel like a more rational use of time and infestor energy in general, but i think the spell would still feel quite bland.

also i think it would be near impossible to target it in rational ways on swarming melee units when battle and / or tactical movement had already started: we wouldnt want such an AoE buffing ability to promote generic clustering of allied units for the mere purpose of getting as many of them frenzied in one casting as possible!

I think we should all consider the idea behind the ability; though feeling like its plastered on to fix something, it does potentially fix something significant; NP & Thor canons are potentially quite nice abilities that has some sort of fit in the state of the game, but as it was, the very threat of them ever coming into play made ultralisks a very bold choice in these matchups.

... so how about we just change some of the abilities inner workings? rather, add some:

instead of making the ability standard friendly-buffing AoE, what if we made it spread when the frenzied unit ("the frenzee") was killed, or participated in killing an enemy unit?

i can conceive of several versions of this idea; whether there would be a separation between the frenzy buff cast directly by the Infestor and those spread from that one to other units, or they would all be the same.

if they all would be the same, whether spread on kill by or death of the frenzee, the effect should spread too aggressively, maybe not AoE but to at most 3-4 nearby allied units

if there were a separation between infester cast and unit to unit spread frenzy such that it could only spread from units that received the initial frenzy-cast, the AoE or number of targets could be made more significant.

the "spread on death" alternative doesnt really speak to me tbh; what epecialy comes to mind is the notion of casting on a zergling , positioning it in a cluster, and killing it.... also, this doesnt lend itself too well to casting on ultras: you shouldnt want / expect the ultralisk to die, but still you want the effect on it initially...

the spread on kill is more intresting... but what about AoE attacks that kill more than one unit in a hit? should this multiply the spread? maybe not. maybe there could be a cooldown of one second or something on the spread-effect.

Finally, its debatable to what extent the timer of the spell should be able to get renewed by further unit-by unit spread; this would most likely require a significant cut of duration, which in turn would make frenzy necessary to cast "in battle"

... to paint a picture of one of many possible directions this suggestion can go:

When a unit is frenzied, it will spread the frenzy to 2 nearby units any time it participates in killing a unit (if attacked unit dies within 1 second?)

the spread frenzy inherits the remaining duration on the initial frenzee.


This rewards focus-fire micromanagement in that such attention maximizes the utility you can get out each frenzy cast. However, even without that attention the effect will till spread, especially if you compensate with more castings of frenzy.

with duration begin inherited, it still retains that predictable factor of when it wears off, for you and your enemy. this keeps things rational and can have tactical implications.

You can cast it on one or two units in a pack of mutas just as they fly in to harass a worker line. Depending on how many castings you use, and if you target fire initially, it will take more or less kills (=time) for the effect to spread to all of the mutalisks in the pack.

if you rank up enough kills fast enough, you will have the effect spread through the pack giving +25% damage which can be very deadly, and even make the enemy hesitate about engaging the pack before the effect wears off (the duration isnt affected, so he/she can estimate when it wears off by estimating when you cast it)

Maybe you can even extend the power of such aggression by recasting the frenzy with perfect timing; retaining a position when you use the last of the damage boost on the pack to rank up even more kills, - which sets up for spreading the recast frenzy more easily (maybe more recently cast frenzy can allow "rewrite"; spreading to already frenzied units to increase the remaining duration on them)

This sounds powerful.

but lets remember its still on limited duration per casting, so to be used for aggressive harassment and pushing, it requires map control to allow for casting it on large enough scale and then asap forcing a battle that the opponent cant really stall or reposition.

also, keep a relativistic mindset: if you think this is a generally cool / good idea, remember that if too powerful, it can be tweaked. frenzy can be made tier3 (that seems quite realistic!). energy cost can be increased to 50 or 75. duration can be decreased to like 20 seconds. the spread can be limited to one unit at a time. etc... i definitely think its balancable.


Thoguhts on the general idea? Questions? possible iterations?

[Gifted]

Not a bad idea.. my personal opinion is to also allow it to be auto-cast with some basic "dynamics" to it's selection (Dont' choose the zergling over the ultralisk, etc) But maybe I'm just old fashioned

[GRUNT]

Your idea is certainly very cool and flavourful for Frenzy, Todie, although I think I would prefer a straight-up AoE damage buff spell. It's not that your idea is too complicated, but I find something about the arbitrariness of an AoE damage buff spell to be appealing; it's showy enough to be a spell I'd want to use, and I value the fact that it'd be more reliable, even if it's not as creative or potentially powerful as your suggestion.

[CrowToss]

The ultralisk is virtually the only unit I can imagine using Frenzy on, and I rarely build those. I would be in favour of turning Frenzy into a researchable upgrade for the ultra and giving the infestor a new spell.

[Hoywolf]

It might be boring... but they could make frenzy a reverse GS, you pop it and it adds damage to your army in range.

Or they can change the effect to increase movement spd as well, as Z off creep is not as mobile as it should be.

[Todie]

Not a bad idea.. my personal opinion is to also allow it to be auto-cast with some basic "dynamics" to it's selection (Dont' choose the zergling over the ultralisk, etc) But maybe I'm just old fashioned

this just wouldnt fix the flatness of the ability; it sill wouldnt have any energy-effective impact on smaller units, especialy not considering potential pathing issues etc; whas the range of this thing? it trigers when a unit atack the enemy and an infestor is nearby? .... it seems quite likely that the casting AI would often do shit you didnt want it to; given he complexity & variety of tactical situations in sc2 the "dynamics" to the casing mechanic you mention would probably be really hard to get right, and if not gotten right, the spell might be downright annoying to use with autocast.

Your idea is certainly very cool and flavourful for Frenzy, Todie, although I think I would prefer a straight-up AoE damage buff spell. It's not that your idea is too complicated, but I find something about the arbitrariness of an AoE damage buff spell to be appealing; it's showy enough to be a spell I'd want to use, and I value the fact that it'd be more reliable, even if it's not as creative or potentially powerful as your suggestion.

reliability might be an issue. but i wouldnt like what a straight up AoE Frenzy
would do o your priorities pre-battle; bunch everything up and spamm frenzy on it? that does NOT create an inspiring tactical situation! the notion of bunching up before battle even seems quite unintuitive to me: Hello one-ctrlGroup-syndrome?

we shouldnt care if the suggestion in itself is creative, but only what it would do to the game.

you shouldnt be in the mindset of making sure whatever happens, you have reliable abiliies on your units. make sure you keep a relativistic mindset; shit will get sorted out sooner or later, such that is reliable / crisp / balanced as it can be given the circumstances we need to still focus on those circumstances; the basic mechaics of units and abilities! youve spotted a "cool and flavorful idea" ... instead of disregarding it for reliability, try to figure out what alterations to the suggestion might make it adequately reliable! alternatively, counter my arguments against raight up AoE frenzy,, or consider hem in an alteration of that general idea!

off the top of my head, to increase reliability we could increase the rate and liklyhood of spreading it by allowing it to spread if attacked unit died as long as 2-3 seconds after being attacked.. unless this would make it too messy, we could also let the effect spread whenever the frenzee was killed (possibly only to one unit though, to remove benefits from killing your own units)

The ultralisk is virtually the only unit I can imagine using Frenzy on, and I rarely build those. I would be in favour of turning Frenzy into a researchable upgrade for the ultra and giving the infestor a new spell.

the 25% damage boost is certainly valuable to all zerg units, and the immunity to concussion is also useful. as a passive or activated ability on he ulralisk, it would feel almost as stae as it does now. IMO its clear that it needs new means of affecting more units wihout excessive clicking or energy use.

It might be boring... but they could make frenzy a reverse GS, you pop it and it adds damage to your army in range.

Or they can change the effect to increase movement speed as well, as Z off creep is not as mobile as it should be.

a reverse guardian shield would feel a bit tacky IMO ... i think we have enough "auras" in sc2 as it is. but this is highly opinionated. increased speed i just don know about. it would certainly be powerful. possibly broken.

these are new ideas that doesnt really have much to do with the current frenzy. so if you care to elaborate it. make a new thread on it. the topic in general does need more attention!