Real Time Strategy

So I know this is almost a week late, but I had a ridiculously busy weekend and things are just now settling back down.

Anyways, the patch is finally here: Notes

When the beta ended, I was dreading this patch a bit, simply because Tac spam was still the dominant strategy everyone was using, and it could be countered, but it just was not fun to fight against. However, Relic truly surprised me when I read the 1.5 notes, and after playing some 2v2 this patch, I can definitely say the game is very balanced right now. There are no glaring unbalances that I can think of, and each race has their own place in 2v2 now.

Space Marine in 1.5: I am still currently playing SM, but starting to play around as Ork somewhat. After reading the forums, you will think SM are the weakest race right now. And while they very well may be in 1v1, they are definitely still extremely potent in 2v2 games. However, SM playstyle has changed a lot in 1.5. Before, you basically built Tacs in Tier1, then upgraded them in Tier2. Some games maybe get a Plasma, or a Dreadnought, but generally Tacs weren’t just the core of an SM army, they were the army. It just was not fun to play as, and definitely not fun to play against. Now, things have changed. In most 2v2 games I only find myself making one Tac squad, and sometimes I don’t even upgrade them in Tier2(unless the enemy is getting lots of vehicles). To put it in more simple terms, SM play a lot more like Eldar did last patch. You really cannot go head-to-head against an enemy in Tier1, you just have to play defensively and try to hold them off. The problem most players have, is that they still just build Tacs, and expect to win every battle no matter what. Here is my current Build Order for team games as Apothecary(playing with an Eldar, by the way).

Tac>Scout>Power Axe or Purification Vial(depending on what you are up against)>Shotgun

From here it all depends on what you are up against, and how your enemy is playing. If it is an Ork or Tyranid massing Tier1, I usually get the Purification Vials first, then get Shotguns for both of my Scouts. I usually try to have Purification Vials, Power Axe, Double Shotguns, and sometimes even Sergeant upgrade for my Scouts, before going to Tier2. This build requires the ability to throw grenades perfectly in order to deal with triple melee builds, and if you miss all of your grenades, you may as well instantly retreat and try again. The general idea is to engage with your Apothecary, then bring in your scouts time your Shotgun Knockdown with a grenade, so there is no chance of the enemy moving away from it. If executed correctly, the enemy will either have to retreat and regroup, or if he keeps pushing, just retreat and then go back. Either way, you will inflict much larger casualties on him, if you placed your grenades well.

With this Build Order, I often find myself pooling a lot of extra Req, which is not a bad thing, you can expect to lose several Scouts, but do not ever fight head-to-head with your scouts, especially if you purchased the Sergeant upgrade for the squad. Any time a melee squad gets on your scouts, retreat them, instantly. Once in Tier2, I usually get a Plasma Devestator right away to help deal with melee blobs, and then a Dreadnought is my next purchase. Dreadnoughts are an extremely underused Walker unit, and I will post sometime in the future how to effectively use one.

Underused Bosses: The only complaints I have about this patch so far, is that Relic did basically nothing to help the underused Bosses in the game.

Ravener Alpha: I realize he was overpowered for so long, but the Ravener Alpha is basically useless in his current state. His damage is fine, but his upgrades are just horrible. Tunnels die way too easily now, and just serve as a way to feed your enemy experience. He needs a slight buff to the effects of his Weapon Wargear. The slow needs to be buffed a bit, and his Acid Splatter barely does any damage.

Farseer: I was honestly expecting some kind of buff to this Boss with the 1.5 patch. Her main abilities were nerfed to hell with this patch, and now she can no longer fulfill her role as a support Boss. I realize Doom was probably too good, but it did not need to be nerfed nearly as bad as it was. Her other weapon upgrades are absolutely useless as well. She either needs to have her survivability buffed in some way, or she needs to be given a decent ranged weapon upgrade.

Anyways, hope you enjoyed. I apologize once again for the lack of content here recently, and I will try my best to start publishing more articles each week now.

[The DoW2 patch is taking longer than expected to be released, so unfortunately there is not a lot to write about]

So I have been thinking a lot about “E-Sports” lately(I still am not sure how much I like that term), and what makes certain games so attractive to the professional community. Now, I have not done much extensive research on this; but, to the best of my knowledge, I will try and talk about some of the more popular E-Sport titles, and why some of them have been so dominant, and why some of them will have/will likely diminish in popularity.

Counter-Strike/Counter-Strike:Source: In my eyes, it is the most popular E-Sport game out there. Only a handful of other FPS titles have been able to come close to it in popularity, while keeping the simplistic feel. This game has been going strong for years now, and seems to have no end in sight. Why? Simple is the keyword here, in my opinion. CS is a game anyone can pick up, and learn all the basics in just a short time. You have a team, you have a weapon, you have an enemy. This game basically has no skill cap, because anytime you die, there was some simple mistake that lead up to that moment where you just fell over. There are basically no random moments that occur where something happened outside of your control. If you were outnumbered, it is because the other team executed a plan better than your team did. The game seems simple, but the skill in it revolves around your aim, and your teamwork. One of which you master on your own, the other you master as a team(duh). To me, this requires the highest amount of teamskill to succeed.

Warcraft 3: This game has been competitive for quite some time now. It is highly popular, and requires intense practice to be good at. When you get to the competitive level, however, this game has recently started to lose some of its shine. In the early years of this game’s popularity, people recognized the winners as the one that simply played superior. It was all about who countered better, who harassed better, and of course, who micro’d better than the other guy. Perhaps that is due to the fact that the game was still fairly new, and new strategies were being developed all the time in order to counter/surprise the enemy. Now, what has happened to the game? RNG. Somewhere in the past, I would say, 2 years of WC3s competitive community, it seemed people started finding skill caps. Instead of only having a few players that dominated the professional leagues, many other players began to win competitions. I believe, in fact, that other players did start catching up to the “big dogs”, in terms of skill. But it was then realized, what won games was this: drop luck. It came down to where every player used the same build orders, the same creeping paths, the same harassment tactics, and so the outcome of a game came down to two things: micro and item drops. And, unfortunately, item drops seemed to outweigh the former. This has, unfortunately caused WC3 to lose some of its popularity as a competitive E-Sport title, as many of the top players decided to either stop practicing so much, or quite altogether. Because one could play the best game of their life, and still lose because the other guy managed to get better item drops.

World of Warcraft: This game has only recently become so popular in the E-Sport scene. Probably because it is a monster in terms of popularity, and companies saw a great opportunity to milk it for all the money they possibly can. The game is fairly complex, and takes a long time to learn all the abilities/counter to each ability. The competitive community consists of many skilled teams, and none of which are excessively dominant. But why is this? Almost every E-Sport title in the past has had certain teams who just dominated for the longest time, so why has WoW been so even? Once again, in my opinion, the answer is: RNG! Call me biased all you want, but RNG plagues this game like the Swine-flu. You cannot even begin to list all of the things in this game that rely on a simple dice roll to bring an outcome. We have seen it far too many times where a team has outplayed another in such a way it is almost laughable, yet the other team manages to win due to some RNG that happened at such a decisive moment. Don’t get me wrong, the 3v3 scene requires an insane amount of teamwork and coordination, but I feel there are far too many factors that go on outside of the player’s reach. All in all, this game has much potential to continue growing as an E-Sport, but I fear it will not last long unless Blizzard makes many changes to make certain things static.

Starcraft: Ah, the mother of all competitive games. Perhaps not the most popular worldwide, but in how competitive it is, I feel it takes the cake. This game is widely considered to be the hardest game for a single person to master(note that I said single, so not comparing it to team FPS games). Professional players practically make this game their life. Nal_Rah, a highly recognized player who went on to play in the Blizzcon SC grand finals, even said, “if you eat, and play Starcraft, you can be as good as me.” I highly doubt he was exaggerating. Starcraft players devote so much of their life to this game that it makes the top WoW raiders look like 4-hr a week casuals. The Starcraft competitive scene is, amazingly, going on as strong as ever. So why is this game still going strong? For one, it has never stopped evolving. In the early years, the game revolved around your early game micro management, and it still does today. Most players, however, consider the Starcraft today to revolve more around macro than anything else. That’s not saying micro isn’t important(as some of the micro these top players do is just jaw-dropping), but the majority of games are decided by who held the strongest economy in game. Because once you get such a strong economy, you can mass produce any unit needed in order to counter what your opponent has. Some may not agree, but, in my opinion, the secret behind Starcraft’s success is this: it is static. Every single aspect of the game has a fixed number, and those numbers do not change. This game is, ultimately, the opposite of RNG. For instance, think of your favorite game, and then think of how many times you find yourself saying “I hope this procs, I hope I crit, I hope this happens”. Now imagine what those games would be like if you did not have to do that. That is basically what Starcraft is like. When a battle ensues during a Starcraft match, you know exactly what will happen. Not necessarily what the outcome of the battle will be, but you know exactly what each of your abilities will do, and how much damage each of your units will do. There is no wishful thinking that will save you in a game of Starcraft. This is why, wait for it, I consider Starcraft to require the highest amount of individual skill.

Finally, why RNG? If the games without an RNG system are the most competitive, why doesn’t every game follow suit? Simply because RNG adds excitement. We, as humans, love the thought of not knowing what will happen next. If you took away the RNG system, many games would becoming boring, very fast. I’ll even be the first to say WoW would not still be around if it weren’t for the RNG system, because people love randomness. It is a little funny to me, actually, that if Starcraft had been made years later, it would not be anything like it is today, because Blizzard would have surely added random elements to it. I’m not sure exactly when it happened, but somewhere in the last decade, every game seemed to add their own form of RNG. Anyways, I’m not sure exactly what my point is in this article, but perhaps it will bring some enlightenment to some who read it.