"pre approved" balanced melee map with black fog that the competing players have never played before.
These maps would require players to:
1/ discover and analyze each new map IN GAME
2/ form and act upon real "live" analysis, decision making and strategy
3/ bear/overcome a real tension derived from the abscence of knowing the map beforehand
Universal builds:
builds that would emerge from playing unknown maps
---------------------------------------
Rant:
as i've tried to make my argument many times and have been ignored every time... i'll try to make it short 8^)
Why are certain melee players considered good? How are melee maps appreciated/judged?
In practice, players select a map they get to know by heart, apply build orders and tactics that are rehearsed to death.. over and over.. and then go to the next map.
The only variation between the matches (in tournaments or ladder) is "how good the execution was" and "how one build/tactic fared against the other".. the only difference between each map being how "well" they allow such rehearsed strategies (and, hopefully, how wide the palette of strategies allowed is on said maps).
How are melee maps considered good? In this environment, i guess only their conformity to these preconceived notions of "strategy" matters...?
But is star2 a chessboard? Should one apply the same thought process from it when going into a game.. when going into the editor to build a melee map?
Is this enough? Should we not be asking for more from the virtual environment that is star2.. from our "cherished" melee champions..???
---------------------------------------
My dream (i know we are galaxies away from even seeing it go into practice) is to have great players defined by more parameters:
1/ the same basic principal of star2 applies:
players know their ponds by heart, will have to find resources to get an adequate unit production to develop their strategy and generally outwit their opponent (who is in the same predicament) when attacking.
2/But beyond that, they will have to master a tension much more palpable/interesting: mastering the ins and outs of the map quicker/better than their opponent.
---------------------------------------
My query to you dear reader:
Can we hope to have such awesome gameplay mainstreamed (dare i ask, played in competitions)?
ps: black fog should have never died, and it will live again
SC2 is far from a chessboard game, where all the game state is visible to the player. it's a game of unknowns, where one constantly seek to have more information about the opponent(s) in order to adapt better and counter their development. A great deal of strategy revolves around correctly predicting your opponent's future moves and begin responding to them preemptively.
Totally unknown maps (with opaque fog of war) would add an extra element to adapt to. Some may say games would be far more varied, others may say it would distract from the core gameplay...
It might be possible, but to achieve that, SC2 would need some clever algorithms to manage to procedurally generate random yet new, interesting, nice-looking, and balanced maps... I wouldn't be against the idea but it's all up to Blizzard, and it's not as easy as it looks.
For the nice looking, interesting maps, they could have an array of map "chunks" - they can be arranged in random order.
I would like to see that type of gameplay and try it. It sounds promising and interesting :)
BUT
Quote:
Why are certain melee players considered good? How are melee maps appreciated/judged?
In practice, players select a map they get to know by heart, apply build orders and tactics that are rehearsed to death.. over and over.. and then go to the next map.
It's not the build order that wins a match, but a player that executes it and improvises.
randomizing the map would be hard; both to make it good looking and balanced.
im not a good melee player, but what ive been reading from the pros is they have certain opener strategies; 9 pylon - 14 vespene; something like that i dont really understand. but its more often that you would have to change your builds depending on your opponent's builds. Of course this involves scouting etc2 for 'hidden tech' or proxies. A good SC2 player wont be sticking to only 1 strategy.
Good strategies in SC2 are not All-in strategies, they are more like footholds the player can use to reach the upper tier of their techtree; or at least units to counter the opposing build. How the player realizes his options and transition from one strategy to another determines his level of skill.
"form and act upon real "live" analysis, decision making and strategy". I am pretty sure this is alive in sc2 =P
but eitherways, I do like the element of randomness in a map layout; although maybe not the whole map; just certain important areas such as chokes, xelnaga tower placement, and rocks. I would like to see random weather effects implemented in sc2 (although it would need lots of balancing) as well.
Black fog... im not so sure. with terrain randomness it would definitely increase the skill cap of SC2, however i would not be surprised that casual players and probably most of the lower leagues would have trouble trying to learn the map, while microing and macroing at the same time.
Sorry if i mislead anyone..
i meant a mass number of mapmaker made maps prepared and agreed upon by both parties as fair (balanced)
(player's teammates or captains or coach would vouch for them .. or more likely an organization would provide said maps and propose them at random during a tournament or on a ladder)...
The results of algorithms' computer made maps would never be "accepted" by anyone, although i agree that it is a most interesting notion i do not subscribe to the legion of corollaries it implies. i meant a map pool of unknown acceptable maps.
The black fog is essential to the purpose of the method.. after all that's the way it was in older versions of the game and the dumb-ing down of the game with its abandon is not a competitive driven move from blizz, it is a decision made to broaden the player base (to me, at the cost of one of the most interesting part of the game). (Never ever let me get started on the win loss ratio... it losing all its use with the loss of the loss column).
"star2" is not a chessboard: indeed that is my point... However, the learning by heart of maps or the absence of black fog (or indeed most of the balance notions or rather preconceptions) pushes the game back towards the notion of said chessboard.
As it was said (and i agree), there is plenty of place for strategy in the way things are done ... however, i just don't see the point in it not being "all it can be".
Is an idrA such a great player..? Would he fare as well with no prior notions of the map...
Many.. many.. too many.. people complaint about turtling terrans (or protoss).. my proposed method is debatable i agree, but it doesn't allow for such poorly inspired play...
(i don't think turtling should be avoided per say, however it is just bad form for the game itself...).. since discovering the map (and its inner workings) would take too much of the game time to allow for it to be a viable option).
The question is (i agree) would this pull from the core gameplay.. or is it the core of the game.
My feeling is that (providing maps are "acceptable") this is very much part of the core of the game...
The build orders or knowing timings and capabilities of one's units is not the core of the game.. it is the game's mechanics..
practicing the gameplay is not practicing strategy...
But i don't intend to try and change anyone's mind about this.. i am merely saying my piece :^)
(and will do so again and again).
I would say that more than the players knowledge of the map is the players ability to adapt to what your opponent is doing, that wins games. True, you need to explore to determine how you can best use the terrain to your advantage, but scouting your opponent results in much better information than scouting the map for an expo.
Black Fog, I always wonder why they removed that, also island maps what happen to them. I like burning tide I think that map has so much potential. There is so much possibilities with the map editor that maps can be a whole new game in the Starcraft universe. If you sat down and think and allow new ideas to come in your head there would be ideas on top of those ideas and so on. Those ideas can bring a new level of play that has never been seen before.
My inspiration on map ideas is Battlebots. Whats yours.
@playpong: Go
The argument that the game has to be "finite" for the players to be able to "express themselves fully" doesn't convince me. i understand the point of vew.. but disagree.. Do you think volley ball is more interesting now that every point is counted (rules were changed (for tv airing's sake?), before that change, the team had to be serving and score for the point to be awarded, this was the only sport with such gameplay).
My point is players play maps.. it's a square with pathways and zones.. gimmicks, resources... always the same square bound sand box ! The strech to "unknown" is merely verbiage.. the drones scvs or probes will always react the same...
To think that star2 has to be restricted like real environment games are is (at best) counter intuitive... and (at worst) reactionary!
This goes beyond star2 by the way... Moving .. positioning, dodging in an fps is that much more difficult if you don't know the map.. the players aren't lost in new surroundings, their adrenaline pumps out even more..
Those are games.. no one risks his life.. (maybe a brain aneurism could happen but hey.. it is written on the boxes :) ...)
My point is not to say that Huk vs MC on Xelnaga doesn't deserve praise in the strategy department.. my point is to say that the game remains on the level of chess rather than implode into all that an rts can be...
Virtual reality is infinite.. a chessboard is infinite... i love chess, just don't see the point of a electricity playing a part into a game of chess. (well, i like playing across the world without moving, but that's a given.. ).
ps: i think scouting is so important / vital in the gameplay that it must never be confused with its older brother: discovering
discovering has been banned from the ladder (therefore tournaments), some would say it has never been implemented in multiplayer (1v1) at all.
i disagree, but only in so far as that the idea of implementing it is bad for competition/ raising the level of play.
Why are so many requests being made for multiplayer quest like maps..? Because that specific ability is underrated but missed going from the campaign into multiplayer modes (underrated by developpers, asked for / missed by the players).
@SolidSC: Go
love battlebots, engineering gone haywire is a must.. and i agree that it has much to do with how an "amateur" mapmaker should view the editor he is using!
i had a "bigtrack" when i was 10 or so and i loved/used it to death :^p
As for inspiration, i'm an old fart and my first inspirations go too far back (chinese go, chess, tron light cycles (only recently understood how important this one was to me) into snake ; and in relation to star2galaxy: when i fell in love with "orcs vs humans" (the fact that the ponds were not the same in the two races.. if that needed being said)...
i think game editors were really the initial "dose".. i only made new "levels" for load runner because i wanted to see what could be done (if i could outgrow the game so to say, never did though :^) ).. i must admit playing the correlated done games was never more than a "is it doable for a good player" issue.
i do think that this is my point:
"allow new ideas to come in your head there would be ideas on top of those ideas and so on. Those ideas can bring a new level of play that has never been seen before"
The nature of the grey wall was because in a ladder players with more knowledge of the map have an advantage, as they do not have to search for expands. The same problem applies to generating a random map, a player may get lucky and find the best expansion location before the opponent.
Players like Slayer's Boxer did a lot of their thinking ahead of time and with hours of practice not just mastering the game but studying the ins and outs of every map.. being able to express an even higher level of creativity through such mastery was definitely something that you can't just add to a game. It's pretty much why a sport is a sport and a game is a game.
That being said, StarCraft 2 as a competitive game that has its problems that still need to be addressed.
Timing windows are too small and too effective. Battles are too Decisive. Disparity of map control among the races is also an issue. I assume part of the reason the game is like this is because of Blizzard's post warcraft 3 mentality of game design oriented around shorter game durations.
All you need is a template for the mineral field, a certain required base area and a single entrance (at least early game) and some grass cover at choke points and your done. Also doodad up any place that you don't want units to go to.
Basically just hire a few koreans to make the maps "randomly".
I must say that I've been able to understand all of your posts in this thread. A job well done. On a more serious note though, this is an interesting topic.
Topic has been answered with this post. Adding in "unknown maps" does not increase the strategy of the game. Rather, it changes it. You would have a focus on improvisation over memorization. Frankly, I think the former is more interesting. But, one is not superior to the other. Therefore, this is more a matter of preference.
Glad to see you actually climb down from your tower once in a while (fun pun run on)
:^p
i agree, it's a matter of preference, i would prefer (what you called) improvisation (i would call it extra gameplay / added tension though)..
and i think providing they tried, most players would enjoy it.. anyone laddering on a regular basis would hardly be "lost" beyond the 4 minute mark.. (after several games doing it, i even suspect they'd love it :D ) ..
i'm convinced glory (at the very least) would arise from such a gameplay (not to mention my personnal favorite: extra fun).
...(long silent dramatic pause)...
..it would certainly separate slick sentient robots from day in day out dishwashers automatons ...
ps: how am i not surprised you prefer the former (former: what has passed already, what is no longer..) .. but o0O ? That means you think it's not a bad idea :)
i do admit my wish would be to passively witness great players faced with this gameplay .. players with game sense (so that obviously rules me out :^p )
thank you for voicing your opinion ;)
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Unknown map:
"pre approved" balanced melee map with black fog that the competing players have never played before.
These maps would require players to:
1/ discover and analyze each new map IN GAME
2/ form and act upon real "live" analysis, decision making and strategy
3/ bear/overcome a real tension derived from the abscence of knowing the map beforehand
Universal builds:
builds that would emerge from playing unknown maps
---------------------------------------Rant:
as i've tried to make my argument many times and have been ignored every time... i'll try to make it short 8^)
Why are certain melee players considered good? How are melee maps appreciated/judged?
In practice, players select a map they get to know by heart, apply build orders and tactics that are rehearsed to death.. over and over.. and then go to the next map.
The only variation between the matches (in tournaments or ladder) is "how good the execution was" and "how one build/tactic fared against the other".. the only difference between each map being how "well" they allow such rehearsed strategies (and, hopefully, how wide the palette of strategies allowed is on said maps).
How are melee maps considered good? In this environment, i guess only their conformity to these preconceived notions of "strategy" matters...?
But is star2 a chessboard? Should one apply the same thought process from it when going into a game.. when going into the editor to build a melee map?
Is this enough? Should we not be asking for more from the virtual environment that is star2.. from our "cherished" melee champions..???
---------------------------------------My dream (i know we are galaxies away from even seeing it go into practice) is to have great players defined by more parameters:
1/ the same basic principal of star2 applies:
players know their ponds by heart, will have to find resources to get an adequate unit production to develop their strategy and generally outwit their opponent (who is in the same predicament) when attacking.
2/But beyond that, they will have to master a tension much more palpable/interesting: mastering the ins and outs of the map quicker/better than their opponent.
---------------------------------------My query to you dear reader:
Can we hope to have such awesome gameplay mainstreamed (dare i ask, played in competitions)?
ps: black fog should have never died, and it will live again
SC2 is far from a chessboard game, where all the game state is visible to the player. it's a game of unknowns, where one constantly seek to have more information about the opponent(s) in order to adapt better and counter their development. A great deal of strategy revolves around correctly predicting your opponent's future moves and begin responding to them preemptively.
Totally unknown maps (with opaque fog of war) would add an extra element to adapt to. Some may say games would be far more varied, others may say it would distract from the core gameplay...
It might be possible, but to achieve that, SC2 would need some clever algorithms to manage to procedurally generate random yet new, interesting, nice-looking, and balanced maps... I wouldn't be against the idea but it's all up to Blizzard, and it's not as easy as it looks.
For the nice looking, interesting maps, they could have an array of map "chunks" - they can be arranged in random order.
I would like to see that type of gameplay and try it. It sounds promising and interesting :)
BUT
It's not the build order that wins a match, but a player that executes it and improvises.
randomizing the map would be hard; both to make it good looking and balanced.
im not a good melee player, but what ive been reading from the pros is they have certain opener strategies; 9 pylon - 14 vespene; something like that i dont really understand. but its more often that you would have to change your builds depending on your opponent's builds. Of course this involves scouting etc2 for 'hidden tech' or proxies. A good SC2 player wont be sticking to only 1 strategy.
Good strategies in SC2 are not All-in strategies, they are more like footholds the player can use to reach the upper tier of their techtree; or at least units to counter the opposing build. How the player realizes his options and transition from one strategy to another determines his level of skill.
"form and act upon real "live" analysis, decision making and strategy". I am pretty sure this is alive in sc2 =P
but eitherways, I do like the element of randomness in a map layout; although maybe not the whole map; just certain important areas such as chokes, xelnaga tower placement, and rocks. I would like to see random weather effects implemented in sc2 (although it would need lots of balancing) as well.
Black fog... im not so sure. with terrain randomness it would definitely increase the skill cap of SC2, however i would not be surprised that casual players and probably most of the lower leagues would have trouble trying to learn the map, while microing and macroing at the same time.
Sorry if i mislead anyone..
i meant a mass number of mapmaker made maps prepared and agreed upon by both parties as fair (balanced)
(player's teammates or captains or coach would vouch for them .. or more likely an organization would provide said maps and propose them at random during a tournament or on a ladder)...
The results of algorithms' computer made maps would never be "accepted" by anyone, although i agree that it is a most interesting notion i do not subscribe to the legion of corollaries it implies. i meant a map pool of unknown acceptable maps.
The black fog is essential to the purpose of the method.. after all that's the way it was in older versions of the game and the dumb-ing down of the game with its abandon is not a competitive driven move from blizz, it is a decision made to broaden the player base (to me, at the cost of one of the most interesting part of the game). (Never ever let me get started on the win loss ratio... it losing all its use with the loss of the loss column).
"star2" is not a chessboard: indeed that is my point... However, the learning by heart of maps or the absence of black fog (or indeed most of the balance notions or rather preconceptions) pushes the game back towards the notion of said chessboard.
As it was said (and i agree), there is plenty of place for strategy in the way things are done ... however, i just don't see the point in it not being "all it can be".
Is an idrA such a great player..? Would he fare as well with no prior notions of the map...
Many.. many.. too many.. people complaint about turtling terrans (or protoss).. my proposed method is debatable i agree, but it doesn't allow for such poorly inspired play...
(i don't think turtling should be avoided per say, however it is just bad form for the game itself...).. since discovering the map (and its inner workings) would take too much of the game time to allow for it to be a viable option).
The question is (i agree) would this pull from the core gameplay.. or is it the core of the game.
My feeling is that (providing maps are "acceptable") this is very much part of the core of the game...
The build orders or knowing timings and capabilities of one's units is not the core of the game.. it is the game's mechanics..
practicing the gameplay is not practicing strategy...
But i don't intend to try and change anyone's mind about this.. i am merely saying my piece :^)
(and will do so again and again).
I would say that more than the players knowledge of the map is the players ability to adapt to what your opponent is doing, that wins games. True, you need to explore to determine how you can best use the terrain to your advantage, but scouting your opponent results in much better information than scouting the map for an expo.
Black Fog, I always wonder why they removed that, also island maps what happen to them. I like burning tide I think that map has so much potential. There is so much possibilities with the map editor that maps can be a whole new game in the Starcraft universe. If you sat down and think and allow new ideas to come in your head there would be ideas on top of those ideas and so on. Those ideas can bring a new level of play that has never been seen before. My inspiration on map ideas is Battlebots. Whats yours.
@playpong: Go The argument that the game has to be "finite" for the players to be able to "express themselves fully" doesn't convince me. i understand the point of vew.. but disagree.. Do you think volley ball is more interesting now that every point is counted (rules were changed (for tv airing's sake?), before that change, the team had to be serving and score for the point to be awarded, this was the only sport with such gameplay).
My point is players play maps.. it's a square with pathways and zones.. gimmicks, resources... always the same square bound sand box ! The strech to "unknown" is merely verbiage.. the drones scvs or probes will always react the same...
To think that star2 has to be restricted like real environment games are is (at best) counter intuitive... and (at worst) reactionary!
This goes beyond star2 by the way... Moving .. positioning, dodging in an fps is that much more difficult if you don't know the map.. the players aren't lost in new surroundings, their adrenaline pumps out even more..
Those are games.. no one risks his life.. (maybe a brain aneurism could happen but hey.. it is written on the boxes :) ...)
My point is not to say that Huk vs MC on Xelnaga doesn't deserve praise in the strategy department.. my point is to say that the game remains on the level of chess rather than implode into all that an rts can be...
Virtual reality is infinite.. a chessboard is infinite... i love chess, just don't see the point of a electricity playing a part into a game of chess. (well, i like playing across the world without moving, but that's a given.. ).
ps: i think scouting is so important / vital in the gameplay that it must never be confused with its older brother: discovering
discovering has been banned from the ladder (therefore tournaments), some would say it has never been implemented in multiplayer (1v1) at all.
i disagree, but only in so far as that the idea of implementing it is bad for competition/ raising the level of play.
Why are so many requests being made for multiplayer quest like maps..? Because that specific ability is underrated but missed going from the campaign into multiplayer modes (underrated by developpers, asked for / missed by the players).
@SolidSC: Go love battlebots, engineering gone haywire is a must.. and i agree that it has much to do with how an "amateur" mapmaker should view the editor he is using!
i had a "bigtrack" when i was 10 or so and i loved/used it to death :^p
As for inspiration, i'm an old fart and my first inspirations go too far back (chinese go, chess, tron light cycles (only recently understood how important this one was to me) into snake ; and in relation to star2galaxy: when i fell in love with "orcs vs humans" (the fact that the ponds were not the same in the two races.. if that needed being said)...
i think game editors were really the initial "dose".. i only made new "levels" for load runner because i wanted to see what could be done (if i could outgrow the game so to say, never did though :^) ).. i must admit playing the correlated done games was never more than a "is it doable for a good player" issue.
i do think that this is my point:
"allow new ideas to come in your head there would be ideas on top of those ideas and so on. Those ideas can bring a new level of play that has never been seen before"
The nature of the grey wall was because in a ladder players with more knowledge of the map have an advantage, as they do not have to search for expands. The same problem applies to generating a random map, a player may get lucky and find the best expansion location before the opponent.
Players like Slayer's Boxer did a lot of their thinking ahead of time and with hours of practice not just mastering the game but studying the ins and outs of every map.. being able to express an even higher level of creativity through such mastery was definitely something that you can't just add to a game. It's pretty much why a sport is a sport and a game is a game.
That being said, StarCraft 2 as a competitive game that has its problems that still need to be addressed.
Timing windows are too small and too effective. Battles are too Decisive. Disparity of map control among the races is also an issue. I assume part of the reason the game is like this is because of Blizzard's post warcraft 3 mentality of game design oriented around shorter game durations.
All you need is a template for the mineral field, a certain required base area and a single entrance (at least early game) and some grass cover at choke points and your done. Also doodad up any place that you don't want units to go to.
Basically just hire a few koreans to make the maps "randomly".
@houndofbaskerville: Go
I must say that I've been able to understand all of your posts in this thread. A job well done. On a more serious note though, this is an interesting topic.
@adovid: Go
Topic has been answered with this post. Adding in "unknown maps" does not increase the strategy of the game. Rather, it changes it. You would have a focus on improvisation over memorization. Frankly, I think the former is more interesting. But, one is not superior to the other. Therefore, this is more a matter of preference.
:^)
Glad to see you actually climb down from your tower once in a while (fun pun run on)
:^p
i agree, it's a matter of preference, i would prefer (what you called) improvisation (i would call it extra gameplay / added tension though)..
and i think providing they tried, most players would enjoy it.. anyone laddering on a regular basis would hardly be "lost" beyond the 4 minute mark.. (after several games doing it, i even suspect they'd love it :D ) ..
i'm convinced glory (at the very least) would arise from such a gameplay (not to mention my personnal favorite: extra fun).
...(long silent dramatic pause)...
..it would certainly separate slick sentient robots from day in day out dishwashers automatons ...
ps: how am i not surprised you prefer the former (former: what has passed already, what is no longer..) .. but o0O ? That means you think it's not a bad idea :)
i do admit my wish would be to passively witness great players faced with this gameplay .. players with game sense (so that obviously rules me out :^p )
thank you for voicing your opinion ;)