1.2 Patch notes

You can read them here:

http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/1213111662

 

Void rays are now more viable early vs thors and colusi but because the speed upgrade was removed it kinda cancels it out, they are now slightly better than crap.

Not saying much.

BUt hey at least now we can annoy zerg alot more with pheonixs, amirite?

 

Here are the balance changes:

* • PROTOSS
o -- Hallucination research time decreased from 110 to 80.
o -- Observer
+ Cost decreased from 50/100 to 25/75.
o -- Phoenix
+ Build time decreased from 45 to 35.
o -- Void Ray
+ Now deals 20% more damage to massive targets.
+ Flux Vanes speed upgrade removed.

* • TERRAN
o -- Bunker
+ Build time decreased from 35 to 30.
# This is only a temporary change for the patch 1.2.0 PTR.
* -- SCV
o Repairing SCVs now assume the same threat priority as the unit they’re repairing.
+ SCV construction movement made more consistent.

* • ZERG
o -- Infestor
+ Fungal Growth no longer affects air units.

Well there's the Protoss buff they talked about. I'm glad to see that it was mostly for unused units and tech. Observer buff isn't surprising, 50/100 seems like such a ripoff.

Flux vanes removal makes sense, what they are trying to do is make phoenix and void ray have separate roles. Right now, speed upgraded void rays are almost as fast as phoenixes and are weak to the same units, it's almost like you can interchange the two.

I can't blame them for the SCV change, having your units blocked by a wall of repairing workers that have to be individually targetted is frustrating and illogical. However, that does nerf things like thors and planetary fortresses, things that IMO didn't need a nerf.

I am confused by the fungal growth nerf. It doesn't seem its' that good against mutas, but maybe I am being biased.

 

Why?

 

So protoss can more easily uberwtfpwnbbqsauce your overlords with pheonixs, obviously because phoenix build time was reduced as well.

 

Because lore-wise it doesn't even make sense.

/troll

It'd be nice if all the units had at least one non-weapon/armour upgrade to give you the chance to at least somewhat focus on a certain tech. Which is why I think the void ray should be given something else... maybe an upgrade that implements their second charge?

 

I'm also quite confused about the FG change...

For the SCV change I think it was needed because surrounding the repaired target turned him immune to melee attacks and forced focus-fire on the scvs.

As for the protoss changes, I'm pretty happy with them, mainly because they will make stargate builds more popular since both phoenixes will be more accessible but also VRs will be a nice unit to supplement the core army, and the response of a stargate build to massive units(colossi/thors/ultralisks)(20% damage boost to one of the highest dps units in the game{if not the highest} is quite awsome).

I made some calculations yesterday and an uncharged VR after patch will kill a colossus in about the same(even a few fractions of the second less) time than a fully charged right now. This means that PvP will become quite a bit more flexible, since up to now stargate builds were not very popular in this matchup...


Thing that bothers me with the removal of flux vanes isn't that the VR speed is reduced, but that there's no useful upgrade anymore from the fleet beacon. The carrier upgrade is still quite useless, making the most expensive building in the game only unlock 2 units and nothing more. It could use some working there.

 

Uh, aside from the balance issues here and there, why isn't anyone talking about the chat channels that are about to be implemented. I think with the new chat channels clans will have an easier time. Also, people can just log in and simply pair up according to skill levels. This is going to be huge !!!

Of course I hope that Blizzard is smart enough to prevent bots and spamming in the chat channels.

A new era is about to be born. The age of adding friends into a party to simply chat will be a thing of the past!!!

 

Stirlitz, the carrier upgrade is NOT useless. The carrier gets up to full DPS within 0.5 seconds instead of 3 seconds.

 

Im pretty happy with this update. Finally Blizzard is listening to us. This update would make people to use more strategies with phoenix and void ray buff, but I don't know why they removed the Flux Vanes, because thats part of the strategy too. I saw someone going for all void rays with speed upgrade and it was quite nice strategy.
I'm confused with the FG nerf lol... Since plague from sc1 affected the air this is kinda weird lol
And the observer buff o my god thank you 50/100 was ridiculous!!!!!!
I kinda disagree with the flux vanes removal... I used all rays and it was pretty fun

 

What's wrong with this patch?? When I want to start the game - except for one time - it now always tells me that I need a German version of the game for this patch (which is already installed, I think) and automatically closes the program. All other patches were installed just fine - and with this I could start the game (after many tries) at least once. The point is: I use an English client (as German translations are rather lame) and the patch notes are always in German.

 

Ok Im reposting because this update is too awesome for Protosses against Zergs, phoenixes are kinda pwning Zerg if I go 1gate 1stargate build

 

In my toss 2v2 games I was already building a few phoenixes whenever one enemy was a zerg, now I can get them out faster. Now the zerg needs to keep base defenses to fight them since his army will never be able to catch them in the field unless i micro poorly, which does happen.

Also about time they gave SCVs same priority. It was BS trying to get lings to kill the scvs rather than attempting to hit the mech hiding behind them.

EDIT: This also limits zerg units that can hurt air to 4, 2 of which (queen and hydra) are too slow off creep to ever kill any retreating enemy air units. So zerg is pretty much forced to go spire if the enemy gets any air units, which phoenix hard counters 2 of the 3 units it unlocks.

 

It would be a boring strategy imo, and if it worked well most of the time it would imply that VRs are overpowered by themselves. A terran going mass banshees will probably beat a terran going mass marauders, if he can kill his first big attack from air before it clears off his base, but that's not something interresting and mass banshees won't work most of the time...

Which in all situations except for very sporadic hit and runs will result in minimal increase of damage done. If the carrier has an army to support below it then when it gets focused it is possible to micro back and in the fight again without getting all the interceptors inside again, but yeah the upgrade gives a little convenience in such cases. Usually carriers come as heavy air support to a solid ground army so they're spending most of the battletime attacking anyway. The longer the battle, the less the significance of the upgrade.


Check the 2 replays I added:
The first one is a carrier with catapult vs a carrier without catapult in 2 cases(both +0 weapons and both +3 weapons to show the maximum difference possible). They both attack each other at the same time and the first fight ends with the graviton carrier having 18 hp left and the second fight with the graviton carrier having 30 hp left. In total it gets off 6 interceptor shots before the unupgraded one reaches full dps. After that point if the fight goes on AND you don't have to micro the carrier too far back(that's another area where graviton helps) they'll do exactly the same damage.

In the second replay I show a different situation where the upgrade does indeed prove more useful. I spread marines and hunt them with 2 carriers and the upgraded one finishes his a lot faster than the unupgraded one. Still that's something a few phoenixes would have done better anyway.


The upgrade is not useless of course, no upgrade is. I just think that it's questionable if it's worth upgrading.

Marauders get for 50/50 an upgrade that gives them a whole new level of awsomeness, zealots get the same level of increased awsomeness with an 150/150 upgrade and carriers get to shoot 6 more shots per fight which is the equivelent of 1.5 game seconds of attacking with all interceptors out.


Whenever I go carriers(which is something I do on occasion because I like this unit), I always upgeade graviton catapults, but I do it because my macro is not good enough and it's a way to dump some resources that start stockpiling after the mid-game, but I doubt that a better player would waste that money on so doubtful an upgrade, unless of course for the coolness of it, because the aggressive throwing of the upgraded carrier is much cooler than the indifferent tossing around of the unupgraded one, lol


It's an upgrade that I find cool in it's concept, but it's usefulness seems a little doubtful and very situational to me which if you compare with other upgrades for various units is something that doesn't happen.

If you go reapers, you can't argue that the speed upgrade is useful only in specific situations. Or the pre-igniter, if you have hellions then it's a good upgrade, because it doubles the effectiveness of harass and the killing of lightly armored units{but regardless of enemy army composition the workers remain light and hellion harass gets a lot better}.

Pick any upgrade in the game: the only one that given an army with the unit it upgrades in its composition whose usefulness is so doubtful is the carrier one. A zealot and a sentry in a big fight will provide their hp total as an extra meat shield and a guardian shield for a significant defensive bonus and cost less than the catapult...


Damn, I've gone a little too long for a quite insignificant matter, lol... Sorry about it... Anyway, I added another replay in the meantime comparing +0 with +1 carriers resulting in the +1 carrier being left with 5 times the hp the carrier with the catapult is left with(90 instead of 18).

 

I agree it might be boring but it's like Zerg going all mutas against Terran in SC1
And I can't feel if it's boring or not I can't feel anything while I'm playing a game I'm so focusing on it

 

I would like to see some buff for Carriers OR Mothership in 1.2.1 Patch. I think Carriers really need buff, they just die to Vikings focus fire so quickly and I would like to see Temporal Rift requiring 125 energy coming back to Mothership, as she is the final tier unit and a turning point unit. All it is like an expensive arbiter :/

 

If Carriers were resilient against vikings, terran would have no way to beat them

 

No but like too quickly we never see carriers used in pro gamer matches

 

I say bring back 4 armor for carriers T_T
As for mothership.
Planet Cracker upgrade
+ 50 max energy upgrade

gg.

 

The max energy upgrade was removed, and will never return, because if you reach max energy with anything then you're not using it properly.