Yes, the SC2 beta will be for soon and I just came with a question that was harrassing me. Why does the barrack just need 150 minerals to get built ? You can build 3 marines with this amount. 3 marines will never be equal to a whole building. I know what you'll say : THE GAMEPLAY. But it should be somewhat more realistic, don't you think ? Why only 8 points of minerals each time a SCV brings minerals ? That should be like .... 1,000, idk. I know, I know, this is just game ......
That post looks space junk worthy tbh. There is a simple answer to your question: Blizzard wanted it that way. To elaborate more, it'd be a right pain in the arse to collect those heaps of resources at the beginning of the game, and costlier buildings would greatly slow down the game even at higher tiers. If you want more realistic costs play AOE2 and above. IIRC.
Strategy. To set aside 1000 minerals for a second barracks, would leave you vulnerable. Your opponent could have over 10 extra marines built than you with those resources you're saving up. It would take a long time for your investment to pay off. ie, with your double rate of marine production, how long before you've caught up to your opponent who didn't buy a second barracks, but is over 10 marines ahead of you? My guess is around 10 minutes. That's a risky investment if it only starts to show an advantage 10 minutes later. If the barracks cost this much, players would probably build only one of them, which means less ways to play the game.
Thanks for your answers. I follow what Kuvasz meant: to elaborate more, quickly and to run the game earlier. that's the evidence.
If you want it to be realistic, think of it like this: The barracks costs alot more minerals than 150, but a marine costs half as much as he's advertised for. So the guy in the sky (Battlecruiser) let's you take that barracks and build it for 150 minerals going to pay him, with the knowledge that he'll get the rest of his minerals from those pesky marines you're gonna build. Now if your barracks blows up before it can make enough marines to pay the guy, then he made a bad investment, and you're gonna need to explain something to him after the mission is over. =) And I'm sure you could twist it whichever way so that it makes sense for the other races in the same way.
Thanks again dudes @LordKerwyn : hey ! Never thought about this, not so bad. So I suppose 1 zergling = 10 actually. No sarcasm from me, don't worry EDIT : 1 zergling = 1,000, sorry for my little mistake.
Don't forget that the building time is also a 'cost'. The complete costs, imo, are: Basic cost: - Barracks - 150 minerals Opportunity cost: - The SCV who builds the Barracks could have mined about 60 minerals in an equal amount of time (I tested it) - The SCV could have been used for scouting You could have build 3 SCVs instead, generating higher and quicker income. You could have chosen to build a Refinery or other building first. To conclude; there are other costs involved you may not be aware about.
True. Great reply again. And indeed the buildings which cost more minerals and gas take more time to be built, and this provokes more loss in other ways as you mention
I never thought of that reduction of income as a cost. But I suppose everyone builds one barracks at some time because you need that to tech up. So it's a cost for everyone. The real question is whether it's worth building more than one barracks. Is it true that you can only have 8 scv's gathering minerals at any one time? I can't really remember now. Having that limit would mean that there is perhaps no loss of income when building your second barracks, because it's a surplus scv. A barracks gives you an advantage, just as spending your minerals on something else gives you an advantage but in a different way. What Blizzard likes to do I think is to give you as much freedom as possible in the the early game, so you can use different strategies: Three extra workers is good. A refinery is good. A barracks is also good.
There is no limit on how many SCV's can gather minerals. There is however a limit to 1 SCV on each mineral field at all times. If there are 8 mineral fields you could indeed argue that at all times only 8 SCVs will be harvesting.
i'll just take the time to post this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDS5D0HKGwo or, you could say that the barracks are just cheap robots, so cheap mineral ore can be used to make them, while the marine's armor has to be refined, so you end up with 5 minerals' worth of quality metal to produce actual armor out of 50 raw mineral ore.
