Hidden building identities...

...during construction, for Protoss and Zerg. I mean there is no way (both lorewise as well as graphically) to tell what grows under that membrane of warps in through that rift, so why not hide from the enemy the name and the progress bar until the building is complete? Visual cues would become much more important and so the number of steps in size change (and maybe the individual appearance of buildings in progress?) for the mutating building would need to be increased, and maybe provide an altogether separate set of steps for advanced mutations. For Protoss buildings it would be impossible to learn the type of the building during production.

Just another aspect to differentiate the races (well in this case Terran from the other two) and to increase the importance of timing, scouting, and game experience (as in being able to recognise certain clues like anticipating the building based on number of workers, gas occupation, shape/size/colour of mutating organism, etc.).

Alternatively the progress bar could be made visible to the enemy to allow easier anticipation.

Well?

 

I think it's a good idea but I don't see it being done as there are probably a lot more people that want to be able to see what the protoss and the zerg are making against them. At least they don't how what are in the zerg eggs.

 

Seems kind of imbalanced against Terran but I'll think about it some more before I give a more detailed response and vote on the pole.

I remember thinking about this way back in 1998 so it'll be good for me to get back into some of the ideas I had back then.

 

Well, seeing how zerg buildings remain in a pupae stage until completion, the only thing that would differentiate between mutating buildings would be size. What with Protoss warping in, I'm fairly certain it doesn't spend all of that warping time preparing to warp in all of the structure's matter in at once at the last second. I'm fairly certain in actuality, it warps in the matter over time, which in theory WOULD allow an onlooker to easily determine the structure as it's warp is closer to completion. As for terran, most structures look relatively similar excepting size until near the end of completion. So in actuality, Zerg would have the highest advantage, and Protoss probably the least.

 

I think it should be as is. The enemy can see what building is being build for all 3 races. Why? The Protoss and the Zerg don't have to have a worker hand around and build their buildings. They kind of build themselves. And by looking at a Terran building in construction you can tell what it is. So if they are hidden like you want it'd be a double blow for the Terrans.

Lore wise though having them not visible would be more realistic as the Protoss probably have a shield obstructing the building from being seen till it's built and the Zerg, well it's just the same membrane thing covering each building till it's built.

 

Maybe the similarities in the animations for the Zerg morphing stages are just because of developmental / design choice constraints. Maybe each building does look different enough to be identified. We'll probably never know unless one of the lore guys answers this question.

I'm going to vote for things staying the same. My vote has been given.

 

Lore-wise it would be cool to implement, but I don't think that balance-wise it makes sense.

 

*lore addicted guy arrives*

If you look more closely at the UI bar of a warping in Protoss building -or unit- it says: "opening warp rift". So the matter is not transported over time at all. In fact, warping happens almost instantly, the rift just takes time to form.

 

im thinking this might be a little way of blizzard making the races just feel different, a bunch of tiny differences make a huge impact.

 

I'd rather keep the differences in the units and abilities themselves.

 

I think it would create too much of an imbalance in scouting.

 

I agree. I would rather focus on strategy and micro/macro then on studying pixels to see what buildings are being made.

Plus, when map hacks come out that's just one more thing in the hacker's favor.

 

Agreed, the game would be imbalanced UNLESS adding a new feature, that can be mounted into any probe, terran worker or drone, which would give them information about every enemy building in it's site, which can be leveled up in the command center to counter act counter espionage, however to counter act, there should be a technology "counter-espionage" on the command center, each level increasing the spy capability of your opponent on structures that are being built and progress, if the esiponage and counter-espionage levels match, then the building name and progress will not be revealed to the scout, but of course there are many flaws, it could increase the time to get a scout scouting DRAMATICALLY so it kinda extends the time of the battle, but this is only something i had thought about, though i know it isn't as good as other ideas.

for now i think we should just stick to what is inside now...

 

That would be a bit complicated karlo

This would make scouting too ineffective imo, especially early on when you need to know if that's a cyber core or a gateway warping in etc.

 

You lost me countering the counter espionage.

 

Another reason to keep your scout alive for as long as possible. Also the two buildings you mentioned are so much different that even I as a nub could determine which one is being built just from its placement and gas occupation (2 gates strategy doesn't take gas at that stage, but gate+core does).

And EMR it seems you completely overlooked the bit about unique appearances for individual Zerg buildings. I suggested not just size but shape/color&texture difference as well.

As for Protoss, since I knew warp rifts worked the way Aurora described them I thought this would make sense. And the argument of keeping racial differences to units and abilities goes against Blizzard's aim to make the three races as distinct as possible. Buildings are very important factors too.

 

The point is though not to make unnecessary complications in the process a player has to go through to benefit from his scouting information, considering a casual skill level player will be better off using his apm elsewhere and blizzard doesn't want to make unnecessary additions to the learning curve.

 

Its a nice idea but it is too finicky. Also, its taking it far too seriously IMO.

 

You forgot that, if this were implemented, players would be trying to make their buildings look like other buildings so this wouldn't apply then.

 

They can, but then their production buildings wouldn't be next to each other and so their macro would be at a disadvantage from that tactic.