How about a makeover for the colossus?

I have been looking around at several topics on both this forum as well as on battle.net. Most people still seem to hate the current colossus attack style, as well as the high cost. It even gets chosen to be the -probably least used unit in sc2-. That cannot be good.

The colossus lore states that it was once the ultimate protoss war machine. If it was the ultimate war machine, then why is its role in the current game to mainly raid the enemy supply lines. Its role needs to be changed into at least an assault support unit. The thermal lances need to be removed imo and be changed into a direct hit weapon, not a sweep weapon. Why would the protoss create a weapon that wastes most of its firepower by firing at the ground?

 

I Agree the colossus should be a military support unit much like the reaver.

 

IMO, bringing back the attack style from the '07 Protoss Gameplay Video would solve the problem. We've already seen from the Battlecruiser how deadly zero-waste fire can be, and it'd definitely justify the cost of building a Colossus.

 

I thought it had the sweeping ray back then? Did it used to have other attack styles beside the sweep and fan patterns?

I would like to know what Itza thinks. He always seems to find a way to make things sound a lot more simple then my uncomprehensive walls of text. :/

 

The original attack was a single-target beam that did 144 damage over a period of 12 seconds. It "swept" in the sense that once it killed one unit, the beam would move to the next closest unit for the rest of the firing cycle. I think the reason this attack pattern was scrapped was because of the amount of damage done per second was too high, and armor wouldn't do much to lower the damage. Examples:

144 damage dealt in 24 damage/2 seconds pieces over 12 seconds. Eac point of armor reduces damage by 6 points, putting lowest possible damage at 108 (assuming no unit will have more than 6 armor at Tier 3)

144 damage dealt in 12 damage/second pieces over 12 seconds. Each point of armor reduces damage by 12 points, putting lowest possible damage at 72

144 damage dealt in 6 damage/ .5 seconds over 12 seconds. Each point of armor reduces damage by 24 points, putting lowest possible damage at 0

 

Well the colossus probably used to be a long time ago. Then technology changed, and so it wasn't so buff anymore. I like the old attack better. It made the colossus a better unit. But I guess this is what happens when blizzard starts balancing. This won't be the last change we all don't like. It isn't the first ether. But when it's all done, it's actually not that bad.

 

I think it would also be good to change back to the old constant beam, because there would be more continuity between units (it and the Void Ray).

Kinda like how in SC1 Reapers and Carriers shared the same attack method, just applied in different ways. It was a nice balance of unique units and similarities across the race.

 

According to a recent post on the Korean battle.net forums, colossi now do 45 damage. (This is a recent change.)

Colossi can hit five units (possibly more, but at least five), and this adds up to 225 damage in one swing (better than 144, IMO).

That's so powerful it can kill most worker units in one sweep.

Get the info here: http://www.blizzforums.com/showthread.php?t=24115

 

It needs the original attack back

 

Wooot! Awesomely sweet 45.... one shot unupgraded rines?
Now it really fits its lore role, and makes up for a replacement of the reaver

 

OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG NO F'ING WAY
THAT IS FREAKIN AWESOME
but wuold it cause balance issues?
45 seems a bit high.
If i was making this, i would make it 25 and +10 vs shields
unless u r talking about 45 / 2 seconds, then yea absolutely.

 

As far as aesthetics go, it's pretty good. They could improve it still however. I think the beam should be blue instead of orange. Blue is the official Protoss weapon color, it HAS to be blue.

 

Um... no. The armament at discussion is a thermal lance.

As such, I hope it qualifies as a flame weapon and kills the same way hellions do, leaving only cinder behind them.

 

A thermal lance can't fire that far according to that article. New idea to add to a possible make over: change the weapon name.

If the weapon uses psionic energy from the void, then that would fit perfectly in the lore. It would explain the red colour of the beam, the extreme power and why the protoss stopped using it, AND why they are now using it again instead of creating something new in the four years of relative peace. -in their opinion the void was evil after the dark templar were seperated from the main population-

--discuss--

 

The Kalath intercession was after the high/dark split, so the colossus can't have anything to do with dark tech and the void because they were used in the intercession.

They're thermal lances. Pimped up ones.

 

Nah.

Reavers did 100 damage. I, for one, didn't complain about it, even when it could kill a trio of hydralisks just like that. (It just means I need to scout better!)

 

Yes but the reaver was extremely slow (i liked recall for reavers ), had much fewer hitpoints and shields points, is somewhat less range (Colossus + range upg), and it couldnt climb cliffs

w/e im just glad the colossus got better

 

Most people used the reaver drop -reaver in shuttle, unload near enemy, attack once, load back in before counter- tactic anyway, so reavers lacking speed or not being able to climb cliffs is irrelevant. Recall was best used for the dragoons since they had poor pathing and always blocked slopes. This is just about the only good thing the colossus does now: being fast and mobile.

 

.... and now high damage output + now fires on blasts

 

I think we should all understand that all unit balance are subjected to change up till release. Even after release, Blizzard will patch the game until the game is balanced. The important part is to finalize all the unit/mechanics. Everything else like the numbers fixed during beta or patched after the release.

The Colossus shown in BlizzCon 08 was severally underpowered because before that, they were extremely overpowered during the BlizzCon 07 build. Jon stated that once you get 3 + Colossus in the BlizzCon 07 build, it was basically instant death to all approaching enemy ground force. It is why that Blizzard decided to nerf it. However, as we all found out, the Colossus was basically useless. It is why Blizzard then decided to buff it in between the Blizzcon 07/Blizzcon 08 build.

I'm sure during beta, the Colossus number will undergo many changes until release.