missing roles in the Protoss army

Ok I don't know if anyone else has noticed this but the protoss are missing a few things.

There's no decent splash damage. The protoss are currently dependent on psi storms for area damage. I think they're trying to make the collossus fit this role, but the current linear attack sucks. I think they should give the archon or immortal splash damage. Maybe they could even give the DTs a cleave attack.

The protoss have no air to ground without using capitol ships, and warp rays are only effective against heavy units, meaning the only way for protoss to deal with massed marines/hydras/stalkers from the air is carriers.

Also there seem to be some huge balance issues, like the collosus is not tough enough to excuse being able to attack it from both ground and air. Second, there's no way that the blink ability makes up for the huge nerfs the stalker has undergone compared to the dragoon. Protoss units are supposed to be tough, but the stalker is actually pretty flimsy compared to mauraders, roaches and hydralisks.

 

Stalkers are flimsy because DTs are flimsy too I guess. As for the AoE I'm fairly sure the archon has it. As for the missing ATG, in SC1 the Protoss didn't have anything for massed weak units so they don't necessarily need anything besides the mothership. It's part of the racial identity that the Protoss won't have a dedicated ATG like the banshee or the guardian.

 

They at least had the scout, which did ok against ground in a pinch.
Archons have splash? Well that's good.

If they make the stalkers that flimsy they need to lower the price, seriously. The blink ability doesn't improve them enough to be worth the cost, and they need to be effective on the field since the toss are pretty dependent on them for AA.

 

Reavers did good vs massed weak units.

As for the identity thing: I agree. The Protoss are a precice race. Wasting a lot of power on splash damage that may not hit anything... that is not like them. The Archon only had it because they were beings filled with the pure rage of High Templars. -according to the wiki-

 

yeah, that is why the protoss could not defeat the zerg at aiur
thats their weakness

 

I always saw it as:
Protoss being a counter for Zerg,
Terran being a counter for Protoss, and
Zerg being a counter for Terran

maybe with the new units and changes in SC2 this will change up, though

 

Terran were so effective against Zergs ....
I think it would be more Terran>Zerg>Protoss>Terran..... at least that's how SC1 was built!

 

SC1 -> reavers had splash damage -.-

 

Protoss have most of their roles filled in fact the only role I can see that isen"t filled is the GTA in the form of the stalker versus heavy air and like iv been saying the stalker needs its damage increased to 10 +10 but everything else is filled very well.

There is also the debate if the carrier should be the main battle ship but that all depends if the mothership gets put as a unique unit.

 

What about the Phoenix and its special ability for taking on air units? and Warp Rays for heavy air units like Battlecrusiers? I think Protoss have all their roles filled quite nicely so far and I havn't seen or read anything from Blizzard that shows otherwise.

 

Phoenix doesn't have the overload ability anymore. It's been replaced by anti-gravity and consumes mana per sec while it's activated. Therefore, Phoenix isn't really an anti-air unit anymore. Its damage which is 10X2 isn't that impressive and based on those facts, Phoenix is more of a harassing unit or picking out key units during a big battle.

Archons as mentioned, deal splash damage. They will be very effective against melee units or a group of clumped air units like the Mutalisks.

Colossus in the current build, are extremely deadly. They deal 45 splash damage but at a slower firing rate. What does that mean? Get 2 or 3 of these guys and basically anything will die in 1 shot. On top of that, they have siege range. So the only effective counter against these guys are air units. So every unit in the game could hit a colossus even if the unit is ATA.

My only complaint with the Protoss current roles is their intimation factor. In SC, Protoss was intimating because of their huge HP advantage over their counter races. Zealot was intimating because of their huge amount of HP advantage. Same goes to Dragoons. Infact, they had more HP then the freaking Siege Tanks. The first unit that comes out actually has more HP then a freaking Siege tank, which is around mid-tiered. How intimating is that?
While you were first learning SC, how many of you shet your pants when you see half dozen of zealots charging into your base early game? The Strong but few theme is what I'm talking about.

SC2, everything has changed. Marauders have almost as much HP as a Zealot/Stalker. Roaches with their crazy regen and 100 HP are also gonna be crazy tanks. It just seems like Protoss no longer has that Strong but Few theme anymore.

In order to fix that, I think Blizzard should lower the Marauders HP to around 90-100 (currently it's 125). Because right now in SC2, Protoss doesn't have it's natural HP advantage over their counter races anymore. Zealots + Stalkers? Heck, I'll build Marauders because it has as much HP compared to the Zealots/Stalkers. Same goes to the Ghost. They have 100 HP! That is like 20-30 too much HP for a Terran unit. We can say the exact same thing regarding the Zerg. Roaches with 100 HP and their crazy regen, can tank like crazy. With the new introduction of the Brood Lord (350 HP), it doesn't look too zergy with that many HP.

I really want Protoss to have that overall intimidation factor in SC2 with their strong but few theme. But with the overall buff of HP from the other races, it doesn't really look like the case and would probably be my only complaint in regarding to the Protoss.

Maybe it all plays out differently. Hopefully, my question will be answered by the time Beta starts rolling.

 

You analyzed that really well. Just 2 things that I find are wrong with it:

- Starcraft fans wil eat you for saying mana.
- Seriously: Having worries about hp amounts makes little sense. Blizzard is good at balancing, although you are right about that the Protoss are losing their race advantage.

Thanks for the info on the Phoenix and Colossus by the way. I needed to see some recent stats on that, before judging those units again.

 

I'll keep the mana thing in mind next time. Thx for reminding me.

The problem with the HP issue is that Protoss is suppose to have huge amount of HP compared to their counterrace. But in sc2, we see that it's not the case. However I agree that blizzard will be able to balance it. When beta comes out, hopefully my concerns will prove invalid. If not, that's what beta is for, balancing the game. LOL.

 

Indeed.

However, we still have the accelerated shield regeneration to think of. Still, Protoss base hp should indeed be higher then the others. At least enough to make a real difference, not 5 lousy hp or so.

 

The Colossus definitely fills the splash role well. It just need balancing thats all.

 

The protoss units might of gotten a health decrease but their shield regenerate a lot faster. (Think of how this effects units like the archon which he is all shield)

Also remember blizzard is trying to do something very hard in the form of balance and not only that but balance so massing of 1 or 2 units is not a norm.

Think of it like chess with 3 different types of playing types.

 

Although shield regeneration is a lot faster in SC2, we have to remember that it only regenerates when the unit is not in battle.

Therefore, shield regeneration doesn't really help the unit during battle. However, it could prove to be useful right after a battle and you want to regroup and launch a counter-attack.

 

Toss units regenerate when out of combat? Are you sure?

I think I saw from the first videos from Blizzcon and BR1 that stalkers and zealots did regenerate as soon as they were not attacked. There might be a small difference, but it would mean that they still can regenerate "when they attack" and "do not get attacked".

Do you guys have any information on this? I am not sure of this.

 

This is all i could pull up about the shield regeneration rates. right now X is really unknown, but i believe it to be about 5-10 seconds.

 

I still don't know about the collosus and phoenix. I was aware that the phoenix has anti-grav now, which is pretty cool (kind of the reverse of the net ability the raiders/crypt fiends had in WC3) but that doesn't make it an A2G unit if you have to use an ability on every ground unit you hit. right now the only air unit the protoss have to effectively deal with massed marines/hydras/stalkers is the carrier, so protoss are going to have to tech up all the way before they can get a foothold on island maps.

So does the phoenix fill the role of the corsair instead of the scout? I wonder if the Bisu build is still possible. Could be interesting indeed, esp. being able to lift spore crawlers.

As to the collosus, I think the area attack would be much better if it cut in an arc, since units naturally form an arc to fire up at it anyway. The straight perpendicular line makes no sense. Another idea, it wouldn't be that hard for them to program it to have a "smart" area effect, so that the direction of the line can change in order to hit the most units.

I do agree with you that the protoss just don't have an HP advantage right now. The stalkers' blink ability does not make up for it's punitive hp compared to the dragoon. They've made it too much of a harrasment unit, but it still is the only unit to fill it's very critical role on the battlefield and right now it doesn't have a lot of survivability without constant micro.

I think a nice debuff to the marauder hp plus switching places of the roach warren and hydralisk den on the tech tree would set my mind at ease. the 100 hp of the roach is fitting for it's role (it still gets one-shotted by tanks) but not that early in the game. Also I would rather the brood lord had less hp and did more dps, it's a flying artillery piece not a tank.