New Colossus Attack

I don't have time for a full reply, what with it being one thirty in the morning and all, and overmind seems pretty keen to continue, so I'll just note a couple of things.

Now imagine it attacking from a position perpendicular to the one they're in. Tell me in which situation they'll be hitting more Zerglings.

Not being about to attack Air targets does not prohibit the Colossus from being a critical mass unit. For example, imagine the Carrier, but if it could only attack Ground targets. It's still a critical mass unit. It might not be invincible, but it does reach its limit.

@ 10-Neon. Some nice images there, and some nice comments too, especially about only being able to flank. It did almost ease my pain for a second, until I realised that only being able to flank is still just as restrictive. Anyway, a lot of those situations seemed very dependant on luck, and not on the understanding of the unit itself. For example, if units have just been sent straight from your opponent's base, then they'll only be susceptible to flank attacks, but if they're grouped outside of the base beforehand, then its effect it drastically limited. It's also dependant on what the units themselves attack, or what they're order to do, and where the attack formations develop. If things don't go your way, you're not always able to simply micro it into a better place.

Anyway, now it's one forty and my heads about to mash the keyboard, so I guess I'll leave it at that then.

 

The same number. What are you getting at?

If you consider a unit unable to attack about half the units in the game and ineffective against another quarter of the units under most situations to be a critical mass unit, go ahead, but that doesn't answer the question of why the 450-450-20 Colossus had to be nerfed. It would be understandable if as the unit number increased it grew exponentially more powerful against virtually every unit in the game, but it only grows exponentially more powerful against light ground units, a more linear power curve against heavy ground, and no change in power at all against air units. Hardly a justification for nerfing. So, please come up with an actual explanation for why the 450-450-20 Colossus was nerfed rather than saying that it could be critical massed.

 

That's where the skill curve comes into play. As they say, "luck favors the prepared." You analyze the terrain, figure out where units are likely to cross, and place yourself accordingly.

Units will string out in "flank-only" patterns when they're going somewhere and don't realize you're there, or when they're in a restricted corridor. Catching these is a matter of determining point A, the origin of the troops, point B, their destination, and a convenient point C, a place in-between where you can keep your Colossi from view.

They'll string out in "direct-only" patterns when they're attacking your units and structures. In these cases, you place them either directly behind the units being attacked, or directly behind the attacking force. This position is one that you don't have to wait for, or stumble upon, because you can force them into it by attacking.

Placement requires both knowledge of the unit, and the way it interacts with the terrain.

If the units are grouped up before leaving the base, they're going to mobilize in a formation you can attack from any angle. Circles are easier to hit than lines, at least, if you're a splashing ranged unit.

 

I would think because of there height they should simply be looked at as flying units that can have their shields attack by ground and flying units but only ata can attack them directly after their shield is gone .

Once this unit becomes more familiarized it will probably be a lot stronger because of its stand alone (climbing over units and cliff climbing) property and also increased range seems to be a must for this unit to get the full advantage as 9 outclasses a lot of range units and the fog of war advantage it will have.

It should be able to attack on the move and do more damage to smaller units like +10 verse lighter or smaller +3 versus armored but i also see the fact that there really doesn't seem to be enough damage from them and i also still stand by on a stronger shield against maybe ata or smaller units.

2 are defiantly powerful after watching http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sbp2ZilUDB4&feature=related and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zL-ZEHcnek&feature=related but you can see in both the players fail to micro them away from the other units putting them in harms way.

 

Here is one way of fixing the Colossus:
1. Make it deal 16+8 vs. Light, not that vs. Shields junk.
2. Give it 3 Defense. Every other Massive unit has 2+ Defense.

Do that, and it will kill Zerglings in 2 hits, and the Zerglings will take 175 hits to kill it, twice as many.

 

That sounds about right and also i think the Upgrade should make the cool down on his thermals decreased just a bit and yes do more damage to less armored dudes but there are alot of armored units (the roach is armored along with the stalker and also the marauder) that are smaller also.

I also would like to see it be able to attack on the go to make this unit more mobile and more of a micro stand alone.

Stats and cost could be tinkered with a bit but making it expensive justifies that this unit is not to be masses along with the carrier.

 

The fact this thread is still alive and the Colossus is still very messy proves beyond your theories the Colossus must have the old attack. :wacko:

 

The colossus doesn't necessarily need its old attack back, it simple just needs to be able to be balanced so that its effective at what it does but not too effective to where you would want to make a army of them to mass murder your enemy like the old Sc Carrier.

 

However, the Colossus is unable to attack a large number of game units, and is terrible at fighting another set of game units even when deployed in critical mass numbers. 10 Colossi would be used as target practice by an air force, meaning that you have invested 5000 resources in an army that still needs even more resources to be spent on AA units.

Hence, the Colossus being nerfed from 450-450-20 to 500-350-16 was not an attempt to correct for critical mass, but for some other reason, most likely it being too strong in regular combat.

 

Nice. The value of your opinions and judgements have just dropped drastically.

Not being able to attack Air units does not prohibit a unit from reaching critical mass, so just because the Colossus can only attack ground doesn't mean it wouldn't get exponentially stronger in larger and larger numbers. Seeing as the Colossus does get exponentially stronger, it would have had to be nerfed. You saying that that isn't a reason because it can't attack Air targets is like saying there's no reason to nerf Zerglings, because they can't attack Air either. Any unit that is able to hit critical mass would need to be nerfed. Why? Because it gets exponentially stronger and stronger in greater numbers. So what if it can't attack Air? It's turns out much stronger than it's intended to be. What happens when a unit turns out to eb much stronger than it's intended to be? It gets nerfed.

Again, not being able to attack Air units does not mean the Colossus cannot end up a lot stronger than its cost. So what if it has a counter? Everything has a counter. Counters have nothing to do with critical mass. If a unit is overpowered, then it's overpowered. Fullstop. What happens to it? It gets nerfed. If a unit is overpowered in a specific situation, then it's overpowered. Fullstop. What happens to it? It gets nerfed. If a unit is overpowered in large numbers, then it's overpowered. Fullstop. Now tell me... What happens to it?

Luck also favours the lucky. Sometimes, there's no telling where the assault front will break out, like in one of the screenies you linked where you noted all the better places the Colossus could be standing. Who's to say those Marauders or Hellions or whatever would have lined up like that? As it turned out, the positioning of the Colossus was just unlucky, and it's too late to be moving it to a better place. Another thing is that Colossi are easily microed against. Those Marauders, etc, could have simply changed targets, thus forming a situation where the Colossus is next to useless.

In my opinion, unless they're taking out some units, which they don't appear to have the time to achieve granted the speed at which most things run, there's very little gain, and it would end up being much more effective to simply use them as back-line fighters. Terran and Protoss wouldn't be too bothered by the ambushing Colossus, what with the Medivac's transport capabilities and healing rate and the Protoss' out of combat shield regeneration, and once you've surprised them once, I don't see them running through, again, unprepared. Overall, it seems like a lot of effort to achieve something less efficient than if you just used them as back-line fighters.

That's true, but again, if it's hardly worth flanking at all, then you might as well be using them just like this in the first place, which wastes their ability to hike.

That's a double edged sword. Knowledge of the Colossus is simple... It's useless unless attacking at the right angle. Simply changing your target could potentially nullify the Colossus' use, or even just take it out of the equation.

My bad, I didn't make this too clear. Firstly, I meant if they're grouped outside of the opponents' base, where, despite being able to hit from all angles, far less units would be hit overall.

 

I believe its because people where crying BS on it and blizzard reacted too quickly instead of dealing with it in a different way. Also as you can see most want to see the colossus back to the way it was.

Problems
-Can be attacked at every angle effectively by everything from getting mauled by warp rays to smaller units, (something it should not have a problem with) bigger heavier units, ( i can except that) getting taken out by ata which I would think should not be able to effect the colossus but the only real ata units right now are the phoenix and the corrupter (but still very effective against the colossus).

solution
-well it can walk up ledges and escape smaller units that have to walk in normal terms, but it cant outrun flying units and the terrain feature can also be a curse with other units as well
-my opinion give it a shield that can be effective against smaller attacks to some degree kind of like the immortal shield (good against small units like zerglings, marines, banshees, ect)

problem
-due to the attack being a aoe which in turn means instead of killing 1 at a time to degrade the groups damage it in turn has to kill off a group with several swipes all the while getting pummeled in certain situations

solution
-with its thermal upgrade it gives it more range to stand in the back and maul small units and also in groups it seems this units is somewhat effective but for the cost of creating 2 or 3, other units of better quality could be brought in such as the immoral ect.
-allow it to sweep twice in a attack row with a long attack cooldown and give it more damage verse light units instead of that stupid shield thing.

problem
-the colossus is in part a stand alone units and must be microed as such but the way he is now it seems he is just too vulnurble and can be taken down way too quckly with too many counters

solution
-well once again he does have that ledge step and also i don't know if he currently is able to step over units.
-allow him to have attack on the go and also if the step over thing is not in it should be added due to his large size and skinny legs.

 

The stats for the Colossus is 150 shield 200 hit point which means adding a shield effect that reduces units that only do 6-5 damage - 1 which in turn is op. I think that the Colossus doesn't need anything like that considering you won't only have a massed group but units as support with them too

The cooldown for one sweep is pretty little 16 with bonus of 8 to shielded units meaning 2 Colossus deals 32 damage x 2 = 64 which pretty much kills any tier 1 unit. I see lots of balance in a unit that can kill 6 units at once. /sarcasm.

If you let it attack on the go it means you want to reduce the attack cooldown which in turn makes it like a Protoss version of the Hellion except it can 3hit marine groups. -.-

 

If a unit can be easily countered by a variety of commonly available options, then it is not overpowered. Its like saying that the Baneling is overpowered because it can slaughter melee units. As I have stated repeatedly, the 450-450-20 Colossus, when massed, would still be demolished by an airforce the fraction of its cost, or a variety of other things that are easily available late game. Investing 5000 resources into a unit that can ONLY attack ground is very different from the Zergling scenario. In order to achieve critical mass, your force would be crippling overspecialized and demolished. Carriers and their ability to hit all units and traverse all terrains bypass this.

No matter how many times you state it, I doubt it. Units tend to clump in a variety of situations, are otherwise dense enough to be affected to a decent degree by the Colossus

 

Firstly, that attack isn't that great. Against Protoss, it takes a Colossus seven attacks to down a Zealot. If you've got two Colossi going, that's still four attacks. Seeing as Zealots are pretty fast, and faster still if they've got Charge, there's a good chance it can be in melee combat for the entire duration of those four attacks. Granted, it would not be able to down a Colossus in that time, but what with being up against two Colossus, and being subject to their bonus against Shields, that's not very impressive from the Colossus' point of view.

Against Terran, it takes three shots to down a Marine. With the Marine's Combat Shield upgrade, that's upped to four shots. Against two Colossi, sure, it doesn't make much of a difference, still requiring two rounds of fire from each, but with a single Medivac, the Marine cannot be taken down. Not until the Medivac runs out of Energy, where all it has to do is pick up the Marine.

Against Zerg, we've all seen it. Five Zerglings can take down a Colossus without any casualties.

Overall, yes, the Colossus it still a support unit, but it relies far too heavily on support. The Reavers of old, which weren't even designed as war machines, could still often deal their value in minerals before they were able to be taken down when they were on their own. The Colossus simply cannot do this. For the pinnacle of Protoss military technology, for the construct that was supposed to have single-handedly brought the end to the Kalath Intercession, it's a useless unit.

As for killing six units at once, that's can actually be considered as a flaw, or perhaps not a flaw, but a disadvantageous trait. It's much more effective to take units out one by one, thus reducing their total amount of firepower quicker, than wearing everything down at once, allowing everything to attack to the very end.

So, say, if Zerglings dealt five thousand damage, they wouldn't be overpowered because they...

...?

Zerglings that deal five thousand damage would definitely be counted as critical mass units, though for other reasons of course, but are you still going to say they wouldn't be overpowered because they can be countered by Air units?

You've seen images of units forming a line while travelling, images of units forming a line while attacking, videos of units forming a line while travelling, videos of units forming a line while attacking, battle reports of units like the Hellion and Colossus being extremely positional units and turning the tide depending on where they're standing, reports from Karune about how it's a micro intensive unit because of it's line attack, and you've seen its attack for yourself. Seriously dude, I don't know how else to say this any more... Give up. The Colossus does need to attack from specific angles in order to be effective.

 

You are forgetting the Colossus +8 bonus to shielded units...
16damage is powerful vs 1 group of zerglings and marine clump.

 

No, I took the Shield bonus into consideration for the Zealot.

And as I'd said, the Medivac can heal much faster than the Colossus can dish out damage, so so long as the Terran player spreads the Marines out slightly, which is far easier than most other forms of micro, the Colossus would be lucky to get a kill.

As for the Zerglings, we've all seen the video. Five Zerglings taking out a Colossus with absolutely no casualties.

 

So if this is such a useless unit, do you seriously believe that increasing its damage by 4, its HP by 100, and its cost by -50 Vespene, will really make it overpowered?

I have worked hard to be polite regardless of your continued jabs, but at least try to pretend that you care about making real points. I would like you to indicate the part in my post where I say that Zerglings deal 5000 damage, because I think that part only happened in your head.

Let me summarize this simply:
Investing 1000 resources in Zerglings is reasonable
Investing 5000 resources in Carriers is reasonable
Investing 5000 resources in Colossi is not
This is because if you spend the 5000 resources on Colossi, you will have very little resources left over to deal with units that the Colossi can't handle, which consists of flying units, cloaked units, several spellcasters, and any unit with 150 or more HP. The Zerglings still leave you with plenty of resources left over to deal with units that Zerglings can't handle, while the Carriers can handle virtually every unit in the game to some extent.

Hence, I could care less how exponentially powerful Colossi get against Zerglings and Hydralisks if they still can't beat Roaches, Ultralisks, Mutalisks, Corruptors, Swarm Guardians, Overlords loaded with Banelings/Zerglings, and Nydus Worms loaded with Banelings/Zerglings. You can have as big a rock as you want, but it won't do crap if the opponent has even little paper and you have no money leftover for scissors.

Those happen in small scale battles, and even then, half the time they are clustered enough to allow the Colossus to nail a fair amount of them even if it hits them at a lousy angle.

I've heard that Siege Tanks work wonders when put behind friendly units and terrain barriers rather than in front of them.

Micro intensive does not mean that it requires micro to be effective, only that it benefits strongly from micro. For example, the Stalker and Vulture are both perfectly good units even if you don't micro them, but if you do, they become significantly more effective.

 

Yes. That's what's wrong with the current Colossus. It's a critical mass unit. In large numbers, that Colossi would be far to powerful for what it cost to get them. Imagine doing the same thing to Carriers. Increase damage slightly, increase health significantly and decrease its cost. I mean, if they're overly powered when massed right now, imagine what kind of impact that would have. It wouldn't do an awful lot to the individual, but would stack like nothing before.

Even if you're not massing them, provided they're getting stronger at an increasing rate, then they're going to become overpowered. However, that doesn't stop them being useless units, because they're not designed to be massed. They're designed to be the embodiment of what Protoss stands for; Small numbers but expert fighters. The Colossus, regardless of its nerfed stats or pre-nerfed stats, it almost the polar opposite of that. They're pathetic in small numbers, and overpowered in large numbers. If anything, it should belong to the Zerg right now.

Believe it or not, I'm capable of coming up with my own points. Stuff I say, as you may or may not have noticed so far, has not always been said before by you. I came up with the Zergling scenario in order to prove a point. A critical mass unit can still be overpowered if it can only attack Ground targets. In small numbers, they'd be able to be dealt with, as they don't have the health to survive for that long, but in large numbers, they'd obviously be completely overwhelming. According to you, if something can, and I quote, though I'll quote in quotation marks this time as you seemed to struggle with the quote box, if something "can be easily countered by a variety of commonly available options" then it's not overpowered. That's what you said in response to the Colossus being a critical mass unit, despite not being able to attack Air targets, so let's see if it holds. Does it? Of course not.

Not being able to attack Air units does not stop a unit from achieving critical mass. It might not be able to win you the game on its own, but that's not the idea of a critical mass unit. The idea of a critical mass unit is a unit that gets exponentially stronger in greater numbers. Regardless of if it can attack Air or not, it's more powerful than its cost. What needs to happen then? It needs to be nerfed.

Again, you're talking about being able to win the game on its own. That's not necessarily the case. The only condition for a critical mass unit is a unit that becomes stronger than what it costs as the group grows. To put it another way, the unit out-worths its cost.

I'll put it another way. Let's say each unit has a value, made up of, say, Value Points (VP), which is how the units get balanced. So Ultralisks will have a significantly greater value than Zerglings, so Ultralisks will have a significantly higher number of value points. Get it? I sure hope so. Now, let's say that a Colossus is equal to a hundred Value Points. The problem is that in large groups, the value of the group of Colossi, what with getting exponentially higher, outgrows the linear scale of the entire groups Value Points. Overall, they're more powerful, or valuable, than what they've cost, and need to be nerfed.

That is a critical mass unit. A critical mass unit is not a unit that can win you the game on its own, it's a unit that gets more powerful than what it's cost to build them when built in large numbers. It's overpowered in large groups, so it needs to be nerfed.

Again, you're talking as though to be a critical mass unit it needs to be able to win you the entire game. It doesn't.

And all you need are six Colossi and they can take out a Roach in one round of fire. I'd hardly call that 'not being able to be beaten by Roaches'. Roaches are flimsy. They're not tanks. Having a high regeneration means nothing when you're able to deal more than ninety damage at once. They're designed to be hit on and off for the entire duration of a battle, not to be the victims of focused fire. That's their weakness.

Overall, they don't need to be able to win you the game on their own to be critical mass units. If they're overpowered in large numbers, they're overpowered in large numbers.

Actually, it would be exaggerated in larger scale battles. You know, what with there being more of everything and everything. Just look at the original Protoss gameplay video again. Massive lines. Regardless of whether it was the Zerglings, the Zealots, the Reapers, the Marines or anything, they spread out. It's the same AI. It's not as though they compute what numbers they're in and act accordingly. They're just trying to attack, and when they can, they stop, and do.

And you can't simply rely on all battles being large scale battles. It's an option, but they're not compulsory.

Yeah and Zerglings do wonders when in melee combat......... Sheesh. I hope, for your own sake, that you're joking, 'cause there's a big difference between positional fighters and ranged fighters.

Nice choice of two completely non-positional fighters there. Again, for your own sake, I hope you're joking. The micro from Vultures comes from attacking immediately, not from where they're standing, and the micro from Stalkers is an extension of regular micro, and getting them out of combat quickly. Both of these involve reducing the amount of damage taken, so of course they're still fine when attacking normally, because their attack isn't changed through micro. This isn't the case for the Colossus. The micro comes from where it's standing when attacking. If it's standing in one position, it may be able to hit, or miss, five units, but if it's standing at a different angle, it may only be able to hit two, tops.

If you're still going to say that the Colossus is not a positional fighter, then we might as well agree to disagree. Again, we've seen pictures and videos of units, in both large and small scale combat, running and fighting in lines, we've been given the battle reports and unit reports by those who have played and designed these units, and everything shows that it's highly dependant on where it's attacking from. If you're going to deny all that, then what's the point of continuing to discuss it? Nothing more can be said on it, as it's crystal clear from all sources.

 

Itza, I am a bit confused here. Do you think the Colossus is overpowered or underpowered?

 

It's a critical mass unit, so, depending on the situation, either.

In my opinion, it's useless on its own or in small numbers, but it is devastating in a large group. Just like the Carrier, it's useless in small numbers but overpowered in large numbers. As for the unit itself, it's an extremely positional unit, what with its attack and all, and it's got the mobility to go along with being such a unit. However, the nature of its attack, as well as its uselessness in small numbers, simply waste this enhanced mobility.

What it should be, is a very strong, independent, sparse and expensive unit, which it originally had the means of becoming. However, it's not strong, being taken down by five Zerglings is a clear indication of this, it's not independent, despite having the mobility it does not have the power to back it up, it's not sparse, as they're useless in small numbers and overpowered in large, and they're more expensive than what they're worth, which has turned this into a negative trait, what with being a critical mass unit.

All these problems link back to its attack. It deals weak damage, cannot hit a moving target and deals over a large area of effect. It also can no longer use its ability to hike as effectively.