StarCraft II Q&A - Batch 12

tier 1 means zerglings/marines/zealots and the most basic stuff. higher tiers mean like mothership and thor.

 

Ahhh I get it now. Thanks

 

not the reaver. forget it. why want old units back. just because its useful or cool in sc1 doesn't mean it has to be in sc2. NEW units with new abilities is better. i dont want to be bored playing starcraft 1 with pretty graphics.

would you pick a firebat rather than a specter or a new mech or a marine with rocket lunchers or reapers with flame throwers or a mobile bunker?.. come on. save the remaining unit slot for the NEW units. TRUST innovations and changes.

i like the firebat but...... new unknown units excites me more. and placing old units lessen the chances of getting new and COOLER units. i really prefer NEW units and besides most of the old units are still there specially with the toss(zealot, dk, ht, ta)... not the reaver or i'll be bored playing protoss ground unit. toss needs the vindicator or that thing in the blizzcon artwork.

and karune i hope you change the look of the observer... make it look like a badass cool observer not a fish. like darth maul observers in episode 1 but bigger or something else. =p

 

Well i think they are just a solid Starcraft 1 fans thats why they still wants old units hehehe. :afro: :afro: :gossip:

 

Flamethrowers are even shorter range than the dual Pistols, Reapers could use their improved speed to outmaneuver melee units but that would require inhuman micro to work with Flamethrowers.
Firebats could survive melee thanks to HP, support and Medics, Reavers have none of that as they are made to work where other units can´t get to.

Basically I say that Flamethrowers would be a actuall downgrade for Reapers if they work like they did in SC.

 

yah i always knew that. im a solid fan too. ^^ love the reavers and goliaths etc, but it seems that replacing them in sc2 is better just for the simple fact that they will look and feel OLD and BORING with the "same" look and gameplay mechanics for sc2.

im just trying to help... and make some realize that we need to move on, change, adapt, and LEARN new tactics and skills in sc2 rather than having old units back with the same mechanics.

im pointing out to guys in b-net NOT really here. starcraft 2 forum users are COOL. and bnet users are full of whiners.. like me o.0

and good AM protoss commander. entaru tassadar.

 

Whaaaah!! wait what AM means heheh just asking ???

 

Yeah !!!! mmmmmmmmm

The firebat will invite us to his barbecue. He will prepare crispy zerglings ! ^_^

I'm hungry ! :

I love the smell of .... burned zerglings.

 

morning? your in the philippines ryt? dont you text? gudAm shortcut... heheh.

ok they will get mad on us posting unrelated things here.

so anyway back to the topic.

black color.. i think they can still brighten "blacken more" in the mini map so it can still stand out.
i like black colored terran. ^^

tier 1 units in late games? doesn't matter to me.

how about this question... will tier 3 units will be USEFUL in most games now specially with the pros?

uhm make the firebat shoot balls of fire(NO AOE) instead. or switch between flame throwers. balls of fire for mechanical units and flamethrowers for biological units.

 

Flamethrower would add splash as well as damage bonus vs infantry units, I would hardly call that a downgrade, even with a slight decrease in attack range. It's not as if dual-pistol reapers will be able to completely avoid taking damage in combat altogether anyway. Flamethrower upgrade would just allow the reapers to take down large numbers of infantry more easily, all by built-in design instead of hard micro.

Firebats only have 10 more HP than the marine(50 instead of 40), although they do have 1 base armor while marines have 0. But 1 point of armor could easily be made to be included as part of the flamethrower upgrade, if results after testing show it to be necessary.

Also, I don't see extending the flamethrower range from firebat's original 2 up to 3 to be completely out of the question. From what we've seen, it appears that the attack range of twilight archons have been extended(from 2, same as firebat).

Right now, reaper's attack is just too similar to marine's ground attack, it seems redundant. And Terran doesn't seem to have a unit specifically for the purpose of hard countering masses of basic infantry at early tier 2. Depending on how the viking's ground attack actually play out in a game, it could be the main anti-infantry unit instead. But I don't really know how useful vs infantry viking really is at this point.

 

I agree completely with Remy, except that the Flamethrower should be an upgrade from the REAPER!

I'm all for new units, but why do you even NEED the Reaper if you have the Firebat? The name already fits a flier... Fire... Bat....? Just make the upgrade come as an evolution of the unit. You upgrade, it's HP drops, armor drops, etc, and it gets jetpacks. Fair enough trade.

Then you could use the space to create a new unit! Also, an old unit that usually lost its usefulness after Tier 1 has now become applicable in later stages of the game. But really, I'm just disagreeing in HOW to get it done, not on the final product.

@ Samir... that's just spam, dude. Not cool. I've seen you post like that a couple of times.

 

Well flamethrowers were counters for basic infantry. Making them upgrades from a specialized unit might make them too late. With upgrade i meant to improve the firebat over its old role. With your current idea we would "sidegrade" the Reapers. They have 45 HP wich is less than a shielded Marine at 55 HP. The idea behind the Firebat was that they stand in front of the marines.

Another silly Firebat improvement idea: Give them immolation, let them set themselves on fire to deal really dood damage to melee units.

 

HURRAY! Firebats are back and they will look AWESOME! they are very effective against zergs and melee ;D

 

If you had to choose between the reaper and the firebat, what would it be ?

- reaper : ability to attack ground units only, ability to jump everywhere, to launch grenades, and has two pistols which do the same thing than the marine's gun

- firebat : ability to attack ground units only, launches fire plasma on everything, and DO cause damages to the friend infantry. Yes, normally the firebat should wound his "friends" too. And when he dies, and blows up, he should damage his "friends" again.

Reaper and marines do exactly the same genre of attack, with gun or pistols. Not the firebat, which is special.
However I do prefer the REAPER. Because it'sa new unit, and I personally didn't use a lot of firebats when I played to SC.

 

without any kind of doubt,the best possible information. i hate when in other rts units get obsolete with the pass of time because it limits your strategic options.i still think that this kind of early/weak units will have an even reduced role in SC2 as time progresses than they had in SC1 because of the massive firepower that some units deploy,but ill have to wait to see if its true or not

 

@ Unentschieden, it's not as if Terran is at a huge disadvantage vs Protoss or Zerg for the entire early-game, and can only even the odds when Terran starts getting firebats. Firebats are mainly needed for defending against timing rushes or just people massing lings or zealots in general, which in any case is near the end of tier 1 to tier 2 timing wise.

Firebats were late tier 1, so are the reapers currently. However, reapers do not take up production queue at the barracks(you can still pump marines or medics), and you can pump reapers quickly in "bursts" if I understand correctly. So you're looking at firebats that slightly slow down your infantry production on a whole(with the production of firebats themselve in the equation) but come with flamethrowers by default, and reapers that you can produce quickly and also allow you to pump more M&Ms on the side but require an upgrade for the flamethrowers. Since you can produce the reapers beforehand and just convert them to flamethrowers all at once, I don't think it's gonna be all that late compared to normal firebat production. That in conjunction with the fact that reapers can jump cliffs is why I suggested the flamethrowers to be a tier 2 upgrade, even though it's possible to make it tier 1 with the current Terran tech tree.

And I'm not really worried about reaper's HP. In fact, I think it's a good thing it's not too high, otherwise it would be imbalanced. If you look at Zerg, they have flimsy zerglings as frontline units while hydras provide ranged support. Zerglings have much higher damage output, actually the highest in SC1. There's a chart I made analyzing units of each race in SC1 in my thread hereIn-depth Analysis of Protoss, Terran, and Zerg. I compared the damage per cooldown per food of all the units of each race up to mid-game. Based on that, firebat actually had the highest damage output ahead of the zergling, but firebat's concussive damage and zergling's attack speed upgrade at tier 3 were not factored in.

Firebat's were too over-specialized and not very useful all-around. Which is why I think it should be "damage bonus vs infantry" for reaper's flamethrowers, good damage all-around but even better damage vs infantry. That and splash, and time charge bombs, and cliff jumping to raid your base from your backdoor, I think 45 HP isn't unfair but pretty reasonable for the sake of balance. Besides, you have to account for medics. If people want to go for your flamethrowing reapers, you can just stick med on them and focus-fire with your stimmed marines from the back.

But like I said, this is just one idea for Terran to have something specifically for anti-infantry. If vikings can take up that role with no problems, then it might not be needed. And power up to you btw Unentschieden, you make good points based on good understanding of SC IMO.

 

@Remy well I agree with you actually, it seems we only disagree on the impact Splash damage would have on the effectivity of Reapers. I think they would become to strong against bunched up workers and too weak against melee units in a scenario where they can retreat (remember vultures?).
I think Flamethrowers would negate their mobility advantage wich is pretty much their only advantage - D-8 are supposed to be their damage source, it is obvious that the Pistols are only there so that they don´t loose to worker units imho.

It just doesn´t sit well with me that the units in front would be "squishier" than the longer ranged units behind them (after shield)

Terran anti Infantry might get solved with one of the following:
More marines due to Reactors
Earlier Medics due to Techlab
Reaper micro (the aliens rely on melee on that point and reapers are faster at that point)
Vikings
Bunkers
Edit: and of course the original Firebats if they come back
Or a combination of the above

 

sweet. this one has some cool info. kinda neat how the firebat's back, but i doubt it will stay long.

 

I don't think Terran will really get medics earlier unless the tech lab builds significantly faster than the academy.  Bunker is also the same as before, and I believe will have the same impact as before.  Bunker really plays no part outside of the Terran home base or fortified remote positions.  I'm basically putting hopes on the viking personally.

I didn't really understand what you said about the vulture.  The vulture was very useful against basic infantry in combat, not just at killing workers.  The vulture was also useful in providing defense against swarms of units or early armored units(basically dragoon) during the period where Terran is vulnerable to timing rushes.  The vulture's usefulness vs infantry back in SC1 is the reason why I'm putting hopes on the viking(ground form), because they are at the same position on the tech tree.

But yea, I think my position on the Terran anti-infantry issue is largely the same as you.  As long as it gets solved by something, I don't have a problem with what it is.  I just think that reaper flamethrower concept might be a good way to do it, that would also fit in nicely with the Terran while keeping things unique for them.

 

I meant that the reason the vulture was so usefull for its price was it´s speed. Would it be as usefull if you gave the vulture flamethrowers? Attack move vultures fail horribly (at least for me), they need attention to be usefull. I actually think they were mainly designed to be Minelayers in the beginning - 25 mins per mine are actually a good price imho.

Flamethrower Reapers could work. They just wouldn´t be flying Firebats. You described their potentional uses yourself - that hardly resembles SC Firebats.