Zerg Building are alive - so let them have abilities.

Zerg buildings are organic in nature. If they surrounded by a lot of creep, they should heal faster. They should also heal quickly if tended to by a drone.

Spires should release miniature spores that float around the map damaging (5 damage) enemy air units that come into contact with them. The spores die out after 2 minutes. They should also be sticky - an enemy air unit will get stuck to its sticky surface and get trapped.

In the early game, let the main buildings each have a small defense.

Terran : Small gun on the top
Zerg: tentacle
Protoss: lazer or phase cannon

This would help to make the game not just about early rushes.

 

I like the idea of zerg buildings being semi-conscious units.

Right now they spawn broodlings on death.. which is like some kind of UMS trigger and is horribly uninspired. More polish pls!

 

Wouldn't this make the game start a lot later? The buildings if you had a lot of cheap, able to defend buildings, the players would have to build units that would already spent ( ones you know buildings will kill ), then you would have units that had to deal with maybe units inside the base, not to mentions enemy units on the way to other bases..... Not shooting the idea down but i think rushing is a tactic that works for some people and to eliminate it all together would not be useful. People would just rush anyway and harass workers, units that are just built and are weak could be killed off. Bulding that can defend themselves doesnt change their method of attacking.

 

I think its a terrible idea. The gun, tentacle and laser/phase cannon would completely annihilate any early scout. You'd not be able to have any idea of what your opponent was doing. Playing in the dark isn't a good way to go. If your looking to combat a rush, do it the old fashion way. With a bunker and marines, 14514352 creep colonies or cannons...

 

No, I dont like this idea one bit. I mean come on? Every game I send a scout, and micro him in if they have a unit trying to survive. I scout his base seeing what hes going, maybe early vultures with mines or some marines for early game. With that gun on top it is highly going against early game. I cant even begin to imagine how bad it would make the game.

 

hm, would be spammed to death. Only certain buildings have attacks, the photon canon, zerg spires, and the terran missle turret.

 

^ And for a good reason...

 

Let's complicate a game that already has enough micro and macro choices to keep players on their toes.

Yeah that sounds good.

 

Wait your the same guy who complained about early game rushes. Really man thats sad, u cant survive a simple rush... you know when they make Sc2 there might be maps with rocks in the way off all your doors. plz stop complaining about the only aspect of the game play that you personaly hate. your talking about destroying an important aspect of the game. that would be like saying all races will have there air units removed. we want all the possible options when the game comes out.

 

I'd like to see a Queen ability that focuses on altering structure behavior, for most Zerg structures while Spawn Larva depends on Hatchery/Lair/Hive.

Remember "Swarm Infestation"? It's an ability that causes the hive cluster to come alive and attack nearby enemy units. Maybe this new ability causes the target structure to sprout long tentacles and grow spore mounds, giving it temporary air and ground attack (unlike the glowie butterflies of Swarm Infestation).

Seeing as Spawn Larva and Creep Tumor both cost 25 energy, this Mutation ability would probably cost 75 energy out of a Queen's 200 max, further adding to Macro!


-Psi

 

again i say this spawn larva should be an auto cast and if you just dont need it turn the dang thing off. or since u can build more then 1 queen just make another queen and make her the rabbit of the base.

 

Why?

Spawn Larva is a macro ability, something that the user should always manually do themselves. A base isn't going to build itself, and in no way should any other macro involved ability (building units, upgrading, research, teching) be automated.

It's like saying SCV, Drones, Probes should be automatically produced. As the player, you decide when you spend the energy, when you need extra larvae.


-Psi

 

so how is it that when zerg need faster men they have to make use of a queen but look at terrans. A race that after 2 winning battle reports, units that have what seems to be the best counters for every thing gets a reactor.

How is spawn larva going to compair to that. While your paying attention to the battle field that terran player has got his barracks hotkeyed and is flooding you with vikings, marines, and hellions. How in the world does the simple spawn larva a macro ability going to match up to that.

i'll put this simple a race that is suppost to be about massing is fighting other races that have better versions of there massing like protoss warp-in cutting build time and terrans doubling up on men. Zerg have to use a Macro ability to keep up and not only that its based of energy?? but protoss and terrans just pump away. Dont kid your self how hard do you think its going to be to keep that up agents something as easy as terrans and protoss abilities?

since you can make more then one queen why not have one be a permanent gogo bunny? thought an auto cast. it would be better then having to take your eyes off the battle when you need faster units.

and i just wanna say its NOTHING like saying scv, drones, and probes can auto build a base, dont even try and make that an argument

 

Argument is such an ugly word, it's called discussion

There's one thing about the Reactor though, it will only ever let you produce Marines, Hellions, Vikings and Medivacs in the double, while Spawn Larvae gives you access to most of the Zerg unit arsenal. You will not have access for Marauders, Reapers, Ghosts, Siege Tanks, Thors, Banshees, Nighthawks and Battlecruisers with Reactor.

The Zerg relies on numbers, the player is not very good if his non-Zerg opponent is out producing him. The Zerg in Starcraft 2 are extremely mobile in open terrain, especially with 30% Creep boost that you can place anywhere on land, with Overlords.

If the player can't plan ahead with Spawn Larvae's 40 second cast time, he can't plan ahead with building up an army.


-Psi (Calm down, there's no need for hostility)

 

Creep has nothing to do with what i'm talking about, so go ahead and throw that out the window. Protoss and terrran arnt running there increases to mean off energy or a passive ability. Think about it they said zerg right now is the most punishing race because when you loose men its it hurts. Thats not suppost to happen. thats not righ. zerg didnt have that feel in sc1. While if you watch blizcon matches or the other matches on youtube you see terrans and protoss have a crazy unit production rate, and zerg?? they got spawn limitation. They are held down by energy and forced macro. but protoss and and terrans....nooo.

and you said you can only build Marines, Hellions, Vikings and Medivacs. Those are the units that can kill zerg easy. Marines double with medivacs was said from blizzcon to be odd and too zergish. and hellions destroy mass units and is a sound counter for massed units like zerglings. And how about protoss. Not only does the warpgates cut build time they can be made ANYWHERE. How about zerg? that good old queen is going to make them better....

right now zerg look cool but are not feeling zergish. if you had queens doing something passive you wouldnt have to worry about it like terrans and protoss who are having a field day with the passive macro abilities.

and if i sound aggressive i'm not just speakin. I might like terrans more but i mostly play on random i dont wanna see any race have a disadvantage. i like a fair fight and I KNOW when its not fair

 

Warp-In and Reactor are not passive macro, wherever did you get that idea? Protoss player is required to click and cast while paying resources on a Pylon field, and Terran does so by producing normally.

Larva gives you way more choices than EITHER Warp-In or Reactor. So what if the Marines are double pumped? You've got Zerglings then Banelings, Roaches, Hydralisks then Lurkers, Mutalisks then Brood Lords, Corruptors, Infestors and Ultralisks! You build what you need to counter the enemy, it's basic strategy!

Don't forget Spawn Larva practically gives you 2 Hatcheries for 1. You won't be spending 300 minerals and waiting 100 seconds for the Hatchery, when you can just pay 25 energy and wait 40 seconds for FOUR Larvae, when 1 Larvae takes 20 seconds to naturally spawn from a Hatchery!

Warpgates go on cooldown, and each can only produce 1 unit at a time. If you warp-in a Zealot, the Warpgate you used will not be able to produce another Protoss unit for 33 seconds. If an Immortal, 50 seconds inactivity, etc.

The Warpgate does not have a queue or rally, it doesn't let you store build orders! You need 5 Warpgates to produce 5 Zealots, that's 150 minerals x 5 plus 100 minerals x 5 = 750 + 500 = 1250 minerals. So holy crap, you only need to build a Queen for 100 minerals, use an infinite resource aka Energy, and just wait a bit, then you can build 7 Zerg air or ground units from the Hatchery YOU STARTED WITH, SEVEN UNITS AT THE SAME TIME.

The Reactor forces an entire Barracks, Factory and Starport to dedicate to ONLY producing those units. I'd say it is slightly too powerful right now, because it lets 2 Marines be produced at 1 Marine's build time of 20 seconds, instead of 40 seconds. If they put it at 30 seconds, it would help balance this.

Don't tell me this doesn't give Zerg an advantage, there's no gas involved. A Queen starts with 50 energy, she can cast in succession 2 Spawn Larvae, aka giving you 3 Hatchery's worth of Larvae plus 2 extras. 14 Zerglings vs 2 Zealots or 4 Marines, no advantage indeed.

As for Hellions, we don't know their exact base damage right now, because of their new upgrade of +10 damage vs Light.


-Psi

 

Zerg should have more inherent base defences to compensate. In rush games where after the first 5 minutes, 10 zeolots arrive at your base, the Zerg are definately weaker early game... Let them have something to compensate such as early base defences.

 

Like what?

Do u want a stronger queen? cheaper creap tumors? Think! The Zerg can make spine crawlers all around the base and the same with creap tumors (wait what exaclty does the tumors do?) And they can have the queen with spawn lava so it a queen with probly more then 20 zerglings by the 5 minute mark and you have spine crawlers. Doesn't sound like Zerg are going to have to many worrys with early zealots at 5 minutes.

 

a Creep Tumor is a building made by the Queen with energy, it can only be built on Creep and it expands the Creep like the Creep Colonies did in Starcraft 1, also they stay in a burrowed state, so the enemy would have to have detectors in order to kill them.

You can make Queens after you have a Spawning Pool, and she starts with both the Spawn Larva ability and Create Creep Tumor ability, so technically you can start expanding your creep for energy at the expense of not getting extra larva(which cost the same amount of energy) very early in the game.

As for the benefits of having more Creep(by use of the Queen), and therefore more speed to your units, appose to being able to build more units is debatable. If you can deal without the extra speed until Lair tech, you can then use some Overlords(which gets the Excrete Creep ability as soon as you get a Lair) that are just hanging around your base to spreed the creep instead, but then again, everyone can see and kill Overlords with a unit with anti-air capabilities instead of waiting til they get detection in some form so they can kill Creep Tumors. Terrans gets 'mobile' detection in the form of the Scanner Sweep from the Orbital Command(which morphs from the Command Center, and requires the Barracks), The Zerg get mobile detection from the Overseer which morphs from Overlords only when the Lair is built, and the Protoss can gets mobile detection from the Observer only when the Robotics Facility is built.

Then there is the fact that Creep will also provide the speed increase to ANY Zerg player, so if you are facing against another Zerg player they might not bother stopping the spread of creep since it helps them as well.

... oh sorry I kinda rambled there for a moment.

 

Before I start I loved the gather of information you did and although its nice information I’m going to put it on spot and show you why mathematically its right but still wrong.
First: the reactor is passive. Once you make it that’s it. You don’t have to ever go back to it. It’s a done closed deal. That my friend is passive by almost any macro standards. As for the warp-in, your currect that’s not as passive but its still better then the current ability spawn larva.

Not only can you produce men else where that a pylon is in use but the time is cut short. And lets not forget all it take is a simple hotkey of all your warpgates and its all good and dandy, besides having to press click for each unit(which zerg also do) once the warpgate is made theres no energy stall. Only a money limit (but that goes for everyone). If you have herd anything about the time changing on the warp-in say so cause i havent herd of any changes to it.

Heres the order of macro your going to need to do which is going to annoy the average player and possible set you back while playing zerg.
note: this is given the player is using hotkeys aswell. A protoss or terran player wont even have to take there eyes off what there doing while a zerg player is going to have to look back at base.
(Queen with maxed energy) 200 energy.
Zerg:
1.click hatchery(s) or larva via hotkey
2,3,4.click unit(s) of your choice
5.click queen
6.spawn larva ability .
7.Targeted hatchery repaeat until hatchery is full.
(8. ability ,9hatchery, 10ability, 11hatchery.)
12.Reclick hatchery or larva
13,14,15 pick more units.
16 reclick queen
17. spawn larva ability again
18. target hatchery
19. reselect hatchery or larva again
20. build your 4th larva(last larva after queen is energyless)
Total possible actions:20

Terrans:
1.Select barrack(s)/Factories/starports via hotkey
2,3,4,5,6,ect.Build marines/hellions/vikings/Medivacs
7.Rally point
Total possible actions:7

Protoss:
1.Select warp gate via hotkey
2,3,4,5,6 warp in units
7. select rally point
Total possible actions:7

I have a question about your chart

so if a queen starts out with 50 energy lets say the hatchery has a full 3 by the time she pops out of her egg, how does this chart come to 3 + 4? what was the point of telling us what energy she starts out with if your not going to base this chart on that fact? it would be 5 x 2 = 10. unless you wanna go from if these were units waiting around already full. Sadly to say thats not what happens in real matches.

larva yes does give you wat more choices and thats where it beats our a reactor but it does not completely beat warp-in. Unlike the larva the protoss player isnt going to have to wait to make his counters he gets them as soon as the warp gates are off cool down so lets say you made ultralisk and he saw it. He could at home make immortals and other units effect for countering your attack force. (depending on the map size) if you go on the offence by the time you make it to his base all those warpgates might be off cooldown and he's got more units coming in from all of them. while you. you get enrgy back per second and thats 25 seconds pluse 20 seconds for a larva PLUSE build time. God forbid your army is wiped, out your in troble. and if there is a hidden proxy pylon the walk time for a conter attack is going to be a big hurt for you. this leads to the Question and answer posted after the second battle report cam out

as for your counting skill you miscounted, in 40 seconds thats not four larvae its only 3. 2 larvae is 40 seconds but spawn larvae is 25 energy and you get evergy back per second if i'm not mistaken. thats only 1 from the queen in 40 seconds as 2 would requier 50 energy. Thats a grand total of 3...

In a closing note i just want to say again while it is a possible 20 actions for a zerg player to maximaize there macro the average player would stop using a queen after early match while the terrans and protoss dont even require you to be looking at the building for them to be used. In the end a zerg player might just for for the 300 into another hatchery insted of more queens. its just too much clicking. Late game you have to focus on the battle field. If your lookin at base every other second its not going to help as much as being caught off guard from a suprize attack by the enemy who barly has to think twice or click half as much as you are. This spawn larvae ability needs to be something that is going to last all game. Look at how many times its been change. spawn larvea has already had a few changes compaired to the reactor(hasnt had any) and warp-in which has had less then spawn larvea. Now ask your self why its been changed so much? probably because its base concept is not as fast or long lasting as it needs to be. Comepair that to warp-in and the reactor. barly any changes at all.