Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty

[TrueMetis]

I thought the player character from SC1 was supposed to be Matt.

Actually your supposed to be the Mar Sara magistrate, which means you are sort of mentioned but not in the context of Jim's friend and Ally. Which is unfortunate because you were pretty important and got ret-coned out of existence.

I actually just finished off the campaign on normal and going to start on hard soon. For some reason I had a real hard time with the train mission so I'm not looking forward to that one again. Otherwise I quite liked the campaign although I didn't do the secret mission. I'm just curious as to how they are going to do part 2. Maybe come back as the Cerebrate you were in SC1?

No the Cerebrate you were in SC1 is dead, killed by Tassadar. Your not going to be another Cerebrate either because they are all supposed to be dead. They don't make that clear in game though.

[karaddin]

And your character from original SC1 protoss campaign is Artanis who gets a fleeting reference in the final protoss mission.

[jurble]

The Mar Sara magistrate was a real character, he's mentioned by Tychus early in the campaign "I can't believe the Magistrate made YOU marshal" or something along that line.

[TrueMetis]

The Mar Sara magistrate was a real character, he's mentioned by Tychus early in the campaign "I can't believe the Magistrate made YOU marshal" or something along that line.

But it ignores that you were him and that he was with Jim while he fought with, then against, Arcturus, and that he was there when they stole the Hyperion. It just mentions you in passing though.

And your character from original SC1 protoss campaign is Artanis who gets a fleeting reference in the final protoss mission.

Oh ya I forgot about that. Thanks.

[Mack Kilimaro]

I thought the player character from SC1 was supposed to be Matt.

I think it would have made sense if Blizzard did this. If you look him up on the official site though, Horner's bio has nothing to do with having been Magistrate of Mar Sara or anywhere else. But since none of that's actually presented in the game, I think you can imagine him as your player from SC1 and that's not terribly contorting the game canon.

I assume Artanis will play more of a role in the Protoss-focused campaign for SC2 - which I believe is the last of the three they're going to do. He's a pretty important figure in the BW campaign for the Protoss with his youthful piss-and-vinegar, avenge Tassadar attitude that was kind of annoying but understandable. I actually thought the fact that he came out of that being the High Executor was a little weird, but whatever. We can all handle a little cognitive dissonance.

[Galactus]

I kind of love the protoss executor you meet in the game. She's awesome.

[The Pita]

I liked Selendis because they introduced her in the novels, and she was much more of an actual character because of it. Knowing that she was a good guy, who had helped humans in the past and was doing it out of duty made it much more of an experience than if she were Dark'Thul, Prelate of the Akilae, or something. They should incorporate as many characters from the novels as they can, because it really upgraded the experience. I honestly had to choose between two characters I liked. In the end I chose the one with the easier mission, after trying both a few times.

I thought the player character from SC1 was supposed to be Matt.

The novel Liberty's Crusade is a retelling of the first campaign. Basically, Raynor was the leader most of the time, and Michael Liberty or Edmund Duke were there when he wasn't. Matt is barely in it, or not at all. He's a pilot on the Hyperion who begins service with Mengsk and joins Raynor when he realizes that Mengsk is evil. In Queen Of Blades, he pilots the Hyperion away from Char when Raynor is trapped there, and brings it back later with reinforcements.

Apparently Liberty will return in the sequel, which will be great.

[SergioCQH]

Woohoo! Got my first win versus a Diamond Zerg. It was on Lost Temple. He went Hydras and I went Mutas. It wasn't even a contest.

[Werthead]

Unit control, organization, control groups, queuing, etc made StarCraft completely different than previous rts's.

Interesting, as StarCraft suffered a fair bit of criticism on release for only allowing 12 units in a group, not showing numerical representations of group-select and having shit-awful pathfinding for ground units (particularly large ones), not to mention having pants resolution (even in 1998 limiting resolution to 640 was seen as retarded). In terms of controls StarCraft was left in the dust by Total Annihilation, although it had a far superior story and much more restrained (and therefore interesting) unit selection.

A lot of the things SC2 is being criticised for, such as extreme conservatism in game design, are the exact same things that SC1 was criticised for, to be honest. That didn't stop SC1 being awesome.

WarCraft 3 was massive change in RTS's, with the hero, and creep grinding. WarCraft 3 is the most micro intensive RTS ever.

WC3 was a retrograde step for the RTS genre, again a hugely conservative game which retreated from anything approaching innovation or originality and in fact pulled back from the things that could have been more interesting, such as having larger, more tactically interesting armies or more varied sides (after StarCraft the fact that the four sides of WC3 had more very similar units which were replicated on each side was surprising).

Going back to RTS games of that time period, Ground Control, Hostile Waters, Battlezone, Homeworld, Shogun/Medieval and their various sequels all left WarCraft 3 gasping in the dust as far as innovation and good gameplay were concerned. Even the highly conservative Dawn of War which came out only a year after WC3 was a stronger game. Whilst playable and fun, WC3 remains, to my mind, Blizzard's biggest misstep and missed opportunity to date.

[Max the Mostly Mediocre]

Going back to RTS games of that time period, Ground Control, Hostile Waters, Battlezone, Homeworld, Shogun/Medieval and their various sequels all left WarCraft 3 gasping in the dust as far as innovation and good gameplay were concerned.

Of those listed, only Battlezone was nearly as much fun as WC3.

I kind of love the protoss executor you meet in the game. She's awesome.

Indeed. Apparently she's also, well, you in Brood War.

[denstorebog]

Heh heh. Pants.

[Solmyr]

Interesting, as StarCraft suffered a fair bit of criticism on release for only allowing 12 units in a group, not showing numerical representations of group-select and having shit-awful pathfinding for ground units (particularly large ones), not to mention having pants resolution (even in 1998 limiting resolution to 640 was seen as retarded). In terms of controls StarCraft was left in the dust by Total Annihilation, although it had a far superior story and much more restrained (and therefore interesting) unit selection.

I believe all these flaws made Starcraft into an official gaming sport worldwide (especially in Korea). Also eing unable to see the health of individual units in the group (Alt) made it extremely difficult for even a player with a good micro to keep track which unit he needs to pull back.

Yet all these drawbacks were overcame by high apm. An average player couldn't really do much about it, but if you've watched what Koreans do you'll be left with your mouth hanging open (I was).

Currently SC2 is much more noob-friendly, like most Blizzard games have become. Back in the day Blizzard was about making great games. Now they are about making great games which appeal to many people. The latter is definitely harder and thus requires a level of sacrifice and balance between what the pro gamers want and what the average player wants. Don't get me wrong, I am not calling SC2 WoW - the game is still very competitive and apm is yet again one of the main measurements of skill. But now even a player with ~100apm can get and stay in Diamond and I guess that makes people feel good about themselves. What more can a game offer? :)

[Galactus]

Going back to RTS games of that time period, Ground Control, Hostile Waters, Battlezone, Homeworld, Shogun/Medieval and their various sequels all left WarCraft 3 gasping in the dust as far as innovation and good gameplay were concerned. Even the highly conservative Dawn of War which came out only a year after WC3 was a stronger game. Whilst playable and fun, WC3 remains, to my mind, Blizzard's biggest misstep and missed opportunity to date.

Warhammer: Dark Omen.

[SergioCQH]

I believe all these flaws made Starcraft into an official gaming sport worldwide (especially in Korea). Also eing unable to see the health of individual units in the group (Alt) made it extremely difficult for even a player with a good micro to keep track which unit he needs to pull back.

Yet all these drawbacks were overcame by high apm. An average player couldn't really do much about it, but if you've watched what Koreans do you'll be left with your mouth hanging open (I was).

Currently SC2 is much more noob-friendly, like most Blizzard games have become. Back in the day Blizzard was about making great games. Now they are about making great games which appeal to many people. The latter is definitely harder and thus requires a level of sacrifice and balance between what the pro gamers want and what the average player wants. Don't get me wrong, I am not calling SC2 WoW - the game is still very competitive and apm is yet again one of the main measurements of skill. But now even a player with ~100apm can get and stay in Diamond and I guess that makes people feel good about themselves. What more can a game offer? :)

The reason so many low-APM players can get into Diamond is because Diamond is a huge league, not because SC2 is noob-friendly. Having watched A LOT of pro SC2 games, I think nobody has gotten even close to the APM-ceiling for this game yet.

[Poobah]

APM APM APM

Who gives a fuck.

I know people who mash their keyboards super hard and spam orders and all kinds of crap all to artificially raise their apm. Apm is a worthless statistic without context. Even amongst Pros in the SC:BW scene the APM range is huge from low 300's to mid 500's. Higher apm doens't make you win, higher skill makes you win. Better people naturally get faster, but speed in and of itself is meaningless and when pursued as a goal merely for its own end is just gonna make you a worse player. Way too many people get caught up in APM and forget to actually play the bloody game. Ok you are doing loads of stuff fast, well done, have a pat on the head. Now come back when you can actually play the game.

APM just gives me a massive headache like it's the be all and end all. I just think that's a lie and kinda an excuse people use to justify their own failings. "Oh I can't do 500 apm, that's why I suck" which is just not true. If you're sucking it's probably because you're too busy spamming and bitching about your apm. I don't even know what my APM in SC2 is. I suspect it isn't that high at all. Even at my most hardcore I was like... an average 150APM player in SC:BW when playing on ICCUP, usually closer to 100. And I beat people with much more APM than me. I believe there is/was a tool to work out your effective APM - eg. filter out the spam and redundant actions, and suddenly my APM was a lot more competative. I think they looked at some Pros and found like 50% redundancy in their APM or something silly like that.

Second point, which sort of comes up a lot in a round about way. It isn't directly related to this APM talk but it's sort of tangentially similar: being Korean doesn't make you a good player. Being Korean doesn't give you a racial +50APM bonus. Being Korean doesn't imbue you with mystical gamesense or unlock new builds for you. Being in an environment where you are paid to do nothing but play, practice and improve at the game does that. Correlation doesn't imply causation and being Korean doesn't make you a good SC player.

Finally I kinda disagree with the way Diamond is being categorised. I really don't think Diamond was ever intended to demote "Pro". I certainly agree that Diamond is 'huge' in terms of skill differential. Diamond only contains ~6% of all SC2 players worldwide, but the difference between someone in the top 6% and someone in the top 1% is pretty big although as yet I think the meta-game is developed enough for that game it be as immense as it was in BW. Personally I'd say Diamond was a sort of Black Belt - eg. someone with a basic level of competency in the game and it's various facets as a whole, as opposed to the "Black Belt = grand master" stereotype. If you are in Diamond you know how to macro, how and when to micro, you know how to defend rushes and crush turtling noobs and so on.

Or you're playing Terran and know how to build M&M and a-move :P

[Solmyr]

Second point, which sort of comes up a lot in a round about way. It isn't directly related to this APM talk but it's sort of tangentially similar: being Korean doesn't make you a good player. Being Korean doesn't give you a racial +50APM bonus. Being Korean doesn't imbue you with mystical gamesense or unlock new builds for you.

Well ... it kinda does :). Yes, it is the environment, but this environment was created for a reason. It wasn't like one morning a few thousand Korean players woke up and suddenly all had the idea "hey lets make SC an official sport and own the world". Certain factors led to that, chief among them was that the best players at that time were (and still are) Koreans. As far as apm is concerned I actually do believe they have a racial bonus. All Asians do. And thats not just in SC but in real life. Check the quality of Japanese and Korean goods, check the production capacity of Chinese workers. Western societies are a bit lazier and that applies to to gaming as well. I couldn't go over 300apm even if you offered to pay me. And I definitely wouldn't try just for fun.

[Rhom]

Being Korean doesn't give you a racial +50APM bonus.

:rofl:

[SergioCQH]

I think the smarter AI will actually give more creative players a better chance against the macro/micro masters. I'm all for APM being less important.

[Werthead]

Of those listed, only Battlezone was nearly as much fun as WC3.

WarCraft III is soulless and mediocre. It fills in some time and the typical Blizzard polish prevents it from being shit, but is horrendously badly-written (far moreso than SC1 or 2), extremely unfocused and totally lacking in atmosphere. It is not fit to lick Homeworld's ballsack.

[Poobah]

Warcraft 3 is pretty awful, I gotta say.

The only redeeming feature of Warcraft 3 is DotA.