Zerg Thoughts on the Upcoming Balance Changes
The proposed balance and design changes took everyone by surprise when they were revealed by David Kim. The sheer amount of proposed changes for a mere balance patch is unprecedented in SC2 history. We’re talking expansion-level changes here.
Note: I might get technical from here on out, so sorry about that!
OPINION: The Brood War HD rumor and why I’m worried for SC2
There’s a not-so-confirmed rumor going around that Blizzard will be announcing a Brood War HD remaster during Blizzcon. This rumor has been starting up hype-trains left and right including mine. I never played BW and I would really want to check out the single player. With that said, it’s leaving me a little bit worried particularly towards the future of Starcraft II.
Oneiros
Happy birthday, Starcraft 2!
After about a week of sporadic editing, I finally finished my latest highlight video. I still prefer calling them frag videos, but nothing really gets fragged in SC2. I have to say though, I am really satisfied with the result.
The timing of the video is a pretty cool coincidence. Dreamhack Valencia just ended and released their replays. At the same time, I was really itching to do something creatively. So I thought, why not make another highlight video? I actually only realized that SC2 will be celebrating its 6th Anniversary when the minerals turned into cakes.
History, Strategy, and Europa Universalis IV
As a fan of strategy games in general, I also dabble a bit into other strategy games that are not real-time. And by dabble a bit, I meant that I played a couple of playthroughs of Civilization V on difficulty settings not going above Prince. Continue reading
Worker Harassment
Believe it or not, the workers are often the most important unit in RTS games. The lowly worker who toils overtime without pay to gather the resources you need are also the ones you should be protecting the most. Continue reading
Counterattacking
Original Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mlq/7731729820/in/photostream
The technical definition of a counterattack or a counteroffensive is an offensive performed to retake an advantage lost by an enemy operation. A good example of a counterattack in a war would be the Mortain Counteroffensive during the Battle of Normandy. As RTS games usually only represent a single battle instead of multiple offensives, counteroffensives are technically impossible (unless you go and ask for a rematch :D). Counterattacks in RTS games take on a different form.
Blog Update
Hello everyone!
You may have noticed that I haven’t been posting a lot. That’s because I haven’t been playing a lot of other RTS games except for SC2. I always try to keep my RTS posts as general as possible so that they can be applied to the various RTS games of our own choosing but it’s also damn hard to write about RTS when I only play one!
SC2 has been taking a little bit too much of my play time because I have been enjoying seeing myself improve little by little. Focusing on these small improvements got rid of whatever ladder anxiety I had left so now I can churn out 10 to 15 games a day, up from my usual 5-ish. That also means the grind is real nowadays.
On off days, or days where I don’t feel like playing Starcraft, I have been playing Europa Universalis IV. It’s a grand-strategy game set in the 15th century up until the year Napoleon died, 1821. It’s a game of diplomacy, politics, economy, and of course warfare.
It’s quite funny how I ended up playing EUIV. I was originally looking for a WW2 wargame/strategy game and stumbled upon Hearts of Iron 3 by Paradox Games. It’s a behemoth of a strategy game, but it’s also a little bit out of my league as the aged and unintuitive UI and lack of a proper tutorial meant that I am looking at hundreds of ours of study just to play it.
While I didn’t originally intend to shy away from the challenge, I also found out that Hearts of Iron IV is coming out soon (D-Day, 2016 to be exact). It shares the same amount of depth as HoI3 if not more but most of the mechanics of HoI3 wasn’t going to be carried over to HoI4.
I also found out about other beginner-friendly grand-strategy games from Paradox, namely Crusader Kings II and Europa Universalis IV. From what I could gather, CK2 is more about a lineage of kings and EUIV is more about nation building which somewhat interests me. I figured HoI4 is months away and I really wanted a grand-strategy game, so what the heck. And now here we are, 200 hours in for EUIV but still barely scratching the surface.
All these got me thinking. Since EUIV and eventually HoI IV are strategy games in of themselves, writing about them seems like a natural fit for the blog. I’ll probably end up writing about them down the line.
I’m also waiting for the separate MMR per race for SC2. I’d love to do quick start guides to Terran and Protoss similar to the Zerg one I have now. I could try them out now but I don’t like to preach what I can’t practice. 🙂
That’s the latest for now! Thanks for tuning in!
-Paz
So you want to play Starcraft
From top dog eSport to being overshadowed by other games, Starcraft II’s popularity has been a roller-coaster of a ride. While a healthy amount of fans will still swear by it (including yours truly), there are also naysayers and those who take pleasure in pointing out that it’s no longer the biggest name on Twitch, that it’s dead, that Blizzard killed it, etc. Continue reading
Weponizing Attention
It’s no secret that multiplayer matches in real-time strategy games require a significant amount of skill in terms of multitasking. Each player tries his best to manage a stable economy and production, defend incoming damage from attacks from his opponents, and manage his attacks all at the same time in order to succeed.
Tictac Tactics 