So, being a hardcore strategy player and having played nearly every game in the genre for many years now. I find myself bored of Sc2 ladder. Not because I suck(Master league and I`ll gladly vs anyone here on my EU or US account), but because it feels like nothing more than same repetitive tactics over and over and over. Only difference is how fast you execute it.
"Strategy" in itself involves `out-thinking` your opponent. Here, its whoever bashes the keyboard faster wins. There`s no real strategy. In fact the game punishes any form of creativity. You do the same crap over and over. A few seconds slow, you lose.
Im also tired of the boring/lackluster/uninspired Sc1 style terrain. Flat ground. Ramp. Flat ground. -_-
Units in this game are broken/useless because of poor design. Reaper, Carrier, Mothership, etc
Sound effects/voices and music are mediocre.
No real strategy, terrain offers no strategic advantages(unlike in most other Rts titles), Just about speed and bashing hotkeys all the time.
Very limited micro(if you call blink Stalkers and marine splits micro..Anyone can pull that off...)
Macro = Multitasking game = Too overboard in this game to the point where it kills the fun.
I feel this game is severely overrated.
Ive found myself starting to play Frozen Throne again. CnC 3 Kanes Wrath. Even Brood Wars. And going to try DoW 2 soon. *Shrugs*
IMO, the SC2 mastery curve is too steep, which is why I don't play ladder much. My reaction time just isn't fast enough. Same went for WC3 ladder, I could only reach level 10, and could never progress any further as my skill just hit it's ceiling. After all, I started strategy games from international chess. So I'm sort of accustomed to turn based strategy. In my opinion, for the fun factor, red alert 2 vanilla was the most fun rts ever. Although not the most balanced. I played CNC3 campaign once and got bored. It just wasn't built to be replayable imo. But the top of my list now is still civilization 4-5. Every skirmish you play is a different experience, because the terrain is never the same. The AI can be kinda stupid though, and on harder difficulties they just plain cheat.
CNC4 was an epic fail from the moment they decided to make respawning bases. I totally boycott EA for that. They destroyed the franchise the same way terminator 3 was destroyed.
If you've never tried the Civilization series before and are comfortable with turn based strategy, I do recommend the series. 4 and onward. 5 is the most user friendly, so I'd start there if you're a first timer. 4 was just god damn plain hard because the victory conditions are insane. Reason I prefer turn based strat. It's less stress. I play games to relax, not to get more stressed. And If I'm required to think fast, its actually more stress to me cos I'm almost always required to think in my current job. Be warned though. Even on the fastest setting, one seating of a civilization game can take up to 12 hours. But nonetheless, it's still enjoyable.
PS: The map editor was the primary reason I bought WC3 and SC2. I don't really care about ladder. lol
Personally I recommend the Dawn of War series and its WW2 s[inoff COmpany of Heroes. Amazing RTSes with original squad mechanics and CTF economy.
For a more fast paced Civ, I suggest Rise of Nations. It's pretty much the bastard son of AoE and Civ, or rather, Empire Earth done right.
There is also Europa Universalis 3 and Dwarf Fortress for the more hardcore crowd.
Turn based stratged, i totally suggest Greed COrp. It's unavoidable terrain collapse mechanic gives a lot of strategic thought. Fracas is a very old VB game, but hell if it is good, specially on multiplayer.
Supreme Commander, though flawed, was a gem to the point where I have never played a game which really captured the same feel or experience. Hopefully Chris Taylor and Company at GPG figure out Kings and Castles too, as that looks magnificent.
Hmm I kind of have to agree with your point about sc2 melee. I never played sc1 melee but i came from war3 and i felt war3 was so interesting with heroes and such, but sc2 just very cookie cutter (which arguably blizzard HAD to do it that way).
I would go with war3+frozen throne as the greatest. It spawned some of the best maps and ideas which ultimately have led to tons of iPhone games, internet games, and even fully fledged games.
About C&C4: =D I haven't played it but that must be terrible idea...
So I really I like (old) C&C games. C&C: Generals is different than basic C&C but I still think it is best C&C. Warcraft3 was ok but I hated upkeep system and it concentrated too much on hero units. Starcraft1 and 2 are great games. I like to play 4v4 most at the moment. I have always liked to do things in a group. I don't like 1v1 at all. If I want to play alone then I enjoy SC2 campaigns / scenarios.
I would love a Supreme Commander with quadcore support :) It was a lot of fun
Best RTS? I would say AoE2 is great and one of the best ever. Sure it was not balanced (lol cannon towers) but I played it so much.
It is 10 years? old, 2D but it has missle physics. And some feature i really miss in the most rts: army formations
i wonder if there is gonna be a wc4 anytime soon that will fill your needs that the sc2 melee/editor couldn't fill.
tbh i didnt play wc3 ladder or melee, i only play custom maps. i never touched wc3 editor or paid attention to the detail through story or maps that are being released but i preferred the texturing foresty fantasy style of wc3 then the spacey fantasy style of sc.
ps: i suck at melee. hahah
I liked SC1 and WC3 for their campaigns. Not much of a ladder player, but I think I played the SC1 campaign about 20 times or so. Also I liked the addition of the Challenger campaign a lot.
Other than that I really enjoyed DoW 1 + most addons (the addon campaigns sucked, though. Would be okay as an additional mode besides the real campaign, a "conquer the planet" mode). Thats a really great RTS for me.
DoW 2 was disappointing, though. No base building at all, horrible campaign, which attempts to turn the game into an rpg, and loops the same 2 missions over and over again.
If we count custom maps, WC3 takes the top by far, imo.
The professional competition in Sc1 and Sc2 is unbeatable.
I've never laddered in Sc1, but just watching pros duke it out is already so much fun.
DoW2 doesn't deserve the name Real-Time Strategy somewhat. It's not that it's a bad game, I quite enjoyed the Campaign and multiplayer wasn't too bad either. But the fact that you hardly have more than 5-6 units on the field is disappointing. Warhammer is generally about mass scale war, not about fancy little skirmishes..
Also, DoW2 lacks in mechanics. It contains little bugs with great impact that make it hard to predict the outcome of certain moves, which is deadly to such a game.
Reason of Sc1/2's success is because of it's clockwork mechanics that allow little room for unpredictable differences.
DoW2 has too much randomness in it. You never know whether a troop you're retreating gets stuck on a bush for 2 seconds and gets gunned down helplessly, or whether they retreat just fine.
DoW1 did a better job, but the dozen-or-so additional races that came with all the addons killed balance for such a long long time.
Never was the fan of C&C multiplayer, but the early C&C parts had great single player.
Wc3 multi was quite nice, but I'm kinda missing the mutlitasking in it. You hardly ever fought at more than one place at once, there weren't any huge macro games since economy was so much less important. It could show off a lot of fancy micro though.
So, being a hardcore strategy player and having played nearly every game in the genre for many years now. I find myself bored of Sc2 ladder. Not because I suck(Master league and I`ll gladly vs anyone here on my EU or US account), but because it feels like nothing more than same repetitive tactics over and over and over. Only difference is how fast you execute it.
In some cases, I'll agree with this *cough* 4gate *cough*. On the other hand, this is far from always true. TvT has been fairly dynamic lately (Hellions are seeing more use, viking production is being cut down), Z play overall is being renewed with Spanishiwa's playstyle becoming more popular and "Rets" style of "I'll be on the verge of losing until the 10 minute mark because I expand 50 times, but then I'll suddenly build units and own you completely" is also different from the muta/ling composition IdrA used to play in tournaments like the earlier MGLs. Speed is quite some of it, but barely everything. Tactics still apply.
"Strategy" in itself involves `out-thinking` your opponent. Here, its whoever bashes the keyboard faster wins. There`s no real strategy. In fact the game punishes any form of creativity. You do the same crap over and over. A few seconds slow, you lose.
If this were true, then whoever had the highest APM would win everything, and you know that's not the case. There's perhaps less 'strategy' involved than in slower games (Black & White being one odd but extreme example I can name here), but it's definetely there. There are also players who win with their creativity; TLO for example, is a player that thrives in chaos and has no problems with screwing up the build orders of both himself and his enemy to create that chaos. He often goes weird strategies like mass Raven or early Planetary Fortress or quick Ghosts and wins with it too. If that's not a case of out-thinking your opponent, I don't know what is.
Im also tired of the boring/lackluster/uninspired Sc1 style terrain. Flat ground. Ramp. Flat ground. -_-
...
No real strategy, terrain offers no strategic advantages(unlike in most other Rts titles), Just about speed and bashing hotkeys all the time.
Isn't this the terrain in 99% of all top-down-view games? What else would you want? Terrain *could* offer strategic advantages (throwing aside the fact that cliffs *do* come into play) if you were to create a cover-based-shooting system, but Blizzard has stated before that they tried this in beta and that it just didn't feel right. And I can imagine very well why. It's a system that can thrive in games like Dawn of War, but it's really not for everything. Starcraft is too past-paced and too much about micro (drops are micro too, tbh) for a cover system to really improve the game.
Units in this game are broken/useless because of poor design. Reaper, Carrier, Mothership, etc
How are Reapers, Carriers and Motherships broken or useless? They're never massed, but Carriers come into play from time to time, and so do Motherships. Reapers see even more use as primarily scouting units. Heck, even yesterday I watched a random NASL match between Painuser and Drewbie and Painuser built an early Reaper to scout and harass with in 2/3 games. Carriers, along with Battlecruisers, are actually really good units - they just see little use because they're that high up the tech tree. Perhaps it's a little out of proportion when compared with the Zerg T3 (Ultras and Blords see a lot of use), but calling them broken or useless is stretching it very thin.
This is probably extremely subjective, but I actually quite like the music in pretty much all Blizzard games. I'm not sure how you don't. You can feel that they put a lot of thought into it, as each race's music fits in really well with their theme. And even aside from that, the little themes played at cue moments during the campaign flow incredibly well too. As for the sound effects/voices... what would you consider 'high quality', then?
Very limited micro(if you call blink Stalkers and marine splits micro..Anyone can pull that off...)
Macro = Multitasking game = Too overboard in this game to the point where it kills the fun.
I feel this game is severely overrated.
Ive found myself starting to play Frozen Throne again. CnC 3 Kanes Wrath. Even Brood Wars. And going to try DoW 2 soon. *Shrugs*
I'm confused with what you're looking for. Earlier on you insinuate things like a cover-based terrain system, and wanting terrain to have more impact, along with the game being less about pace (fast clicking) and more about pure strategy. This, to me, sounds a lot like you're looking for one of those 'mass' type games where you zoom out and watch your batallion of archers take position upon a certain cliff for about 5 minutes. Which is where I'll mention Black & White again; while not the best example of a good game, it excells in that kind of gameplay.
With this last bit though, you seem to mention a lot of stuff that basically counters that entire idea. In a large-map-batallion-cliff-style of RTS play, there is absolutely NO micro involved because it takes all your units years to reach a specific spot. Try any of the Total War series and you'll know what I mean. There is no marine splits or blink stalker micro in there simply because if you try to flank an enemy batallion with your own, it'll take 5 minutes for the flank to happen and unless you positioned yourself to do that flank in the first place (which eliminates the 'micro' part of the flank), it'll take too long for it to be worthwhile.
And aside from that, you mention that macro is too multitasking orientated in Starcraft 2, while it's actually a lot more multitasking orientated in these mass-games, where the battles are so large that you'll be flipping between them lateron in the game.
And last but not least, you say you found yourself playing some other strategy games, mentioning C&C3 and Brood Wars. Both of these are extremely fast-paced micro-style games that again contradict the "slow mass-unit" style of strategy games you seemed to be looking for earlier.
All in all I disagree with you on most points and actually hold Starcraft 2 as somewhat of a standard for RTS games. There's a difference of preference if you like slower games that are more tactical focused (in which case I'd recommend you to check out turn-based strategy games like Heroes of Might & Magic 5), but overall, if you're looking for a faster-paced game, Starcraft 2 would still be my go-to recommendation.
It sounds like you've had one long streak of ladder games before posting! I get the impression you are sort "stuck in a box" when you say there aren't really any tactics left to explore. It's time to expand further than the natural expansion! *grin*
I believe there are still tons of varying playstyles out there yet to be discovered!
Also, for the fun of it. Whenever I ladder, I consciously try to have as low apm as possible. That way I can boast to my friends about a replay where I beat a guy with 100 apm with my 30! I think that can yield more strategic decisions and creative thinking!
Oh, and here's an imaginary upvote for Moz' post. :-)
Edit: to stay on topic, I really like TFT too. Still playin' it! Love those champs.
+1. Allthough Im not big fan of creeping. Leveling heroes to creeps is quite same as macroing in sc2 (atleast it feels as boring). I really hate it that sc2 have so many "useless" units like carriers etc...Its fun for a while, but I knew I bought sc2 just for custom maps and not the melee....(and look how many tears that brought me...)
As Alevice suggested above: You might want to give Company of Heroes a try. Don't know how it looks now because I haven't played it for a while BUT it was a great strategy game when I bought it.
If you get tired of sc2 because it is repititive, you are apparently not an esports player. War3 was the same too? Even more repetitive cause every1 does exactly 1 thing per race, right now sc2 doesn't have well determined strats vs each race and ppl still do different things. War3 was cool because you outplayed ur opponent mostly thru micro and your 'whoever bashes the keyboard '
Also if you are a war3 player who actually calls hitting the keys faster when war3 was the micro game... you're contradicting yourself as sc2 is less of hitting the keys (whether it is to pump units aka macro or how well u control which was mroe in war3). Basically outmacroing and microing your opponent which includes also how u will attack - also see top players play also mind game, 'not outthinking your oppo...'. Well a true esports player wouldnt be in a Mapmaking site would he? Actually I found out SC2 is not a bad game at all, you dont need heroes and there definitely is outthinking and outplaying your oppo and battles are even more important as mistakes punish you harder.
'Units in this game are broken/useless because of poor design. Reaper, Carrier, Mothership, etc' - WoW player much? How can someone be in Master and care about design or write that??? Oh yes I heard on sc2 forums some got to master with some unknown matching and placement wins which Blizz said are trying to fix, i can give u source but im too lazy now.
'Sound effects/voices and music are mediocre. ' again, jhow come 2000? masters dont? Again you dont sound like serious player and all Masters I thought r there (then again some Diamonds are worse than gold so League Placement Is Irrelevant)
'No real strategy, terrain offers no strategic advantages(unlike in most other Rts titles), Just about speed and bashing hotkeys all the time. - You dont know what ur talking about,again with Master?
'Very limited micro(if you call blink Stalkers and marine splits micro..Anyone can pull that off...) - well it is a MACRO game, I also enjoyed war3 micro games more but like i said, even if u have to grab more units, the game seems quite interesting without heroes and on more units.
Macro = Multitasking game= Too overboard in this game to the point where it kills the fun. have
- Lol how much war3 have you played? Multitasking makes it good and war3 also had iit, that is if u ever used it..
I feel this game is severely overrated. - that's fine you feel, it is an OPINION of yours, not a fact. Im really surprised some posted things come from a Master player... Like I said, those crazy Masters wouldnt even register here, something tells me you are not one of them.. And who am I? No im not master but esports diamond and I came here because when i dont ladder I play a bit with the editor. It's not like u will see projects or anything of that kind by me.
Im really surprised some posted things come from a Master player... Like I said, those crazy Masters wouldnt even register here, something tells me you are not one of them.. And who am I? No im not master but esports diamond and I came here because when i dont ladder I play a bit with the editor. It's not like u will see projects or anything of that kind by me.
Masters aren't the top of all creation. They're normal dudes, you don't even have to seriously play the game to become master.
I kinda agree and disagree here, interesting points though.
Generally speaking all games are repetitive, you can't really ever make a game that won't be or it will be bad as it'll try to do too many things and end up doing them all poorly. Even RPG games which flow through a massive story can be repetitive (take Dungeon Siege for example). What Blizzard do very well is what I would say Nintendo are famed for. They get a game mechanic that works but is pretty simple. They then balance the living shit out of it of course =).
But one point I agree on is the timing thing. If one player is of the same "skill" but is faster, they will win 100% of the time, which I personally find boring. But I'm an FPS player at heart so give up on this ladder stuff =)
I would also throw quite a controversial point out there that Starcraft 2 is not really a game based on "skill", it's more Speed and Knowledge. There is ALWAYS a set path/route/counter/whatever for each different tactic, so if you know them all and can pull them off quickly, you will win. I'm talking casual ladder games here btw, watching pros duke it out I think is pretty entertaining and strategies tend to differ a lot.
The most annoying thing I find about ladder games is the fact I can't just wait to play a "fair" game. I get thrown into a match with a master league player and he/she beats me with little to no effort because they can do everything twice as fast as me. I'd rather just wait 5 mins to play someone at my level and have a "fun" game.
The most annoying thing I find about ladder games is the fact I can't just wait to play a "fair" game. I get thrown into a match with a master league player and he/she beats me with little to no effort because they can do everything twice as fast as me. I'd rather just wait 5 mins to play someone at my level and have a "fun" game.
Another point is that this isn't true. These players aren't doing 'everything twice as fast as you'. They're pressing the A button to build marines faster than you - that'd be ridiculous. Most of these players simply have such smooth play and such incredibly timings that it just seems like they're getting the same stuff as you 1-2 minutes faster than you. That's not fast clicking, that's knowing specific queues and having a refined build. No way in hell that a 120 APM player will have twice as many marines at the 5 min mark as a 60 APM player.
I think you're confusing a bunch of stuff. A comparatively small number of effective strategies is actually the sign of a highly developed strategy game. Games that aren't very competitive often have huge multitudes of options because no one actually knows how to play. One opening is as good as another because no one knows how to punish "bad" openings, or even what a bad opening is.
If you play in Bronze league, there are 10 million different openings. You'll see more strategies than you could ever imagine, from mass Battlecruiser to "never build SCV's ever" to "oh god how do I play this game" to standard openings.
This is because deep strategy isn't about "I'm going to build marines this game instead of marauders". That's facile. Someone whose never played the game before can come up with that strategy. Strategy in an RTS is about decision-making in time, and execution of that strategy, which you've reduced to "pressing buttons faster". Beyond a certain point, it's not about pressing buttons faster, it's about having the foreknowledge and experience to know where to allocate your limited time and brainpower.
If you don't like this, there's a whole genre of games that avoid this. They're called turn-based strategy games. Time, however, is a fundamental part of Real Time Strategy games. Even lesser games like Dawn of War 2 are fundamentally about multitasking, they're just so easy and shallow that you have to make very few trade-offs or decisions regarding it.
But one point I agree on is the timing thing. If one player is of the same "skill" but is faster, they will win 100% of the time, which I personally find boring. But I'm an FPS player at heart so give up on this ladder stuff =)
If you're an FPS player, than surely you can appreciate how ridiculous griping about the faster player winning is. Speed is a skill. There's no such thing as skill independent of play-speed, it's a major part of it. It's like saying "it bugs me how when I play basketball against a pro basketball player, the player with the most agility and coordination wins. That's boring". Or "it bugs me how when I play an FPS, the player with the best reactions and situational awareness wins."
Quote:
I would also throw quite a controversial point out there that Starcraft 2 is not really a game based on "skill", it's more Speed and Knowledge. There is ALWAYS a set path/route/counter/whatever for each different tactic, so if you know them all and can pull them off quickly, you will win. I'm talking casual ladder games here btw, watching pros duke it out I think is pretty entertaining and strategies tend to differ a lot.
That isn't at all true, though. There isn't "always a set path/counter" that players simply struggle to be fast enough to execute.
Quote:
The most annoying thing I find about ladder games is the fact I can't just wait to play a "fair" game. I get thrown into a match with a master league player and he/she beats me with little to no effort because they can do everything twice as fast as me. I'd rather just wait 5 mins to play someone at my level and have a "fun" game.
Huh? This is basically impossible, the matchmaking system will never pair you against a masters league player unless it has good reason to believe you could beat him.
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So, being a hardcore strategy player and having played nearly every game in the genre for many years now. I find myself bored of Sc2 ladder. Not because I suck(Master league and I`ll gladly vs anyone here on my EU or US account), but because it feels like nothing more than same repetitive tactics over and over and over. Only difference is how fast you execute it.
"Strategy" in itself involves `out-thinking` your opponent. Here, its whoever bashes the keyboard faster wins. There`s no real strategy. In fact the game punishes any form of creativity. You do the same crap over and over. A few seconds slow, you lose.
Im also tired of the boring/lackluster/uninspired Sc1 style terrain. Flat ground. Ramp. Flat ground. -_-
Units in this game are broken/useless because of poor design. Reaper, Carrier, Mothership, etc
Sound effects/voices and music are mediocre.
No real strategy, terrain offers no strategic advantages(unlike in most other Rts titles), Just about speed and bashing hotkeys all the time.
Very limited micro(if you call blink Stalkers and marine splits micro..Anyone can pull that off...)
Macro = Multitasking game = Too overboard in this game to the point where it kills the fun.
I feel this game is severely overrated.
Ive found myself starting to play Frozen Throne again. CnC 3 Kanes Wrath. Even Brood Wars. And going to try DoW 2 soon. *Shrugs*
IMO, the SC2 mastery curve is too steep, which is why I don't play ladder much. My reaction time just isn't fast enough. Same went for WC3 ladder, I could only reach level 10, and could never progress any further as my skill just hit it's ceiling. After all, I started strategy games from international chess. So I'm sort of accustomed to turn based strategy. In my opinion, for the fun factor, red alert 2 vanilla was the most fun rts ever. Although not the most balanced. I played CNC3 campaign once and got bored. It just wasn't built to be replayable imo. But the top of my list now is still civilization 4-5. Every skirmish you play is a different experience, because the terrain is never the same. The AI can be kinda stupid though, and on harder difficulties they just plain cheat.
CNC4 was an epic fail from the moment they decided to make respawning bases. I totally boycott EA for that. They destroyed the franchise the same way terminator 3 was destroyed.
If you've never tried the Civilization series before and are comfortable with turn based strategy, I do recommend the series. 4 and onward. 5 is the most user friendly, so I'd start there if you're a first timer. 4 was just god damn plain hard because the victory conditions are insane. Reason I prefer turn based strat. It's less stress. I play games to relax, not to get more stressed. And If I'm required to think fast, its actually more stress to me cos I'm almost always required to think in my current job. Be warned though. Even on the fastest setting, one seating of a civilization game can take up to 12 hours. But nonetheless, it's still enjoyable.
PS: The map editor was the primary reason I bought WC3 and SC2. I don't really care about ladder. lol
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Curse PremiumPersonally I recommend the Dawn of War series and its WW2 s[inoff COmpany of Heroes. Amazing RTSes with original squad mechanics and CTF economy.
For a more fast paced Civ, I suggest Rise of Nations. It's pretty much the bastard son of AoE and Civ, or rather, Empire Earth done right.
There is also Europa Universalis 3 and Dwarf Fortress for the more hardcore crowd.
Turn based stratged, i totally suggest Greed COrp. It's unavoidable terrain collapse mechanic gives a lot of strategic thought. Fracas is a very old VB game, but hell if it is good, specially on multiplayer.
Go play Antioch Chronicles Remastered!
Also, coming soon, Antioch Episode 3: Thoughts in Chaos!
Dont like mapster's ugly white? Try Mapster's Classic Skin!
Supreme Commander, though flawed, was a gem to the point where I have never played a game which really captured the same feel or experience. Hopefully Chris Taylor and Company at GPG figure out Kings and Castles too, as that looks magnificent.
@EternalWraith: Go
Hmm I kind of have to agree with your point about sc2 melee. I never played sc1 melee but i came from war3 and i felt war3 was so interesting with heroes and such, but sc2 just very cookie cutter (which arguably blizzard HAD to do it that way).
I would go with war3+frozen throne as the greatest. It spawned some of the best maps and ideas which ultimately have led to tons of iPhone games, internet games, and even fully fledged games.
About C&C4: =D I haven't played it but that must be terrible idea...
So I really I like (old) C&C games. C&C: Generals is different than basic C&C but I still think it is best C&C. Warcraft3 was ok but I hated upkeep system and it concentrated too much on hero units. Starcraft1 and 2 are great games. I like to play 4v4 most at the moment. I have always liked to do things in a group. I don't like 1v1 at all. If I want to play alone then I enjoy SC2 campaigns / scenarios.
I would love a Supreme Commander with quadcore support :) It was a lot of fun
Best RTS? I would say AoE2 is great and one of the best ever. Sure it was not balanced (lol cannon towers) but I played it so much.
It is 10 years? old, 2D but it has missle physics. And some feature i really miss in the most rts: army formations
i wonder if there is gonna be a wc4 anytime soon that will fill your needs that the sc2 melee/editor couldn't fill.
tbh i didnt play wc3 ladder or melee, i only play custom maps. i never touched wc3 editor or paid attention to the detail through story or maps that are being released but i preferred the texturing foresty fantasy style of wc3 then the spacey fantasy style of sc.
ps: i suck at melee. hahah
I liked SC1 and WC3 for their campaigns. Not much of a ladder player, but I think I played the SC1 campaign about 20 times or so. Also I liked the addition of the Challenger campaign a lot.
Other than that I really enjoyed DoW 1 + most addons (the addon campaigns sucked, though. Would be okay as an additional mode besides the real campaign, a "conquer the planet" mode). Thats a really great RTS for me.
DoW 2 was disappointing, though. No base building at all, horrible campaign, which attempts to turn the game into an rpg, and loops the same 2 missions over and over again.
If we count custom maps, WC3 takes the top by far, imo.
The professional competition in Sc1 and Sc2 is unbeatable.
I've never laddered in Sc1, but just watching pros duke it out is already so much fun.
DoW2 doesn't deserve the name Real-Time Strategy somewhat. It's not that it's a bad game, I quite enjoyed the Campaign and multiplayer wasn't too bad either. But the fact that you hardly have more than 5-6 units on the field is disappointing. Warhammer is generally about mass scale war, not about fancy little skirmishes..
Also, DoW2 lacks in mechanics. It contains little bugs with great impact that make it hard to predict the outcome of certain moves, which is deadly to such a game.
Reason of Sc1/2's success is because of it's clockwork mechanics that allow little room for unpredictable differences.
DoW2 has too much randomness in it. You never know whether a troop you're retreating gets stuck on a bush for 2 seconds and gets gunned down helplessly, or whether they retreat just fine.
DoW1 did a better job, but the dozen-or-so additional races that came with all the addons killed balance for such a long long time.
Never was the fan of C&C multiplayer, but the early C&C parts had great single player.
Wc3 multi was quite nice, but I'm kinda missing the mutlitasking in it. You hardly ever fought at more than one place at once, there weren't any huge macro games since economy was so much less important. It could show off a lot of fancy micro though.
I'm going to respectfully disagree with you EW. Lets see if I can break it down.
In some cases, I'll agree with this *cough* 4gate *cough*. On the other hand, this is far from always true. TvT has been fairly dynamic lately (Hellions are seeing more use, viking production is being cut down), Z play overall is being renewed with Spanishiwa's playstyle becoming more popular and "Rets" style of "I'll be on the verge of losing until the 10 minute mark because I expand 50 times, but then I'll suddenly build units and own you completely" is also different from the muta/ling composition IdrA used to play in tournaments like the earlier MGLs. Speed is quite some of it, but barely everything. Tactics still apply.
If this were true, then whoever had the highest APM would win everything, and you know that's not the case. There's perhaps less 'strategy' involved than in slower games (Black & White being one odd but extreme example I can name here), but it's definetely there. There are also players who win with their creativity; TLO for example, is a player that thrives in chaos and has no problems with screwing up the build orders of both himself and his enemy to create that chaos. He often goes weird strategies like mass Raven or early Planetary Fortress or quick Ghosts and wins with it too. If that's not a case of out-thinking your opponent, I don't know what is.
Isn't this the terrain in 99% of all top-down-view games? What else would you want? Terrain *could* offer strategic advantages (throwing aside the fact that cliffs *do* come into play) if you were to create a cover-based-shooting system, but Blizzard has stated before that they tried this in beta and that it just didn't feel right. And I can imagine very well why. It's a system that can thrive in games like Dawn of War, but it's really not for everything. Starcraft is too past-paced and too much about micro (drops are micro too, tbh) for a cover system to really improve the game.
How are Reapers, Carriers and Motherships broken or useless? They're never massed, but Carriers come into play from time to time, and so do Motherships. Reapers see even more use as primarily scouting units. Heck, even yesterday I watched a random NASL match between Painuser and Drewbie and Painuser built an early Reaper to scout and harass with in 2/3 games. Carriers, along with Battlecruisers, are actually really good units - they just see little use because they're that high up the tech tree. Perhaps it's a little out of proportion when compared with the Zerg T3 (Ultras and Blords see a lot of use), but calling them broken or useless is stretching it very thin.
This is probably extremely subjective, but I actually quite like the music in pretty much all Blizzard games. I'm not sure how you don't. You can feel that they put a lot of thought into it, as each race's music fits in really well with their theme. And even aside from that, the little themes played at cue moments during the campaign flow incredibly well too. As for the sound effects/voices... what would you consider 'high quality', then?
I'm confused with what you're looking for. Earlier on you insinuate things like a cover-based terrain system, and wanting terrain to have more impact, along with the game being less about pace (fast clicking) and more about pure strategy. This, to me, sounds a lot like you're looking for one of those 'mass' type games where you zoom out and watch your batallion of archers take position upon a certain cliff for about 5 minutes. Which is where I'll mention Black & White again; while not the best example of a good game, it excells in that kind of gameplay.
With this last bit though, you seem to mention a lot of stuff that basically counters that entire idea. In a large-map-batallion-cliff-style of RTS play, there is absolutely NO micro involved because it takes all your units years to reach a specific spot. Try any of the Total War series and you'll know what I mean. There is no marine splits or blink stalker micro in there simply because if you try to flank an enemy batallion with your own, it'll take 5 minutes for the flank to happen and unless you positioned yourself to do that flank in the first place (which eliminates the 'micro' part of the flank), it'll take too long for it to be worthwhile.
And aside from that, you mention that macro is too multitasking orientated in Starcraft 2, while it's actually a lot more multitasking orientated in these mass-games, where the battles are so large that you'll be flipping between them lateron in the game.
And last but not least, you say you found yourself playing some other strategy games, mentioning C&C3 and Brood Wars. Both of these are extremely fast-paced micro-style games that again contradict the "slow mass-unit" style of strategy games you seemed to be looking for earlier.
All in all I disagree with you on most points and actually hold Starcraft 2 as somewhat of a standard for RTS games. There's a difference of preference if you like slower games that are more tactical focused (in which case I'd recommend you to check out turn-based strategy games like Heroes of Might & Magic 5), but overall, if you're looking for a faster-paced game, Starcraft 2 would still be my go-to recommendation.
It sounds like you've had one long streak of ladder games before posting! I get the impression you are sort "stuck in a box" when you say there aren't really any tactics left to explore. It's time to expand further than the natural expansion! *grin*
I believe there are still tons of varying playstyles out there yet to be discovered!
Also, for the fun of it. Whenever I ladder, I consciously try to have as low apm as possible. That way I can boast to my friends about a replay where I beat a guy with 100 apm with my 30! I think that can yield more strategic decisions and creative thinking!
Oh, and here's an imaginary upvote for Moz' post. :-)
Edit: to stay on topic, I really like TFT too. Still playin' it! Love those champs.
@OneTwoSC: Go
+1. Allthough Im not big fan of creeping. Leveling heroes to creeps is quite same as macroing in sc2 (atleast it feels as boring). I really hate it that sc2 have so many "useless" units like carriers etc...Its fun for a while, but I knew I bought sc2 just for custom maps and not the melee....(and look how many tears that brought me...)
As Alevice suggested above: You might want to give Company of Heroes a try. Don't know how it looks now because I haven't played it for a while BUT it was a great strategy game when I bought it.
If you get tired of sc2 because it is repititive, you are apparently not an esports player. War3 was the same too? Even more repetitive cause every1 does exactly 1 thing per race, right now sc2 doesn't have well determined strats vs each race and ppl still do different things. War3 was cool because you outplayed ur opponent mostly thru micro and your 'whoever bashes the keyboard '
Also if you are a war3 player who actually calls hitting the keys faster when war3 was the micro game... you're contradicting yourself as sc2 is less of hitting the keys (whether it is to pump units aka macro or how well u control which was mroe in war3). Basically outmacroing and microing your opponent which includes also how u will attack - also see top players play also mind game, 'not outthinking your oppo...'. Well a true esports player wouldnt be in a Mapmaking site would he? Actually I found out SC2 is not a bad game at all, you dont need heroes and there definitely is outthinking and outplaying your oppo and battles are even more important as mistakes punish you harder.
'Units in this game are broken/useless because of poor design. Reaper, Carrier, Mothership, etc' - WoW player much? How can someone be in Master and care about design or write that??? Oh yes I heard on sc2 forums some got to master with some unknown matching and placement wins which Blizz said are trying to fix, i can give u source but im too lazy now.
'Sound effects/voices and music are mediocre. ' again, jhow come 2000? masters dont? Again you dont sound like serious player and all Masters I thought r there (then again some Diamonds are worse than gold so League Placement Is Irrelevant)
'No real strategy, terrain offers no strategic advantages(unlike in most other Rts titles), Just about speed and bashing hotkeys all the time. - You dont know what ur talking about,again with Master?
'Very limited micro(if you call blink Stalkers and marine splits micro..Anyone can pull that off...) - well it is a MACRO game, I also enjoyed war3 micro games more but like i said, even if u have to grab more units, the game seems quite interesting without heroes and on more units.
Macro = Multitasking game= Too overboard in this game to the point where it kills the fun. have - Lol how much war3 have you played? Multitasking makes it good and war3 also had iit, that is if u ever used it..
I feel this game is severely overrated. - that's fine you feel, it is an OPINION of yours, not a fact. Im really surprised some posted things come from a Master player... Like I said, those crazy Masters wouldnt even register here, something tells me you are not one of them.. And who am I? No im not master but esports diamond and I came here because when i dont ladder I play a bit with the editor. It's not like u will see projects or anything of that kind by me.
Masters aren't the top of all creation. They're normal dudes, you don't even have to seriously play the game to become master.
People tend to mess these two things up quite often.
I kinda agree and disagree here, interesting points though.
Generally speaking all games are repetitive, you can't really ever make a game that won't be or it will be bad as it'll try to do too many things and end up doing them all poorly. Even RPG games which flow through a massive story can be repetitive (take Dungeon Siege for example). What Blizzard do very well is what I would say Nintendo are famed for. They get a game mechanic that works but is pretty simple. They then balance the living shit out of it of course =).
But one point I agree on is the timing thing. If one player is of the same "skill" but is faster, they will win 100% of the time, which I personally find boring. But I'm an FPS player at heart so give up on this ladder stuff =)
I would also throw quite a controversial point out there that Starcraft 2 is not really a game based on "skill", it's more Speed and Knowledge. There is ALWAYS a set path/route/counter/whatever for each different tactic, so if you know them all and can pull them off quickly, you will win. I'm talking casual ladder games here btw, watching pros duke it out I think is pretty entertaining and strategies tend to differ a lot.
The most annoying thing I find about ladder games is the fact I can't just wait to play a "fair" game. I get thrown into a match with a master league player and he/she beats me with little to no effort because they can do everything twice as fast as me. I'd rather just wait 5 mins to play someone at my level and have a "fun" game.
@Eimtr: Go
Butthurt much? EW put it up his post as a point of discussion, what's up with the massive ragecake?
Another point is that this isn't true. These players aren't doing 'everything twice as fast as you'. They're pressing the A button to build marines faster than you - that'd be ridiculous. Most of these players simply have such smooth play and such incredibly timings that it just seems like they're getting the same stuff as you 1-2 minutes faster than you. That's not fast clicking, that's knowing specific queues and having a refined build. No way in hell that a 120 APM player will have twice as many marines at the 5 min mark as a 60 APM player.
I think you're confusing a bunch of stuff. A comparatively small number of effective strategies is actually the sign of a highly developed strategy game. Games that aren't very competitive often have huge multitudes of options because no one actually knows how to play. One opening is as good as another because no one knows how to punish "bad" openings, or even what a bad opening is.
If you play in Bronze league, there are 10 million different openings. You'll see more strategies than you could ever imagine, from mass Battlecruiser to "never build SCV's ever" to "oh god how do I play this game" to standard openings.
This is because deep strategy isn't about "I'm going to build marines this game instead of marauders". That's facile. Someone whose never played the game before can come up with that strategy. Strategy in an RTS is about decision-making in time, and execution of that strategy, which you've reduced to "pressing buttons faster". Beyond a certain point, it's not about pressing buttons faster, it's about having the foreknowledge and experience to know where to allocate your limited time and brainpower.
If you don't like this, there's a whole genre of games that avoid this. They're called turn-based strategy games. Time, however, is a fundamental part of Real Time Strategy games. Even lesser games like Dawn of War 2 are fundamentally about multitasking, they're just so easy and shallow that you have to make very few trade-offs or decisions regarding it.
If you're an FPS player, than surely you can appreciate how ridiculous griping about the faster player winning is. Speed is a skill. There's no such thing as skill independent of play-speed, it's a major part of it. It's like saying "it bugs me how when I play basketball against a pro basketball player, the player with the most agility and coordination wins. That's boring". Or "it bugs me how when I play an FPS, the player with the best reactions and situational awareness wins."
That isn't at all true, though. There isn't "always a set path/counter" that players simply struggle to be fast enough to execute.
Huh? This is basically impossible, the matchmaking system will never pair you against a masters league player unless it has good reason to believe you could beat him.