Spam

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 12:08 am

Heh, I hate this kind of debate:

  Tom, you used the example of a 200 limit cap in SC.

  Change that limit.  What would your strat be if your cap was 100?

How about 50?

25?

10?

  Do that for me.  Even if it seems a little strange.  For argument's sake: what units would you go for knowing that your cap overall was very small?

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 12:48 am

Wow - who plays SC where you get to the pop cap? (I always thought that 200 pop cap limit was for network performace issues) I've played one SC game with "build up" rules and yes, Dom's statements are correct (in that context). But by playing "game rules" (aka, no made up rules - which is what the competitive players played),  I've never seen the 200 pop cap limit hit, so it (almost) never comes into play. And SC still had "spam", they just dealt with it with AOE units (which could be counterable by other units).

Under the 200 pop cap, FO and SC are relatively similar in how the supply/population mechanism works.

Hard (supply) caps don't solve spam.

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 2:05 am

You can always try hosting a game and trying to enforce your own limits on certain units (and see how long that works)

Most people I've played with so far seem to do a fair job of balancing their fleets, with a few reasonable exceptions.

I believe this issue has been exhausted.

FYI:  My definition of a shorter, fun game, averages about 50-90 minutes.  I've correlated this between my own games, as well as several of the posted youtube games.  If anybody is constantly breaching the two hour mark, there are some strategy guides in the forums . . .

[tom]

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 12:39 pm

Last edited by tom on March 23rd, 2010, 1:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Wow - who plays SC where you get to the pop cap? (I always thought that 200 pop cap limit was for network performace issues) I've played one SC game with "build up" rules and yes, Dom's statements are correct (in that context). But by playing "game rules" (aka, no made up rules - which is what the competitive players played),  I've never seen the 200 pop cap limit hit, so it (almost) never comes into play. And SC still had "spam", they just dealt with it with AOE units (which could be counterable by other units).

Under the 200 pop cap, FO and SC are relatively similar in how the supply/population mechanism works.

Hard (supply) caps don't solve spam.

i agree. this hardly ever happens with competent players.

Heh, I hate this kind of debate:

   Tom, you used the example of a 200 limit cap in SC.

  Change that limit.  What would your strat be if your cap was 100?

How about 50?

25?

10?

  Do that for me.  Even if it seems a little strange.  For argument's sake: what units would you go for knowing that your cap overall was very small?

10? have u played sc boggz or are u just essing with me? jk
it is heavy dependent on who is my opponent and what hes doing. if ur idea is that i should get as many ultralisks as i can cuz they r awesome and rule all and r at the top of the tech tree then u r mistaken.
10 -> 5 workers, 10 zerglings
25 -> 10 workers, 30 zerglings (im pretty sure i would be unable to tech)
50 -> 20 workers, 20 zerglings, 10 mutalisks
100 -> 30 workers, 12 mutalisks, 3 defilers, as many zerglings&lurkers as i can
200 -> workers as needed, 12 mutalisks, 4-5 defilers, depending what my plan would be so anything from 24 guardians;mass zeglings/lurkers and ultralisks later;mass mutalisks;mass hydralisks&zerglings to whatever i need to win a game

i still encourage u to check out some vids. this one is nice.

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 3:42 pm

Tom, Tom. Out of 5 videos you showed me of nice commenting and good gameplay in the last two weeks, most of them had some sort of spam at some point - or at least used most if not all of the pop cap at some point in the game. I recall one particular one that involved a stalemate between two top Korean players who were both Protoss. One had bunkered himself up with turrets - we saw limited Dark Archon usage, and a bunch of normal Archons... and then simply put, the pop cap of Dragoons with a few Templar as support.

[tom]

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 4:13 pm

Last edited by tom on March 23rd, 2010, 4:16 pm, edited 1 time in total.

u should really expand ur vocabulary  . stop using the 's' word
i already said that in sc many times players focus on 1 type of units. u can call it spam if u want. notice that some upgrades, like attack upgrade, affect only some kind of units. so if u invest in it, its a good idea to transition to some unit that also benefit from that upgrade.
im done (yet again) with explaining my point of view. i guess i failed to convert anybody (again). i like sc gameplay, its just to time consuming and micro dependent to play sc on a decent level. i think i'll put something about this in my sig. the end

EDIT: there, looks better

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 4:23 pm

u should really expand ur vocabulary  . stop using the 's' word

  Saying stuff like this doesn't help you "convince" anyone .

"Spam" is not a bad word.  I don't think you're attempting to see it as anything other than something we hate.  Spam just means a single unit that is mindlessly built because it is either:

- Overall very useful and does well in large numbers.
OR
- It's slightly out of balance and is "spammed" because they dominate.

Akiras fit the first bill, K'vorts the second .

To be honest I forget how SC got involved in this.  I think it was because you (Tom) disagreed with the idea that having a total pop hard cap encourages turtling.  That's fine.  You can disagree .  If the cap is set to 200, even in SC it's not likely to be reached before someone has won and will not likely end up as a stalemate.

  HOWEVER ... as DOM pointed out:

I recall one particular one that involved a stalemate between two top Korean players who were both Protoss. One had bunkered himself up with turrets - we saw limited Dark Archon usage, and a bunch of normal Archons... and then simply put, the pop cap of Dragoons with a few Templar as support.

  It happens, even in SC .  Fleetops is a much slower-paced game, the units take longer to build (many units take longer to build than Turrets), and the maps are larger than MP Starcraft.  That's where the similarities end.  We have replays of people (usually newer) turtling themselves in Fleetops and the only reason it's defeatable is because there is no cap on how many ships you can build.  You can make a critical mass of vessels and attack the turret wall at a vulnerable spot or ensure that you do not attack the turrets at a point where they can all hit you.  If you were to limit the number of ships with a cap like Warcraft 3 (different food costs for different units), the Turreting would be far more effective.

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 4:39 pm

my point was that pop cap doesnt necessarily mean players start to turtle. turtling happened to me in all rts i played, counting FO.

'Spam just means a single unit that is mindlessly built'. yea, its a positive sentence

ill just finish my involvement in this discussion with last statement:
'i dont mind having or not having pop cap but its terrible when spam or heavy turtling can win u a game'

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 4:51 pm

i don't think turteling is an effective strategy in Fleet Operations (given you are playing on the "recommended" settings), as map control is very important. To fortify certain positions on the map with defense platforms is okay, and i think we can see a fair use in Fleet Operations too, like in the early game, where turrets usually are strong.

At the end of the day, turteling is not much different then spamming turrets. Spam in general is a strategy. A valid strategy. And we do not want to deny this strategy completely. It should still be possible to be deployed, like many other strategies. The problem is that strategies should not be relatively equal to each other in terms of efficency, but they should also scale to some extent with the difficulty to field a certain strategy.

In 3.1.1 we saw a shift to spamming certain units, and we hope to solve that issue in 3.1.2 (and the following mini patches, depending on community input). Spamming itself will never be denied completely in Fleet Operations. We just want to make sure that its not the most efficient strategy (as its probably the most easiest to play).

That being said: there will never be global hard caps in Fleet Operations there will probably be some changes to supply later on this year, just to make it more interessting (who enjoys to buy supplies every few minutes)

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 5:07 pm

the ferengi 

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 5:28 pm

i think they would favour selling supplies

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 5:31 pm

myleswolfers, I believe you have just been owned :fish:

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 6:00 pm

The Ferengi would probably sell you the supplies they stole from you before...

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 6:02 pm

thats true too

posted on March 23rd, 2010, 6:06 pm

could be a neat new feature