Let me start by saying how much blizzard rocks and how great it is to finally play the game. It’s still somewhat unreal that we are playing SC2. This is not a discussion of balance, nor is it a shout of wanting to play SC1 again.
I understand that some units are gone and that others are modified, but this is a discussion about how during the transition between SC1 and SC2 a large part of the racial identity was lost. -- Notice -- Post turned out much longer than expected. Points of discussion are organized to skip around easily if so desired. The points covered are: swarming, synergy, the roach, busywork and boring, abilities, tier 3, and lack of demanding response.
If you don’t want to invest the time to read the whole post then I would recommend the swarming, busywork, and lack of demanding response sections. Now to the main point: zerg. What… happened…? Why does my race not swarm anymore and where is my ability to inflict fear into my opponent? And can someone please tell me why I have so much “busywork” to do around my base? Swarming: I’ll begin with the most obvious issue: swarming. Where is it? Why do all of my units cost so much supply? Hydra – 2. Roach – 2. Ultra – 6. Broodlord – 4. Even my macro mechanic takes supply. I am expected to bring in more income than the other races, yet this requires more workers and you guessed it… more supply.
These supply issues 1) suffocate zerg players in their 200 supply cap and 2) require additional overlords such that even more workers are required to supply the resources for such a demand. It’s painful seeing a terran army that is twice the size of my own but same supply count. Synergy: The most obvious example of lack of synergy comes from the swarming example above in which all of the zerg mechanics work against one another. However there are many other examples of synergy lack as well.
Let’s take a look at the base units of zerglings, roaches, and hydralisks. Each has their uses on their own: hit and run, sneak and tank, damage dealing. But how well do they work together? They don’t. My tanking unit (roach) is more mobile than my glass cannon of a hydralisk. The other glass cannon (zergling) engages in melee while my roach tank is ranged (some of this can be made up for by good play but the statement stands). These issues are a product of poor racial design.
The Roach: Easily the worst thing to have happened to the zerg. Someone came up with the idea of the roach and they forced it into the game, tearing apart the zerg tech tree to do so. Why did the roach have so many problems in beta? Because the whole zerg tree was stretched around the thing. Hydras are awkward to get and awkward to use (slow off creep). And the roach has to be the absolute most boring and uninteresting unit in the multiplayer version of the starcraft universe.
Busywork and Boring:
Zerg is the only race that has busy work. I am talking about 2 things: spawn larva and creep tumors. I always want to be spreading preplaced creep tumors and spawning larva after the creep tumors nearby have been set. But this isn’t particularly enjoyable and nor is it much of a strategic decision. “Just placed a creep tumor, I can’t wait to come back in another 15 seconds to place another one! Come back in 40 seconds to spawn larva!”. What kind of strategy is this? At least protoss chooses what to chrono boost and terran has game altering pressure on whether to scan or mule. But not zerg. No. We have easily the most boring and busy mechanic that unnecessarily ties the user to their base.
Abilities:
However, if anything hits on the fact that zerg was poorly polished, it’s the abilities. The current state of corruption should have never made it into the retail game. +20% damage… is this warcraft 3? It’s just lame. It’s not cool, it’s not fun to use, and it’s a joke. What’s amusing is that the first version of corruption (if anyone remembers from early beta) was actually quite cool and gave zerg a neat (very zerglike) counter to such threats as bunkers and planetary fortresses. (note that the current contaminate from the overseer is not the same as the old corruption).
Tier 3:
Ultras, broodlords, and cracklings. Broodlords actually perform their task well – air siege units. The only downside is that they move as fast as flying cows and are difficult to defend from a unit such as a viking (which was seemingly created specifically to destroy the broodlords). Good luck protecting them with hydra, hydra are about as fast as broodlords once off creep (synergy issue) and corruptors do not function well against vikings. Ultras have issues reaching their opponent. If you aren’t careful they horribly hurt your own army by stalling it up in awkward and undesired positioning. It almost hurts me to say cracklings… they are nothing compared to the cracklings that we know and love. The upgrade is hardly noticeable. Want to watch your frenzied claw happy zergling run over your opponent’s unprotected base? Sure, go ahead, but don’t expect the tier 3 upgrade to make much of a difference. If you happen to notice it at all I would be interested in letting made know.
Lack of Demanding Response:
Think about your opponent putting colossi, void rays, or tanks on the field. These are units that are brought out mid to late game that threaten the existence of the other player. They are units that demand a response. Good luck finding something like this in the zerg arsenal. Zerg’s units simply annoy (harass) the opponent, with higher tech units annoying in new ways. Zergling hit and run, muta fly by’s, infestors popping infested terrans. I like the harassment style but where are the units that force a response from my opponent? Many of zerg’s units are responded to very efficiently, turrets for muta, detection for infestors, and good base layout for zerglings. Zerg gets no such breaks. Colossi on the field… better throw up a spire and invest absurd amounts of resources into corruptors so that they can do absolutely nothing once the colossi are gone. The zerg lack units that demand a response and it is pathetic.
Zerg was the last race designed for starcraft 2 and it is painfully obvious. The race not only feels unpolished, but also poorly designed. I had hoped that the racial identity issues that so many placers voiced would have been taken care of during beta, but clearly that was asking for too much. In reality, I seriously doubt anything will be done before release of Heart of the Swarm, but I do think it important to let blizzard know “what is up” with the race I so know and love.
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