Balance discussion. The strongest race!

General Discussion
1

So the GSL ro 6 we don’t have any Terrans, that is very disappointing. And also Maru surprisingly performed very poorly.

In general from tournament results Zerg seems to be the strongest right now. Terran and Protoss are close, but Terran seem the weakest.

In your personal opinion:

  1. What is the strongest race right now?
  2. What is the weakest race right now?
  3. Do we have any balance issues or no?
  4. The new maps are not balanced ? Or maps are fine?
2 Likes
2

RO10 had an even split: 3/3/4, so it would seem all races performed reasonably well. The pool is always too small to draw defininite statistics, and as it gets smaller it’s more and more meaningless statistically so anything after RO10 makes for specious arguments that have more to do with the particular performance of any given player on the day of their matches rather than the race they play.

Balance? No. On the professional level things are evening out more and more. Design issues? Absolutely. Protoss is still OP in a BO1 but trash in a BO7.

I actually object to the GSL map pool, mainly because they brought back Golden Wall which is an attrocious map for TvZ (39.1% winrate) because it’s incredibly difficult for Terran to expand past 4 bases due to how spread out everything is. I do not understand, at all, the decision making behind this.

1 Like
3
  1. Zerg, without a doubt, for numerous reasons. Though I’m not sure it’s by much
  2. That’s difficult to say - the Terran in me says that they’re the weakest, but Maru really didn’t perform at what I would consider his best - he was clearly experimenting; it looked like he was trying to find something, anything to work with. Byun looked incredible on day 2, then his wrist started hurting and it was down hill from there. Ryung looked pretty good day 1 then Day 2 looked good, just… not good enough.
    Creator was the surprise turn-up pretty much this entire season - he’s looked incredible, and it’s wonderful to see after so long for him. I actually hope he wins this season, however ZvP really feels like a rough matchup in general, though if memory serves the stats indicate that it’s a lot closer.
  3. I know PiG feels that the patch didn’t do what it was supposed to do, as do quite a few pros. We’re still seeing the presence of queen timings, as well as voidray into skytoss on both sides, and both styles of play are so common and played out that it’s boring to watch. Many people feel that the matchup is boring to play on both sides, boring to watch, and boring to face. It’s not necessarily a balance issue, but Protoss ground certainly seems to have less success than protoss air does in ZvP - between Ravagers demolishing forcefields and early defenses, Banes in the mid and late-game and Lurkers in the late-game, it’s no wonder players would rather just go air and not have to face them. Ravagers especially feel like they remove the one thing Protoss’ early game was balanced around initially - forcefields (I posted a thread on that a while back)
    The PvZ Problem - Sentry/Ravager
  4. Golden-wall being back… Well frankly TvZ is a nightmare on that map. The map is uniquely interesting, to be certain, but it’s certainly one of the worst maps for TvZ. Not sure about TvP or PvZ because we never really saw those matches on that map. Nautilus is another 4-player map, which typically inherently favour Zerg just by virtue of random spawns alone. That said, I’m not sure if it’s imbalanced, because it’s really dependent on what spawns you get, as well as whether your spawns are scouted. We haven’t really seen enough of the map to know. Most of the maps in the pool seem to currently favour Zerg as it is though - the sheer size of the maps make them far better for Zerg with one or two exceptions.

Eh… I don’t think this is strictly 100% true - looking at trends over a long period of time can certainly show whether something is balanced or not. Winners and runner-ups are just one metric that should absolutely be considered, though never in isolation. They’re meaningless if you’re just looking at the winner and runner-up of one tournament though.

1 Like
4

I think at top level we have balance. There is much more about personal skills right here right now. Sometimes u feel good and win every one. Sometimes u feel bad and lose to underdog. U make terrible mistakes, everything goes wrong, sometimes just unluck. So many factors. But in the end only personal skill and mentality really metters. Im sure Serral or Maru could get near the same results with other races.
We (ladder players) have a bit different situation in every league/mmr range. I guess at lower mmr protoss is in favor, cuz its a bit easier to control and do not need that much apm: passive defence, good eco, warps all around, skytoss…
In the same time zerg is a bit harder to play under the pressure and harass. There is so much to do in macro for zerg. A bit overdronning and lose… Poor creep - lose…
My own race - Terran - is in between P and Z, imho.
And for us (ladder players) map pool doesnt matter that much, we lose or win not cuz of maps. But personally i dont like map pool right now and waiting for new maps!

5

Golden wall was fantastic for TvZ. 53% win rate and all you had to do was 8 rax all in with a free gold, no way for the zerg to counter attack since there was only 1 attack path and if they went all they way around they died.

6
  1. At the very top (top 20) zerg has the edge: it is very visible in numbers/ tournament victories and takes away some joy of watching it if you’re not a zerg-only-fan.

Below anything under top 50 GM I think it’s pretty much balanced and we’re all just apes clicking buttons, hoping our ‘strategy’ combined with our impeccable micro will work…

  1. Again at the very top protoss since they have the PvZ meta which is kinda problematic and has been stated, seen, experienced,… numerous times. Apart from the very top it probably doesn’t matter that much which race you play.

  2. Unless you’re at the very top you might have. I don’t :stuck_out_tongue: .

  3. See point 3.

1 Like
7

It absolutely is. You leverage the truth of it yourself:

Players are individuals, they aren’t their races. When they win or lose it is just as reflective of their particular performance during that series as it is of the overall balance. When you have a very large sample pool, you can eschew the former more. Beyond the RO10 (or equivalent) the number of players is too small to draw racial balance statistics; only individual matchup statistics are sound.

1 Like
8

These two statements are in direct opposition. If the defining feature for a race’s success on a map is that they have a single all-in strat that works and they’re dead outside of that then it’s a bad map. I shouldn’t have to say this, but here we are.

1 Like
9

I was in Dimond league when I stopped playing, once I started playing ranked again. it moved me to bronze, but I still have the same mmr and playing very good bronze league players. does anyone know what is going on?

10

Wrong post, but yeah sometimes MMR system is weird like that.

11

Professionals base their map choices by using strategies with the highest win rate. It is a matter of fact that golden wall is terran favoured against zerg. The gold base was impossible to secure as zerg prior to three bases but invulnurable as the terran. Now we have the opposite with Pride of Altaris.

12

Explains why TvZ was at 39.1% on Golden Wall during GSL, because it’s heavily Terran favored and you just know better than all the pro terrans. Please.

2 Likes
13

Are you using current TvZ GSL map statistics?

14

Yes, 2022 S1 GSL
https://liquipedia.net/starcraft2/Global_StarCraft_II_League/2022/Season_1#Map_Statistics

1 Like
15

Golden wall was substituted during the second group stage and yet Byun still chose it and went for… an 8 rax all in. https://youtu.be/dtl0P8lHsak?t=644 Exactly what I’ve been saying. That’s why it had a higher than average win percentage in GSL, too.

16

Protoss is the strongest because there is nothing like having a swarm of invisible renovable flying interceptors attacking ground and air !
The weakest is zerg because is the most difficult race to emphatize!
The day in wich everybody say SC2 is balanced never was and it wont be because most players of this era are pridefull !

17

  1. What is the strongest race right now?
    In regards to pro play: There is no argument anyone can make that Zerg isn’t the clear number 1 race. Rankings, winnings and tournament results clearly show that Zerg is head and shoulders above the rest, with a bit of a resurgence of Protoss, which always happens after a patch. On the ladder its pretty balanced I think.

  2. What is the weakest race right now?
    Not sure about that, Terran and Protoss both have their issues.

  3. Do we have any balance issues or no?
    Airtoss is still broken, no one wants to play or fight it (just nerf the carrier). Ground toss is hot garbage after the early / mid game, thus everyone has to play Skytoss especially in PvZ. Queens are still absurdly broken, ravagers morph to fast (and why do they break forcefield??), Ultras are too weak and can be countered too easy. Terran is pretty much fine except the Ghost EMP, which is way way stronger than Storm.

  4. The new maps are not balanced ? Or maps are fine?
    The map pool is pretty Zerg favored, but its fine. The maps are just a bit boring. I guess that’s what happens when you focus the map pool around pro play, but I don’t mind it too much.

2 Likes
18

  1. Zerg. It’s because early game ZvP isn’t balanced. Rest of the game is (within reason).

  2. Protoss or Terran, depending on the match up. ZvP is unfair for Protoss and if Terran slips up in TvP, it’s practically auto lose due to units like Disruptors and how Protoss macro scales upwards so fast.

  3. Yes, there are balance issues. Zerg cheese is too strong vs Protoss and even a failed 12 pool can go straight back into macro with minimal damage done to the zerg economy.

Disruptors are also kind of broken. Same with Widow Mines and potentially EMP’s shockwave upgrade. Late game everything is broken so I don’t see the need to highlight that late game comps get silly, like Skytoss deathball or mass BC Lib Thor or Lurker BL Hydra Queen. The objective is to stop the opponent from getting their dream army running because those super late game armies are always busted.

  1. Terrible, terrible map pool. Zerg favored, gold bases, no ramps on the nat for multiple maps…the map pool hasn’t been good for the last 3-4 years and imo is partly responsible for the poor shape of ZvP.
3 Likes
19

TIL you think a negative win rate for Terran on Golden Wall in 2022 of -10.9% is a Terran advantage. At least I know I can ignore anything else you ever have to say in this life or the next.

20

? Simple question, Who do you think asked for Golden wall to be included in code S instead of pride of Altaris?