I like that this is a very courteous discussion of the replay, even though this discussion has blown out of proportions 
I only posted THAT specific replay because I literally just played it. There are games I have played where the situation is such where Swann looks like the most overpowered CO ever.
Honestly by my standards I didn’t even play that mission well, I’ll be the first to say that, but we still won and I did still carry.
My point is this though.
How can Swann be bad if he can carry a Mutation mission with a bad ally? Seriously, HOW?!
You haven’t explained that part of your reasoning except to say that you think other CO’s can do it easier.
So basically you just want Swann to be easier.
Why? Swann is fine. He can accomplish any task put in front of him if the player plays well enough. As far as I’m concerned the problem is that the other CO’s are TOO easy especially Tychus and ESPECIALLY Zeratul.
I don’t see any reason whatsoever why he needs to be changed/buffed/overhauled whatever when I already have plenty of fun playing him and when I can carry bad allies through mutation level missions.
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I like Swann. He’s a pure mech commander with great buffs for his partner. If you are a gas heavy commander having Swann as a partner makes a brutal feel like a normal difficulty. Plus, a critical mass of Goliaths backed by Observers healing them will chew through just about anything.
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It also feels like Swann is pidgeonholed into playing Only Goliaths, just like Karax is only able to go for carriers if he’s going for Units. Mostly cause his ground units are garbage and (still) overpriced and he lacks Any and all anti-air. “Mirages” are Horribly bad units that don’t really do anything useful except die to a gust of wind.
If you check some replays either here or on YouTube, you can see that there are a variety of ways to play. Herc/tank, stutter stepping wraiths, turrets and thors, cyclones and hellions, and full “I def” to rustle some jimmies. Now granted, mass Goliath’s is the easiest to do APM wise. But once you get Swanns macro down pat, you’ll find more time and spare APM to do these other play styles. He’s got a bit of a longer journey to get your build order just right for the different missions, but the rewards are just as great.
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Basically, if you bothered learning you’d known how wrong that entire response is lol. Then again, why bother learning if you can just complain about it.
This isn’t really a Swann problem as so much that COs like Zeratul, Tychus, Abby, and Dehaka are higher tier. If you want them to be at their level, that’s going to be a harder sell since we just can’t have everyone at that level.
For the love of Xel’Naga, please do NOT make Swann like Mengsk! I actively avoid playing Mengsk! He’s just not my style
Because carrying an easy mutation is not that hard to begin with. I mean it’s broodlings and blizzards…
Basically any commander could have carried that game… and you don’t need to be Serral to do so.
You can say that sentence about any commander, and it would hold true. So it really has not much to say about Swann, is that not true?
The question is: how well is well enough? Cause the answer is VERY different depending on which commander you are talking about.
Apples and Oranges…
That is the same as what i said.
Consider this: saying “2 is bigger than 1” is the same as “1 is smaller than 2”.
I think ackmondual’s point is that it wouldn’t be desirable to have more co’s at the same power level as those 4, since they can often trivialize Brutal due to how strong they are. It’s more of a “Zeratul, etc are overpowered” problem more than “Swann is underpowered” problem.
Swann is one of those COs that has higher skill requirements, but has high rewards. With enough practice, micro-ing science vessels to move and d-matrix, Hercs dropping / loading and macro-ing (optimal build order for each map), Swann can as powerful if not more powerful than those COs mentioned.
Also you don’t even need full 200/200 supply to be effective, you can run down enemy comps with just 150/200 supply and100/200 on quick runs.
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Having just finished one releveling of Swann for the prestige I got to say he is weak as hell until at least level 12. He is truely weak.
Ok…
You’re dodging the question.
The game isn’t designed around CO power relative to one another first of all, the game is designed around each CO having power to accomplish each mission. Secondly, Co Op missions are designed to be played with 2 people. The CO’s are NOT designed around which CO’s can solo missions faster or easier. That is not how they are designed because that is not how Co Op is designed.
Your entire complaint is that you think Swann is weak, but actually your entire argument is that you just want him to be as strong as CO’s that you deem to be stronger and easier to play.
Yet you’ve never once addressed the opposing view that the people that play Swann that LIKE HIM, like him precisely because he takes more skill to play than the faceroll CO’s like Zeratul and Tychus. Who are so ridiculously easy to play that they bore players like us.
You just keep dodging this and instead try to state matter of factly that because Swann is harder to play that it is inherently a problem when it isn’t.
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How exactly did i “dodge” your question?
Your game has nothing to do with how bad or good Swann is. Cause it is too easy.
Just like being able to lift 1 pound is no indication of how fit you are.
Besides that…
I claim that it is. Blizz does pay attention to this (i hope). They are just doing a bad job (well relatively speaking).
If i say Swann sux, then i DO MEAN compared to other commanders. What else would i possibly mean?
Of course we compare commanders against each other, cause that is what we are teamed up with… other commanders.
The relative strength of commanders is VERY important in coop !!!
IF that were NOT the case, then you could buff all commanders damage, HP, income, movement speed (everything !!!) to oblivion and beyond EXCEPT Swann, and he would still be fine in your world?
Are you telling me this? Cause that is really stupid.
Listen pal… WEAK and EASY are comparisons in themselfs. WEAK really means weak COMPARED to something else.
If you say “my brother is weak”, then what you really mean is “my brother is weak compared to me” or “he is weak compared to an average human his age”.
Let me play your stupid “i don’t understand basic human language” game.
Lets say Swann is only hard to play - NOT weak, just harder.
Then what does that really mean? I would say it means this:
With a given skill level and same amount of practice, you cannot achieve as much with Swann as you can with an easier commander.
Read that above sentence. Now read it again. And again.
AND AGAIN !!!
Assuming you never hit the skill cap with any amount of skill and practice - which is a perfectly fine assumption to make, as far as i see it - then THIS IS TRUE FOR ALL PLAYERS OF ALL SKILL LEVELS - NO EXCEPTIONS. You will achieve less with Swann than with easier commanders.
No go die for making me write the same crap for the 100th time. And grow a brain if your genetics actually does includes the blueprint for that organ.
The only real selling point of Swann is the Herc+Tank combo (especially with the P3) and i guess the Gas Drones if you are a commander that needs THAT much gas to optimally finish a mission.
Everything else Swann can do is either not often needed or flat out inferior compared to other commanders.
This combined with his hideously slow ramp up time makes him really undesirable and sub-optimal.
The addition of Prestiges made a lot of commanders have alternative play styles or radically different gameplay which changed their pace and tempo (stukov p1 for example).
However Swann prestiges are such unimaginative garbage that they have not done anything to improve his variety or increase his viability and flexibility.
P1 is a lame gimmick, P2 is unnecessary and P3 makes Swanns already most powerful army (herc+tank) even more powerful compared to other Swann playstyles.
Swann still has a lot of units that are sub-optimal or flat out inferior and not worth making.
Overall Swann is bottom tier and his prestiges do nothing to improve that.
By the time Swanns army is in any way relevant a good teammate will have the map already half-completed.
The overpowered commanders (aba, zera, dehaka, tychus) can even almost finish the map before Swanns army becomes a relevant factor.
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Totally. Playing Swann with his prestiges gave me a new appreciation for how he plays in general. You can do a lot of work in the early-game with a Herc and even just a couple of tanks, depending on the enemy comp of course. I’ve also found that my early game can be more secure by leveraging Swann’s fast-building turrets, though this depends a bit on the map. I haven’t practiced that part much yet, but I’m looking forward to getting better with that.
You can’t maybe because your silver level skill level can’t.
I can.
I can do things with Swann I can’t do with other CO’s I’ve said this before. Not only that but I have more FUN with Swann than I do with other CO’s.
The crux of this whole thread is that you don’t like the effort that Swann requires to play and you want him made faceroll like Tychus and Zeratul and you will NOT accept that a lot of players do not want that.
You have this inability to understand that what you want is anti-what other players want. Zeratul and Tychus are BORING because they are way too easy to play. I do not want more CO’s to play like they do and I’m definitely not alone in that as evidenced by the other posters in this thread.
You’re trying to pass off your inability to play Swann as some flaw in the CO. It’s not.
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It depends on what map and if are able to speed run those maps. For example, Abby can speed run SoA and VT easily. Most maps you can’t speed run, you need to wait for triggers.
Swann shines on defensive maps like DoN, OE and Miners. And he dominates against any ground comp and you don’t even need 200/200 supply to achieve that. Just load up 3 HERCs with tanks and you are good. If against Air comp, Goliaths are your friend, but they don’t kill as fast as tanks versus ground comp.
Going have to disagree here. Compare Swann’s 4-5 Hercs loaded with tanks versus Zeratul’s immortals and disruptor build against enemy ground comp. Who will clear the enemy wave faster? I think Swann will, but it takes a lot of practice to get there. Like micro-ing your HERCs and dropping them before your Zeratul partner can get to the wave, d-matrix to protect your units. Avoid using F2 key like most COs.
If you are talking about competing in kill counts (vs Zeratul, Abby, Tychus, etc. ), it will be harder and you’ll need more practice. Practice on all maps and against all comps until everything becomes a muscle memory. I’m talking about months of only playing Swann.
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But after killing a wave you also need to kill the objective, and on a map like SoA where we have Slivers (on Rifts we have Shards, etc) - Ascendants are garbage, and Swann with his gas heavy army can shoot down a sliver in seconds.
This leads to good synergy (potentially) - one ally deletes units, other deletes structure objectives.