Mutator Numerical Difficulty Feedback

Co-op Missions Discussion
1

This data is taken from the starcraft2coop website. It states that each Mutator has a number that represents its difficulty on a scale of 1-10, and that each tier of Brutal+ has a range representing the minimum and maximum numerical difficulty for that tier. At the bottom I wrote which Mutators I feel are off, feel free to dispute or list your own suggestions.

Brutal Difficulty — Minimum Difficulty — Maximum Difficulty
Brutal+ — 8 — 10
Brutal+2 — 11 — 12
Brutal+3 — 13 — 14
Brutal+4 — 15 — 16
Brutal+5 — 17 — 18
Brutal+6 — 19 — 20

Mutator Name — Numerical Difficulty
Aggressive Deployment — 3
Alien Incubation — 2
Avenger — 5
Barrier — 2
Black Death — 7
Blizzard — 4
Concussive Attacks — 1
Darkness — 2
Diffusion — 3
Double-edged — 3
Eminent Domain — 1
Evasive Maneuvers — 1
Fatal Attraction — 3
Fear — 3
Going Nuclear — 3
Hardened Will — 2
Heroes from the Storm — 10
Inspiration — 2
Just Die! — 7
Kill Bots — 6
Laser Drill — 2
Lava Burst — 3
Life Leech — 1
Long Range — 2
Mag-nificent — 4
Micro Transactions — 5
Mineral Shields — 2
Minesweeper — 6
Missile Command — 3
Moment of Silence — 2
Mutually Assured Destruction — 5
Orbital Strike — 1
Outbreak — 3
Photon Overload — 1
Polarity — 7
Power Overwhelming — 5
Propagators — 8
Purifier Beam — 2
Scorched Earth — 2
Self Destruction — 3
Shortsighted — 1
Slim Pickings — 5
Speed Freaks — 2
Temporal Field — 1
Time Warp — 1
Transmutation — 7
Twister — 2
Void Reanimators — 5
Void Rifts — 10
Walking Infested — 2
We Move Unseen — 3

Mutators I think could be higher: Avenger, Black Death, Diffusion, Fatal Attraction, Fear, Going Nuclear, Hardened Will, Inspiration, Kill Bots, Mineral Shields, Minesweeper, Missile Command, Moment of Silence, Orbital Strike, Polarity, Scorched Earth, Self Destruction, Slim Pickings, Transmutation, Void Reanimators

Mutators I think could be lower: Blizzard, Micro Transactions, Mutually Assured Destruction

I’d like to point out that these are for Brutal+ and NOT for the Weekly Mutation. Knowing what Mutators you are getting ahead of time before choosing your Commander effectively lowers the difficulty of them. Also most of my suggestions are intended for only 1 or 2 point adjustments, with maybe a couple exceptions.

2 Likes
2

I hate polarity and black death with a passion.

3

The problem is Blizzard executed this poorly. Certain combos are unplayable and just feel bad. Any double economy mutator is just no I don’t want to bother even though we’ve had them before. Short sighted and mines is awful. Speed be a joke with some combos and lethal on others.

Map is also a huge factor.

Synergies from combos should be given a weight to help influence when you get them OR they should remove 1 mutator.

1 Like
4

Yea, Map should also give some point in that difficulty equation.

5

Simplest solution…let players have a mutator veto list. 5-10 mutators thatthey won’t get.

Also, reduce the targeted# of mutators, instead of 3/4 rarely 2 it should be 2/3 rarely 4 (odds shifting as you move to+6) . That would be less likely to cause synergy effects.

6

Mutator veto doesn’t work. Certain mutators would never be seen which make up majority of 6 plus. If you didn’t know 6 typically spawns anything from the 8-10 category such as void rifts, heroes, propagators, transmute, black death, in combination with other very lethal combos. Basically 6 means at least 2 lethal where 1-3 is at most 1 lethal.

It would be nice however to down vote trivial mutators such as any economy which themselves aren’t bad until you pair them with say void rift which on certain maps if you can’t keep up with snowball out of control and make roaming impossible.

7

Mutator veto would work…if both players had 10 vetoes (non overlapping) there are still 30 of them.

You might need to allow +6 to have 5 or 6 mutators if the 20 highest were taken out, but that should be fine at +6

8

No it wouldn’t work. The difficulty in higher brutal +6s is the combinations available and the flaw of a veto system is you could just veto hard combinations. Micro-transaction and slim picking is all of a sudden not the big of a deal when it’s not paired with speed freaks, heroes, transmute, or rifts. There are many hidden layers to higher difficulties. At higher brutal+ you get harder and harder combinations. We don’t know Blizzard’s internal rating system, just that they have one.

1 Like
9

Cloaked void reanimators are a real nuisance for Brutal+1

10

Youu could only veto individual mutators, not combinations.
So tough combos would still be there just not with your least favorite mutators

And we do know Blizzards internal rating system. Its been posted on the forum twice

11

I would prefer that it has a fixed “set” of mutators to use in every Brutal+.

For an example: You will always get Just Die + Barrier OR Barrier + Leech + Tornado OR Transmute + Speed Freak and so on every time you play Brutal +

And at Brutal+6 you will get a fixed “set of 4 mutators” instead of “set of 4 random mutators”.

12

That sounds far too limiting. Variety is the one good feature of the current model.

1 Like
13

Definitely not the hardest one but I HATE fear - more so than polarity. It tilts me so freaking hard

14

I’m sorry what? This is one of the most irritating of ANY of the mutations and it’s absolutely crippling to macro based CO’S like Mengsk, Zagara, Raynor, Swann and others.

If anything it should be higher. It’s fine as a weekly mutation that can be prepped for, but as a random mutation against the wrong CO it’s basically a death sentence.

15

My picks for higher: Slim Pickings, Kill Bots, Avenger, Microtransactions

My picks for lower: Power Overwhelming, Walking Infested, Long Range

16

I never have any problem with Microtransactions, and it’s weird you bring up Zagara because she like, doesn’t even need her expansion lol. I suppose if you’re one of those people who spam click all over the place, I could see Microtransactions being a problem. But I definitely believe it’s one of the weaker Mutators.

17

It’s not necessarily a hard mutator, it just goes against the spirit of the game (and people who play ladder), where ultimately you want to be able to micro your troops and do alot of things at once, which can take some precise movement at times. For example, Dehaka doesn’t like it because everytime you issue a command to him it’s something like -10 minerals & -5 gas, which puts alot of strain on an already gas needy commander (if you plan to build an army). It’s not that hard, but it’s not really that fun either. You have to adopt a whole new mindset of not clicking everywhere and try to be as economical with your movements as possible. And all this is coming from me (130-150 apm on average), and I can see it even being way more annoying for the 200-300+ apm guys.

1 Like
18

Regardless, I cannot justify having to click less being a 5 difficulty Mutator. It’s always been one of those Mutators I can mostly ignore.