I had spoken about this issue before, I want SC2 to be at normal speed as in campaign because i feel most people would to construct better strategies.
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By the way, this chart is from WoL. You can see the average APM for GMs is about 200. Nowadays the average is 275 for the past year. Bronze by comparison hasn’t changed at all. There was already a strong correlation between APM/action latency and performance, but then years of design changes have favored players who are more mechanically gifted, which is why average APM in higher leagues has gone up, strengthening the correlation even more, which is equivalent to saying SC2 is an APM spam game.
https://sc2replaystats.com/stats/analytics?group_by%5B%5D=player_division&matchup%5B%5D=PvT&matchup%5B%5D=PvZ&matchup%5B%5D=TvZ&format%5B%5D=1v1&game_type%5B%5D=AutoMM&metric_options%5B%5D=games&metric_options%5B%5D=avg_player_apm&date=January%201,%202023%20-%20May%201,%202023
The issue was A) the 12 worker start, B) buffing defensive mechanics like the siege tank, and C) nerfing offensive mechanics like mutalisks and infestors. Nowadays, it just doesn’t matter how far ahead you get, you have no tools that are capable of breaking a terran’s defense without going bankrupt yourself, which means the game goes longer, and longer games favor players with more APM because there are more units to micro, more bases to manage, more production facilities to macro, etc.
SC2 actions are about quantity and not quality. I mean, the average action latency for a GM is 40 ms. That’s including ping, by the way, so they are probably reacting even faster. That’s 1/25th of a second. Do you really think that strategical thinking can happen on time scales of 0.04 seconds? If you believe that, I have some ocean front property to sell you in Arizona:
When you are playing SC2, there is almost no thinking involved – it’s all prememorized actions. Thinking is slow, so players have to eliminate thinking processes in order to keep up with the pace of the game. This requires rote memorization. SC2 is not a strategy game – it’s a mechanics game, e.g. how fast you can click, how much multitasking you can manage, etc.
If you want a good example of a purely strategical game, look no further than “Baba is you”. Actions in that game can easily take 20 minutes to plan out. This idea that GMs in SC2 as some kind of strategical masters playing the best real time STRATEGY game in existence is … nonsense.
REAL TIME Strategy. Real Time. It means somebody is making a strategy against you at the same time, and a bad strategy will generally beat no strategy. Baba Is You is not a competitive game against another person imposing a time limit and, in fact, is not a strategy game at all but rather a logic puzzle game.
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It is why even though I worked for an AAA company and for real unlike Batz’s ‘I’ve worked in game industry for 10 years’ although he could have dev-ed something for games, lots of small studios exist, I do not like Total War series even though they are considered good. I’m interested in the vibe that old games like Dune 2 gave you. Frankly they feel better in a way than SC2 but SC, War3 are still that, RTSes and closer than turn based carefully planned strategy games. It is enough SC2 to be War3 in the future even with its SC specifics for me to accept this genre and way of playing these strategy games. Some of my first games in WoL (especially on Scrap Station) and weekly tourney against GMs especially former war3 players were like as if we played war3, more micro dropping than doing the SC thing of the game. But it just shows succeeding from War3 and the same Im planning to make in Stormgate, as long as it becomes a relatively well developed product (no one expects huge breakthrough in RTS genre) like War3, SC, not something that goes wrong.
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It’s hilarious that people ignore the substance of your arguments while saying you have no clue what you are talking about. If that were true, you could easily dismantle my points, but you don’t. So, it’s obvious you are lying. You are wrong, and you are talking out of your rear. If you knew what you were talking about, and I didn’t, you’d be able to run circles around me in the debate instead of doing personal attacks. At this moment, I am literally the only person to present any evidence whatsoever in support of my arguments, and it’s very compelling evidence. Why do you ignore it? I think everyone knows.
FYI, not only did I work in the video game sector for 10 years, it’s where I received most of my fortune early on. I had a game that was a reasonable success. I never started a studio because I hired freelancers on an as needed basis. I earned about a million from it. I bought three houses with it which I now rent. They are top/bottom units. I get 1500 for the top and about 1200 for the bottom. From those alone I make about 100k/year. I also developed a game engine which I license to developers to build MMO games. My game engine is unusually popular with people in Australia and Eastern Europe, for some reason. You get a pretty good sense of how games work when you have to write the code that actually makes them work. Implementing all the features that developers request will give you an excellent understanding of a game genre.
I still do the occasional programming job for video games. I definitely don’t need the money, but I enjoy the work. Probably 95% of the programming that I do these days are for personal “pet” projects. I am thinking about coding an AI to play metal music on YouTube, and using the video upvotes/downvotes as a feedback mechanism. I may do it, I may not, we will see. If you ever hear of a metal band with no vocals called “RAMSKULL” then be sure to stop by and say hi in the comments section. We can have an argument over music genres, lmao.
Anyway, it’s just flipping hilarious to be one of the most competent people on the planet when it comes to game design and yet being called an idiot by internet randos who can’t even understand game genres. This is the Dunning-Kruger effect in action, lmao. Strategical thinking cannot exist on the time scales of 1/25th of a second, period, end of story. If a game requires you to play that fast, it is not a strategy game, period, end of story.
I will provide citations, as always:
A second criticism of the RTS genre is the importance of skill over strategy in real-time strategy games. The manual dexterity and ability to multitask and divide one’s attention is often considered the most important aspect to succeeding at the RTS genre. According to Troy Dunniway, former Westwood developer who has also worked on Command and Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars, "A player controls hundreds of units, dozens of buildings and many different events that are all happening simultaneously. There is only one player, and he can only pay attention to one thing at a time. Expert players can quickly flip between many different tasks, while casual gamers have more problems with this.
And:
Real-time strategy games have been criticized for an overabundance of tactical considerations when compared to the amount of strategic gameplay found in such games. According to Chris Taylor, lead designer of Supreme Commander, he said, "My first attempt at visualizing RTSs in a fresh and interesting new way was my realizing that although we call this genre ‘Real-Time Strategy,’ it should have been called ‘Real-Time Tactics’ with a dash of strategy thrown in.
And:
In an article for Gamasutra, Nathan Toronto criticizes real-time strategy games for too often having only one valid means of victory — attrition — comparing them unfavorably to real-time tactics games. Players’ awareness that the only way for them to win or lose is militarily makes them unlikely to respond to gestures of diplomacy. The result is that the winner of a real-time strategy game is too often the best tactician rather than the best strategist
And:
In an article for GameSpy, Mark Walker criticizes real-time strategy games for their lack of combat strategy[sic], suggesting real-time tactics games as a more suitable substitute
The experts absolutely agree that the “real time STRATEGY” genre has virtually no strategy. Some even classify the RTS genre as the LACK of combat strategy.
Ey listen up/read, whatever. I said in my post that you could have worked on something because making games today isn’t something exclusive to few AAA’s. So that’s fine, I believe you, you may have worked on something. But that gives you no right to call me a liar. I can provide you proof that I have studied Game Design in a Uni, I have projects that again do not mean im some super designer but mean I know the field, I have worked for AAA. Do I need to show them? Perhaps it needs to come with ID, CV, Resume. Do you need them too. Shall I provide them? Where do I apply for your positions? F-OFF and believe whatever you want.
You keep repeating what I posted once, I have been with strategy games the most for many years they were my main. It is enough for my points to stay valid. I do not put much effort in my posts on this forum if you didn’t learn it by now. I am not making essays, you know, like you do.
You may dismiss these games being RTS because they do not show enough strategy but officially, they are that, RTS games. Whether you and the other critics like it or not. I did mention that War3-SC type of games though do have more focus on fast fingers than strategy but strategy is not lacking. But it is a type of RTS some enjoy playing, I enjoy playing. This isn’t total war, nor some turn based game. Btw some people like Demuslim and Beastyq went AOE4, is this again too much APM and too little strategy? I believe it is close to War3-SC just less try hard. When you say these Blizz games are not strategy might as well say AOE series are not RTS too… Wrong.
Critics are fine, it may have been written in whatever article but ‘too much APM’ does not change the definition of RTS. These games have all the features of the RTS. You started saying the 
is not an 
because it lacks red.
(real time )Strategies games are played with two things
- strategy
- execution
Sure strategy matters… yet you complain SC2 has no strategy. Remember when you A moved your Zerg units into a falling NUKE then RAGEQUIT? You got outplayed by strategy.
EXECUTION matters a lot
It may not be the ‘gotcha’ nuke strategy but in similar style or toe-to-toe like units vs units without the ‘gotcha nuke’ who do you think matters? The one who executed BETTER
And better execution = APM or EPM (the point is the one who controls more but people with higher APM have also higher EPM). Tell me one game that doesnt matter. Dune 2 - you had to select units 1 by 1. The faster one builds and sends, the more efficient they are. Starcraft with its inability to select multiple buildings - the more APM you are able select and build, producing faster army and economy, the better player you are.
Strategy can beat APM in your falling nuke example. Why do you think I complained how Airtoss just low APMers can win with it… because they picked the better strategy to use these units not because they are better executors. But without a gotcha strategy, better execution = better playing and the opposite is also true. I have thrown strategies into the 
of players who fail to execute it because I am better APMer than them. TvT is exactly that when strategies are equal, better played micro and macro win.
Then again I see why you rely on strategy so much, some told you above, you just like to make your cheese wins vs pro players else complain that your strategy doesn’t always work. This is a game of execution too.
Critics may say if RTS is too much motion than strategy, then do you like mobile games? I play one, wasted $1500 and the game is automated for brain dead- you only need to pick correct hero combination and game AUTO wins for you, no micro needed just choosing correct heros?? SO MUCH skill in these games… so much that these players who never learnt strategy like me (because MOBILUL gamers)… are so bad
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Academic accomplishments only bolster a substantive argument. You could have a PhD and it would mean nothing without supporting evidence & citations from industry experts. I don’t see what is so hard about this. Screaming “I am an expert” while you contradict actual experts, on the basis of zero evidence none the less, is nothing but an obvious lie. Sorry, it is.
For me, what escalates this to a lie is that I have provided an overwhelming amount of data & expert opinion, and you wave it away with “Nah” or “because” or just outright ignore it. For example, experts say a better definition is “RTT” or “real time tactics”. How do you rebut this? I quote, “Critics are fine, it may have been written in whatever article but ‘too much APM’ does not change the definition of RTS”. Translation, experts disagreeing with you doesn’t matter to you because you say they are wrong. That’s your entire rebuttal. You should’ve just wrote “IDGAF, the experts are wrong.” How am I supposed to take that?
I provided hard proof for my claims, and 4 citations from industry experts which said more or less the same thing that I have been saying, but you still claim I am wrong, and ignore any substance of my arguments. When all the evidence is against you, and you keep saying otherwise, there is a certain point where what you are saying becomes a lie.
I guess your professors all had a bias that neatly fits the perspective of a die hard SC2 fan but conveniently ignores how the industry experts view the topic as well as any critical analysis of the game genre and relevant statistics. I totally believe that, bro. I wouldn’t care about qualifications, but you keep bringing them up while ignoring the substance of the topic, so here we are.
The consensus amongst experts is that RTS is a misnomer because the games really don’t have much strategy.
Here’s a fun fact for you: the majority of SC2’s players (approximately 90%) play the arcade, commander, and co-op. These game modes are closer to League and Dota than they are to the SC2 1v1 multiplayer. Even SC2 players prefer a slower paced format that drastically reduces the mechanical demands on the player. League alone has 17x more active players than SC2. Players vote with where they put their time, and they say that SC2’s version of “RTS” sucks. The RTS genre is NOT defined by the minority of players who prefer the mechanically focused 1v1 multiplayer of SC2.
*But it is the type of RTS most enjoy playing.
“The experts are wrong, I am right, the evidence is wrong, I am right. Why? Because I said so.”
Most RTS games have those, but in the case of SC2 it’s 95% execution and 5% strategy, which is an unusually high emphasis on execution.
That’s a myth. If strategy were more important than APM, there would be little to no correlation between APM and league. Mr “I studied game design at uni” can’t understand a correlation chart, apparently.
Let me tell you something. There isn’t a “game design” degree that I know of. Game designers are computer scientists. I wouldn’t have to explain a correlation chart to a computer scientist. To graduate with a CS degree, you need calculus, algebra, discrete mathematics, and statistics, at a bare minimum. So when somebody comes along and says, “I am going to ignore this correlation chart and make claims contrary to it” and “oh by the way I studied game design in uni” it’s obviously not true.
If you are a game designer, you can read correlation charts. If you can read a correlation chart, you don’t make claims contrary to the correlation charts. There is a very strong relationship between league and how fast a person plays. If strategy decided who wins, then speed metrics like APM would not correlate with win-rate (or would have a small correlation). According to Blizzard’s own employees, APM has a correlation with win-rate of 0.65. That’s huge:
https://conf.splunk.com/files/2019/slides/FN1698.pdf
I do not believe that you’ve studied game design in university and I don’t believe you’ve worked in the gaming industry. Sorry, I don’t buy it. The only reason I am saying this is because constantly bringing it up is obnoxious and only makes me roll my eyes. If you want to convince people of your point, you need a substantive argument based on evidence and citing industry experts. That’s how this works. You could be David Kim or Dustin Browder and I wouldn’t care what you have to say UNLESS it were backed by evidence. Conversely, you could be an 8 year old kid, who still believes in Santa Clause, BUT if your argument has a strong factual basis then I would agree with you none-the-less.
Do you have any statistics at all which attempt to measure the impact of strategy on win-rate? Is there even a shred of evidence to support your claims? If so, please list it.
To my knowledge, there hasn’t been any substantial effort to try to quantify the impact of strategy on win-rate. The closest thing we have would be the pro players doing nonsense strategies like “mass marine” in Grandmaster. Tell me, if strategy decides the outcome, how can these people get into Grandmaster with mass marine? How is that possible? Strategy affects the outcome, but it’s very small compared to the mechanic skills like how many hotkeys you can use, how good your multitasking is, and how fast you react. Those decide ~95% of the game’s outcome.
Citations, of course:
I contradict actual experts? I contradict someone ranting in an article. Go see the definition of a real time strategy game. I do not need to put any links, because it is enough to go to Wiki (and I know Wiki is not academic_ but go and look at the sources they use about what is real time strategy. What you describe is someone being upset that RTS does not offer enough strategy that does not change the fact.
You can call a lie whatever you want, I owe you no personal information for proof. It does not change the fact… I am not an expert because I have not worked all my life in the field, but it means that I have an understanding of the industry, meaning Im not bronze-gold in it, sorry to break it to you. I dont care what you believe and what not, facts do not change about me.
As for the ‘Nay sayers’ you describe, nowadays there are also Flat Earthers and one that think the Earth is a matrix or a hologram. Yes sometimes even ‘academic’ will put some outworldly opinions. Plus, I do not argue what RTS looks like, it could be as they say, but it is still RTS.
You are not arguing with me, you are arguing with those who defined RTS. Your people who say otherwise are just that part of it, not everyone who says that these games are not RTS.
So you lost to a nuke because you were too slow? Not because of strategical positioning of your opponent? Probably the guy was just sitting with 0 APM on some cliff and just pressed the nuke button and you couldn’t see the 
like avilo!
But did you read my Execution part? I did say that how fast a player plays relates to league yes, the more you can do, the more efficient your playing and typically better battle managing, better economy. Of course. And funny how you say only SC2 lacks it when SC and War3 are the same. Starcraft 1 with these click every single building they never added a ‘select all buildings of type’ controls… how is SC1 any better? It is a lot less strategy because you fight with limited controls there.
No one gives an F what you believe, it does not change the fact.
No one gives an F what you believe, it does not change the fact.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real-time_strategy
Now before you cry Wiki is not a source reeee. go to references. Same story. Just compiled in 1 place on a wiki page.
Plus you didn’t get my point, it is not that fast paced games especially SC2 do not put more weight on APM than on strategy, yes they do, but it is still a strategy game by definition, an RTS. You start saying that they are not RTS,. well they are. The ‘experts’ you cite are questioning the definition of RTS which is again created by other experts.
Also your Beastyq example: Yes if you are more efficient in execution, execution beats strategy. In what game someone making the ‘smart idea to go tier 3’ as super duper strategy will beat someone who attacks early with more army because the idea of how they go tier 3 has been poorly thought (for example never considered defending themselves to reach tier3 as more tech = less army) ? Why should that ever change?
The only fault of SC2 is that it is faster pace than any previous title but you could say that for SC1, War3, War2 any game… In what world someone managing battles poorly because they got the super duper tier 3 should deserve to win if they fail at managing? Actually that can happen - Protoss with poor APM 40-60 beats someone better with the strategy to go tier 3. Their strategy is - survive to superior army, win with less skill. So strategy can beat skill in SC2. Why do you think I hate losing to someone who A moved his Skytoss and I know he is not as experienced in the game. Luckily poorly executed strategy deserves to get punished and it does.
So just because you can find ‘experts’ that are naysayers. Today many just get their diploma PhD and then make some outworld claim and they will find some book that tells them so… and then watch the pointless arguments between both sides.
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I mean really, we’ve all seen his replays at this point. We know darn well that Batz doesnt actually understand strategy or how to use it. Is it any wonder he doesnt understand how much strategy is actually involved in Starcraft?
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BlockquoteAs for the ‘Nay sayers’ you describe, nowadays there are also Flat Earthers and one that think the Earth is a matrix or a hologram. Yes sometimes even ‘academic’ will put some outworldly opinions. Plus, I do not argue what RTS looks like, it could be as they say, but it is still RTS.
Man I was waiting for someone to bring up the correlation between Batz and flat-earthers, dude legit sounds just like them 
then he makes multiple accounts claiming he is right talking to himself in a lobby to make it seem like he is having a compelling argument
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tehbatz is or was a climate denier at one point. If you type “tehbatz climate” into the search bar you can find old posts to that effect.
If you drew a Venn diagram of flat earthers and climate change deniers, the circle of flat-earthers would fit almost entirely within the circle for climate-change deniers. At the very least, they share some similar behaviors and thought processes which lead them to bad conclusions.
I believe that we are more that wants a normal speed game than those who stay like now!
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You contradicted Troy Dunniway, the developer of Command and Conquer and Creative Director for Ubisoft. You contradicted Chris Taylor, the creator of Total Annihilation, Supreme Commander, etc. You contradicted Nathan Toronto of Gamasutra. You contradicted Mark Walker, an award winning game designer and who has a Masters degree in Warfighting and International Relations from the Naval War College. But, worst of all, you contradicted the evidence.
An expert with a Masters degree in War Studies and who has designed award winning games is, to you, “someone ranting in an article”. That’s a gross mischaracterization.
Lmao. You just said all the experts are wrong and called them “people ranting in an article” right after you denied incontrovertible proof which showed decisions in SC2 are made on the 1/25th of a second time scale, which is proof that strategical thinking can’t exist to any meaningful degree.
So, yes, your argument has boiled down to posting blatant lies.
No, those people say the proper definition is “Real-time Tactics”, and they say that because these games don’t have strategy so calling them a strategy game is inaccurate. That is what the experts say.
Anyone with a brain knows that strategy is a plan executed over a long time period while tactics are the little maneuvers that happen frequently and on small time scales. If SC2 requires 200 APM to play, it is by definition a tactical game, NOT a strategy game. This is understanding basic definitions to words. If your argument relies on denying the evidence, inverting the definitions to words, and contradicting expert opinion, then your argument is nothing but a lie.
The only thing going on here is that the people on these forums are legit psychos who will pick a fight over the dumbest stuff, even when they have no hope to win. They disagree for the sake of disagreeing and for no other reason. They are extremely low in agreeableness (a big 5 personality trait) which is probably why they spend their time online and not in real life, because people in real life would not put up with their antics. So, they go online and scream at people about random crap.
Could you imagine trying to employ someone who would disagree with you over the definitions to words as they are defined in the dictionary and as they are used by industry experts? “Hey bucko, why don’t you use some of that 16 gauge 3-wire NMB to wire that switch?” to which he rants “NMB WIRE IS THE WRONG WORD! SWITCH IS THE WRONG WORD! IT ISN’T CALLED GAUGE! ReEeEeEeEeE” for 20 minutes straight. Lmao. That’s called being unemployable.
This is called copium, lmao.
“Copium” is a term often used to tell someone that they’re in denial about something**. The term was first popularized on the notorious messaging board 4chan in 2019, accompanied by images of popular meme character Pepe the Frog
He just… doesn’t stop does he lmao. Will be the heat death of the universe and batz will still post reams of utter nonsense devoid of logic on this forum
I did tell you, the definitions are not mine, they are definitions put by the same level of directors/designers as the ones you list.
We all know you are a dumb forum troll (since you ask for proof: your thousands of posts with the need to argue for the sake of arguing). No need to prove it.
It would be very typical of you to not have these people say the things you claim they say and just post and list some names to put weight in your arguments. Dont waste my time with your meaningless argues. I will not spend much time on you.
Do you understand how stupid it is to attach yourself to SC2 as if War3 and SC1 are anything different? I told you, the difference is not that big, whatever is true false for SC2 is same for other RTS games.
You are just mad at the game and think of some theories to justify that it is the game that does whatever you dislike.
The fact that you suddenly start taking some position that some people with unreal ideas that cannot happen post (the ideas about making the game Normal which is impossible because SC2 stays as is and nothing will change it), and go miles in using whatever you find to prove an unwinnable battle that the game will ever change, shows you are just TROLLING.
If SC2 was the problem, War3 would be played by many but the difference is not that big, SC1 also. ALL RTS games are in decline, ALL Of them! (particularly talking about competitive mode like 1v1)
AOE 4? Tell me how heavily played is this game without all the APM of SC2? Do you see LEAGUE of legends numbers? Do you?
You are high on drugs mate. There is no other explanation for the unreal world you live in.
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It is fun to meme with batzy, poor guy has to always be right about everything and can never say anything with balance or nuance, he is always resolute his opinion is fact and there is no room to discuss lmao so funny
He really is a chatgpt flat earth kinda guy, man is possessed
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BREAKING: A new study sheds light on the Battle.net forums! The results will shock you:
https://i.imgur.com/tn3OgJo.png
Considering all the alternative Accounts you created here on this Site all i can say is that you Look lovely.
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oooh a Batzy profile pic on bnet forum image
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There is legitimately 3-5 people who use this forum, almost no one really reads it even casually, reddit and TL are equally dead. Its mostly Twitch or discord in pocket communities outside the odd reddit post that catches fire.
Look at gamers without borders , probably less than 50 comments across 3-4 threads on the biggest cash prize tournament of the year and no one cares.
This forum is just a Batzy safespace echo chamber of his own making, his drivel probably contributed to this site dying more so than the decline of the game.
And on slowing game speed, even having a slower seperate ladder it could work because i remember in the olden days of WOL , like the first 50 games were set to slower speed for like bronze silver
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