This last round of nerfs made Mengsk, who was one of my favorite commanders, almost unplayable. I was never a huge fan of Zeratul, and now i won’t play him at all. The changes might make things more challenging and ‘better’ for those of us used to Ladder - but this is not ladder. And it should not get the same treatment. I play co-op for a fun, relatively easy time in the SCII universe, not to push myself to the limit trying to do things with commanders who are only half of what they should be
These nerfs are killing the game mode. Please, i know you guys can do better than this and I think we would all love to see it
I would hesitate to call Mengsk unplayable, but with the difficulty ceiling massively raised thanks to B+ I’d much rather have seen Blizzard just embrace the power creep and buff the weaker commanders.
Seriously. Reminder that they stated they wanted to stay away from nerfing commanders because you’re supposed to feel powerful ? It makes no sense for them to rush a patch with mostly nerfs when they are huge bugs like stettmans drones not having burrow on their command card.
How can you advertise Mengsk to have early game presence and then nerf him 3 weeks later? Does this mean they did not finish testing before releasing him? His early game makes him so fragile most Mengsks are being carried by their partner for the first or two objectives. He is FAR too weak early game now compared to other commanders bc of the nerf.
Get your stuff together Blizzard, stop listening to the armchair vocal minority who are insisting on nerfing everything. You can see from the anger in the forums they are dead wrong.
I need to note: the announcement was made and the patch was released 24 hours afterwards with no specifics or numbers on the announcement, nothing the community could’ve tested or gauged and then implemented the changes with no feedback!
Please stop with the hyperbole. Mengsk is still above average.
The whole reason why we have this awful power creep is because you guys expect every new commander to be at least top 3 on most maps.
Just a heads up… Maguro, who often makes brutal+ content, has some excellent Mengsk gameplay that has helped me tremendously. It took me from being very lackluster to performing, holding my own, and even carrying at times. I’d recommend watching his videos on his youtube for strategy and build ideas.
www.youtube. com/channel/UCVZ2VbhcwN3fI5Tt8fqQrtw
Yes… I realize that some may not have the micro or macro that he has, but still whatever you can take from the videos is helpful.
It really depends on many factors, like if we’re talking about simple Brutal or specific mutators. It also depends on ally for many commanders like Stetmann that are support oriented.
Anyway, I’d say Artanis is about average.
Zagara, Alarak, Fenix, H&H and Stukov are probably below average. We all know the top tiers since people cry for nerfs for them all the time. Karax and Swann are a bit hard to categorize since they shine on certain maps with certain mutators while pretty bad for others, so I’d say they are about average too. Karax is definitely higher than most people realize.
Brutal has never been very hard, but power creep has been diminishing its challenge for a long time.
Many players including myself find mutations more annoying than fun in their brand of difficulty, and would like a mutation free difficulty above brutal or for power creep to be scaled back.
If Brutal is too much for you you can always step down to a lower difficulty: the rush of an easy win is always an option for you.
But there is no suitable difficulty for people like me.
Playing Dehaka over the past two days under a personal challenge to not use his hero unit or the Pack Leaders has solidified my stance that games are fun with some challenge.
Mengsk is absolutely fine right now, and if anything playing a string of post-nerf Mengsk games when he was released made other commanders seem harder to me.
I get the impression that people with no idea on how to mix his Royal Guard and Troopers properly may be struggling more since they can’t brute force or calldown everything as easily.
Zeratul only got a substantial hit to Cannon cheese, and it’s apparently still an usable risk-free strategy.
Maybe it’d be better if they teleported with the old cost, but it’s still functional.
Oh please. 6 more workers at the start of every mission does not make the CO “playable.”
I don’t know how players like you were playing him before, but he has all the tools he needs to be a strong CO still now. I’ve had tons of success with him in Brutal+.
In that case, Mengsk would have to be a textbook example of below average, with a very similar playstyle to Artanis but a similar power topbar that has an implementation cost and can be up on time to actually use your ult at 5 minutes. Not to mention how templar are just better than ghosts, immortal cheaper and almost as effective as marauders, etc. And of course guardian shell.
Now, I know that most good co-op players will put Artanis as well above average. However, not too far above average in the eyes of most (well above average in my opinion).
Personally, I can’t see Mengsk running missions faster than Artanis except where ESO cheese is viable (and even still Artanis is fast ramp up), I can’t imagine that he will outdo him for mutation solos, and for personal experience playing on Brutal+ and mutation, Artanis is much more powerful for those as well. Partially this is because of the huge buffs in the Artanis rework, so yes he is still a power creep problem. But still, I don’t think Mengsk was well handled.
Is generally considered around average, and I would put him just above. His biggest weakness is that he has 1 option: brute force. Very bad for void rifts, and for movement restricting mutators, but anything that just makes enemies stronger he can obliterate with ease.
Artanis isn’t more powerful, he’s just much, much easier to play. There is nothing about him that’s punishing, not even floating thousands of minerals/gas and his units are very durable, especially with his top bar.
But he also has very few tricks and a low skill cap.
Anyway, Mengsk has a far better defense for those defense maps while also having strong striking/base pushing ability and yes, ESO can cheese many maps regardless of mutator.
A few weeks ago we had Diffusion+Just Die Void Thrashing and people expected ESOs to be too slow to kill them twice in time, yet Mengsk could power through it. If he could do that, he can do any mutation with ESOs on similar maps.
Even with no objectives to cheese it can destroy ground waves before they get close to your base which can be a key with mutators that make enemy waves especially nasty.
You also have Prides destroying entire waves with one or two Yamatos.
Zeratul is actually a lot more fun now. I can still steamroll every mission with ease on Brutal at level 5. I can only imagine how ridiculous he is with masteries.
If he’s that strong NOW after a huge series of nerfs, that can only hint at how broken he was prior.
With a reliable topbar where he can actually use his ult on cd…
Does he really? How many bunkers does it take to outperform 4 zealots an a pair of Templar on standby? How much better really are they than standard issue cannons even. The only time static defense is ever really valuable in SC2 is when holding against trickles of enemies, and there Artanis has no more issue than the other protoss commanders (I pity the Terrans and Zergs)
Yeah, ESOs are broken, yet they are the only thing that wasn’t nerfed while being the only thing that needed a nerf. Also, how many maps can you reach the objective from the mutator-safe zone (your main and expansion)
Yes, but that was also before they nerfed his ramp up time, before they nerfed his topbar heavily (meaning now he would have half as many nukes and zerg waves to help those ESOs) and even still most people found units more effective, with ESOs cutting it a little bit tight.
Yes, but then the gas cost becomes a problem. Karax can do the same wave clearing for much cheaper SoA upgrades than all that mass ESO, not to mention that it takes all of Mengsk’s supply.
And in the cooldown I mine enough gas to make 6 templar, which does way more damage than a pair of yamatos.
Artanis has an army that doesn’t punish him for splitting it up, unlike some commanders. Mengsk CAN’T split his army widely, or he gets to have no topbar whatsoever. Artanis also has very kiting capable units, more potent spellcasters, and abilities on all of his units rather than “go get em’ troopers!” which, by the way, you want to avoid at all costs in order to ever get to use your top bar.
I remember being newer to SC2 and being afraid of Brutal. I played Normal, and Struggled there. I saw Brutal as an unbeatable thing. I got better and eventually I was able to play on Brutal and mostly hold my own. I won about half the time, and it was fun. As more commanders came out, the newer commanders made Brutal easier, and after the reworks, and buffs that have happened, Brutal feels like Hard, and Hard feels like normal. I still look at Brutal, and feel like it should feel like that daunting task it used it. That big scary difficulty that I have a good chance of failing. Brutal+ is neat, but I don’t really like Mutators. The EXP bonus is nice, but I just want to play the game with a higher difficulty.
I’m not a speedrunner, and I have like 40 - 60 APM most of the time. Brutal should be easy for the those crazy 300 APM players, not for players like me, who only play a few hours a week.
I mean, have you played the campaign through recently? The campaign almost never gets changed at all, and when it is it’s only small bug fixes, so it’s a good way to gauge how much you’ve actually gotten better vs. commander power outpacing all the many Amon buffs.
Well. This forum is a nest of whiners. Good luck getting enough support. Most of the kids here hate fun in 2v1 PvE mode and consider their ally an enemy.