Just a random thought I had with how the Protoss warp in structures from another world in exchange for resources, why couldn’t they return to sender for a refund, much in the same way that the Undead from Warcraft 3 summon their structures from the Twisting Nether (or the Shadowlands with the “#NewLore”) and could send them back for a partial refund of resources based on how much health the structure has left.
How would this affect how Protoss construct and plan out their bases, would making Protoss proxies a bit more viable in a similar way that terran buildings can be lifted from proxy locations back to their main be good or bad for Protoss design, or make having to abandon your main less punishing?
I know something like this will never happen, especially now but I think its interesting to think about.
It’s called pressing the Esc button
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That’s cancelling a building under construction, smart alec.
I’m talking about salvaging complete structures for a partial refund.
Selling buildings like in C&C would not go well with Starcraft’s “resource war” mechanics.
In SC (and all Blizz games) the map is supposed to run out of resources eventually, so you either win earlier, or the game becomes a stalemate.
This is on purpose, and allowing a Sell feature, would make it abusable, as it would run counter to the base game design.
Every one of your investments is supposed to be permanent and irrecoverable. A race that could sell expensive buildings, even for as little as 25% total resources back, would have a busted endgame, as it could stall out all game until all resources are depleted, and win in lategame by default, because it could still produce units, while the others could not.
Terrans can salvage bunkers and relocate their buildings, that kind of flies in the face of the idea of a finite investment. FOr quite a while the bunker salvage was a 100% return too.
I don’t really see how getting 25-75% of the cost of a dark shrine & a pylon is going to bust the economy balance wide open. There’s a lot of good things this could do for Protoss.
Zerg can uproot and move their static defenses allowing them to encroach with spine & spore forests on top of having generally low structure costs and the ability to heal them with queens on top of a passive regeneration.
Terran can fly most of their buildings and lower their supply depots, allowing them to dynamically change their production and wall off very effectively.
Protoss lacks the ability to do much of anything with their strucutres, proxying is a huge investment compared to terran (mostly impossible for zerg) as any structures you build are going to be stuck there for the rest of the game while Terran can float and retreat and protoss wall-ins are always incomplete because again their structures are stuck there.
A building recall or unwarp would allow for early game wall-ins to be more effective and not require you to have a bodyblocking zealot/adept or to kill a pylon, tech structures that’re no longer needed can be removed for cheap, proxies can be less risky and balanced around that.
Protoss has a lot of problems that need addressing but never will be they’re such a swiss cheese faction of all ins and godly or garbage spell casters that can insta-gib armies or do absolutely nothing (cough disruptors). Giving them maybe a little bit of utility and balancing them around it so they’re not just the faction what with the way-too-much-AoE-and-the-shields. AoE damage is its own bag of problems in SC2… In Brood War I feel like Protoss was differentiated by their array of powerful spellcasters and in SC2 they’re kinda just meh nothing special just cheesy and all-or-nothingy.
Terrans can only salvage one building, and it is the one where they need to invest supply in order tro use it, and relocating buildings still makes them a permanent investment, since when Mineral run out, relocating your structures will still not allow you to produce units, or gives them any combat capabilities.
It is true that Terran bends a lot of the rules, and has quite a few C&C mechanics, but they still do not bend them so bad that it goes against the “resource wars” gameplay of the whole game.
As soon as Minerals run out on the map, not race can produce units combat anymore, as a way to force players to expand early, or face a stalemate as the endgame.