Overall goal is to improve the iconic unit composition of Muta Ling Bane and improve anti-air support of Hydra. I understand the changes below are fairly substantial and would require extensive testing in PTR.
After many Baneling nerfs, it should receive similar push treatment like Ultra as many times they get stuck behind allied units and get wasted before coming into contact with enemy. A new upgrade at Baneling Nest granting +5 HP might open up Hatchery strategies (doesn’t require Lair), and Banelings will be able to survive 2 Roach attacks. For early game, this would improve super aggressive lingbane instead of ZvZ always turning into Roach wars.
As Mutalisk is rarely seen and gas intensive, decreasing gas cost while increasing mineral cost (overall cost same) will help offset high gas investment of Muta Ling Bane composition. To improve Muta survivability, for their regen, it should be changed to recover health immediately after taking damage to encourage preservation during hit-and-run tactics. In addition, add expensive upgrade at Spire that increases maximum HP of Mutas by +20 to help survive Widow Mines. As window of viability for Muta harass is limited, I propose a build time reduction for Spire and Greater Spire. One side benefit of Greater Spire build time reduction is being able to field Brood Lords earlier, which is a small buff in of itself.
However, to prevent Mutalisk from dominating ZvZ, Grooved Spines upgrade of the Hydralisk will be +2 vs. Air (stay +1 vs. Ground). As Hydras always struggled to compete with Queens in terms of anti-air support as Queens have far more health and self-heal, the additional range vs. Air will put Hydra and Queens on an equal footing in terms of range. This change makes Hydra a better anti-air specialist within Zerg arsenal.
Baneling
Increased allied push priority from 0 to 1 (pushes units out of the way when moving).
New research: Thickened Pustules
Cost: 50/50, 57 seconds
Research from: Baneling Nest
Every Baneling gains +5 health (does NOT require Lair).
Mutalisk
Cost changed from 100/100 to 125/75.
Change Mutalisk Regeneration to recover health immediately after taking damage.
New research: Hardened Carapace
Cost: 200/200, 79 seconds
Research from: Spire
Increases the maximum HP of all Mutalisks from 120 HP to 140 HP. As a visual indicator for upgrade, the Mutalisk’s body will be slightly bulkier.
Spire / Greater Spire
Build time for Spire and Greater Spire decreased from 71 seconds to 57 seconds.
Hydralisk
Grooved Spines increases attack range of Hydralisks by +1 vs. Ground (+2 vs. Air).
i only see 2 big issues here, the viper thing is just not needed, if you require greater spire still whats the point of even morphing them from muta, when you can already build them from larva. if you dont want them to built from larva then you have to sacrifce a muta at its cost plus what ever the viper cost is, which now makes vipers double the money essentially. the other problem is making the muta more expensive. now lowering the gas is nice change but increasing the minerals for a unit that is basically wet paper with out giving it a health buff is just bad and not addressing the issue of why mutas suck( dont get me wrong, i love using muta, but there still wet paper if you dont know how to use them properly), and even with the regeneration that really wont make a big difference as most dont make it out of battle in the first place. Now if there regeneration kicked in quicker than it does now, you might be on to something.
by the way, the reason you dont see ling bane muta too often is the gas cost for muta plus banes is a killer to do unless you got like 6-7 bases, and with alot of maps its kinda of impossible to get there.
Good feedback. I clarified OP that Vipers are no longer morphed from Larva, but morphed from Muta. Plus the cost of morphing into a Viper includes the cost of Muta, that’s why the morph cost is lowered from what its currently at (actually its 50 min more), but build time was slightly reduced to compensate.
I understand Muta is a wet paper bag, but instead of buffing them outright as a better fighter, a more thematic way to buff them is to offer new upgrade to improve their regen passive ability.
the problem with the regen as of right now, not your post, but there actual regen, it requires you to be out of battle for set time before it kicks in. and most people who play muta dont really take the mutas out of battle like that for the regen to even kick in. the way there used for the most part is general harrasment being attacking in and out rapidly and staying on the move which kinda prevents the healing, unless you send them off somewhere and accidently forget about them. They honestly just need a dang hp boost, not much even, but something to just not get wiped liked they do, espescally for there current price as it is.
True, but have a perfect solution to that problem. With the new proposed upgrade below, the Muta will recover health immediately after taking damage to encourge muta preservation and hit-and-hit tactics. Upgrade removes delay to Muta passive regen…
New research: Vascular Regeneration
Cost: 150/150, 64 seconds
Research from: Spire
Mutalisk’s Tissue Regeneration is at a faster rate of 2.8 HP/second (up from 1.4 HP/second) and recovers health immediately after taking damage.
Note: Upgrade removes delay to Muta regen to encourage preservation to hit-and-run tactics. As a visual indicator for Vascular Regeneration, the hue of the Mutalisk’s wing will change from purple to red.
I don’t think this many sweeping changes are needed to make Muta/Ling/Bane better. I don’t think Banelings need buffed at this time, they still see enough use.
I do think the 125/75 cost for Mutas may be worth tyring, and itself might be enough to get people to start using Mutas again.
I have historically been a fan of increasing Hydra AA range with Grooved Spines, but I’m not sure if it would be balanced. It has the potential to cause Hydra play to just be strictly superior in matchups besides ZvZ, so it could be counter-intuitive to encouraging Muta play, but on the other hand it would potentially discourage Stargate openers in PvZ which could in turn make Mutas a more attractive strategic choice.
Would really just need to see how it would play out in testing.
True, definitely needs testing, but would be interesting to try out in PTR. I think the gas cost for muta plus bane is too gas intensive. One thing for increasing Hydra AA range with Grooved Spines, if found too strong, they could reduce AA damage slightly while keeping ground damage the same. I was just afraid of muta running amok in ZvZ.
I think a major problem with muta is its doesn’t have a real transition out of it. Having a Viper morph would offer a way out into another army composition, plus is puts muta back into name.
This wasn’t really a problem back when Mutas were strong, it was just part of the risk for Muta switches. The lesser gas cost already alleviates this a bit. You’re incidentally messing with a lot of things like tech timings and availability of Vipers without a Spire that could have consequences you don’t intend.
I think we can all agree that build time for Spire and Greater Spire at 71 seconds is far too long and should be reduced to 57 seconds. The only Zerg building that should remain at 71 seconds is the Hatchery and Hive.
Only other buildings at 57 seconds is Lair and Lurker Den.
True, these changes would need extensive testing. If Viper morph doesn’t work out positively, it could be scrapped outright. However, I think the muta changes would be a net benefit to improve viability of this lackluster unit.
If this isn’t just arbitrary “because some other buildings have that build timing,” then please tell me what specific timings this allows Zerg to hit that they need to and why. Does it hit before an upgrade or timing attack it otherwise wouldn’t hit before? If so, is that considered alongside your other changes as a balance factor?
hydras are already almost far supior in every way possible compared to muta, and even corrupter. along with almost all other units except ultras. Give a person a bunch a hydra who has good micro and you can watch them stomp damn near everything that gets thrown at them. Right now its pretty much my go to anymore straight out the gate anymore cause of the sheer force with them behind good macro. If you stutter step them in to battle they become one hell of a force to reckon with.
Moot argument. Balance counsel is Serral-obsessed, meaning buffing zerg is a non option. Any buff to zerg’s strategical diversity is a carte blanche buff to all zerg through inject & tech switch styles. Protoss stuggles with this the most, lacking a generalist unit, meaning it would be a buf to ZvP in particular. Because balance counsel commies are rigging tournaments, they won’t endanger their plan to force serral to lose to an f2 abuser at the world finals.
wouldnt worry too much about that considering theres only one left. and frankly i dont see no more balance patchs happening anytime soon now that sc2 has been dropped from tourneys.
Well, kinda explained in OP that window of viability for Muta harass is very limited. When muta hits field, there is barely a window where they can pay for themselves and do sufficient damage. Reducing build time for Spire will allow them to hit field slightly earlier. For example, once WMs and Thors hit field in sufficient number, mutas are dead weight.
There is still a 1 mil tournament and it is a shame it’s being rigged. A person who said he was an “advisor” to the counsel, whatever that means, said aligulac’s win-rates are invalid because serral doesn’t play weekly tournaments. This guy must be as high as a kite because back down here in reality serral is an outlier and any dataset that includes him is invalid. They obviously can’t understand very basic statistics which begs the question of how they figure out how the game works. Well, that’s easy to answer, they watch serral and that’s their entire understanding of the game. It’s like an economist looking at Elon Musk and concluding Joe-Schmoe who works at the burger shop owes $10 billion in taxes. It’s absurd to the point of comedy, as if it were a monty python skit, but it’s reality – this is how a billion dollar game is being designed for a million dollar tournament.
Even if you could somehow solve their obsession with serral, and delete their bias in favor of protoss, they still wouldn’t be qualified to be doing what they are doing.
They will never allow Zerg to have strategic diversity because it would be mental overload for the f2 abusing protoss in the 6.5k mmr range. They never should’ve been above 5k mmr based on their mechanics and so if you aggravate a mechanics-related issue, which scouting is, by buffing zerg’s strategical options, it’s obvious apetoss abusers would not be able to cope. They can’t even stop rallying colossus into enemy armies for crying out loud and we’re going to expect them to do midgame scouting? Not a chance. They literally can’t do it. They don’t have the ability to. Buffing zerg’s strategic options is polar opposite to the goals of the balance counsel. Protoss would be deleted from the 6k+ mmr range because they simply don’t have players with the mechanical strength to do midgame scouting. Colossi rallied to their deaths are proof.
If you can’t increase the strategical diversity then the game remains boring and repetitive, and THAT is what has killed the game. In their quest to nerf serral, they have made the game so boring that sc2 literally died. Serral-obscession caused the collapse of esports. The worst part is that I told them it would. I screamed at the top of my lungs for an entire year, on a daily basis, and they still fell into face first into that trap. These people are not qualified to even have an opinion on sc2s design. Their game designing skills arebronze league.
The serral dominance isse is downstream from the disastrous decision to ban koreans from tournaments. We would have a broad spectrum of parting and innovation and rain and etc victories had they not been racist against asians. The foreigners have been terrible at starcraft and serral is the only one to reach the same level as kespa era koreans. It was inevitable that the region lock would cause serral to dominate.
After more thought, I just removed viper stuff completely from OP to focus on improving muta ling bane. As muta is a wet paper bag, I also proposed to change base muta regen to recover health immediately with no delay.
I like the changes or the spirit of changes but the problem Mutas have is that whenever they run into their counter, they die. Really, really fast.
And I don’t mean fighting the counter, I mean stuff like a good widow mine hit or whatever.
That’s what mutas need addressed to be useful again. I’d argue that with how vehemently fragile the muta is you could give them revival on death the same way Co-Op Deahaka mutas have revival after death.
If you balance the numbers they won’t revive too fast or when they revive give them a debuff that significantly weakens their attack/armor values for X seconds after revival since the idea is to allow mutas to survive super bad split second encounters.
Allowing them to morph into Vipers is rather nice too but depending on who you ask that could be a nerf to the Viper.
honestly with the muta removing the light tag and giving them maybe 30 extra health would solve all the problems with them. No need to really go indepth with it all and give another upgrade for regen. even if the regen would take effect faster that would be a big improvement.
That would probably render intended counters like Phoenixes too ineffective, and there is always a risk that buffed Mutalisks would snowball too easily.
That said, someone could probably play around with those changes on an extension mod.
it wont affect phenix too much as they can just derp around the mutas with out being touched anyways. widows would probably be the only thing really affected much, but with the way every terran places widows in more than one hear or there a few good widow shots are still gonna toast them easily.