Starcraft vs Warcraft

[Horath]

Here's an old blog post of mine on the subject: (Apologies for gender bias, but I am a male so I tend to use male pronouns.)

The Greatest Game (redux)
I've been playing a bit of StarCraft lately. Last night my brother was out, so I borrowed his machine and played a bit of WarCraft III, this time with the expansion.

And once again, I was underwhelmed. It's just not as good a game.

The only thing WarCraft has going for it is the level of tactical attention needed.

But they get this detail two ways. The first is by having heroes that gain experience, which are interesting and cool, but also restricting. There is a tremendous incentive to keep all of your forces with your hero(es), because they're so powerful and you can only have three of them and often have only one or two. Whereas powerful spellcasters in StarCraft (High Templar, Science Vessels, etc.) can be almost as game breaking, and because they're buildable units you can send a few with several different drops, strike forces, and defensive groups.

Their second trick, so to speak, is to give the units very high hitpoints (and admittedly, higher damage as well), so that they survive longer in battle. The problem is, that makes the game seem slow in comparison to StarCraft. (Comparison: The basic Human unit is the footman, which in the early game, when unupgraded, costs 135 gold (13.5 trips) and 2 food, has 420 hit points, 2 armor, and does an average of 12.5 damage. The basic Terran unit is the marine, which when unupgraded costs 50 minerals (6.25 trips) and 1 food, has 40 hit points, 0 armor, and does exactly 8 damage. A footman kills another footman in 420/(12.5-2)*1.35 (cooldown) = 54 seconds (40 attacks). A marine kills another marine in 40/8*[Blizzard doesn't list cooldown at battle.net] = 5 attacks. Intellectually, I understand that in WarCraft you will lose eventually if you don't deploy your troops exactly right, but in StarCraft you start losing immediately.

Then there's the issue of resource gathering. To be brief, I don't think that WarCraft gives nearly enough attention to this. Each mine can use exactly five workers, as most, unless your resources drop-off point is poorly positioned. So you fill a mine and go, instantly. In Starcraft there is a maximum saturation for minerals, but it's much higher. Gas works the way gold does, needing only three workers per geyser, but that's the secondary rather than primary resource (WarCraft's secondary resource is wood, which is everywhere on most maps).

And then there's supply. In Warcraft they decided that their emphasis on tactics would be served by a supply limit of 100 (remember that each footman consumes 2!). And that they would reduce the amount of gold actually delivered per 10 removed from the mine. So once you are using 51 supply, you only get 7 per 10, and once you're using 81, 4 per ten. This massively deincentivizes the building of large armies, because to keep a large army you not only need more expansions, but you also permanently reduce the amount of gold in the world.

The inefficiency of resource gathering, together with the need to keep your small army united, massively decreases the importance of map control. Your primary goal in WarCraft is to kill your enemies' heroes, then his troops. Then you can kill his miners and bases at leisure. Oh, right. Why's this? Because I forgot to mention; units in Warcraft III have much longer build times than in StarCraft, and buildings have tons of hit points. When you destroy an enemy's army, it will take him/her too long to build a new one. But before then, you can't afford to attack his buildings because his units will take you down as you do.

In StarCraft, on the other hand, resources are everything, low level units can be built very quickly, quick strikes can take out crucial tech buildings, and expansions rise and fall constantly. In other words, StarCraft is a deeper, richer game than WarCraft, which has only tactical detail to recommend it. Then there's the story line. I don't ask for black and white good/evil distinctions (both the Terran and the Protoss are sort of mixed in StarCraft, and even the Zerg are searching for perfection, admittedly using borg strategies), but I do hate the revisionist history of WarCraft III (which is all set-up for World of Warcraft). Perhaps it's because I grew up in a world where Orcs were Orcs and Humans were Humans, and while the the WarCraft II expansion moderated the contrast between the races, it was still there. I like my humans, darn it!

[ThunderTitan]

Yup, they're different games... which isn't a bad thing. This isn't just Warcraft in space!

[Pol]

Returned to Starcraft yesterday and just noticed that you can play it in windowed mode (via wmodx) and that it comes with cpu throttling, how much that would be needed for H3

And did my own map, wit my own units. The other version of the map is playing itself, so you may just watch ala TV style.



Of course, the problem with cpu is, that is attacking in all directions, so it taking him ages to win. Map isn't balanced, it's just for a show with a victory - Red is having most resources so it should win.
Team 1 - Red+Purple (Terran Team - Location left up and down)
Team 2 - Blue+Teal (Terran Team - Location right up and down)
Zerg's Clan Ka - Orange in the middle of the Space Platform
Aldaris' Temple Guards - Protoss, Temple Protectors, middle down

Terrans modified units:

• Elite Marine D2+3/Ag8+3
  Firebat D2+3/Ag16+36
  GolliathX D5+3/Ag20+3/Aa40+12/200HP
  Heavy Siege Tank D20+3/Ag33+9/Aarc70+60
  Star Warship D12+3/Ag25+18/Aa27-9/512HP
  Bunker D10/800HP

And so on for others... - done with SCMDraft2. The map itself is here.

Zergs are playing on cheap units and attacking tactics, Protoss on defensive - ensured with Value this area higher AI Script. And it seems that without human intervention it will take forever, more than six or eight hrs.

[Orfinn]

Starcraft aaall the way!

But VISTA hate Starcraft

I've tried most ways to get the damn operating system to accept it and play it, but naaaaah... I can play Diablo 2 though

[ThunderTitan]

Compatibility mode not working either?

Hmm, try this: http://www.techsupportforum.com/gaming- ... oblem.html

[Orfinn]

Neup... tried every combination with the color setting, windows comp setting whatever but to no prevail.

Gotta try your suggestion sometime later, it may not work (i've almost exhausted every option there is) but thanks for the tip anyway

I've seen alot of threads where a few people say they have zero problems running SC on both Vista 32 and 64bit

They are INDEED the lucky ones...

[Midas]

WC... The main reason is arguably the Priceless unit quotes... I remember the first time I discovered them... They turned my day from horrible common weekdays to ones that made my week! The second reason is because the setting, since Futuristic Space Alien Wars don't really suit me...

But don't get me wrong, Starcraft is as just as well-done, and I'm anxiously waiting for the coming up sequel...
Knowing that Warcraft 4 is a long way to come...

[klaymen]

Knowing that Warcraft 4 is a long way to come...

Since Blizzard introduced their storyf**king attitude (read: they released WoW, where story important characters die just for some epic items), on b.net and wow forums known as lorelol, I doubt that W4 will exist.

And if it will, I can't imagine what it will be about (considering WoW's story "advance").

[Metathron]

Yeah, I wish for W4 as well, but slim chance that's ever gonna happen...

[ThunderTitan]

If they're smart they'll just have it as cannon that no one managed to kill neither Arthas nor Illidan...

[MistWeaver]

If they're smart they'll just have it as cannon that no one managed to kill neither Arthas nor Illidan...

I dont know/dont care wtf is going on in WoW, but in WarCraft storyline Arthas killed Illidan.

Reviving him somehow because his just too cool to die, would remind me about Highlander 2, and would be totally lame.

[ThunderTitan]

Dude, he just slashed him across the chest and left him there... that's never ever fatal in any fantasy world. The victim will only be sporting a cool scar next time.

Don't you know nothing?

[MistWeaver]

Dude, he just slashed him across the chest and left him there... that's never ever fatal in any fantasy world. The victim will only be sporting a cool scar next time.

Don't you know nothing?

Yeah I guess Kil'jaeden will help him heal and escape from the foundation of the frozen throne. After all Illidan failed him only twice

Or like I said - taking both of them to War4 would be boring, lame and incoherent.

[ThunderTitan]

Dude, he just slashed him across the chest and left him there... that's never ever fatal in any fantasy world. The victim will only be sporting a cool scar next time.

Don't you know nothing?

Yeah I guess Kil'jaeden will help him heal and escape from the foundation of the frozen throne. After all Illidan failed him only twice

Or like I said - taking both of them to War4 would be boring, lame and incoherent.[/size]

Yeah, it's not like Illidan had 2 allies close by that could help him or anything (which is actually what they went with).

But i only care about Arthas showing up in any WC4, so i can kill the annoying emo myself...

[klaymen]

But i only care about Arthas showing up in any WC4, so i can kill the annoying emo myself...

Well, since patch 3.3.0 with Icecrown Citadel raid (guess who resides there?) is live, I seriously doubt your dream about Arthas will come true (unless he will do some rez stunt like Mal'Ganis did).

[MistWeaver]

Yeah, it's not like Illidan had 2 allies close by that could help him or anything (which is actually what they went with).

And where were they when Arthas was kicking his ass ?

[ThunderTitan]

Yeah, it's not like Illidan had 2 allies close by that could help him or anything (which is actually what they went with).

And where were they when Arthas was kicking his ass ?

The follwing is seriously not safe for work, children under 30 (or over it) and anyone who values their sanity: http://rule34-images.paheal.net/547ac60 ... rmrage.jpg

But they where with Illidan at Icecrown in FR, not helping him in the battle is another of those cute staples of fantasy stories (just like there's no Anub'arak there - let's just say Anub kept them busy just long enough)

But i only care about Arthas showing up in any WC4, so i can kill the annoying emo myself...

Well, since patch 3.3.0 with Icecrown Citadel raid (guess who resides there?) is live, I seriously doubt your dream about Arthas will come true (unless he will do some rez stunt like Mal'Ganis did).

Yeah, the idea was that i wanted to do it in a RTS, as i don't play WoW or am much inclined to ever play it enough to get there.

[Corelanis]

That was unsettling.

I dont care how they kill arthas because they will never do it the way I want to see it happen which is, I want uther to come back to life just long enough to beat him to death in a very long and brutal fashion with his warhammer.

[Midas]

Bronzebeard...

I wish for all the dead heroes (and heroine) to rise from the dead and give him a piece of "mercy"

but hey... is just a dream

[theLuckyDragon]

Hey, it doesn't matter if Illidan, Arthas and even Deathwing are all dead by the time of Warcraft 4! Blizz always has a hidden stash of bad guys. Like this Deathwing stuff in Cataclysm.