We have til the end of the month!

As for the voidrays...expect them to be neutered. :) Though, with the recent phoenix improvement there's at least some competition for protoss air choices.

My expectation is that after Closed beta ends, open beta will begin. This is a norm for Blizzard, and I doubt they will change it. They've even said that they expect to push 3v3 and 4v4 before the end of beta. My guess is that they will open those up either here very soon, or wait till June and do it with an open beta push to completely stress test the servers and the full range of multiplayer options.

The beta ends May 31 and then reopens a few weeks later.

StarCraft 2 beta ends May 31, returning 'several weeks' later -- Joystiq

Man I am going to go into serious withdrawal when they close the beta down... VS AI simply ain't gonna cut it.

Oh well, I am kinda disappointed that blizzard isn't taking stronger measures to balance out cheese tactics (void ray rush n such). I know that good scouting will tell you if a player is prepping to rush, but then you counter and generally you either win or lose, but the game ends there less than 10 mins... I only really get to play till late game with 2v2 matches, which is a shame I would like 1v1 matches that go the distance but they rarely do.

i probably wasted years of my life on battle.net back in the day. i am seriously wondering whether it is a good idea for me to get involved in this.... :P

who am i kidding, though. i am sure i will cave and buy it.

@Quaren: I think cheese is good for the meta so long as it's not the dominant strategy, which I don't feel it is. It's similar to SC1: scout scout scout.

information information information.

I'm leaning back on this yet again. so often games are won past the 10 minute mark by having the right information plus having board control.

If you are constantly scouting, have the watch towers, and monitor the board you can prevent expansion, look for weak points, stop an advance, cut off a drop or ghost, etc.


I find the zerg to have the most frustrating ability to monitor the board until you've researched burrow. then, for as cheap as zerglings are, there's no reason not to have some buried all over the board so you can at least see troop movements and slow down expansions.

Patch came today. Looks like they are down right now for maintenance. 3v3 and 4v4 added, several other changes and balances. Some look good.

StarCraft II Beta -- Patch 13 (version 0.15.0.15449)

General
Map Publishing is now enabled: Using the map editor, you can upload your custom maps to share with the Battle.net community.
Facebook feature is integrated: Here’s a quick way to expand your social network by seeing who among your existing Facebook friends also has a Battle.net account.
3v3 and 4v4 formats are now enabled.
Numerous updates have been made to the Leagues & Ladders system:
Removed Copper League and added Diamond League above Platinum League.
Player ratings start at 0, rather than 1000.
No longer displays loading screen odds in placement or practice league matches.
Matchmaking system logic updated.
UDP is enabled to help improve game performance.
Numerous performance and stability improvements.


Balance Changes
PROTOSS
Sentry
Force Fields can now be destroyed by Massive ground units walking over them.
Void Ray
Range decreased from 7 to 6.
Warp Gate
Subgroup selection priority changed from 2 to 3 so that it takes priority over Gateways when selected.

TERRAN
Marine
Stimpack research cost decreased from 150/150 to 100/100.
Combat Shield research cost decreased from 150/150 to 100/100.

ZERG
Infestor
Infested Terran spell removed.
Frenzy spell added:
Costs 25 energy.
Targets a single biological unit which deals 25% more damage and is immune to snare, stuns, and mind control for 30 seconds.
Overseer
Contaminate spell added:
Costs 75 energy.
Targets a single enemy structure which cannot train units or research upgrades for 30 seconds.
Infested Terran spell added:
Costs 125 energy.
Infested Terrans have the same stats as those previously created by the Infestor and are placed directly under the Overseer when spawned.
Ultralisk
Life decreased from 600 to 450.
Damage changed from 25 to 15 (+25 Armored).
Damage versus structures increased from 60 to 75.


Hotkey Changes (English Only):
Zerg Set Worker Rally Point changed from R to G.
Zerg Spore Crawler changed from W to A to avoid conflict with the Select All Warp Gates hotkey.


Battle.net Interface
Revamped summary pages for player Profiles and Leagues & Ladders.
Added a Help system with tech trees and other tips and tricks.
Removed identifier from the character naming process and added the ability to refer friends for invitation into your party or lobby.
Updated the Battle.net user interface to consistently use a nested menu system.
Added in-game blocking and player muting.

Hey guys, I finished one of the UMS maps I was working on. It's multiplayer only but if you have 4-9 people to play with you, it'd be awesome if you could leave some comments. It would go a long way in helping make it better, The game really doesn't get fun until you have 5 people. With 10 players, I can only imagine how hectic it gets.

The game is published on US servers you can just search for it in join game under "Tag! You're It"

Releases tomorrow!

Release map list:

2 - Agria Valley
2 - Blistering Sands
2 - Burial Grounds
2 - Crossfire
2 - Desert Oasis
2 - Incineration Zone
2 - Jungle Basin
2 - Junk Yard
2 - Scrap Station
2 - Steppes of War
2 - Worldship
2 - Xel'Naga Caverns
3 - Elysium
4 - Arid Wastes
4 - Debris Field
4 - Delta Quadrant
4 - Discord IV
4 - High Orbit
4 - Kulas Ravine
4 - Lost Temple
4 - Metalopolis
4 - Monlyth Ridge
4 - New Antioch
4 - Nightmare
4 - Red Stone Gulch
4 - Scorched Haven
4 - Shakuras Plateau
4 - Tarsonic Assault
4 - Terminus
4 - Twilight Fortress
4 - War Zone
6 - Arakan Citadel
6 - Colony 426
6 - Dig Site
6 - Dirt Side
6 - Frontier
6 - Monsoon
6 - Quicksand
6 - Tectonic Rift
6 - The Bio Lab
6 - Typhon
6 - Ulaan Deeps
6 - Abyss
8 - Extinction
8 - Forbidden Planet
8 - High Ground
8 - Lava Flow
8 - Megaton
8 - Outpost
8 - Sand Canyon
8 - Tempest
8 - Toxic Slums

I'm very excited about the campaign mode and mods for this game. Maybe I'll be more into the MP this time around since there will be challenges to help train you.

Ok CE's are so damned scarce around here, had to call a few lesser known stores to get one in my name and even then they're making no hard reservations. "Just be here" is the response I get.

Gamestop said they couldn't help me cuz I waited til the last minute, best buy never sent me a verification email on my preorder so bleh to that. Cuz they specifically said during the checkout process not to go try and pick it up til I got that email.

StarCraft II


/rawr

I love achievements, they are so finely tuned in this that it's going to add a ton of re-playability to unlock avatars/decals etc..

Instead of buying a new Mac mini or iMac to play SC (it won't play on my Mac mini with the integrated GMA video), I've decided to put together a custom gaming rig with the singular purpose of playing StarCraft 2. I've got the SC2 disc sitting on my desk and the Newegg shipment won't be here until Monday, which is an eternity. Still, once I get the thing together, I'll have a quad-core AMD machine with a Radeon HD 5770 that can handle most games out there easily. The fact I can get such a fast machine for about $600 really does tell a tale about the premium Apple puts on their hardware.

It's going to be strange switching over to Windows 7 after using OS X for so many years.

LOL you have became assimilated!!!!!!!!!

BTW did you buy an assembled PC from NewEgg? I recommended one to a coworker (for SC2) a couple days ago that had a 5770 and an AMD quadcore in it as well.

I'm putting it together myself. I found a nice mobo, the MSI 870A-G54 (USB 3.0!!), and just built from there. I've got the Athlon II 2.9GHz quad with the aforementioned video card. The case was only like $14. Throw in 4GB ram, a WD Caviar 500GB HDD, a 500W PSU and a basic optical drive and I'm ready to go. All said, it's only like $600 worth of hardware but it should be able to tackle Crysis at respectable specs.

Down the road, I can upgrade to the Phenom II x6 CPU and faster video cards if I need, too, which is nice.

Actually, I owe you a big thank you for your video card buyers guide. You're the reason I grabbed the 5770.

Campaign mode is great. It's short compared to SC1's campaign though. I'm on the final mission right now. It took 11 hours to get that far, might take 11 more to finish this insane mission... holy hell I got fckt up... I need sleep..

Yeah I'm kinda taking it easy, I predict many late night league sessions once I feel like I've honed my macro on the computer hard modes. I don't see the point in going online until that becomes easy to me because I know there are people out there who breathe the hotkeys and build orders in their sleep. they can probably recite the 150 key presses it takes to tech up to a protoss mothership or something.

I haven't beaten it yet but I thought blizzard said the whole idea of them splitting it into three games was that each campaign was supposed to be bigger than original starcraft and brood war combined. That's disappointing.

yup, which is why I dislike playing rts online. I'll wait for starcraft 2 dota before picking this up, thanks. I'll stay on my console for now.

It feels shorter than SC1 because, well, it is. It's 26 missions with 6-8 of those being optional compared to SC1's 30 missions and it's way shorter if you count Brood War's 25 missions. The story is also much more narrow and focused. It's Jim Raynor's story and while it's pretty badass in parts it's not to the scale of the original's plot. Now, 15-16 hours of game time, and a shit ton of replayability makes the game a much better value than anything else on the market.

What you feel is better value smells like pure fail to me. Is this worth waiting 8 years for? I expected more. Poorer plot than the original, less play time than the original, so you're basically saying that the only thing it has going for it is better graphics and physics, which is expected.

Is anyone else playing the campaign on hard? Normal was way too easy so I turned it up to Hard and restarted. The lava mission where you have to gather 8000 resources just kicked my ass!!!!!!!! The game is actually challenging on Hard though...on normal I beat the first 6 missions or so and completed all of the objectives and rarely lost even 1 unit.

I'm going to complete the playthrough on normal, then I'll do hard, and if I'm not bored with it by then, and my skills actually improve, I'll do brutal. (or cry trying)

apparently there isn't too much difference between hard and brutal aside from kill priorities, for example they'll single down any scv's in your vehicle/mech based army if they so much as breath a point of repair towards one of them. They def have the "kill the healer" mentality.

---------- Post added at 08:37 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:35 AM ----------

ok?

Kerrigan's still hot.

You expected more? like what exactly?

They've been fairly open with the development process. What I mean by that is, they've made it clear they are going to release this game in 3 campaigns. They released a FULL multiplayer experience, which is what this game primarily is trying to cater towards as an e-sport. Like many PC games of THIS generation, the single player elements are usually an afterthought or not the primary focus (Mostly an FPS problem tbh) Being used to that kind of afterthought bullshit, I find this campaign to be very fun, diverse, and well told.

I wouldn't say the plot is "poorer" than the original, it's just not new to us anymore, we know who the zerg are, we know who the terrans are, we know who the protoss are, as far as play time, it really depends on the player. One thing that I will say is that while SC1's missions all seemed to eventually disintegrate in to "build massive army, win" this one actually seems to change up mission types a lot more, defend a mining laser while it goes through a door, survive 20 minutes against a rush, collect a certain number of minerals in a volatile lava environment, hijack trains, spectre/ghost solo mission, capture and hold points while uploading data to towers (lolsup Odin)

Some are the typical build/push/conquer type but they seem rare and usually there to showcase the strengths of a unit you have available.


It doesn't really matter what I say, You've made up your mind to wait to even pick the game up out of some principle or another and some people just like to downplay or bash the experience they're missing out on even though they have no 1st hand knowledge. The fact that youre nitpicking a positive review and focusing on the unsaid negatives (aka putting words in people's mouths) really is all I need to know.

Just chill, it's a game, it's a really good game. If you cant/dont have/want the ability/desire to play it then... dont. No need to make up imaginary reasons to hate on it though.

Personally, I have friends who play it, and Co-op is a riot.

Also I like watching sc2 replays :p

The story is not poor. It's different. It's up to the players to decide which they like more but neither are bad. SC2's missions are much better though and there's no arguing about that.

Lasereth, You can change the difficulty anywhere. No need to play through the whole thing on the same difficulty. I played on Hard for most missions. I turned it down to normal on a couple of missions that I just didn't want to fail again. If you play on Brutal, you'll want to save your game every couple of minutes because things can go from well to fail in seconds. Having that recent save can prevent a lot of frustration.

so is Starcraft like Warcraft in space, or a totally different sort of game?

It's a real time stategy, much like the first 3 Warcraft games. It's nothing like World of Warcraft though. So, Yeah, It's basically Warcraft in space.

oh,I can do turn based strategy games... but real time ones always panic me

Yeah I know, I wanna play it on hard on purpose.

http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/profile/.../achievements/

Just to see where I'm at on the game for anyone curious.

This game is AWESOME...but rapes my poor little integrated graphics laptop up the butt. I couldn't find a decent ded. when I bought it. I think I'm going to be going for what willravel purchased in a few weeks when I'm out in CA with the new job.

@YaWhateva: I didn't hear that they said it was supposed to be bigger than both SC1/BW combined...it's equal to one of them though imo. The quality however is leaps and bounds improved.

@Vaultboy and others: Multiplayer isn't so scary as in sc1. The league system really separates you from the people who breathe the game. They will be clawing each others eyes out in Platinum/Diamond, while we can tinker down in practice/bronze/silver/gold. Also, there are already a slew of customs that are high quality, though I hadn't seen a DotA the one time I checked in. It'll be there within the week I'm sure, though at an unknown quality level. Join us!

I do believe I've seen DotA already. Haven't played it yet though.

Yet you spend a good couple of paragraphs on justification for a two-line comment of mine?

As you say, I've made up my mind. But do not make assumptions that I've done this blindly, or on "imaginary reasons".

My resolution to buy the game based on whether it has a Dota map hardly constitutes "hate", as you put it. And similarly I hardly "bashed" the game. I just stated my opinion. No need to get all offended just because we value different things.

Yes, the league system is a definite improvement. I'm just never become a fan of online rts multiplayer, so the warhammer style campaign split (and its brevity) is a minus for me, hence my decision to wait for a dota map, or some other equally fun map that spreads by reputation, and for a price drop.

there was no offense taken, I just thought it was a silly reason to down a game, if you want to play dota, play dota, or LoL, or HoN, or any of the other knockoffs.

I don't see the point of buying SC2 to play a Dota knock off in the SC2 engine.

A SC version wouldn't be a knock off. It would be Dota 2, provided of course that Icefrog and co invest the years developing and refining it. Or do you miss the point that games often evolve with new engines? Yes, dota is merely a map, but it is also a game unto itself, as Hon and LoL have shown. Except Blizzard brings way more game to the table i.t.o. engine, server stability and tech support than Riot does, given their resources.

I have seen enough to realise that SC2 does not merit enough for me to buy it. Dota 2 would, especially given that I would then have all of the 'standard extras', plus other custom maps.

Would be a bit like not buying HL2 because Counterstrike: Source wasn't out yet.

SC2 is fucking awesome, by the way. I've been playing the challenges a lot. I like the micro ones especially. Anyone acutally playing, if you've just done singleplayer and multiplayer, check out the Challenges. They're actually great practice for dealing with particularly tough things - micro, matching units to enemy forces, and dealing with rushes..

I golded all the challenges easily except two :<.

Jozrael.250 here, or croselius@gmail.com. What's everyone elses tags?

I've picked this game up a month ago and have been casually playing it.

lordeden@gmail.com is my email on there. Friend me for some co-op or 1v1 play.