Innovation vs metagame. Fight!

[Lost Son of Nikhel]

In the Orc Balance issues (LOLOLOL with C. Please, kill me) there was a discussion, and one of the questions was "there's a fundamental lack of innovation and a lazy attitude towards improvement and adaptation"

What Toil IS claiming is that there's a fundamental lack of innovation and a lazy attitude towards improvement and adaptation: this prevents people from adapting to winnable situations, hence why Toil's example of 3 sluggas 3 shootas was pertinent: is it an OP build? I don't think so; it's just a huge T1 with tons of T1 pressure. Instead, the obvious fallback position is "that's unbeatable"=> "that's OP"=> bitch whine "plz Kelltos fix mah gam"... how can anyone be objective when talking about balance if they're blind to their own biases?

And even then, the second half of Toil's claim (which, believe it or not, is consistent) is that even the things which he believes are OP have significant counterplay if you scout it/ predict it/ whatever. Basically that skill can overcome any OPness in the game. Note that this is NOT the same claim as OP doesn't exist: Toil's actual claim has the corollary that balance is manageable in every case, NOT that balance is perfect.

Dark Gods know that I'm not a pro player, but I have the feeling not all races could have the adaptation or inventive to create new VIABLE builds.

As a Chaos Lord player, I would like to go for Heretics + 2 x CSM + 2 x Raptors. Is a new and potent build, isn't it? But now here comes Mr Metagame who slaps me in da face.

With that build, I'm simply screaming for a quick vehicle/dread, which against I don't have any quick response. As a Chaos Lord, I can't buy a AV weapon for him. I can buy mark for my CSM, but in the best case are soft AV, and require a fuckton of resources to upgrade them. Heretics and Raptors aren't a match against a vehicle.

Take advantage of your high pressure power in T1 and genbash your enemy, then. But my genbash power is mediocre in the best case.

I'm not going to extend this more, because I'm entering into the theorycraft terrain. But as a Chaos player, IMHO a build without Havocs or Noise Marines for genbash your enemy is a build which is shouting for a quick vehicle to rape mah army.

[Toilailee]

Well, my hat goes off to Noisy, for being the only player to ever try new stuff back when meta was reeeeaaaally stagnated.

[ChrisNihilus]

I did a post in the past for the low flexibility Chaos in Tier 2.

Anyway I'm just a little more that a Beginner, but i feel that the game is still fresh and that there is no a rigid metagame that all player must obey (like most of the Starcraft 2 history).
I see different builds, different games, different solutions as the patch are really frequent and the balance i feel is pretty good.

On the other side I agree with you.
Some races are more flexible and open to new builds than the others.

I suggest that after the balance start to feel good for everyone we try to add some upgrade in the races/heroes/units that feel a little too rigid.
If balance is the way to go right now that doesn't mean it will be the right way in the future.

I'm mostly against new units, but i think that having an alternative for key units can open the door to new and improve gameplay if ever the metagame will feel stagnant.

[Nurland]

Why is this in the balance section?

[krakza]

I'm a big fan of innovation, to the point where I'm somewhat over-zealously opposed to the metagame.

I wish to play double sluggas more than double shootas, and I'm viciously opposed to playing the Force Commander, Chaos Lord and Lictor Alpha; all commanders whom I have a very hard time dealing with myself.
I know people will tell me it's a skill level thing, and I know it is, but at this time I can play a Chaos Lord player and lose very consistently even though we're of similar skill level; my chances are consistently much higher if he's playing any other commander.

I get discouraged from innovating as A. I'm only intermediate in skill anyway and B. These builds are generally harder to pull off, which leads back into A meaning that I lose more games and get more frustrated. I always just end up going back to the basic builds for hollow victories.

In fairness it's partially my own fault for my temperament. I'm very prone to going [Chat]: "bg" - [Menu] - [Quit Game]. My temperament is actually very mellow in real life, but get me in a video game and my head starts steaming!
Regardless, I digress.

Actually, that's all I have to say on the subject matter (despite half of it being irrelevant yammering (a talent of mine!)).

[Lulgrim]

Why is this in the balance section?

Move it then u n00b

[Nurland]

Moved it. Was just wondering if there was an actual reason for it being in the balance section.

[BaptismByLoli]

Moved it. Was just wondering if there was an actual reason for it being in the balance section.

Maybe to show it was just a direct response to the Ork balance issue thread debate =p

[Forestradio]

A hilarious game between Ace of Swords and myself that involves a GK build that I've never seen before: double storms into double purgation.

Why? Because the meta game is boring. and stupid.

[[TLV]Soul_Drinkers]

There are other of us who dont follow the meta, namely myself and torpid

[Unconscious]

Krazka I get you completely if your not making a change or breaking the mold in some way what is the point?

Thing is, if your trying to experiment and comparing yourself to people who are more experienced than you, you are not giving yourself an accurate measure.

It took me about 6 months to learn to use Keeper of the Grove in wc3 (a hero no one takes in tier 1) as a first hero in all but 1 of 4 race match ups. Its about build-measure-pivot. Learn-Unlearn-Relearn.

The point of innovation, initially, is to prototype ideas, they are meant to be new designs and sketch pads that only become more stable after practice.

How about sharing some of the lists or innovations you are looking to make work?

If your consistently losing/having issues with the same heroes you must see what you are consistently not doing that isn't solving it.

Have you thought of starting with a relatively hollow build in t1 and then transition into something innovative?

[krakza]

Krazka I get you completely if your not making a change or breaking the mold in some way what is the point?

Thing is, if your trying to experiment and comparing yourself to people who are more experienced than you, you are not giving yourself an accurate measure.

It took me about 6 months to learn to use Keeper of the Grove in wc3 (a hero no one takes in tier 1) as a first hero in all but 1 of 4 race match ups. Its about build-measure-pivot. Learn-Unlearn-Relearn.

The point of innovation, initially, is to prototype ideas, they are meant to be new designs and sketch pads that only become more stable after practice.

How about sharing some of the lists or innovations you are looking to make work?

If your consistently losing/having issues with the same heroes you must see what you are consistently not doing that isn't solving it.

Have you thought of starting with a relatively hollow build in t1 and then transition into something innovative?

Currently I'm really trying to make double Assault Kit Stormtroopers work (which it fucking doesn't!!). That said, I'm playing retail most recently. I quit DoW2 for a few months to concentrate on study, and now I was just waiting until 2.3 to get elite mod back (since it's apparently on the horizon).

I'm a lot better temperately these days (those two months probably did me good!) so I'm back on the experimentation parade! Discovering the terrible terrible damage double sentinels with missiles does to ranged blobs. They won me T2 against a nid army practically by themselves...

I've also tried to make Devastator-Heavy builds work in the past but it just seems they're so easily counterable, Libby synergy or no. Likely doesn't help that my favoured SM hero is Apoth, who typically does better with ASMs.

[Takadekadaka]

I feel like it's really hard to have any sort of focused experimentation without a plan of sorts... As it is right now (since I'm low level), any form of "breaking the mold" I do is purely reactionary/out of panic and won't yield the same results out of thinking critically about the choices you make before hand.

I'm wondering what thought process people have, if any, behind breaking away from the meta. Do people favor calculated gambles or do some people experiment for the sole purpose of creating a new play style?

[Atlas]

I got a couple ideas that are just kind of out there but I think I'll try em this week. I usually just innovate when I just sit and think something silly like "what if I got x,y,z? hmm, that's kind of funny actually lemme try that".

Otherwise I'm pretty much at the stage of copy/paste better players.

[Swift]

Always innovation here. Being a beginner who always plays with beginners, I can generally allow weird builds to come through that can either shock the opponent into defeat or completely destroy my entire army in one fell swoop. I am a victim myself of double CSM into double Raptors with the PC. A sane fellow would say that part of my AV problem is sorted by the plague fist, but it takes me such a long time to get there that I tend to miss out on AV in T2 and go straight for the lovely Tzeentch marks for my CSM with Aspiring Champions.

On a side note, I have been playing Inquisitor a lot recently and I have found that the Interrogators armour combined with Bone 'ead Ogryns really stirs things up a bit. But I only tried it since RyanM7074 told me to do it out of the blue one game. For those who do not know what the build does: infiltrated Ogryns.

[Atlas]

Yeah I learned the inflitrated ogryns trick pretty quick and it's one of my staple strategies now. I'm actually putting together another Inquisitor strategy now that uses the interrogater's armor a lot more prominently.

[Swift]

It is probably my favourite armour for her as I use it on other things later down the line like Kasrkin.

[Torpid]

It works excellently with HWTs alongside the servo skull. The skull grants detection in an area and vision, as well as passively increasing the IQs sight radius by 15 so it supports the HWTs very well, especially when they have an autocannon/lascannon.

[Ace of Swords]

Get the Liber Heresius and spam infiltration on your whole army, been doing that recently, it's luzly.

[Vapor]

Get the Liber Heresius and spam infiltration on your whole army, been doing that recently, it's luzly.

Even better is playing teams and infiltrating your teammate's entire army. Nobody can handle an onslaught of infiltrated FC + ASM + Tacs. Rofl

[BaptismByLoli]

Holy crap. Team game with GK spamming shrouding, Inqui spamming her interrogator armour, Rangers spamming Holo Field... etc 0.0