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Forums \ StarCraft 2 forum \ Randomness in StarCraft 2
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MerlinOmega
Randomness in StarCraft 2 (1642 reads, 7 replies, 5 months ago)
Hello, we are three game development students at the Stockholm University of Sweden doing a study on the effects random elements have on players in competitive RTS games.
We would very much appreciate if you could take a few minutes to answer some questions for us.

1. What league are you on the Starcraft2 ladder?

2. These are instances we have been able to identify in Starcraft2 where random occurrences can take precedence over skill. Explain if and how they affect you.
A) Random starting locations
B) Randomness in build orders (BO losses, BO wins).
C) Randomness due to lack of accurate scouting (Scouting at the right place at the right time, not being able to scout everything e.g. Army movement, tech, baneling landmines, etc.).

3. Do these small random factors affect you? Explain how they affect you.
A) SCVs random movement during construction.
B) Random creep spread growth.
C) Random larvae movement.
D) Random burrow/unborrow animation duration.

4. Can you identify any more? Explain how they affect you.

5. How do you adapt your strategies to handle randomness in Starcraft2?

6. How large do you think the impact of randomness is on the outcome of the average StarCraft 2 match?

7. Do you think randomness needs to be a part of any competitive RTS game?

8. Do you have anything to add?


Thank you in advance!
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5 months ago
#1
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PsychoBaBas
1. Master league (I only play Terran)

2.
A) If TvZ and close position, I am quite happy since I can always have a presence, sieging towards his natural. If far position, I need to sit back and expand more freely.
If TvP and close position, I need to be wary of allins. If far position, I need to get ready for a timing push or the Protoss will get too big.
If TvT and close, again be prepared for 1 base attacks, if far positions, get map control and expand freely.

B) There is for sure a randomness in build orders which result in wins. As some are almost impossible to scout (example, proxy void ray, hidden dt tech, hidden 4 gate), I take a risk to exclude one the of two most damaging.

C) This is what makes or breaks TvP in my opinion. In TvT, the match up is not that unforgiving. In TvZ, a hidden spire will greatly help a Zerg but will not be instant GG. Also, in TvZ the Terran would expect to see mutalisk after scouting a lair, which he always does with scans. Scouting a Zerg is not hard due to the "building-on-creep" requirement.
TvP is a different scenario. You dont scout the colossus tech, you die. You dont scout the HT tech and take a gamble by making vikings, you die. You dont scout the double forge and are way behind on upgrades, you die. Needs constant scouting. Protoss can assume bio in 90% of games.

3.
A) For SCV making buildings, it's just annoying when the worker hits the scv making the barracks, thats about it.

5. I take a risk to stop the most damaging of the scenarios I might face. For example, if I scan and notice a 1 base protoss vs my fast expanding Terran, and I see 3 gates + gas, I would first of all check the gases. If I see a lot of gas being used he is most likely either going DT, or void ray. I see DT more often than void ray, and having no detection is instant GG, so I take a risk and pressume DT. If it's void ray, I take the loss as a build order win. Additionally, if the void rays and warps in units in my main, and i lose then thats fine since in the expansion protoss will not be able to warp in units on high ground, which makes this strategy redundant when HotS comes out.
If it turns out to be a hidden warp prism, immortal build then thats fine since my build does not lose to that easily.

In other words, since I cant cover everything when fast expanding, I have decided that my build will almost for sure lose to void ray but will withstand anything else, given good scouting.

6. Randomness is too great in SC2, compared to Brood War. And I hear ZvZ and PvP are very affected by this, as is TvP in my opinion.

7. NO. Because it allows for undeserving players to get cheap wins. Almost any pro can lose from a Master super-allin, which is really bad.

8. I hope we get a more robbust game with the expansion.
This post was edited by its author @ 5 months ago
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5 months ago
#2
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homesmasher
1: Master (Playing random)

2:
A) Random starting locations affect me greatly, not in a bad way it forces you to make the decission of main strategy after the game started, It's just good as long as the map isn't greatly biased (like close posistion metalopolis)

B) Doesn't happend i don't do cheesy builds.

C) Doesn't really overwrite skill, as the skill lays in good scouting.
Most often il lose due to hidden base, i've lost like 1-4 out of 2000 to proxies!
When this happends It's all my own fault and there's never anything which points to that there is something i'd just have to randomly do.

3)
A) Actually yes, it gets really annoying as in TvZ i do lower ramp wallof which leaves like 60% of the rax angle vulnerable to the drone harass as it's constructing (only take affect for very early zerg scout) often forces me to take an xtra scv of the minerals, not detrimental though!

B) No not at all, yet

C) Nope

D) Not a huge fan of burrow except for landmines so nope

4) The randomness of generally moving around is what affect my gameplay the most, you could potentially say "It's a players choice so it's not really random" but at 15 minute mark excactly where your army are at each second is not timed out, so you base the movement around your gut a lot, and it gets a bit random, and if your really unlucky your enemy might be at the worst spot for the timing, it's never detrimental but sometimes plays it's part.

5) Play <<Safe>> and scout, sc2 is stable enough that it'll overtake anything :)

6) I think it's quite big, because people are stupid and like to take risks, even the pros do this and it saddens me greatly, people should have more confidence in playing safe!

7) To a certain degree yes, but it should be possible to handle it by just being good.

8) nope :p
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5 months ago
#3
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inco
1. What league are you on the Starcraft2 ladder?

Platinum.

2. These are instances we have been able to identify in Starcraft2 where random occurrences can take precedence over skill. Explain if and how they affect you.

A) Random starting locations

Doesn't really affect my play in a way that's negative. It may change my plans, as in "if he is nearby by air, I'll drop" and "if he's far away in all ways, I'll go heavy eco" etc. It's rather a part of the game which makes it more interesting, rather than boring. There has to be information gathering in a game like this and finding out positions and how to use that is one of the nice things.

B) Randomness in build orders (BO losses, BO wins).

I guess I've lost to build orders more than the player's skill, however I don't agree with looking at it like that. It's just poor scouting, reading signs and gambling on one's own build - thus, I find it's more skill than luck/randomness.

C) Randomness due to lack of accurate scouting (Scouting at the right place at the right time, not being able to scout everything e.g. Army movement, tech, baneling landmines, etc.).

Scouting is a skill and it's not random of you scout poorly and lose your army to baneling landmines or don't know where your opponent is. I have been close to losing due to baneling landmines once, though, but I simply adapted my play and won afterwards.

3. Do these small random factors affect you? Explain how they affect you.
A) SCVs random movement during construction.

Yes, at times but it's not something worth mentioning.

B) Random creep spread growth.

Nope, never had any problem with that.

C) Random larvae movement.

Never even realized :P

D) Random burrow/unborrow animation duration.

Haven't taken notice of it yet, so no.

4. Can you identify any more? Explain how they affect you.

Sorry, no.

5. How do you adapt your strategies to handle randomness in Starcraft2?

Gather information and use knowledge/experience to adapt.

6. How large do you think the impact of randomness is on the outcome of the average StarCraft 2 match?

The way I think you guys define randomness, I'd say that it has an impact. How it is on an average is hard to say, however I reckon it doesn't say much on lower levels but at the really high levels it can be the difference between winning or losing. Not in a bad way, though, as all one needs to do is gather information and adapt in general.

7. Do you think randomness needs to be a part of any competitive RTS game?

Yes, the way I understand it as you mean it, it should be a part of RTS. Gathering and using information is too important and interesting to remove.

8. Do you have anything to add?

Nope, can't say I have, apart from best of luck in the study and all that stuff =)
Divorce is a hereditary disease.
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5 months ago
#4
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S_SienZ (Senior Editor HoN)
1. Terran player. No league as of yet (play on public accounts in LAN shops so the league is random)

2A. Starting locations can be accounted for pre-game with openers appropriate for each scenario be it close positions / close by air / cross-spots. Aside from that I generally have builds for big and small maps to accomodate the variance between maps like Xel Naga Caverns and Tal Darim so it's all good here.

B. BO wins are usually due to bad scouting. Usually you only lose to randomness if your opponent does a coin-flip build or you're in some bizarre scenario where both of you do the same proxy rush to each other leaving each other with no defence. Even then it's more decision making than randomness imo.

C. Scouting is a skill, no randomness involved unless you count stuff like a facebook message notification causing me to miss a small red blip on the minimap that was there for like a second.

3. I rarely 11 double rax bunker rush, so I'm rarely affected by this.

I don't think randomness plays to a big role in the game, especially at competitive level when even certain spawn locations are blocked. So basically luck? yes, randomness? Not exactly.

Any randomness that can be accounted for by the player and leads to more depth in the game is good.
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5 months ago
#5
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craftmatic2
1. What league are you on the Starcraft2 ladder?

Top of Platinum 1v1, 2v2, and 3v3, T and P.



2. These are instances we have been able to identify in Starcraft2 where random occurrences can take precedence over skill. Explain if and how they affect you.
A) Random starting locations

Sucks. Wish all 1v1 maps were 2 start locations only, 3 at the most.

B) Randomness in build orders (BO losses, BO wins).

Sucks. Protoss mirror most of the early game is scouting and re-scouting both the enemy base and yours to avoid some sort of cheese rush or hidden tech.

C) Randomness due to lack of accurate scouting (Scouting at the right place at the right time, not being able to scout everything e.g. Army movement, tech, baneling landmines, etc.).

I no longer move armies on the map as Terran, and wouldn't do so as protoss if there were an option. Moving an army around in the middle of the map is probably the easiest way to get a random loss in 1v1, and especially 2v2.

3. Do these small random factors affect you? Explain how they affect you.
A) SCVs random movement during construction.

REally pisses me off in situations where you're trying to build two or more adjacent buildings simultaneously, because they get in the way, or pop out on the wrong side of a depot wall and then you have to stop and issue 3 more orders to fix it: drop depot, re-order SCV, wait for it to get inside, raise depot, etc.


4. Can you identify any more? Explain how they affect you.

Splash damage in any matchup between any combination of protoss or terrans is pretty much a crap shoot. It's another reason I try to stay out of the middle of the map and avoid fights at all. I try to wear opponent down with money screw to avoid the big "colossus in the middle of hte map RAWWWRR there went everyone's army, and one guy gets lucky and lives" thing...

5. How do you adapt your strategies to handle randomness in Starcraft2?

See above.

6. How large do you think the impact of randomness is on the outcome of the average StarCraft 2 match?

A lot bigger than it should be, and bigger than most people realize.

If you study replays and things like "Units lost" you can also find many, many disparities of situations where it seems like it should have been an even match, but one side kills 2 or 3 times as much stuff as the other...

7. Do you think randomness needs to be a part of any competitive RTS game?

There ARE good forms of randomness, such as the Broodwar high ground mechanic, which was essentially a "rule" to give the high ground an advantage by design.

Then there are bad forms of randomness, such as in SC2 the line of sight blockers and massable splashing saper units.

8. Do you have anything to add?


The 1v1 Maps have too many resources on them in general, that is too many bases and too many start locations, which introduces additional randomness.

I've seen a few replays even at the pro level which allowed unfair strategies by fast expanding to the gold mineral field, or some other non-natural FE build which was impossible to scout in time...

The map "Worldship", which is not currently in the map pool, has a resource gather rate imbalance which causes the top locaton to mine gas 10% faster than the bottom one. Taldarim Altar has similar issues, and IS in the map pool...

That's not really "random", but it's an imbalance.
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5 months ago
#6
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craftmatic2
B. BO wins are usually due to bad scouting. Usually you only lose to randomness if your opponent does a coin-flip build or you're in some bizarre scenario where both of you do the same proxy rush to each other leaving each other with no defence. Even then it's more decision making than randomness imo.

C. Scouting is a skill, no randomness involved unless you count stuff like a facebook message notification causing me to miss a small red blip on the minimap that was there for like a second.



Scouting is hugely affected by randomness.

In fact, on a 4 player map, here are the odds of different scouting scenarios.

Each player as a 2/3rds chance of scouting to the wrong start location to find their opponent, so that you can see what their opening build is.

This means there is a 1/9 chance that both players will scout in the correct direction to find one another immediately.

There is a 4/9 chance that both players will scout in the wrong direction.

There is a 4/9 chance that one player will scout in the correct direction, while the other player scouts in the wrong direction, randomly giving one player an unfair advantage.

So in about 4 out of 9 games, statistically, an unfair, unavoidable random scouting advantage occurs due to random start locations when playing on a 4 player map.


What difference does it make?

Well, if the opponent is doing some sort of cheese, you won't find it until it's too late in 4/9 of the time, which is better than 1/3 for BO 3 matchups...

So statistically, you could average 1 "free" win in a BO3 matchups just by cheesing at least one of the games...
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5 months ago
#7
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homesmasher
Sorry craftmatic, but u havent considered target firing with collosus and other aoe units? (much like ul have to do with blings/infestor)
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