Auto-casting in Starcraft II from Blizzard’s Dustin Browder
There has been a lot of talk regarding the implementation of auto-casting in StarCraft II. The bulk of the comments on forums, as noted by Lead Designer of the game Dustin Browder, reveal the players’ fear that it “will remove a lot of skill from the game.”
Browder clarified that it will not do so, and only a few select abilities will actually be getting auto-cast simply because it “doesn’t work very often.” This is because special abilities in the SCII are very different from those found in other games in terms of design and use.
Among the differences that were noted included abilities that fire off occasionally, used with great precision, and cost a lot of energy. These really penalizes players when they miss making auto-casting not a viable addition. To further stress his point, Browder cited some abilities in the latest build that would not be getting auto-cast along with a detailed explanation of why this is so:
- Psi Storm: this ability fires with so much authority, uses so much energy and hits your own units if you’re not careful. The player MUST choose when to do this. We cannot possibly do it for him. Any decision we would make would certainly be wrong most of the time. Plus if we could figure out a rule set for auto-casting Psi-Storm (and I don’t see how we could) we would remove way too much skill by putting it in the game.
- Force Field: same deal. Position is so important we couldn’t possibly choose for you and be smart about it. Plus it would ruin all the fun of using the spell.
- Time Bomb: same. We can’t make it auto-cast. There is no simple rule that would work. Plus, it would remove a lot of skill of using it at exactly the right moment.
So far only SCVs and Medics have been confirmed with the auto-cast abilities for repairs and healing, which takes away the hassle of having to do that manually. A lot of players are looking for the same balance that was found in the original game, and it looks like Blizzard still has their eye on the ball in that respect. More updates on StarCraft II as we get them.
There has been a lot of talk regarding the implementation of auto-casting in StarCraft II. The bulk of the comments on forums, as noted by Lead Designer of the game Dustin Browder, reveal the players’ fear that it “will remove a lot of skill from the game.”
Browder clarified that it will not do so, and only a few select abilities will actually be getting auto-cast simply because it “doesn’t work very often.” This is because special abilities in the SCII are very different from those found in other games in terms of design and use.
Among the differences that were noted included abilities that fire off occasionally, used with great precision, and cost a lot of energy. These really penalizes players when they miss making auto-casting not a viable addition. To further stress his point, Browder cited some abilities in the latest build that would not be getting auto-cast along with a detailed explanation of why this is so:
- Psi Storm: this ability fires with so much authority, uses so much energy and hits your own units if you’re not careful. The player MUST choose when to do this. We cannot possibly do it for him. Any decision we would make would certainly be wrong most of the time. Plus if we could figure out a rule set for auto-casting Psi-Storm (and I don’t see how we could) we would remove way too much skill by putting it in the game.
- Force Field: same deal. Position is so important we couldn’t possibly choose for you and be smart about it. Plus it would ruin all the fun of using the spell.
- Time Bomb: same. We can’t make it auto-cast. There is no simple rule that would work. Plus, it would remove a lot of skill of using it at exactly the right moment.
So far only SCVs and Medics have been confirmed with the auto-cast abilities for repairs and healing, which takes away the hassle of having to do that manually. A lot of players are looking for the same balance that was found in the original game, and it looks like Blizzard still has their eye on the ball in that respect. More updates on StarCraft II as we get them.
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