Hi, Everyone!

In this post I am proposing changes that I would love to see being added to the Patch. Inspiration drawn from Pig and Greenert but I tried to refine their ideas. I will include my ideas as well and try to explain why I decided to make it that way. Let's begin!

Note: All time periods are written in Faster game speed unless stated otherwise.

Zerg

Hydralisk

• Supply cost reduced from 2 to 1.
• Build time reduced from 24 to 21 seconds.
• HP reduced from 90 to 80.
• Needle Spines damage decreased from 12 to 8 (+4 vs armored).

Reason: With this rework I aim to bring the Hydralisk closer to their Broodwar counterparts and feel more "swarmy". I refrained from changing the cost since Roaches fill the "cheap recruits" role already. I imagine Hydras as the "swarm" unit that is balanced around being more expensive thus used en masse when you have a big economy.

Hydralisk Den

• Lair requirement removed. (Upgrades are still locked behind Lair).
• Hydralisk Den build time increased from 29 seconds to 39 seconds.

Lurker

• HP reduced from 190 to 180.
• Morph time increased from 18 seconds to 21 seconds. (To compensate the Hydra buff. The overall morph time from Hydra to Lurker remains the same - 42 seconds).
• Spines damage reduced from 20 (+10 vs armored) to 16 (+8 vs armored).

Reason: But that's a lot of nerfs! Well let's not forget the lurker also costs 1 less supply with the Hydra buff. Also to compensate for Seismic Spines buff.

Lurker Den

• Lair requirement added.
• Seismic Spines requirement changed from Hive to Lair.
• Seismic Spines reserch time increased from 57 seconds to 79 seconds.

Terran

Cyclone

• Tech Lab requirement removed.
• Lock On ability valid targets changed from ground/air to only air.
• Lock On range decreased from 7(15) to 6(13).
• Armor decreased from 1 to 0.

Reason: I was originally a big fan of the non-tech Cyclone. Therefore I want to experiment with a change like this where cyclone does not begin with its op ability right away but rather has to be reserched. Kept the anti-air Lock On because I think early game Oracle harass will be too good. Keep in mind this is NOT the op reworked version of the previous patch 5.0.12 since it is 1 supply more and costs an additional 25/50 making massing them harder. Also Lock On cooldown is still twice as long compared to the previous reworked version on patch 5.0.13.

Tech Lab

• Added a new upgrade: Expanded Target Algorithm - Cost 50/50, 43 seconds reserch time. Allows the Cyclone's Lock On ability to target ground units.

Ghost

• EMP now deals 50 instant damage to energy and shields. Applies a DoT effect to the affected units that drains 50 energy and shields over 2.5 seconds (1.79 on faster game speed).
• EMP radius increased from 1.5 to 1.75.

Reason: I personally don't think Ghost needs any major changes since late game ZvT is pretty balanced right now. That said I think EMP needs a little bit of a rework. However I don't think that making all of the EMP damage a DoT effect is a good solution. At the same time 100 points of damage was a little too good vs big shield targets especially Archons which are literally unplayable. I think this is the perfect middle ground where interactions vs Zealots remain the same while making it a lot less effective when trying to burst down big targets. Adjusted the radius a little to make up for the loss of burst damage.

Protoss

Observer

• Observers can now be produced from the Nexus instead of the Robotic Facility with a condition that Robotic Facility is present on the map.
• Observer build time increased from 17.9 seconds to 21.4 seconds.

Reason: I think this will streamline Protoss production making it fell smoother. Increased a little the production time since it can now be spammed and as a result will be much easier for the protosses to replace them when destroyed.

Disruptor

• Purification Nova now has 0.25 inner radius that deals 200 damage (+200 vs shields). The rest of the radius damage remains the same at 100 damage (+100 vs shields).

Contriversial opinion: Protoss ground army was always much worse than any other race especially zergs. That is the reason most protosses prefer to switch to air in ZvP. In the pro scene protoss ground almost always struggles against the zerg one. The biggest problem in my opinion is that once zerg morphs lurkers the protoss doesn't have much counterplay and is forced to go Tempests. You might say immortals but they lack range against them. While Disruptors not one shotting them means either Lurker gets healed back to full by the Queens or simply dying to the much more mobile zerg army. I think this is an elegant solution to the Disruptor problem allowing it to one shot immobile siege units while interactions with the other more mobile units remain the same.

Carrier

• Interceptor build time increased from 9 to 12.

Mothership

• Can now be abducted again. Heroic units are abducted only half the distance.

Contriversial opinion: Protoss air army was always much better than any other race especially zergs.

If you made it that far, Thank you for the time! I am looking forward to discussing these changes - what is op, what is weak, what I overlooked etc.

Cheers,

LordPartyPancake