Is Protoss underpowered in high level play? [SPOILERS]
UPDATED WITH LATEST DATA FOR JULY/AUGUST - SEE PAGE 9
Introduction
The worm has turned. It began almost impercetibly. Protoss players such as myself started questioning whether the balance complaints of other races were really justified in light of the results we were seeing at high level play.
I have previously said it would be unwise to jump to conclusions based on the results of a couple of high profile games or one tournament. I am still of that view. What I would like to discuss is the emergence of an apparent trend in poor protoss results in high level play. I say "apparent" trend because I think it is still too early to conclude that what we are seeing is actually a "trend".
Conscious of not jumping to a premature conclusion, it seems to me that the emerging data raises a legitimate question: is protoss currently underpowered in high level play?
Disclaimer
As a protoss player I have an interest in this debate. I will try to keep this to a minimum, but I am conscious that the very fact that I am raising it as a topic of discussion demonstrates an inherent bias on my part. I hope you will forgive me!
Some definitions
First, my discussion is limited to high level play. By "high level play", I mean top tournaments such as GSL, and Grandmasters league, with particular emphasis on the leagues in Korea, NA and Europe, which I suggest are the most competitive.
Second, I have carefully and deliberately used the word underpowered. By underpowered, I do not mean "unplayable" or "uncompetitive". Strong players will continue to perform well because their inherent skill allows them to overcome possible shortcomings with their race. Underpowered also involves questions of degree - it may be very slight, such that the effect on lower level players is low or almost negligible, but enough to have a significant effect at higher levels.
Third, the expression underpowered in high level play is important. It may also be legitimate to ask "is protoss overpowered in low level play?", having regard to the race's arguably simpler mechanics (I'll leave this for others to decide).
Why it is important to look at data
In any non-mirror match up, it seems to me there are three key variables that affect the outcome of the game. The first, and probably most significant, is the player (or more correctly, players). The second variable is race. The third is map. In examining the relative "power" of a race, we are trying to eliminate the "noise" that is created as a result of differences in player skill and different maps.
For this reason, I suggest (although you may disagree) it is virtually useless to examine anecdotal experience - ie a player's personal experience of the race and their recent games. This is because the key variable here is the player, not the map or race. But, when we look at the results of hundreds (or thousands) of games, the significance of the "player" diminishes drastically, whereas the importance of "race" (and "map") dramatically increases.
I acknowledge that the following data does not attempt to isolate "map" as a factor, and that this is a significant limitation. I apologise in that the data is simply not available.
In summary, what those results showed was that in global tournaments, the win rate for all match ups had begun to approach 50% (although I would be interested to see the current results more than one month (and 1 patch) later). However, the results showed Protoss was been getting absolutely murdered in recent Korean tournaments, with win rates of 33% of ZvT and 30% of ZvP. I said at the time I would be interested to see whether this was the start of an emerging trend (Korea tends to lead the field in all things Starcraft).
The results of the current GSL "Super Tournament" have been, if anything even more dramatic. 16 protoss players qualified for the round of 64. This represents 25% of the field, despite the fact that Protoss players make up approximately 35% of active 1v1 players in Korean. Of these, 6 advanced to the round of 32 (two of whom advanced in mirror match ups). Three Protoss players have so far played in the round of 32 (Genius, HongUn and Trickster) and all have been knocked out. I pray that at least one of the remaining three advances to the top 16, so that there is at least someone I can watch to pick up some tips on how to play the race at the moment. But I think there is a real risk at the moment that we will have a quarter final (or even round of 16) with not a single protoss player.
I note in passing that the number of Korean protoss players complaining about balance has (as of yesterday), overtaken zerg players for the first time in many months (see http://www.playxp.com/sc2/jingjing/ - red = zerg, green = terran, blue = protoss, purple = nothing). Of course, all this demonstrates is "sentiment" (what people think about balance) rather than an actual indicator of balance.
Grandmasters League statistics
The number of Protoss players in the Korean Grandmasters League has remained the same as when I last examined the data. 32% of Korean Grandmasters play protoss, compared to around 35% of all players. They remain slightly underrepresented amongst Grandmasters. (It should also be remembered that random is dramatically underrepresented in GMs League, and as a result (statistically at least) Zerg and Terran are both significantly overrepresented. Zerg is the most overrepresented. There is a similar trend in SEA: see my earlier thread at http://www.sc2sea.com/archive/index.php/t-1242.html).
There continues to be very few Protoss players in the top 10 of any of the regions. Based on my search this morning, of the top 10 players in each of the major regions, NA has 1 Protoss, EU has 0 Protoss, Korea has 2 Protoss and SEA has 1 Protoss. By contrast:
- 5 of the NA top 10 are Terran and 4 are Zerg;
- 6 of the EU top 10 are Terran and 4 are Zerg;
- 7 of the Korean top 10 are Terran and 1 is Zerg; and
- 3 of the SEA top 10 are Terran and 6 are Zerg.
Discussion
These results hardly provide a definitive answer to the question I have asked. But, I think, the data legitimately entitles me to ask the question: is Protoss currently underpowered in high level play?
I am very curious to see what Blizzard's overall data shows, and really wish they would release this (as they have done in the past). The most problematic scenario, I think, is one in which the data shows Protoss is overperforming in lower level play (whether that be overperformance in bronze, silver, gold, platinum, or overperformance all the way up to high Masters). At the moment I don't have any data and could only speculate on the position below Grandmasters. If this were the case, would raise the question, as many have already suggested, of who it is that Blizzard should be balancing the game for - professionals or the average player? Personally, I tend to think it should be balanced for high level play and everyone else should try and catch up by looking at what the professionals do. However, at the moment we do not have data to suggest any underperformance by Protoss below the parameters I have identified.
On a sad note, it will be difficult for me to pick up much to "imitate" from the GSL super tournament. Unfortunately, most of the Protoss games have been terribly one-sided and not really worth watching (for my part, it is starting to look brutal and somewhat bleak out there for the pros). However, I remain optimistic that one of the remaining Protoss players will show us something new and spectactular to stop the rot. My hopes are now pinned on SlayerS_Alicia (who, for those of you who don't know, more or less gave us the aggressive 3gate expand which revolutionised PvT a few months ago).
Tom please add at least one picture to your articles so it has a thumbnail!
I really liked your writeup Tom, looks like a piece of academic writing that I am familiar with from school - a breath of fresh air in this forum settings
I just want to point out a possible faulty deduction before addressing the issue of whether Blizzard should balance for high levels/casuals.
Faulty Deduction?
Your argument is as such:
Premise 1: Protoss (players) have not been performing well in high level tournaments (Lowest Win Rate) Premise 2: Protoss are underrepresented in the GM leagues in the world.
---- Conclusion : Protoss is underpowered in high level play.
While your first 2 premises are facts (As you have nicely presented with data) so they cannot be debated, the conclusion is questionable.
Does having a lower win rate equate to a race being underpowered?
I beg to differ.
While you have nicely pointed out 3 variables that determine a match outcome (player, map, race), I would like to suggest that the 3rd variable of race is incompletely portrayed. I mean, how does a person's race affect a match outcome? Does it matter whether he's producing SCVs or producing Drones (that's what race means)
I think a more accurate and complete description of that variable is this: Current Race Metagame. And with this description we'll see a possible answer as to why the results you have pointed out is occurring.
Current Race Metagame means how a particular race is currently handling matchups against other races. This can interact with the variable Map as well, for example, in the past TvZ on Lost Temple was just them abusing cliffs and Zergs losing terribly.
Over time of course, the metagame shifted with Zergs knowing how to handle this with OL/Spine placements, etc.
An example of it being an independent variable is the TvZ bunker rush - Zergs were losing to it when it was first popularized, but the metagame shifted back when they learnt how to handle it.
Thus, it would seem that the reason for Premises 1 and 2 is simply this - Current Zerg/Terran top player's Current Race Metagame is simply better than Protoss' Current Race Metagame. They know how to handle the different strategies Toss can throw at them, and know how to beat them effectively.
Does this mean Protoss is 'underpowered'? Not at all! It simply means Protoss player now has to figure out how to adapt to how Z/T are playing them now, and work out a new approach to beating them.
Issue of balancing
There has been endless debate about this already so I'll just provide my opinion on this issue.
Yes, Blizzard needs to balance the game for the high level players. But can they do this at the expense of the average players? No! There is a huge player pool that they will lose if they let the game fall into imbalance at the average level.
I think the key thing about how Blizzard is balancing things is just to ensure there's no strategy that the average player using a particular race can pull off to consistently beat others (e.g. 4gate) simply because that build is too strong.
And as for higher level play, they have to look at WHAT is causing the Protoss to lose. You cannot just average out the population as you would for a statistical analysis - you have to actually look at each game and find out WHY they are losing.
Is there some strategy/tactic that is just too difficult to hold off as Protoss? Is there some unfair advantage that another race gains over Protoss which the Protoss cannot make up for?
(E.g. Protoss usually gets more Probes than other races in the early stages, but they CAN make up for this with MULEs and fast Drone production later on)
As I don't have a proper conclusion,
-The End-
Last edited by crAzerk; Fri, 3rd-Jun-2011 at 12:09 PM.
At higher levels most balance problems are minor and its more differences between players
Zerg is flawed in design so they are always on the back foot, at least in early game. Call it QQ but the game was made too fast without zerg being able to adapt to what the opponent is doing equally as fast
However was have seen players like nestea get around this problem well
What crAzerk says is wrong though as the game is horridly imbalanced at lower levels and blizzard isn't intending to do anything about it. If they balance for the lower levels (even diamond) then it would break the game for higher level play
All I can say is look at Inka - how the hell did he get into the code S finals?
There continues to be very few Protoss players in the top 10 of any of the regions. Based on my search this morning, of the top 10 players in each of the major regions, NA has 1 Protoss, EU has 0 Protoss, Korea has 2 Protoss and SEA has 1 Protoss. By contrast:
- 5 of the NA top 10 are Terran and 4 are Zerg;
- 6 of the EU top 10 are Terran and 4 are Zerg;
- 7 of the Korean top 10 are Terran and 1 is Zerg; and
- 3 of the SEA top 10 are Terran and 6 are Zerg.
this is really scary. imo both protoss and zerg are slightly weaker than terran atm but the results although a small sample seem to indicate protoss is the absolute worse. hmm!
I agree with crAzerk. It's simply a matter of T and Z having figured out how to beat the way P is playing right now. We saw it not too long ago that people thought ZvP was unwinnable.
P just needs to figure out why they are losing, and a way to combat that.
crAzerk, you raise two good points, although permit me some clarification. My conclusion can basically be stated as "the data is consistent with Protoss being underpowered at high level play". As you rightly point out, the data is also consistent with poor adaptation to the current metagame, and this could be the possible explanation. A further explanation it that the poor performance is purely coincidence. That is why I have been careful not to give a strong answer to the question I posed.
This is also why it is important not just to look at snapshots, but to seek to identify trends. I suppose I am saying that the apparent trend I began to observe 1-2 months ago has continued, with the result that the hypothesis that Protoss is underpowered has become more plausible (but by no means proven).
Your second point is also a good one:
Quote:
Originally Posted by crAzerk
And as for higher level play, they have to look at WHAT is causing the Protoss to lose. You cannot just average out the population as you would for a statistical analysis - you have to actually look at each game and find out WHY they are losing.
I agree, but there are in my view two distinct stages. The first is to use statistics to determine if there is a problem. The second step is, having determined that there is a problem, to examine particular games and strategies, make alterations, and then observe the effect this has on the data (ie repeat step 1).
But there is no point starting at step 2 - pointing out all the things that you observe seem to be wrong with a race, seems to me to be irrelevant if on the whole the race is still performing well. The variables in SC2 seem to me to be so complicated that the only way you can really observe the way all the strengths and weaknesses of a race "come together" is in the proverbial real-time laboratory.
What can i say? Look at the recent tournaments. Protoss just got whip left right up down. If you noticed, the PvZ is probably the weakest if you see zerg playing with banelings, mass roaches, speedlings and couples of infestor. It totally crush the deadball so easy.
The rebuilding of 200 food (save lots of larvas) for zerg is bloody easy as compared to protoss with higher tier units like colo & immortal.
Roaches needs a tweak. 75/25 cost for that unit is ridiculous.
Look at today's Week 8-2 incontrol vs july, July just crushed incontrol purely with mass roaches everything incontrol loses his deadball.
The most problematic scenario, I think, is one in which the data shows Protoss is overperforming in lower level play (whether that be overperformance in bronze, silver, gold, platinum, or overperformance all the way up to high Masters).
I feel this is probably true (I'm silver). I think that possibly Protoss is broken in the sense that it doesnt scale from low level play to high level play (or vice versa hehe)
The only way I can see a major enough change happening to fix this is with the new HoTS units and rebalance that can occur then.
___________________________________
Can I have autocast for Inject Lavae? kthnxbai
What crAzerk says is wrong though as the game is horridly imbalanced at lower levels and blizzard isn't intending to do anything about it
Care to elaborate?
No wait, don't bother. A lower level player complaining about game balance is like a newbie basketball player who can't throw the ball into the hoop going 'This game is unfair! Make the hoop bigger!' There has already been much said about this elsewhere so I won't say more.
Ok @ Tom,
Quote:
As you rightly point out, the data is also consistent with poor adaptation to the current metagame, and this could be the possible explanation
Hmm, I wouldn't quite say that the data is consistent with either of those. Making such a statement is a logical fallacy of begging the question, where you assume what you're setting out to prove.
(E.g. You're trying to show that Protoss is underpowered because Protoss are losing. And then you say Protoss are losing and this seems consistent with them being underpowered)
What is more accurate which you also did mention, is that 'Protoss being underpowered' is a plausible explanation for "Protoss losing', just as 'Protoss having a poorer Current Race Metagame' is a plausible explanation for 'Protoss losing'.
Regarding your second portion, I had an interesting thought - Would it still be possible for a race to be performing well even though there is something wrong with the race?
If you think about it, it IS possible, if the other races haven't found a way to exploit it.
E.g. When Spanishiwa first brought his build out, he was dominating everyone with it, along with everyone else who hopped on to use his build. But there was a clear inherent flaw in it that it lacked map control and had 0 means of pressure in the early game, allowing others to double expand, etc. Did other races figure it out immediately ? No. Thus the Spanishiwa-bandwagon 'performed well' for a period of time, abusing the solid Zerg mechanic of Queen/Spine defence which seemed OP at that moment.
Which led me to think - if a race can perform well both when there is something wrong with it and when there's nothing wrong with it - is it then relevant to look at its current performance to use as an indicator of its balance?
Or should we be focusing on the reasons for its current performance (poor Current Race Metagame) instead?
Last edited by crAzerk; Mon, 6th-Jun-2011 at 11:40 AM.
Reason: to avoid retards
I'm breaking up into 2 posts because it was getting long.
@dennistoo If you could, read my points as well, but if you can't it's alright, I'll try to answer you but it would be better if you have had context
Quote:
The rebuilding of 200 food (save lots of larvas) for zerg is bloody easy as compared to protoss with higher tier units like colo & immortal.
There's no question here. Zerg has the quickest way of replenishing their lost army. You are right.
But have you taken into consideration this fact as well - A typical 200 Zerg army is generally significantly weaker as compared to a typical 200 Protoss/Terran army?
And thus perhaps this is WHY Zergs NEED that quick way of replenishing?
Think about it.
Quote:
Roaches needs a tweak. 75/25 cost for that unit is ridiculous.
Yea, they should make it gas free!
Haha ok well I have nothing to say about this, besides maybe pointing out other 'imbalances ' - 1 immortal can kill 3/4 roaches (slightly higher cost on Immortal, but lower food count too), 1 Thor can kill probably 20 queens, etc.
Quote:
Look at today's Week 8-2 incontrol vs july, July just crushed incontrol purely with mass roaches everything incontrol loses his deadball.
There was a period of time where the Protoss deathball (did you spell it as 'deadball' on purpose? It's pretty funny though if it was on purpose.. like it just dies to anything haha) basically killed everything, and Zergs were the one complaining about imbalance.
But as I've said in previous posts, Zergs have learnt how to deal with this, and adapted their Current Race Metagame. That's why they're beating it.
Crazerk Thank you for being on this thread and pointing out the most valueble points
I wanted to give you another rep point but the forum doesnt allow me to just yet :P
According to the graphs on TL, Protoss has a positive win rate ration longer than Zerg. Just to note.
Protoss have Forcefields which can
1.Stop reinforcements coming down the ramp
2. Trun a wide open space into a small choke
3. Use to delay rushes
4. trap units for storm
5. block the widest ramps of the 3rd expansion of xelnaga
6. Prevent anything from getting them surrounded
FFs cost too little energy and they have to be nerfed abit
without FF i do agree the toss will die miserably.
But at any wide open space a zerg engages such as in outside the bases of shaukuras plateau, the toss can just FF the entire whole area with 20 FORCE FIELDS! Most of them stacking up on each other but still enough to create choke just like at the backdoor entrance of xelnaga caverns.
FF are too big and cost too little energy.
Protoss underpowered? NO!
FORCE FIELDS OVER POWERED!
btw i play random on NA and I have not lost as Protoss yet.
Its just so easy to warp in units and attack.
Or just sit up on 3 base(especially taldarim) and mass up a death ball (while harrasing with voids/DT) against Zerg or Terran.
___________________________________
PapaBigBelly.588
Previously known as ArousalPerMinute
Last edited by PapaBigBelly; Fri, 3rd-Jun-2011 at 1:08 PM.
There are 3 heavily underused units in the game right now - warp prism, carrier and mothership. If you don't use some of your race tools, how can you claim you are underpowered? High level players are starting to realize that. We even saw a mommaship in GSL.
There are good situational units that are designed to do very specific things, like phoenix. Phoenix is successfully used for it's purpose when the game goes a particular way, which is fine. Voidray is fine, DT is fine. But having NOBODY EVER use 3 units out of 15? 20% of potential right down the drain.
What concerns me is terran though. All they need to win is a marauder-medivac ball with optional ghosts and vikings. Never see BC, ravens. Occasional nuke to harass 6-th expansion 40 minutes into the game is not a good metagame for a game of starcraft magnitude.
Baneling drops were obliterating terran infantry balls until they learned how to split.
There's nothing stopping Protoss players from doing this. I feel like this is a pretty good example.
As for using statistics as an indicator to determine whether or not a race is underpowered, that's all it's ever going to be - indicative. Drawing conclusions from this kind of data is a bit of a stretch.
What I would point out - albeit with a lack of examples - is that we haven't seen the same level of meta-game innovation from Protoss players as we have seen from their Terran and Zerg counterparts. Whether this is because individuals drawn to the Protoss playstyle or aesthetic are generally less innovative, or Protoss is more difficult to innovate with as a race, remains to be seen.
Much respect to Tom for such a well presented and evidenced post.
___________________________________ Apth.767 SEA | NA | KR
crAzerk your logical fallacy point is in fact a general problem that arises in attributing causation in relation to any observed association between two things (in this case, the association between a player's race choice and performance on the ladder or in tournaments).
While I would prefer not to go into too much detail about the finer points of philosophy and scientific method on a Starcraft 2 forum, what I am in fact doing is a form of inductive reasoning. Unfortunately, as the creator did not hand us a list of the laws of the Universe when he made it (or whatever you happen to believe), the only way we can discover "the rules" is through induction (reasoning from the specific to the general). Strictly, the statement "the sun has come up every morning in observed history; therefore the sun will come up tomorrow" is a form of inductive reasoning. It is also, in one sense fallacious. All that can really be said is "the sun has come up every morning so far; this data is consistent with the hypothesis that the sun comes up every morning (and will do so tomorrow)". But we cannot strictly exclude the possibility that the sun will not come up tomorrow. This is where we run into concepts of "strong induction" and "weak induction", which, for the sake of everyone's sanity, I will not go into.
To say that I have made a faulty deduction in the present case would be quite right, if I had sought to make a deduction (which I haven't!) Unfortunately, deduction is a luxury available only in pure mathematics. All other premises from which we make deductions are ultimately founded on induction. (I touched something very hot once and it burnt my hand. While I cannot logically deduce from this that touching all very hot things will burn my hand, I am going to treat it as a general working hypothesis.)
Purely anecdotal evidence
ArousalPerMinutes, with respect I think your post is a rather unfortunate example of what I mentioned in the OP: first focusing on one particular aspect of a race (in this case forcefields) in isolation from how all the aspects of the race come together as a whole to affect its performance; and second making an anecdotal statement to illustrate the point (eg to the effect "this is what I do, and I haven't lost").
At higher levels most balance problems are minor and its more differences between players
Zerg is flawed in design so they are always on the back foot, at least in early game. Call it QQ but the game was made too fast without zerg being able to adapt to what the opponent is doing equally as fast
However was have seen players like nestea get around this problem well
What crAzerk says is wrong though as the game is horridly imbalanced at lower levels and blizzard isn't intending to do anything about it. If they balance for the lower levels (even diamond) then it would break the game for higher level play
All I can say is look at Inka - how the hell did he get into the code S finals?
PvP and cheese lol
Crazerk said: "If you can actually point out a strategy that a race has that is ridiculously easy to execute yet ridiculously difficult to defend as another race, please do tell."
Uh, 2rax, 4gate, roach-ling all-in, etc etc.
All races have these sort of hard to hold, easy to execute rushes where the onus is on the macro player to defend. What this means is that macro players trying to play the game the "right way" and actually improve in the long run need to get better to withstand the cheese on ladder. Simple really, to get better you need to play better... Some players will have success with easy to execute all-in strategies but they will never go beyond a certain level and are usually prone to dieing to all-ins themselves.
In regard to what Meatex said in the first place:
The only way you can say the races are imbalanced at the lower level is because players are emulating different ways of playing from their favourite pro players. In general (and not as common as it was 4+ months ago) T and P lower players tend to emulate easy to execute rushes whilst the zergs try to emulate idra/nestea economic macro style without actually understanding the specifics or improving enough at the game to execute them versus poorly executed all-ins and harass. Basically theres players at the lower levels trying to execute builds which take practice, game knowledge and more practice! They often die to harass or all-ins and then say zerg is weak in the early game. THIS is NOT true. The truth is zergies are trying to do really hard macro oriented builds which they can't handle, and are usually just raging when they lose rather than seeking to actually perfect these difficult to learn styles.
I recomend these type of players should all-in on a regular basis themselves, bane busts, roach-ling all-ins and early-midgame timings are simpler to execute whilst still demanding many of the challenges and excitement of Starcraft. In no way are these forms of cheese or timings weaker then the T or P equivalents. It's just zerg players at the top don't use them quite as often and so their noobier brethren think they suck.
Cheese more zergies! And actually learn how to do it properly. So many zergs decide 1 day to try all-inning and they just suck so bad at it cos they're used to playing defensively. This is understandable. What really cheeses me off (see what I did there? :P) is that these players then say zerg cheese is worthless. It's noT!
I just don't think there are enough 'high level' tournament games to even think about using statistics at this point, and all ladder statistics are useless because there are so many factors in ladder success such as number of games played, playstyle, the maps that are played on or thumbed down, etc.
We went through a similar process with each race so far at various stages during release and something is always figured out that can turn balance about on its head. No one has figured out the best way of playing a race yet but if you take one matchup you will find in it certain builds or strategies that can make it look very one-sided towards one race.
___________________________________
Brendan "TAdeL" Ferguson Clan TA | Twitter | YouTube
Even the smallest donations help keep sc2sea running! All donations go towards helping our site run including our monthly server hosting fees and sc2sea sponsored community tournaments we host. Find out more here.