Starcraft 3 - Defining the new game rules
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My idea dated back to 04 July 2005. Since Starcraft 2 is building up its momentum, I repost the thread (the original expired already).
http://www.sgforums.com/?action=thread_display&thread_id=140455
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Episode 1
Blizzard has released MMORPG Starcraft as its new award-winning title in year 2008. This is a new game from Blizzard that took 3 years to complete after the World of Warcraft.
This new title emphasize a true battlefield experience that everyone is playing an unit in the game, as this is the new direction in the MMORPG trend.
The MMORPG Starcraft starts with the original 3 races but it will open more unknown races along the way, according to Blizzard. The revolutionary element in the new game is everyone is possible to become a hero when it gains more experience and respect in the game.
The game starts off with no central governments. Everyone is free to form its own government to compete in this resource-short planet. It totally follows the Darwinian idea of evolution - selection of nature - survivor the fittest.
I joined the game in the first round. Starting as a civilian. Soon, I participated in a marine recruit campaign to build a force called The Union. The group was pathetic. There were only 18 soldiers with a few machine guns in the Union. The way we built up a nation was a legend. The deciding war in which we defeated an outnumbered Zerg force and gained control to our economic resource was still a hot topic among others. From there on, we rely on our resource to build up our whole chain of economy and military. We enjoyed a couple of game years time of peace which we can concentrate on our nation building, as other forces were busy building theirs too.
However, peace doesn't last long. Our neighbor force The Fallens started to eye on our resource rich territory. They plotted a large scale war on us. The worst thing is we were hidden from the evil fact and caught off guard!
When our territory border scout reported the invasion of The Fallens, it was too late to recall our scouting Battle Cruisers Fleet. We were on our own to handle The Fallens.
I was the 4th ranking general in The Union. I was having lunch during the time. MMORPG Starcraft AI software will take over routine work while the players are not online. Suddenly, my admiral phoned me to get prepared of it. I immediately got into the MMORPG Starcraft realm to organize our defending force.
Things aren't optmistic. We have only a group of Marine infantry of 46. Most of them are novice players and haven't had any real battle experience. The old birds have been promoted to pilot the Battle Cruissers already, anyway. A fleet of 5 deadly Siege Tanks are in place, this let me feel slightly easy.
I recalled 2 Battle Cruissers for help. These two newly-built ships are under my control. However, Sam, the second ranking general doesn't want to put in 100% reinforcement for us. He just wanted to protect his own territory. I made a complaint to the highest ranking admiral, Rob. He said he would think of a way... -
Episode 2
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Rob contacted Sam and lectured on him the importance of keeping my territory safety intact. After these 3 gaming years (1 gaming year is equivalent to 1 calendar week) of development, The Union has morphed into a nation of 3 cities. Rob, as the highest ranking admiral, controls of the biggest and the earliest city. Rob's city has the most complete facilities and infrastructure. We are not particular worried about Rob's city as its defence will be able to take The Fallens' attack in a rather long period. That would be enough to wait until our Battle Cruisser fleet's return to turn the tide.
The Fallens' target is obviously on my city or Sam's city. Our cities are relatively newer and lack of decent defence systems. On the other hand, our new cities are giving our nation more vibrant economic advantages with more resources and income.
Sam and I were not on good term since day one. We were fighting very hard to climb to this level. We were always opponents, though we were in the same nation. We were supposed to float together, sink together.
Looking at the map, I was pretty certain that The Fallens' army would defnitely head towards my city, instead of Sam's. I believed that Sam's unwillingness to send out his elite Battle Cruisser fleet has his own interest calculation.
On the surface, Sam agreed to dispatch his fleet once The Fallens reached 100km from my city's outskirt with an obvious attack target intend. But who knows he would really do that? I asked myself.
Under the new MMORPG Starcraft system, a leader is chosen using a democracy method. One person one vote at least, person with battle credit will have more votes accordingly. Rob was the undisputed highest leader because of his charism and incredible battle credit. Remember the very first war to gain control to the economic resource? It was his strategy that lead our smaller army to victory.
Therefore, it is extremely important that a leader to continue to grow his city, economy, military and influence. With a bigger city and economy, you can support more guys. Those guys will in return vote you to become the leader (under the normal situation), which will gain you more power.
My 2 battle cruissers are on their way back home. 46 marines and 5 tanks were all I have. I gave my men a speech before they headed to their positions in the field. 'Defend our city, no matter what it costs', these are the words I share with my men.
The sky was so cloudy and dark. It signified a big battle was approaching. I looked at the skyline, far far away, knowing that our enemy was coming closer. I grew a bit nervous. It wasn't easy to reach my current status. Though I could restart the game if I were defeated in this coming war. I would need to restart everything. I wasn't sure I would be able to make a full comeback for next time.
I decided to lead a small squad of vulture riders to make some initial contact with the army. Hoping they will be delayed and become hessitant for a full attack. Then, I left with another 3 vulture riders towards the enemy.
The Fallens was, in fact, an alien race to human - the Zerg. It was the parent to the zerg force which The Union destroyed in the First War. The Fallens had sent out a few small scale disturbing forces after the First War, but it didn't cause much trouble to us. However, this time wasn't the same anymore.
My intelligence officers told me that they saw hundreds of Zerglings running their way towards here. It was an amazing number they never saw before. We all knew that how cruel a Zergling can be. Not even the bravest warrior in The Union would want to face it without a proper machine gun.
4 vultures went in the direction of The Fallens. A first blood would be drawn soon...
(To be continued...) -
Episode 3
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I summoned the best elite warriors of my team to go together with me. They have been with The Union since the early days. I knew them very well, especially their battling technique, experience and strategy.
In MMORPG Starcraft, a Terran player usually joins as a marine with basic firearms. As he promotes throughout the game, he will be able to access and control more sophiscated weaponry. For example, Battle Crussier which is one of the deadliest weapons in Terran's arsenal.
The other interesting and new aspect is, the Terran player is given the authority to command more men when he climbs to higher career ladder. Each government may choose the best organization structure they feel most comfortable. For example, The Union is practising a well-defined smaller team structure - Every 10 marines/units form a squad, directly commanded by a squad leader. Next, every 10 squad leaders form the next level team, commanded by another higher ranking commander. This structure continues until Rob's level.
I, being a newly-promoted 4th ranking commander, was commanding an army of 46 marines, 5 tanks, 2 Battle Crussiers and the newest territory establishment in The Union. My force was rather weak due to our new territory status. However, we were building up. We were training more men and were building more advanced weapons at the moment.
The sudden invasion of The Fallens had destroyed my initial planning. I had to counter them with a much weaker force that I had at the time. Too bad. I wished if they came at a much later time...
The Fallens was still far away from my territory border, about 200km away. The Vulture automobile we were riding was a revolutionary design by Terran scientists. Its highest speed is 350kmph. I liked to ride on it to race around. The feeling was like playing a car racing game in Starcraft. We would reach the first The Fallens' striker in 30 minutes time.
My cell phone suddenly rang up. I paused the game for a while to pick up the call. It was Blizzard's far east game master. He told me that Blizzard was interested to broadcast the upcoming war between The Union and The Fallens. Oh my god! This was a great opportunity! Every player, who plays MMORPG Starcraft, hopes to run into this offer from Blizzard. It basically means that you will earn a huge amount of prize money from that!
Let me do the math for you. Blizzard will sell the broadcast right to any interested media company. Given Blizzard's popularity, it is almost equivalent to broadcasting Olympic Games. A lots of MMORPG Starcraft fans will tune in to watch the selected shows. Advertisement will surely follow.
Now, Blizzard will take 60% of the earning from broadcasting right and distribute the remaining to the involving governments. The victor of the war will get 35% and the loser will still get 5%. Not a bad deal, huh? This was what I thought.
I called Rob to discuss about the details. He agreed to it. Then we were on. The Fallens would definitely agree to it as they would think they would be the winner of the war (else they won't pick up this war). The only problem with this broadcasting was it would draw much attention from the community. People would be able to scrutinize your status from the broadcasting. Although according to the rule, there will be a 1 gaming year (1 calendar week) of war-free zone declaration for the involving governments and territories, it is still quite risky to draw much attention, especially when you were still not that strong.
The broadcast would be on the air at 8:00pm that day. I looked at my watch, there were another 2 hours to go. Let me had a quick dinner first. I told my 4 vulture guys to rest for a while.
*****
200km from The Union's 4th ranking commander, Law's (that was my nick in the game) territory.
A mass group of Zergling was holding to the ground, waiting for a Zergling Lord's direction. The Zergling Lord commanded a striking force of 80 over zerglings in this invasion.
The Zergling Lord was actually deciphering a secret order from its highest admiral. The secret order contained a very evil conspiracy plot.
(to be continued...) -
Episode 4
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The Zergling Lord couldnÂ’t believe in the order it just received. However, it had to execute it. In a well-structured military organization demonstrated in MR^2 (MMO-RTS-RPG, a new term coined for this kind of new gaming concept) Starcraft, one of the obvious ways to get promoted is to follow higher-level generalÂ’s order and execute it excellently. Otherwise, you can easily be replaced by any other person who is more willing to follow the instruction, anytime. This appointment power is one of the tools that enables higher-level general to rule effectively.
People who do not like work under organization or nation can choose to become a wandering ranger, move around in the realm of MR^2 Starcraft alone. In fact, more people choose to join a nation and hope in one day will climb to the power submit. Anyway, it is much more influential a nation leader can be than a lone high-skilled ranger.
The zergling horde was getting impatient to just hold to the ground doing nothing. The unrest began to spread in the horde. They wanted to taste some blood, rather than just waiting at this place. The Zergling Lord directed its army to advance. The zerglings couldnÂ’t wait any longer and rushed at the highest speed. They were so many and you could see dust covered every corner of the place when they passed-by.
What the zergling horde didnÂ’t realize was we were already following them, from a safe distance, monitoring their movement. I really didnÂ’t want to get any closer. It was so frightening to see such a huge amount of zerglings moving in a group. They had the strength to level everything blocking their way.
My memory reminded me the time when I was still a private, scouting The Union’s territory border in a small squad of 8 marines, many years ago. It was just a very ordinary routine checkup, but the ending wasn’t ordinary at all. I was still troubled by the same nightmare until now – zerglings seemed to be everywhere, coming out from every tree. We totally lost control on the situation. Our small squad of 8 simply fired at will. It didn’t work at all. Most of our bullets just hit the air. We felt so hopeless and helpless. We realized that we were surrounded by an outnumbered zergling force. Those brute zerglings began to rip us apart, one by one. The scene reminded me of the Doom3 scenario, the spooky Mars base came to life, monsters came out from dark corner and caught you in surprise…
I was the only survivor of the ambush. I was the one because they chose me to be the one – they wanted to leave a survivor to go back and tell the story. Those zerglings stood in a line in front of me, teasing my inability to fight them. Then I realized that there were only 5 zerglings in total - 8 marines couldn’t handle 5 zerglings. I couldn’t sleep well in that night. I woke up many times from the same nightmare. It was simply a huge blow to me. I vowed to repay them in double. This was the golden opportunity to show them our muscle.
4 vulture bikes scattered in 4 far corners. We were waiting the zergling horde to enter into the heart of our mine field. Our high tech binoculars enable us to monitor the zerglings from a great distance. The zergling horde didnÂ’t realize that they were getting closer to hell. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, Â… We activated the mines. The zerglings immediately sense something wasnÂ’t good but it was too late. They tried to escape and totally lost their formation.
BoomÂ… a great explosion happened. 4 spider mines killed off 12 zerglings, not a bad deal! The Zergling Lord was indeed a superior leader. It quickly reassembled its force, putting them back to a good formation shape and came after us. We tried to return fire, however the minimum firearm we have on the vulture bike wasnÂ’t sufficient to hurt this huge group of zerglings. We were forced to retreat after suffering serious damage from the brute zerglingsÂ’ claws.
We headed back to the main base at full speed. The zerglings were following but they couldnÂ’t get us given our high speed bike. The broadcast had silently been on air in the middle of the battle. It drew attention of 50,000 audiences in the first 20 minute broadcast. According to initial estimate, it would bring 186,000 dollars to the ultimate winner.
As the FallensÂ’ force has gone beyond 100km safety line, I called Sam for reinforcement. Damn! Sam didnÂ’t pick up his cell phone.
70 zerglings are going to have a direct face-to-face skirmish with my smaller army soon. Reinforcement has yet been confirmed. I was so worriedÂ…
(to be continuedÂ…) -
starcraft 2 havent come out u talking about starcraft 3 wtf
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with blizzard, it is not hard to imagine....Originally posted by the.owl:starcraft 2 havent come out u talking about starcraft 3 wtf
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starcraft 3 will probably come out in 2018 or later.
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Originally posted by Gordonator:starcraft 3 will probably come out in 2018 or later. Hell, yea.... not long more