Balance Testing
BlizzCon is coming up, so we want to push the Ultralisk and Cyclone changes to go into effect after the event. BlizzCon gives us the chance to watch the top players compete at the highest levels, which is another opportunity to make balance changes to fine tune the game. With the offseason coming up a few weeks after BlizzCon, we have a great opportunity to get more wide-spread testing, so we plan to apply the balance patch to the ladder at that point. Note that this doesn’t mean all of these changes are final—we will continue to work with all of you to iterate and improve on these changes to get them in a good state for season 1 next year.
Maps
After the BlizzCon finals, we’d like to change out the map pool during the offseason and replace them with familiar existing maps. That way we can focus on the final numbers tuning of the major patch changes during the last ladder season of this year. We’d also like to make sure that the map pool consists of a diverse set of maps so we can be confident we covered all our bases.
The map design team has come up with a rough, initial set of maps for your consideration, so let’s start talking about which of these maps need to be changed out before we finalize the map pool.
Daybreak
Dusk Towers
Echo
Habitation Station
Ulrena
Newkirk Precinct
Whirlwind
Keep in mind that we need to keep a diverse map pool, so if you remove a map of a certain type, please only suggest another map of the same type as its replacement. For example, if you want to remove Dusk Towers, please suggest another macro map.
