StarCraft 2 Beta...what balance means

Normally, gaming forums require that one wade through hundreds of uneducated posts before coming across useful information.  I do it anyways because every once in awhile, I find little gems of wisdom and insight that are truly remarkable.

Today's little tid-bit comes from a poster called Bibdy.bobdyboo:

Pretty much all of the balance changes have been made to encourage unit diversity. People always look at patch note changes and assume that changes were made to find that perfect balance point. They're really not. Roaches were nerfed because they were too prominent in ZvZ. Hydras were nerfed again because people simply used them too much (and still do) to counter almost everything. Marauders had Conc Shell put on an upgrade, because it screwed up the early-game PvT dynamic, where super-fast Marauders were hammering on Protoss bases at the start of matches and Protoss couldn't counter them for like 2 minutes. Marines and Reactors had their build times increased in response to very commonly used quick Marine/SCV charges in PvT strats (in Korea mostly). SCVs had their health reduced to combat the same problem. The Dark Shrine had its cost and build time increased in reaction to that, since DTs could now 1-shot SCVs and be much stronger against Terrans (this was one of those rare, pre-emptive nerfs). Blizzard are only going to be happy when they land balance at the exact point you're talking about. When there's massive unit diversity, tons of crazy strats, tons of crazy counter-strats AND a 50% win rate for everybody. That is never going to happen so long as people keep sitting on the boards screaming that X or Y is overpowered. It'll happen when you play a *%@*load of games, give them lots of data to work with and they make gradual tweaks here and there to encourage different unit usage and just see what people come up with. For instance, now that Immortals come out later, are Roach-rushes going to be overpowered against Protoss? The only one's who know for sure, are Blizzard. If its a problem, they'll fix it in some manner. Another Roach nerf isn't going to be because they thing Roaches are "10% too powerful!". It'll be because there's some strat that's very common, strong and barely counterable.

Did you see that.  I like this definition of balance much better than my previous one (I had said Balanced Enough  is when the game is decided by player skill rather than choice of faction), and this is the model I believe has lead Blizzard to success with the first StarCraft.  Variety of strategy is key.  Most forum posters complain about individual units being overpowered.  Sure we could analyze why that unit is too strong for it's cost and tech level, but there are more dynamics to strategy than just mass producing a single unit (even zerg will fail if they attempt to mass only one thing).  "See the forest not the trees" is an analogy that my mom liked to say.  There's a bigger picture out there, and the multitude of dynamics involved in strategy games is what makes looking at individual unit stats less than useful.
Trends and following the Emergence of new strategies is what needs to happen.  With such a large beta tester base, we can view these things and observe and tweak until things are "balanced enough".  After all, the game would be awfully boring if counters were written in stone for you, or if the units were all equal.

If we can observe that all factions have a variety of strategy that involves a multitude of units being used at high levels of gameplay then we can infer that the game is balanced.  If a unit is over-utilized, then we can infer that said unit could be overpowered.  Certain units are meant to be more versatile than others.  For example Marines, Stalkers, and Hydralisks.  As units that can strike both air and ground, you can be certain that most mid and late game strategies will involve them or be prepared to deal with them.  Does this make them overpowered?  No probably not.  It makes them useful.  These units are designed to be "all around" units, so that they easily fit themselves into various strategies is not surprising.  There is a limit though.  If the strategy is such that these "backbone" units become the only unit used in the strategy, then there's obviously an imbalance if they're defeating units that are meant to destroy them.

But if we see a specialized unit...say the Dark Templar being utilized with great frequency, then we start worrying.  A clear harassment and tricky unit, a DT should not be something that a player relies exclusively on.  A few to harass workers or pick off buildings, or mix a few in with your ground army to make your army more offensive than it seems at first glance.  Either strategy still requires other things to compose the bulk of your army with specialized units as "assistance".

Units have roles, if they exceed their roles, then perhaps they're imbalanced, but noting if something exceeded is dependent on strategies as a whole...not specific unit stats.  Ultimately the change in balance will be derived at the unit level, but it will be made in response to strategic situations and variety.