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gohuskies posted:Blizz clearly realized that there was too much mission choice in WOL and it was hurting the story, because they cut it down in HotS and LotV. I don't recall LotV as well but in Heart, you get to choose between mission chains but once you're in a chain, you're going all the way through it before you get to switch to a new one. Heart and Legacy both have the same structure here. The big difference is you do have to complete everything (I think) to start the final mission chain. Add me to the list of people who swore they heard about the protoss justification some 13 years ago, but memory is dumb and also suggestion is a thing.
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Oct 7, 2023 18:43
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| # ? Jun 1, 2024 00:17 |
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Intermission 18    Mengsk! It's always Mengsk! The end of the universe is coming and I should have known he'd be behind it! But how did he hybridize zerg and protoss? The technology required is way beyond anything terrans have developed. He can't be working alone on this...   The final research notice!  >Watch news.    Let's play that clip again. A commotion starts up in the background.    Okay, I know they can't do that much here, since there's a good chance first time players could miss the mission unlock, but did they really have to do the 'news broadcast is forcibly shut down' thing twice in a row?  >Talk to Tosh.    Searing. Blinding. Like feelin' the sun burning your face with your eyes squeezed shut. I never felt a thing like that before. I hope I never do again. >Talk to Swann.    Great, like we ain't got enough to handle with the zerg. Now we got Mengsk breedin' his own drat monsters too. Wait what the hell was that.  >Examine Protoss Tank.  >Use Research Console.  And now I'm getting money from spare protoss research.  The final set of protoss upgrades consist of the Tech Reactor, an add-on we've seen on a number of Dominion buildings that'll let me save real estate on multiple Tech Lab'd buildings.  Or the Orbital Strike, which lets me drop infantry units directly on a rally point.  Orbital Strike can open up cheese strats for a few missons, but Tech Reactor is better for general use.  Wait, is that...  Oh god it's the rocket outhouse from Zero Hour.   Good news, everyone!  You're all no longer allowed to delay these missions! 
BisbyWorl fucked around with this message at 03:54 on Oct 11, 2023 |
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Oct 8, 2023 03:32
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Tyrador, of course. Haven's probably just going to be one planet-sized mass of Zerg by the time we finally get to it.
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Oct 8, 2023 03:45
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Tyrador, obviously, that great big Hercules shuttle needs a chance to be a BIG SHOT.Regalingualius posted:Haven's probably just going to be one planet-sized mass of Zerg by the time we finally get to it. At this point Zerg have completely colonized the planet. There's been a couple generations there who never knew it as anything other than a Zerg world. They have zerg suburbs and zerg soda shops and zerg office jobs. Then Raynor comes in and just starts shooting up the place. Terror in the streets. Mass panic. No Jim. *You* are the monsters
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Oct 8, 2023 04:04
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bladededge posted:At this point Zerg have completely colonized the planet. There's been a couple generations there who never knew it as anything other than a Zerg world. They have zerg suburbs and zerg soda shops and zerg office jobs. Then Raynor comes in and just starts shooting up the place. Terror in the streets. Mass panic. We gear up for the inevitable final battle on Char, only to find the place deserted. Kerrigan decided to move the entire swarm to Haven.
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Oct 8, 2023 04:09
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The Zerg eventually got bored of Haven and moved on, leaving it empty of all sentient life. Since then, a new batch of human colonists has arrived.
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Oct 8, 2023 04:37
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idonotlikepeas posted:The Zerg eventually got bored of Haven and moved on, leaving it empty of all sentient life. Since then, a new batch of human colonists has arrived.
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Oct 8, 2023 04:42
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I know plenty of people right now who would take that deal, forget refugees living in a dystopian future.
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Oct 8, 2023 04:50
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Gotta be Tyrador. We haven't come this far just to save the colonists in a timely manner now.
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Oct 8, 2023 05:08
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Haven was the original benchwarmer, and it won't be getting off that bench if I have anything to say about it. Shame about the Vikings though. They're kinda cool. Oh well, the Hercules is about to be obsolete. As if it was ever relevant.
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Oct 8, 2023 09:06
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Tyrador, because I want to compare it with the Knights of Tyrador cosmetic pack. Also because I want to see how many lines Hanson has left.
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Oct 8, 2023 09:14
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So I was thinking, if we just skipped Haven completely, could we make Bisby finish the game without Vikings? And maybe pick the air heavy variant of that one mission in the future?  Warmachine posted:Haven was the original benchwarmer, and it won't be getting off that bench if I have anything to say about it. I haven't used medivacs once during my last playthrough, the healing is just too bad compared to upgraded medics. I did some drops with the Hercules, because yeeting huge bioball in like a second is always fun (if not great strategy).
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Oct 8, 2023 10:40
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Haven, more like Haven't. Please go to Tyrador, this obviously is the most important of the two.
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Oct 8, 2023 11:31
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We don't go to Haven.
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Oct 8, 2023 11:39
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We should never do Haven, and then Bisby should show us the mission as a bonus after finishing WoL.
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Oct 8, 2023 12:22
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Torrannor posted:We should never do Haven, and then Bisby should show us the mission as a bonus after finishing WoL. Starcraft II has three (four? (five???)) campaigns to do after Wings of Liberty. We could just leave it until after those. 
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Oct 8, 2023 12:38
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Ending the LP with Nova going to check out Haven. I like it.
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Oct 8, 2023 13:17
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Let's go to Haven and let Kerrigan finish her archeology degree, she can polish her thesis a bit more.
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Oct 8, 2023 13:39
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Tyrador, I want to see if Ariel has more to say about stuff.
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Oct 8, 2023 14:06
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 Time to go say hi to the ex.
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Oct 10, 2023 14:25
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Research Spotlight: Protoss Tier 1  Ultra-Capacitor
Now each of the weapon upgrades in the Armory and Engineering Bay increases attack speed by 5% in addition to increasing damage. This is just a free 15% increase in your killing speed by the end of the game. Simple as it gets.  Vanadium Plating
Now each of the armor upgrades in the Armory and Engineering Bay increases unit life by 5% in addition to increasing armor. As mentioned before, decreasing the enemy's survivability is a far more efficient way to increase yours. Winner: Ultra-Capacitor. Tier 2  Orbital Depots
Now an SCV simply has to place a Beacon, and the crew on the Hyperion will handle the rest. Good if you have a habit of getting supply blocked, less so if you're already on top of your macro.  Micro-Filtering
This makes it much easier to build high-tech armies, which are always bottlenecked by gas. Winner: Honestly, either one works here depending on how you play. Tier 3  Automated Refinery
Why the Protoss have never thought to transport vespene in this fashion is a mystery. Perhaps they lack Terran creativity and pragmatism, or possibly their primitive superstitions forbid the practice. Two consectutive upgrades to vespene harvesting, and this one has much more of an impact. Yeah, it's a bit more expensive than a stock Refinery, but that extra 25 minerals and 15 seconds are saving you the 150 minerals and 51 seconds needed to make the SCVs needed to saturate a geyser. On top of that, it lets you instantly max out on gas at the start of a mission without needing to pull SCVs from minerals, and if you're making a maxed out army it lets you cram in an extra 3 supply worth of units per geyser you tap. Also wow, 'primitive superstitions.' Did they really need to throw in some surprise racism?  Command Center Reactor
This breakthrough, made possible by recent insights into Protoss containment fields, should help us get a stronger foothold early in future missions. Ehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. I've actually cooled on this after thinking about it a bit. Like, sure this will let you get your economy going at super speed considering Wings just loves to start missions with 4-5 SCVs, but depending on your mission order you'll probably hit 15 protoss research around the same time as you unlock the Terran Building upgrades. At that point, you can just buy Orbital Commands and use MULEs to more than make up the difference in your early mineral income. Winner: Automated Refineries. Tier 4  Raven
Being a Detector doesn't matter in the campaign, at most you'll reveal a few burrowed units here and there. So what's left is a much more active counterpart to the Science Vessel, with no auto-casting abilities. Abilities  Build Auto-Turret
They do have one issue, however, in that their Structure tag lets Ultralisks use their Structure-exclusive ram attack which deals 60 damage a hit and crumple an Auto Turret in just three hits.  Build Point Defense Drone
However, if you haven't figured it out yet, the endgame of Wings is aaaaaaaaaallll about that TvZ, where the only ranged unit that isn't nailed by this are Roaches (for whatever reason). This lets a Raven completely shutdown Hydras and Mutas and render them completely helpless.  Seeker Missile
  Science Vessel
The fire-and-forget counterpart to the Raven, the Science Vessel has a bit more bulk than the Raven and has the always useful Nano-Repair. Abilities  Irradiate
As I just said, the endgame is purely against zerg so this becomes a universal damage button. Yeah, it'll hurt your own bio units too, but if you're making Science Vessels you're probably going for a mech army to begin with. It makes Seeker Missile even worse, honestly. Irradiate costs 1/5 the energy and deals 250 damage over the duration to everything in range.  Nano-Repair
An ability so good you don't need to care about Irradiate. High tech armies are pricey, and being able to keep them patched up without needing a group of SCVs to follow behind your army is extremely useful.  Winner: Science Vessels, just because they can keep an incredibly powerful, incredibly expensive army alive without needing to shell out money for repairs. Tier 5  Tech Reactor
This new add-on, known as the Tech Reactor, replaces the old Tech Lab and Reactor add-ons and allows us to train two of any unit type simultaneously. This one can actually be a bit awkward to use, depending on how you play. If you're just doing whatever, great! You save a lot of valuable base real estate and a good chunk of cash over having to make 2-4 of any given production structure! If you're steamrolling the map with a bio army, you're paying more money when you only really need one or two Tech Labs and a bunch of Reactors.  Orbital Strike
This technological marvel gives us the ability to reinforce instantly when far from our main base and to surprise the enemy from above. This can let you cheese a handful of missions by just tossing units at an objective that normally intends for you to get past an army to reach, but is a bit meh for general use. The infantry restriction means all those slower mechs and flyers still have to cross the distance like normal, and on defense missions (and there are a good number of them) all it really does is save you the five second trip from your base to your defensive line. Winner: Tech Reactors for normal play, Orbital Strike if you're going pure infantry. BisbyWorl fucked around with this message at 16:25 on Oct 10, 2023 |
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Oct 10, 2023 14:34
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BisbyWorl posted:Tech Reactor So, funny thing, those are the LOTV Multiplayer values of time for the Tech Lab and Reactor, and because we're in the campaign they're actually the original Wings of Liberty values of 25 seconds for Tech Lab and 50 for Reactors... Which is actually kinda weird. See, the reason you want tech labs is to unlock access to more advanced units. Tech Reactors cost 50 more gas than Labs, where gas is already the bottleneck for high tech units such as siege tanks, and takes as long as reactors to build. It removes your ability to build anything but tech reactors, so in essence this means that taking Tech Reactors actually technically delays the first tank you build by 25 seconds. Of course, in return you get a second queue, allowing for a second tank to build and saving you 20 seconds on building a second tank... but if you don't have the 150/125 to pony up for a second tank, that queue goes idle. It's not really a distinction that super matters but it is funny to see such a high level piece of tech actually be a tradeoff depending on how important getting a second tank is compared to getting the first.
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Oct 10, 2023 15:40
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BisbyWorl posted:Winner: Tech Reactors for normal play, Orbital Strike if you're going pure infantry. Like you need anything beyond the MMM trifecta to steam roll WoL
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Oct 10, 2023 15:58
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One little thing about Vanadium Plating. Vanadium isn't an alloy, it's an already existing metal, but I guess calling it neo neo steel was too easy.
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Oct 10, 2023 16:04
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Torchlighter posted:So, funny thing, those are the LOTV Multiplayer values of time for the Tech Lab and Reactor, and because we're in the campaign they're actually the original Wings of Liberty values of 25 seconds for Tech Lab and 50 for Reactors... Noted, went back and fixed it. poo poo like this is part of why I'm not bothering to do skirmish write-ups. There's just so much stuff that changes from game to game.
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Oct 10, 2023 16:26
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BisbyWorl posted:Noted, went back and fixed it. And that's not even getting into the concept of co-op, which is like Blizzard took the campaign and skirmish rules and smashed them together into a strangely compelling format which wouldn't work for versus but is great for letting two people use fun toys against the AI. Seriously, I'm not comfortable with how much I'm actually enjoying co-op--moreso even than ladder. Once again, if not for Bisby, I'd have not given SC2 a second look in 2023, and yet here I am wasting hours on a ten year old RTS game from the sex pest company.
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Oct 10, 2023 18:56
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Warmachine posted:And that's not even getting into the concept of co-op, which is like Blizzard took the campaign and skirmish rules and smashed them together into a strangely compelling format which wouldn't work for versus but is great for letting two people use fun toys against the AI. I think the spice to co-op is that Blizzard simply does not have to give a gently caress about co-op factions being 'balanced' or 'challenging' and could go completely nuts. If you want a harder experience, that's what mutations and solo challenges and whatnot are for. Stukov in co-op is some of the best RTS fun I've ever had.
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Oct 10, 2023 18:59
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Co Op is a lot of fun and while it's got problems like Zeratul being obnoxiously overpowered it is something that RTS really needs to revisit to pick up steam.
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Oct 10, 2023 20:04
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SIGSEGV posted:One little thing about Vanadium Plating. This annoys me too; besides just being bad engineering, it's incredibly lazy writing. If you know your periodic table it sounds just as dumb as, "We have created a new lightweight alloy called aluminum. Aluminum diffuses weapon impacts much more effectively than traditional armor plating, and it better preserves the life of our units." Could you not have written something a little more interesting, or at least taken a second to come up with a name for a new alloy? Though I suppose it's not as bad as some of the other writing in that post. It's got some of the prime hallmarks of writers not thinking about their setting. The dig at the Protoss which gets called out is particularly funny. Yeah sure the Protoss are dumb for not teleporting their gas, but if Raynor or the Dominion get access to teleportation technology and don't do anything with it except teleport gas (and this is the case!) they're much dumber. It really speaks to the writers wanting to justify some kind of upgrade without sparing a single thought for how it should affect the broader setting. Same thing with the nanotech mentioned on the science vessel; if you have access to the kind of advanced processes which let you program a swarm of nanites that can repair a complicated mechanical structure in seconds, you are at the level of technology where it is indistinguishable from magic and the literal only limitation on what you can do is what you can imagine. Aside from being ridiculous, it also clashes terribly with the bulky Aliens-style futurism of Starcraft as set out in the original game.
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Oct 10, 2023 20:40
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if a Protoss ever tells you to insert something in your gas warper, they are not trying to be helpful
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Oct 10, 2023 20:46
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I'll be honest, my reaction to "why don't the protoss do this? What a bunch of idiots!" was to immediately assume the terrains were doing something stupidly dangerous and prone to exploding because there was a reason the protoss don't do that.
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Oct 10, 2023 20:54
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Protoss: "We already stress the warp network to its peak when setting up a base and deploying a force. The damage to subspace takes ages to heal and constant micro-warps would just make it worse, rendering the area dead to the warp network and causing catastrophic breakdowns in-" Terrans: "LOL superstitious idiots, we're not gonna be here still in five days even, let's turn reality to swiss cheese"
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Oct 10, 2023 20:59
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FoolyCharged posted:I'll be honest, my reaction to "why don't the protoss do this? What a bunch of idiots!" was to immediately assume the terrains were doing something stupidly dangerous and prone to exploding because there was a reason the protoss don't do that. Yeah, short-range warping vespene gas probably risks some sort of warp implosion that would wipe out your entire infrastructure. Of course, this is Stettman talking, whose attitude to "there is a possibility this sample might eat the ship" is "better not tell Swann, he'd make me get rid of it". He'd probably call it a primitive superstition even if he knew exactly what the risk is.
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Oct 10, 2023 20:59
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disposablewords posted:Protoss: "We already stress the warp network to its peak when setting up a base and deploying a force. The damage to subspace takes ages to heal and constant micro-warps would just make it worse, rendering the area dead to the warp network and causing catastrophic breakdowns in-" Wasn't it the secret mission in SC1 that had a bit where Terrans struggled to get a stolen Pylon working without exploding? Back when I'd heard that the SC2 campaign would include campaign-only upgrades, I thought Raynor's Raiders were going to turn into a Terran/Protoss hybrid race due to Raynor being buddies with them. Teenage me was imagining poo poo like vultures firing reaver scarabs, battlecruisers with interceptors riding wingmate, and ghosts with psi storm. Cythereal fucked around with this message at 21:04 on Oct 10, 2023 |
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Oct 10, 2023 21:02
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“In a stunning development, rebel James Raynor and his entire crew were found dead on their flagship Hyperion just hours ago. The investigation is still underway, but preliminary reports suggest that they were all killed in an accident involving experimental vespene gas teleportation technology that led to a rapid lethal buildup of gas. In other news…”
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Oct 10, 2023 21:04
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Alternatively, "Safe warp use requires psi-calibration that 98% of you don't even have senses for!" I don't know, I just like making up dumb excuses to patch such oddities sometimes.
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Oct 10, 2023 21:05
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FoolyCharged posted:I'll be honest, my reaction to "why don't the protoss do this? What a bunch of idiots!" was to immediately assume the terrains were doing something stupidly dangerous and prone to exploding because there was a reason the protoss don't do that. Yeah, and Stettman pulling a reddit atheist feels totally in character as well
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Oct 10, 2023 21:11
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This is just another one of those situations where I'd love to take a character from the game, and sit them down in front of the game itself just to see how they'd react to it (and how they'd play). In this case, have a certain Phase- Smith from Legacy of the Void play through Wings of Liberty, and make sure he reads all of Stetmann's notes and all the technology descriptions and such, just to see how he'd react to it all.
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Oct 10, 2023 21:13
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BlazetheInferno posted:This is just another one of those situations where I'd love to take a character from the game, and sit them down in front of the game itself just to see how they'd react to it (and how they'd play). He just spends the whole time screaming about Space OSHA violations.
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Oct 10, 2023 21:19
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| # ? Jun 1, 2024 00:17 |
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Theory - Protoss have probes handle the mining stuff, and the probes can't be trusted with teleporting gas. Meanwhile, the auto refinery do require someone at the base to make sure nothing explodes - and as far as the protoss are concerned, this is a waste of staff that could be better used elsewhere.
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Oct 10, 2023 21:24
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