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The way the DT-only function works (as far as I know based on my way too many hours spent in StarEdit back in the day) is that there's an 'Area' set up around the cerebrate. It's a box drawn in the editor that matches the build grid. In this case it's likely one square out on every side of the cerebrate, and there's a 'Trigger' set something like this: Do: Forever Condition: Unit (Cerebrate) dies Condition: Unit (Zeratul) Not In Area Trigger: Spawn Cerebrate in center of Area And then the win condition is probably something like "If no Cerebrates in both areas and Zeratul in one area then win". Also, the game checks triggers once every second, so it's theoretically possible to kill the cerebrate with Zeratul and move him out of the Area before the trigger checks, causing it to respawn. JackSplater fucked around with this message at 15:47 on Nov 16, 2023 |
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Nov 16, 2023 15:24
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JackSplater posted:The way the DT-only function works (as far as I know based on my way too many hours spent in StarEdit back in the day) is that there's an 'Area' set up around the cerebrate. It's a box drawn in the editor that matches the build grid. In this case it's likely one square out on every side of the cerebrate, and there's a 'Trigger' set something like this: could it also just check to see if both are dead when one dies instead of every second?
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Nov 17, 2023 11:19
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JackSplater posted:The way the DT-only function works (as far as I know based on my way too many hours spent in StarEdit back in the day) is that there's an 'Area' set up around the cerebrate. It's a box drawn in the editor that matches the build grid. In this case it's likely one square out on every side of the cerebrate, and there's a 'Trigger' set something like this: Interesting! That makes sense based on what I remember of the editor. Incidentally I wonder if they bothered with the "If no Cerebrates and Zeratul" or just did "If no Cerebrates." If you kill both Cerebrates at the exact same frame, could you win without having Zeratul nearby? Could be a fun sort of cheese strategy. Well actually I guess whatever the opposite of cheese is (...evaporated milk?), since it'd probably be way more difficult to pull off than just winning the mission straight. I mean your take is probably correct and it probably checks for Zeratul nearby. But...
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Nov 17, 2023 14:13
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lobster22221 posted:could it also just check to see if both are dead when one dies instead of every second? Possibly? I'm gonna have to redownload the editor to look at this, it's been twenty years. So it's probably code:Player 1 brings 1 Zeratul to CerebrateBox. Player 2 commands 0 Cerebrate. Clear Switch 1 There'd be another one, but I think there's a couple ways to do it. I'd probably do something like code:Switch isn't cleared Create cerebrate at CerebrateBox for player 2 The same for the second AI cerebrate, just at CerebrateBox2 and clearing Switch 2. Then, code:This would actually make it so that if Zeratul isn't in the box at all, you outright can't win, so no cheesing it. Although with starcraft's pathing and controls it'd be extremely difficult to time it well enough to do so. There doesn't actually seem to be a way for the game to check if a player owns a specific number of a specific unit at a specific spot, which is strange. Coulda sworn that was an option, but again, 20 years ago and I was barely a teenager. And was also causing some confusion until I thought to check if there are two different players with cerebrates, and yep, sure are. You could theoretically have one player with two cerebrates, but one would be Cerebrate and one would be CerebrateDaggoth, since they're different units so that they can have different portraits in the mission briefing. It's weird, though, because I could have sworn I've seen a clip of someone killing a cerbrate with zeratul and it respawning because he was slightly too far away from it. EDIT: Found it. GiantGrantGames' no-deaths SC1 run. Another editor fun fact: The trigger to issue a command to a unit didn't exist in the base game. It was added in brood war. (It also didn't allow Hold commands, just Move Stop and Attack) So tower defense custom maps couldn't (as far as I know) exist in base game. How did Terran 3 work, then? Well, there is a trigger available that tells all units owned by a player to attack move to a location. Which is why if you work on clearing the map instead of building a defense it gets significantly easier for every base you clear out. JackSplater fucked around with this message at 17:18 on Nov 18, 2023 |
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Nov 17, 2023 14:44
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I have a far simpler theory for why the Arbiter has an attack. It's to stop it from happily flying into enemy lines when you a-move your entire army forward, like all those other casters kid me never used. 
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Nov 17, 2023 16:30
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Unit Spotlight: Arbiter The Arbiter as it appears in the manual. Cost: 100 minerals, 350 Vespene, 4 supply HP: 200 Shields: 150 Armour: 1 Size: Large Damage: 10 (+1) Damage Type: Explosive DPS: 5.3 Range: 5 Speed: 5 Sight: 9 Special: Cloaking Field, Spellcaster The pinnacle of the Protoss tech tree, the Arbiter is their aerial spellcaster and one of the most powerful units in the game. Of course, it would have to be – 350 is the single highest vespene cost in the game, unit or building, and its mineral cost is a fair bit less but still non-trivial. Fortunately, the Arbiter is also the most durable spellcaster in the game, sporting a combined 250 HP. Still not a great HP:cost ratio, but it at least makes your considerable investment in these units a bit safer. As we’ve seen, the Arbiter initially emerges from warp without any spells, possessing only a truly pitiful attack and its cloaking field. The cloaking field has a range of 5 and as the previous mission illustrates is actually incredibly useful and powerful, despite how easily nullified it might seem. Again, it helps to think of it less as being cloaking in the way a Wraith or Ghost or Dark Templar would use it, a tool for covert operations and precision strikes, and instead think of it more as like an obfuscating miasma that breaks target acquisition logic, makes focus-firing difficult, and helps to ensure the survival of wounded units that need to be micro’d back.  The Arbiter’s cloaking range - as you can see, it’s pretty significant. Also, it's funny - I complain about the Arbiter's speed, but it's the same as the Science Vessel, which I find quite reasonable. I had to check the numbers a few times because the Arbiter definitely feels slower. I wonder if something about the cloaking field creates some sort of optical illusion of slower movement? Or maybe I'm just crazy. The Arbiter also gets three upgrades, and all three of them have the same cost: 150 minerals and 150 vespene (although they do have slightly different research times). Let’s start with the one we’ve seen if anything a bit too much of, Stasis Field. If you’ll remember the AoE (Area of Effect. You’ll have to check out Jossar’s excellent thread for the other AoE) mechanicspost from not too long ago, it’s covering a 3x3 area, which I’m going to dub Small Area. Every unit in that area, friend or foe, gets locked in Stasis for ~43 seconds – the same duration as Lockdown. Unlike Lockdown, the units within are invulnerable during that time, unaffected by attack, ability, or spell until the field ends.  A picture we saw in the AoE Mechanicspost but might as well repost it here. Young me saw this and thought “Okay, it makes units invincible but also it affects a bunch of them so it balances out to being about as good as Lockdown” and boy was I wrong. Like, not that Lockdown’s bad or anything, but removing an entire chunk of the enemy’s army for almost a full minute is just so strong. Especially against Terran. Just instantaneously creating a 43-second hole in their tank line at the touch of a button. What a beautiful unit. The unit itself also creates a big advantage over Lockdown – when you’re looking to, say, shut down a tank line on a ridge, it’s way easier to do when you’re a flying unit that can just glide over and plunk a spell from nearly outside the enemy’s visual range. I also have a theory that for the same reason Irradiate would be kind of a crappy spell if it were on the Ghost while Lockdown would be pretty dope if it were on the Science Vessel, but that’s neither here nor there. You’ll never see it used this way, but I guess in theory it has defensive purposes as well. Cast it on your own units to keep them safe from a nuke or Storm or Plague or something. Again, an insane choice that in competitive play or even campaign play you’ll almost never see, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it saw use in some puzzle-style extra-extra-difficult custom campaigns (I don’t actually know if they exist I’m just assuming that at least some HoMM 3 mapmakers also have made maps for Brood War). And hey, if you accidentally Stasis some of your own units while trying to get the enemy, at least you know they’ll be safe, which is more than can be said for Plague. We also get access to Recall. A powerful spell that takes all friendly units in a 4x4 area, which I’m gonna dub “Medium Area,” at least for now, and brings them to the caster’s location. This spell has unlimited range, able to pull units from anywhere on the map, giving it almost limitless usefulness. Instantly yanking units around is almost always good. That being said, it’s not quite “instant” - the spell happens in two “phases,” by first warping out the target units, then warping them in. It only takes a second or so, but it’s still not quite immediate.     Recall in action: Note that it takes all the Ghosts except for the outermost ring. Also note that when it warps them in, it does not maintain their formation - something to keep in mind. This gives the spell a particular quirk, but we'll talk about it down below in the Vs Terran section. Then there’s the Khaydarin Core, the requisite energy upgrade. It’s… generally not used? I’m actually a little out of the loop on the meta for this one, but as far as I know it’s not too common. Let’s bust out the Moar Space Mana Criteria again: 1. You’re getting enough of the unit that it’s worth having extra energy for it: Probably? The Arbiter is extremely high tech, moreso than the Defiler or Science Vessel, and so is generally very much a late-game unit. But if the game goes long enough that you’re getting them at all, yeah, you may end up getting three or four of them, so let’s say sure. 2. Do you get any extra use out of the extra energy? 250 Space Mana is going to allow an Arbiter to drop Recall and Stasis Field in one go, which can be useful, so let’s say sure. It’s not as important as, say, a Defiler being able to drop both Plague and Dark Swarm in succession, and certainly not as good as the High Templar adding in a third Storm, but it’s good enough. 3. Will you actually get the extra energy? Probably not. Arbiters aren’t quite at the Vessel level of “zooming around constantly dispensing spells” but they’re still generally going to be headed straight to the front lines where they’ll be working their magic as soon as they’ve got the energy to do it, so they’re almost never going to be reaching 250 energy. With their cheapest spell being 100 energy, they’re also not reaping huge dividends from the +12.5 spawning energy. I mean, it’s nice, you know, helps to cut down on energy-charging time, but where it’s not immediately bringing them close to casting like HTs with Storm, it’s not nearly as important. So the result seems to be a resounding “Maybe but probably not.”  The Arbiter as we saw it in the most recent cutscene. Fluff: You know, for the hyper-advanced race, a lot of what we’ve seen from the Protoss so far hasn’t been all that earth-shattering. They’ve got a firmer grip on psionics, teleportation, and robotics than the Terrans do but most of it is stuff that we could conceivably see the Terrans being capable of in a century or two. The Arbiter bucks that trend – this is where things get real out there. The Arbiter is essentially a warship that acts as a mobile space-time distorter, bending and manipulating the very fabric of the universe itself to suit their needs. The ship itself is outfitted with a Phase Disruptor Cannon – interestingly enough the same armament the Dragoon has, although no lore explanation is given for why the Arbiter’s version is half the strength. Maybe it’s because power is diverted away from it to operate the Arbiter’s other systems, or maybe it’s because as we saw in the update, Arbiters are the only unit representing the Judicator caste, so maybe they see actually operating the cannon as some sort of gross Templar-work that’s beneath them so no one ever bothers practicing with it and operating it is a task that gets foisted off on to whoever’s in the captain’s bad graces that day. All some young Judicator waking up in the morning and rushing out the door, their bunkmate all like “Slow down! Are you not going to absorb some nutrition before departing?” and they’re all like “Alas, I cannot, for I have been informed that should I be tardy again this week I will be forced to man the Phase Disruptor.” Uh, anyway. The main power of the ship lies in its ability to serve as a focal point for the massive psionic powers of the on-board Judicators, amplifying them and sending them out in a reality-distorting wave around the ship. This wave is what creates the ship’s cloaking field, bending reality itself around the surrounding units so it seems as though they aren’t there. The Arbiter itself has to be firmly anchored in space-time in order to operate, which is why it isn’t cloaked by either itself or the cloaking field of another nearby Arbiter.  The Arbiter as seen in the ill-fated Starcraft: Ghost. Tech Fluff: The Arbiter’s ability to weaken the fabric of the universe also gives it the ability to strengthen it, to the point of briefly creating entirely discrete pockets of space-time that it can force others into. Anyone enclosed in this Stasis Field is effectively locked in another dimension, unable to effect or be affected by anything in the real world until the pocket lapses and they’re freed again. There’s a lot about this that’s left to the imagination: Can units in Stasis still see and hear? Are they left frozen, forced to watch helplessly as their friends are mowed down? And most importantly, if they’re each being imprisoned in their own individual pocket dimension, does this mean that every unit in Stasis is being pestered by Cespenar for the duration of the spell? On to less worthy but more relevant considerations, the Arbiter is also able to fold spacetime at will, ripping open holes in reality and compressing distances until they are nothing, allowing it to Recall friendly units to its location. Unlike the majority of spells in the game, we’ve actually gotten to see this one up close and in person, as it’s featured in not just the most recent cinematic, but the one before that as well. And as the most recent cinematic demonstrated, the Arbiter can happily Recall non-Protoss entities just as easily as Protoss ones. I’m sure some of you are aware that this has a certain, special relationship with Terran – don’t worry, we’ll be showing that off soon. It should go without saying that disassembling and reassembling the universe around you at will takes a great toll on both the ship itself and the minds of the Judicator crewing it. Arbiters can therefore optionally be refitted with a Khaydarin Core that will strengthen the ship’s ability to act as focal point and make things a little less strenuous for everyone. Campaign Usage: Hell yes. The Arbiter is an infinitely useful unit in the campaign. Stasis Field is kinda iffy? There’s a threshold where the AI has to be hitting you with enough high-value units before Stasis Field really becomes a potent tool, and not all missions, even in the expansion, will necessarily see us hitting that threshold. But the cloaking field and Recall are both massive boons. Using Recall to harass isn’t really a thing in the campaign, and even using it to circumvent defenses can be tricky just because of the way campaign defenses tend to have things like, say, walls of Spore Colonies guarded by Scourge – not safe for Arbiters. But just being able to instantly teleport reinforcements to your attacking force, or have an Arbiter stationed at each base and using them to yank around defensive forces like some sort of Protoss Nydus Canal, or using them to bring units to a beachhead so that you don’t have to deal with cramming twelve Dragoons into six Shuttles. Endless potential. And you know what? Every once in a while, there will in fact be a mission objective that can be sniped through carefully threading an Arbiter through enemy defenses and Recalling. I can’t remember specifics off the top of my head, but we should get to see it before the end (I may do it, or if I feel it’d be too anticlimactic/lame I may just point it out as a place where we could have done it, but either way). Competitive Usage: The Arbiter is a very weird unit in competitive play. Like I’ve mentioned before, it’s arguably the Protoss candidate for “ludicrous broken overpowered bullshit” unit, but despite that it’s only really seen in one matchup. It makes up for that by its ability to sometimes singlehandedly sway that one matchup. Vs. Terran: This is where you’re going to see Arbiters, and so long as the match makes it to the lategame, you’ll see them frequently. All three abilities that Arbiters possess are incredibly powerful here. First, there’s the cloaking field. Terran relies a lot on micro and focus-firing, so obscuring your units so that Terran units lose target acquisition can really mess them up. You might think that this is the matchup where cloaking would be the least useful because Terran has its magic Insta-Detect Button, but here’s a little secret about ComSat Stations: Detection is normally a secondary use for them. See, what really makes the ComSat Station amazing is that it’s a magic Insta-Scout button. Terran wants to be using it for things like checking how many bases you’re on and monitoring your troop movements and trying to see if you’ve got any Sneaky Shuttles that might be waiting to unleash hell on some unsuspecting tank or mineral line. In other words, spotting cloaked units almost feels like a waste of a scan and Terran doesn’t want to do it unless they absolutely have to. The end result is kind of a reversal of the Mine/Dragoon scenario. Remember that? Where I said that even if Dragoons are able to pick apart an entire minefield without taking any damage, it can take them so long that Terran still comes up on top? Same here. Even if Terran is able to use scans to completely negate the cloaking field, the fact that they weren’t using those scans on recon can still result in Protoss coming out on top. The other thing to remember here is that Brood War is generally a game of multiple small, simultaneous skirmishes rather than two big deathballs meeting in the middle – Terran can’t just scan one area and be done with it as there may well be three or four Protoss strike forces with Arbiter support at the same time. Terran’s either gotta be real diligent with their Vessel coverage or use up several of their highly precious scans. Next let’s move on to Stasis Field. An incredibly powerful spell in this matchup, coveted by the Protoss and feared by the Terran for its ability to just instantly remove large clumps of a tank line from the battlefield. Many Terran players have been forced to look on in horror while their immaculately positioned Siege Tanks become ripe for the picking as the other Tanks supporting them get frozen in time. Finally, there’s Recall. Generally, in late-game TvP, Terran has at least part of the map just on lockdown. An impregnable wall of Tanks, Mines, Vultures, and Goliaths stand ready to obliterate any Protoss advance. What can Protoss do? If you guessed “completely circumvent that with a single spell,” then ding ding ding! You win! Even more terrifying to the Terran than Stasis Field is the way that the Arbiter can just glide around your defenses and instantly wink in a strike force at your weakest point. So what do Arbiters have to watch out for? What can men do against such reckless hate? We’ve mentioned it before, and I’m sure many of those who’ve forgotten have probably guessed anyway: Science Vessels. Land that EMP missile and Protoss’s incredibly expensive investment is now just a cloak-field-provider – a cloak field that the Vessel can detect, even. As mentioned in the Templar spotlight, this is normally the situation in which we might see Protoss bring Hallucination to the table: create an Arbiter Shell Game so Terran doesn’t know which one to EMP. Goliaths deserve a mention here as well: it sometimes requires careful micro for Protoss to keep the Arbiter in a place where it’s cloaking your units but out of the Goliath’s big range. Goliaths are also the reason why you want to make sure you’re pairing your Arbiters with a significant enough strike force; you want enough ground forces underneath to turn Terran’s stompers into scrap metal before they can all focus fire and snipe the Arbiter. That being said, I’m curious: a lot of Protoss pros have recently begun adopting a Shuttle-heavy approach to play, which has led to Terran players in response integrating more and more Wraiths, not just getting larger quantities of them but sometimes researching Cloaking for them as well. I wonder if the resulting pack of cloaked Wraiths could end up making Arbiters more unattractive. Of course, I suppose the whole point of the Shuttle-heavy approach is that it’s trying to end the game fairly early, so often Arbiters are a moot point either way. But still, could be interesting. Time will tell.  Protoss would have a hard time pushing into that tank line, but a well-time Stasis Field evens the odds considerably.    Note that even though we already had Recall ready to go prior to being EMP’d, we still can’t cast it after being EMP’d. So what’s the source of this myth? Well, remember that Recall happens in two stages: first it creates a blue ball of light over the target units, then it creates a blue ball of light over their destination, bringing them there. What happens is Protoss successfully casts Recall just before getting EMP’d. Terran can’t see the first part of the spell going off, just the results, so to them it looks like they EMP’d the Arbiter and it Recall’d anyway. However, do note that killing the Arbiter during the delay does prevent the Recall from happening. The more you know. The name of this section’s a bit tongue-in-cheek, PS. I’d assume the majority of dedicated Terran players know this is a myth, they just go off on it anyway because it’s really frustrating to think you’ve successfully shut down an Arbiter gambit only to discover you were a split-second too late. Vs Zerg: You’ll almost never see Arbiters here, for a variety of reasons. First, the spells aren’t as useful. Stasis Field is… okay? As we saw in Zerg 09 it can be a pain, but we’ll see in Brood War that Protoss is going to get a spell that’s much better at shutting down Zerg (Maelstrom). Recall isn’t too helpful because Zerg is mobile enough that they can quickly and easily respond to any sneak attacks it opens up. Cloaking is actually better than you’d think, though. Sure, Zerg has tons of detection but Overlords are just so slow, even when upgraded. My lukewarm take is that Zerg has simultaneously the best and worst detection in the game. So not Protoss’s first choice, but still a unit with some possibilities, right? The bigger issue, though, is that Protoss just doesn’t have a good way of protecting its Arbiters from Scourge. Dragoons fire too slowly and only do half damage to them, the Scourge will likely be flying over your own soldiers en route to the Arbiter so Storms are liable to do major friendly fire, Protoss’s upcoming air superiority unit will need to intercept them early and quickly to kill them on time – nothing really stands out as a good choice. And again, remember how flexible Zerg’s tech and production is. Protoss can’t really exploit an opening left by a Zerg that hasn’t bothered with Scourge because Zerg can just… get Scourge. Any time. No problem. So it’s not useless in this matchup, but it’s pretty rare. Vs Protoss: The Arbiter in PvP is a bit like the Defiler in ZvZ: in theory it’s really good, but in practice it’s very rare for the game to go long enough to see them. PvP isn’t quite as fast-paced as ZvZ, but it’s not like TvT aka the “It is not unreasonable to see clashing Battlecruiser fleets” matchup. For all intents and purposes, High Templar are the highest tech you’ll see in this matchup. Now, if the game does go late enough, Arbiters are good stuff. Everything they do is awesome. Cloaking fields to punish Observer lapses, Stasising entire swathes of Reavers or High Templar, Recalling past the battlefield into the enemy's living room - a lot to recommend it. But again, you've got to tech up to it, and you've got to have a strong economy, and you've got to get Stargates going which otherwise you might avoid in PvP - it's tricky to pull off before the game has run its course. So, to summarize: PvT: A defining unit of the late-game that can singlehandedly swing a match. PvZ: A rarely seen unit whose risk tends to outweigh its reward. PvP: Theoretically useful, but matches tend to end before it comes online. Five Minutes Shorter: The Arbiter does get a hero version in the form of a ship called the Danimoth. Its damage has been doubled to 20, which with the slow attack speed is still quite unimpressive, but with 500 Shields, 600 HP and 3 armour it's ridiculously durable. It doesn't appear in any of the standard campaigns but with how the voter's going it looks like we may end up seeing it in Enslavers where it makes an appearance. There's no fluff or backstory to the Danimoth - it's just a fancy Arbiter ship, I guess. I'm not even sure if the name is a reference to anything, which is unusual for a non-story hero unit in this game. JohnKilltrane fucked around with this message at 19:28 on Nov 18, 2023 |
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Nov 18, 2023 19:22
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You can get up to all sorts of silliness with stasis and recall. Want to block a ramp? Stasis some zealots and have the rest of your army go to town behind them. There's also the dragoon toilet where you take advantage of the jank pathing to stack a few dozen dragoons on top of each other and recall way more ground units than would normally fit into the spell. Just hope there aren't any mines underneath the target.
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Nov 18, 2023 20:04
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quote:Also, it's funny - I complain about the Arbiter's speed, but it's the same as the Science Vessel, which I find quite reasonable. I had to check the numbers a few times because the Arbiter definitely feels slower. I wonder if something about the cloaking field creates some sort of optical illusion of slower movement? Or maybe I'm just crazy. It just looks a hell of a lot sleeker, is my guess
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Nov 18, 2023 22:23
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JohnKilltrane posted:Unit Spotlight: Arbiter Also: One important counter to Arbiters for Terrans is to place lots of mines in their own base, right behind the line of turrets. Those turrets force the Arbiter to quickly use its recall, so that the units then immediately get hit by a decent number of mines. And since those units are clumped together so much … well, it doesn‘t end well. Unless of course the Arbiter does get in far enough before recalling. Then the Terran player is faced with mine drags, etc. And gathering the energy for a recall takes a long time, so there is often enough time for the Terran to recover before the next recall. Another reason using a good number of shuttles has become the more normal play at the highest levels.
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Nov 18, 2023 23:11
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DTurtle posted:The top speed might be the same, but the Science Vessel has much faster acceleration and turning speed. The Arbiter really takes a while to get up to speed or change direction. Ohhh, that makes a lot of sense, thanks. Do you know if there's a database online listing turn and acceleration speeds? Liquipedia doesn't seem to have the info. I'd imagine the BWAPI guys have it somewhere but I haven't been able to find it yet. quote:And gathering the energy for a recall takes a long time, so there is often enough time for the Terran to recover before the next recall. Another reason using a good number of shuttles has become the more normal play at the highest levels. Yeah, it's interesting seeing the meta develop here. I especially enjoy the way that Wraith packs, sometimes even with cloaking, are becoming the New Hotness in TvP. Well, that's maybe an exaggeration, but they're more common than before. Decoy Badger posted:You can get up to all sorts of silliness with stasis and recall. Want to block a ramp? Stasis some zealots and have the rest of your army go to town behind them. Oh man, I can't believe I forgot Stasis blocking! I forget, was it ever officially confirmed that this was the inspiration for Forcefield in SC2, or is that just a (very safe) assumption? The Dragoon toilet, though, I genuinely didn't know about. I looked it up - that's crazy.
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Nov 20, 2023 13:48
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JohnKilltrane posted:Ohhh, that makes a lot of sense, thanks. Do you know if there's a database online listing turn and acceleration speeds? Liquipedia doesn't seem to have the info. I'd imagine the BWAPI guys have it somewhere but I haven't been able to find it yet. All stats If you look at the Science Vessel and the Arbiter, they have the same top speed (5) and the same turn radius (40, which looks like a large radius), but the Arbiter has an acceleration of 33 and the Science Vessel has 50. Lastly, the Arbiter has a halt distance of 24 thousand, but the Science Vessel only 5 thousand.
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Nov 20, 2023 23:37
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Do science vessels even need to turn though, considering their sprite? There's another time save right there if they don't actually need to do so.
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Nov 21, 2023 07:43
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I think they do? There's a little thing on top of them that turns to face whatever way they're going.
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Nov 21, 2023 14:04
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Tested with a custom map, the SV starts and stop on a dime while the Arbiter is ponderous both when it starts moving and when it stops moving. When both are still giving them a move order has the SV gaining quite a bit of distance before they're both at top speed. Top speed maneuverability is the same of both.
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Nov 21, 2023 15:46
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DTurtle posted:Took me a bit to find it: This is a phenomenal resource, thank you so much! Omobono posted:Tested with a custom map, the SV starts and stop on a dime while the Arbiter is ponderous both when it starts moving and when it stops moving. When both are still giving them a move order has the SV gaining quite a bit of distance before they're both at top speed. Thanks for doing that testing. It's good to know I'm not crazy - or at least that if I am crazy, this is unrelated. This does a lot to explain why the Vessel feels so much more maneuverable than the Arbiter.
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Nov 23, 2023 16:41
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Protoss 10: Eye of the Storm Let's open with getting some music going here. Protoss 1: Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFhmCkZMQrE Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/1UZOgvQZR2aVQbvPS2pqSf?si=5e2bc8f1dcc040a2 Protoss 2: Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFhmCkZMQrE Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/2iOsH9fovBPg7pq60MVJTf?si=7020668a84ea4d45 Protoss 3: Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFhmCkZMQrE Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/0m2XzWWmjRfAN1dQtT9tvA?si=5e0ffc6c232d4877 While not as iconic as the Terran soundtrack, I like it a lot. It's grandiose and mysterious and very much suits the Protoss.   Executor, our plan worked perfectly. The Zerg defenses are broken, and the way to the Overmind is laid bare! The time for our stand has come. Indeed. My friends, this is our final hour. Not all of us may survive the coming conflict. Yet, death may be a blessing should we fail here. We seek now to destroy a foe that has ravaged its way across the universe consuming all in its path. And now it has reached the end of its long journey. The Overmind has come to destroy all that we hold dear and assimilate us into itself. And I say to thee, this shall not come to pass! Aiur shall not fall! Executor, I stand ready! As do I. Then we are agreed. Victory or death. There can be no other way. Well, I guess all I have left is to see this through. The Zerg took everything from me: my home, my family, my friends. I know that nothing I can do can bring those back, but I'll be damned if I just sit on my hands and wait for the end. I want a piece of ‘em, alright. I'm in. Then let our actions speak for us! For Adun! For Aiur!Mission Objectives: Destroy the Overmind Tassadar, Raynor, and Zeratul must survive I think this is the first and only mention of Jimmy's home and family. Not sure if that's a sideplot that didn't make it to the final cut or if they just didn't think there was space in the narrative for Jimmy dealing with that grief but either way, probably the right call for a game where dialogue is mostly just a few short sentences here and there. Also, really Tassadar? “I say to thee?” You're explicitly addressing a group of people and you use the singular thee instead of the plural you? Honestly, who taught this alien early modern English. Anyway. Our start:   Tassadar. Praetor Artanis. This comes too late to you. But the Conclave has witnessed your defeat of the Cerebrate. They know now that they cannot deny the necessity or the valiancy of your actions. We sought to punish you, when it was we who were in error. Praetor? You address the Executor! Alas, we had already appointed a new Executor, Selendis, and did not feel we could rightly strip her of this rank simply over our shortsightedness. I know it is poor consolation, but to reinstate Artanis as Praetor is the best the Conclave can do. It is of no matter, Fenix. My rank means nothing, so long as Aiur persists. A noble sentiment.You represent the greatest in us all, and all our hopes go with you. EN TARO ADUN, brave sons of Aiur!(Yes, the all caps is actually in the game subtitles). Wow, does that mean they're gonna send some backup for us?Jimmy's being a bit ironic here, and with good reason: the “Haha whoops I guess you were right and we were wrong” is all we're getting from them. My theory is they're trying to play both sides: if we succeed here today, it'll be a brave and daring victory by the hero Tassadar, with the support of the Conclave. If we fail, it'll be proof of the tragic madness that gripped the heretic Tassadar. That being said, Aldaris does sound pretty sincere here. Maybe this really is straightforward repentance from the Conclave and they just couldn't mobilize forces in time to help us. Or maybe Aldaris himself is a bit more strongly convinced of the rightness of our cause than the Conclave he speaks for. Either way, it's fun to hear Aldaris, the pompous and sanctimonious windbag, eating humble pie. But wait! There's more!  Yep, we get both a Protoss and a Terran base! You even see in the top right that we have two counters, one measuring Protoss supply and one measuring Terran. Crucially, the two bases are on opposite sides of the map from each other, and that's going to be the main challenge of this mission. I don't think we've had a split base start before (aside from Zerg 08, which was mostly just Nydus 101) and it makes life much more difficult, for reasons we'll see as we go forward. The chief reason is that each base has to look to its own defenses. That means…  We're back to our 3 Marine/1 Firebat bunker squads! IMHO this is where that squad really shines. For the Terran campaign you could easily get away with just throwing in 4 Marines, but we're going to be facing a lot of upgrades Zerglings here, so mixing in a Firebat is very strong. We have three heroes this mission. Jimmy's back in the Hyperion, Zeratul's here, and…  Tassadar's also around, but this time he's piloting the Gantrithor itself, our command ship where we've been for most of the campaign. Like I said in the Carrier spotlight, it doesn't get hero Interceptors so its damage is nothing new, but man is it beefy. Of course, that does leave…  Fenix! Welcome. What are you doing here? I have come to serve as liaison. I am here to aid in coordinating our forces and assist in any miscommunications that might arise from your lack of connection to the Khala. Well, I won't say that I don't appreciate it, but I hate to drag you away from the action like that. Nonsense! True glory is found in doing what is needed to save my people, and sound logistics have decided far more battles than strength of arms. Huh. I like the way you think. Welcome aboard.(In reality there's no reason given for why Fenix isn't here. I suspect they were probably just worried four heroes would get too cluttered). Our bases are also interesting in their division of resources:  Matt and Jimmy have a huge, healthy patch of minerals, but their geyser isn't great, whereas…  Our minerals are looking pretty scant, but we've got two gas sources in great shape (the other is barely visible at the top of that shot, we'll see more of it in a second). Fortunately, our forces share resources, otherwise this would be crippling. With that in mind, our second geyser is definitely where we want our defences to be - we want to harvest both of these as much as we can ASAP:  Besides, there's a good choke point there. Alright, look alive, boys, we've got company. What, already?  Boom. Roasted. Red: Daggoth's brood. Well, that's not a surprise. Let's talk a bit about the defensive setup here. Jimmy's base is on the high ground. We can position defenses at the ramps to create easy choke points, but that still leaves a huge plateau to the south that lacks any obvious terrain advantages. That's where these Zerglings came from. Our base, on the other hand, is on the low ground. There's a tight canyon leading into it, easily defensible, but that does leave plenty of cliffs for our enemies to exploit by air. I don't want to deal with Surprise Guardians, so…  Tassadar goes out to monitor things there. More trouble in Hornerland:  That wide open plateau is big trouble. Here we haven't even had time to get range upgrade on our Marines, so they're struggling against these (presumably upgraded) Hydras. That being said, unupgraded Marines in a bunker still outrange upgraded Hydras, but every little bit counts. We can respond…   But this is still a good reminder that we need Siege Tanks, pronto. Our Protoss base, meanwhile, is going heavy on the macro:  Three Gateways churning out Dragoons might seem pretty pitiable for those used to watching competitive, but for the campaign this is pretty intense.  There it is. Let's kick thin-  Ugh. By the way, see the green circle there? That's me reflexively ordering my Dragoons over to deal with this. Fortunately I caught the mistake in time, otherwise this could have been very bad as the poor guys suicided themselves into the enemy forces undoubtedly separating us. That's okay.  Terran can handle this just as well, especially if -  Oh come on, man.  …Especially if I put some Turrets up.   Conversely, our Protoss defenses are really shaping up:  But nothing's attacked us yet. I don't know if the AI is scripted to focus on the Terrans at first or if it's just luck of the draw, but they're generally leaving Team Protoss alone. Which hasn't worked in our favour, because starting with four Dark Templar, a Dark Templar hero, and a Carrier hero means Team Protoss is way more suited to fending off early attacks. Either way, it would have behooved me to focus more on Terran production than Protoss production, but this is a Protoss mission, after all. Speaking of which…  Oh good. Ultras. At least we have Siege Tanks now:  Of course, we only just got them, so we haven't had a chance to deploy them yet. But as we've mentioned, while a little underwhelming, Siege Tanks in tank mode…  Still pack a considerable punch. Of course, having the Hyperion helps too. Sir, how's it going out there? You holding up okay? Got it under control, man. At least for now. Everything cool down there? Fenix is here to help coordinate. His walker's too big for most of the hallways in the Command Centre though, so I've relocated my office to the atrium. What, he doesn't have like a wheelchair or something he can use outside of it? I don't know, and I'd rather not ask, sir. Right, yeah, gotta be diplomatic. Any chance they can warp some reinforcements over here? I've already asked, sir. Fenix says they might be able to get some ships online that can warp forces from our base to theirs, but nothing that goes the other way. Figures. Oh well. Just keep the heavy metal coming, I guess.Speaking of which, Siege Tanks are wonderful, but all these Mutas make me wonder if perhaps our Heavy Metal shouldn't be expanded a bit…  Oh, and check this out:  Jorner’s refinery is already depleted. I swear we've barely started :/ And look!  The Protoss minerals are similarly gone. Still working on establishing our defences and already need to be pursuing an expansions. To that end, we've got that incredibly sorely missed structure: the ComSat Station. It reveals…  …empty canyon. And look!  More empty canyon! Oh, wait.  We did actually catch a glimpse of some creep and a Queen here. Looks like Daggoth's base. Of course, this is right by the Protoss and Daggoth's been exclusively attacking the Terrans, so it seems safe to say it's not his only base. Which reminds me…  The Terrans are actually starting to shape up here.  Oh. Uh, that's a bit more than I bargained for. But fortunately…     …the Big Open Plateau works in our favour for once, allowing our Big Stompy Robits to easily pursue and obliterate the Guardians, range disadvantage be damned. That does, however, indicate that we might want some more, let's say “thorough” anti-air, as our build queue at the bottom indicates:  ComSat stations are phenomenal, Science Vessels kick rear end and Siege Tanks are absurdly powerful, but I think what I've missed most about Terran is the humble Wraith. Zerg and Protoss just don't really have anything comparable when it comes to “dedicated air superiority sweeper.” Scourge are more effective, but you've got to keep rebuilding them, and Scouts are… Scouts. When it comes to keeping the skies clear, nothing really beats the good ol' reliable Wraith. At least, as far as the campaigns are concerned. Yep, our Terran defenses are starting to look quite formidable…  …ah crap. And another:  On the one hand, Terran mechanical units can have the damage from Plague eventually repaired, so unlike Protoss it's not permanent. On the other hand, that takes time, resources, and without Shields to protect them leaves our units incredibly vulnerable until it's taken care of. Fortunately Terran has the ultimate anti-Defiler weapon, but we don't have access to it yet. We do, however, have…  Jimmy, who makes short work of them. (There's gonna be a few screenshots like this throughout the update, where we've got incomplete footage - either like this where we see a battle about to begin but don't see its results, or vice versa. It's just a result of the action getting a bit too frantic for me to be able to capture everything). Also, note the colours: Steve is the other defending force here. This is presumably the bulk of his brood that wasn't given over to Kerrigan’s hunt. I guess it could also be a direct brood of the Overmind, but given that perma-killing one Cerebrate put it out of commission for a while, I'm guessing knocking off two more last mission has left the Overmind completely incapacitated for the time being. (Of course, canonically the Cerebrate of Ep 2 is dead at this point, but that wasn't determined until quite a few years later, so it doesn't help for teasing out “Who is purple supposed to represent in this mission”). One interesting interaction between Plague and Terran that I believe has been mentioned before:   Because Terran buildings burn down, anything brought to “in the red” by Plague can be killed by the spell if it isn't promptly repaired. Buildings with 500 HP or less are especially at risk of this, which means Bunkers, Turrets, and Supply Depots are all particularly prone to getting Plague'd. There's nothing worse than being suddenly severely supply capped because someone dropped some red goop on your Depot clump. Anyway, we've -  Sigh.    It really is relentless. Believe it or not, my focus has actually been on the Protoss, but there just hasn't been any action on their end so far. Speaking of the Protoss…  An Observer finally finds a likely expansion spot. Let's move out.       Seriously, this battle went on forever. Just about every Zerg unit you see there died between screenshots; what looks like unit overlap between shots is actually Lings dying and getting replaced. That could have done some serious damage to us if it weren't for the ramp. But hey! Protoss finally gets to throw down with the rest of them. And almost immediately on the heels of that, we see…  Steve's following up Daggoth's charge with some aerial harassment. Fortunately, we had just enough time…   …for our High Templar to catch up. Like I said, while Jorner have been fighting for their lives, Team Protoss have had all sorts of time to tech up. High Templar, upgrades - they're in real good shape at the moment. Which is good, because…    It looks like the AI has switched priorities and is now more interested in putting the hurt on Artanis. Another instance of the Power of the High Ground, PS. Here the Defilers couldn't get off a good Plague because of range - not casting range, which is huge, but sight range, which was hugely reduced by being on the low ground. With an Overlord to spot for them they could have done some damage but instead they globbed where they could see, and only got a few units. This isn't their only avenue of attack, though.  Remember stationing Tassadar on those cliffs, there? I actually wasn't sure if anything would come from that way but it looks like caution paid off.  A nearby Templar to assist, and…  Uh oh. Executor! The Zerg fliers masked a pack of Scourge, causing terrible, terrible damage to the Gantrithor. Return to base, brave Tassadar. Boldly have you secured our flanks, but soon we shall need you to lead the vanguard, and cannot risk further damage to the ship. Man, those Scourge chewed through the Gantrithor. Granted, once its shields regen it'll still have more bulk to it than even the Hyperion, but still. A few more Scourge and we'd have been toast. Shoring up defenses there will have to wait, though.  Stand strong, warriors! The sadistic servants of the Overmind seek to break our resolve, but we shall not falter! We are the sons of Aiur! We are unbreakable! Let none stand in the way of the Templar! Ahem! …and Judicator. Let none stand in the way of the Templar and Judicator!  (If you're wondering, I cast Storm on those Stasis’d Mutas because I'm just too good at this game. I wanted to waste a Storm so the AI knows my contempt for it. This is definitely the reason, in no uncertain terms).            Yeesh. Daggoth's not messing around. But our boys held their own, and in fact we had very few casualties. Incidentally, I wonder if you could cheese this by putting Zeratul and his Dark Templar on the ramp in hold position and using Scouts to quickly snipe Overlords. Let's see how Jorner's defense is coming along:    They're, uh, doing okay. “But isn't clustering so many Tanks together a nightmare for Plague?” Not to worry, I have a plan. Besides, we have the ultimate in anti-Defiler technology. Observe:    As you can see, when cast on a burrowed unit, Irradiate has no graphical effect. There's no way to know it's there aside from the burst Defiler corpse. Silent but deadly, if you will. Depot Farm:   Meanwhile, trouble is brewing:  Now, what if, and hear me out, High Templar were invisible.   Hahaha! Run! Run!  Huh, looks like there were some burrowed Hydras, too.   Sadly, the storms weren't quite enough to kill these Guardians. But that's okay. They're almost dead.   Meanwhile, Steve's throwing a sizeable wing of Mutas at Maynor:  Once again, spellcasters save the day. This time we'll see one we haven't really been able to meaningfully show off yet:    We kinda forced some use out of it in the Terran campaign and we kinda saw it popping a Defiler earlier? But this is the first time we've really been able to let Irradiate out of its cage and man is it beautiful. Tearing apart Muta clumps like there's no tomorrow. Against the AI it might even be better than Storm against Mutas, because the AI normally won't take the Irradiated Muta and split it off. Although the AI also doesn't Magic Box, or at least, not on purpose so… We also take a Terran expansion:   And, uh…   It looks like that expansion is right on Daggoth's doorstep. So…  We get some defenses up ASAP. This should be able to hold the line, at least long enough for reinforcements to arrive. Lings, Hydras, Mutas, even Ultras will have a hard time cracking this. Guardians, mind you, are a different matter entirely. But fortunately…    We're prepared for that, too. Man, I know I gushed about this already, but I can't get over how much I love Wraiths, especially compared to the lacklustre Scout. Unfortunately…  That Guardian wasn't alone. That's three Ultras? And I think a fourth offscreen? Man, we'd be screwed if this was Brood War.   Fortunately, this isn't Brood War, so we scrape by. Matt, things are starting to look a little dicey out here. Already on it, sir.    Well, that's one way of doing it. Excellent! A path has been cleared for your warriors. Shall I lead their charge? I appreciate the offer, uh, sir, but I'd rather focus on holding the line and let our spec ops team handle the rest.Fun fact: when you combine factions like this, it also sorta combines announcers. Global things like “Nuclear launch detected” and “Okay so like the base is under attack better get on that eh there bud” are still being announced by Aldaris, but when Terran research or upgrades finish, the Adjutant tells us. Especially helpful for knowing which side is supply-blocked based on whether we hear “Additional Supply Depots required” or “YOU MUST CONSTRUCT ADDITIONAL PYLONS.” Daggoth, meanwhile, is not happy about the nuke:  He almost immediately airlifts up an Ultralisk to eviscerate our hapless Ghost. Which is a shame, but at the same time, the badass spec-ops agent setting off a massive explosion seconds before getting gored by a huge alien monstrosity is like the pinnacle of pulp-y sci-fi goodness. Anyway. Despite the issues with the primary unit, the secondary unit should be online soon. It's currently undergoing preparations and should be online within -  Ah, yep, there he goes. Unfortunately…  Sir, what are you doing?! Get out of there, that's an active blast zone! Huh? Oh, drat it. Okay, back to your posts, everyone! We'll finish this hand later. Let's see how fast this can get us out of here.  That should ease off the pressure on Maynor’s end. The destruction even reached over here where the Hyperion was:  Also…  Turns out this entire time this expansion had a geyser and I didn't even know it.  Typical, really. As soon as the Refinery finished, too. This being the expansion, we don't have much nearby beyond our bunkers and tanks, but we do have…     …Wraiths. At this point in the game the AI brings along an Overlord with every single attack, but boy does an Overlord not last long against Wraiths. Our Observer discovers something:  Daggoth has another base near Team Protoss. This mission essentially has the center of the map guarded by Steve, who's in turn surrounded by Daggoth. We have to punch through both to get to the Overmind. Fortunately, we haven't just been sitting idle while playing defense: Executor, our great fleet stands ready! Then the time has come! Protoss warriors one and all, hear me! Ignite your blades, ready your cannons, engage your thrusters, for the hour of reckoning is at hand! The fate of all creation hinges upon this moment! Now, strike with the fury of a thousand, thousand generations of warriors, and deliver our people once and for all! For Adun!   What, what's happening? Fenix says they're moving out. What, without us? Not to worry, sir. Fenix and I have been coordinating on that front.    Oh man, I've been waiting for so long to show this off, you guys have no idea. That's why I had that huge clump of tanks. Recall can teleport Siege Tanks in Siege Mode. It's an incredibly niche application of the spell, but arguably the single most powerful play in the game (and one that I guess technically is possible to pull off in competitive play, although it's so ludicrously impractical that we'll probably never see it). This is also the particular bit of Arbiter-Terran interplay I mentioned in the Spotlight. Yoinking around huge clumps of tanks that can immediately fire in Siege Mode is powerful enough; the fact that it also cloaks them (assuming you don't move the Arbiter) is just straight busted. Daggoth…  …does not last long. And as we get closer…  There it is. Our target. 5000 HP and a Detector. I know I've mentioned this before, but I really like the way each campaign in this game culminates in “Destroy a big, unique building.” It feels just special enough and appeals to the primitive “blowing up special things is cool” part of my monkey brain. We advance on Steve's position:  Why deal with all the tedious unsieging, moving, and resieging when…   ...we've got Arbiters? Speaking of which…   We've had one tank squad, yes, but what about second tank squad? Executor, Tassadar, this is Hyperion actual. Glad we could make it. Time to kick some serious butt.      When we kill the Overmind…  …It becomes this smaller, more sphincter-y Overmind.  Executor, the Overmind has been weakened, but I fear that we have sustained severe damage ourselves. I will steer the Gantrithor on a collision course with the Overmind. If I can channel enough of the Dark Templars’ energy through the hull of the Gantrithor, I should be able to bring swift death to the accursed abomination. Remember us, Executor. Remember what was done here today. May Adun watch over you. The closing cinematic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TyyyK8iIbRM   As a Mutalisk pursues an Interceptor across the sky, a Carrier (presumably the Gantrithor) flies into view:      Another Interceptor explodes, indicating that the battle is not going as smoothly here in Cinematicland as it was out in Gameplayland. The Carrier moves on:  We get a side view of Mutas strafing it:   You can barely make them out, they're so small next to the immensity of the Gantrithor. In case you were wondering how such small creatures could ever hope to harm the ship, we now get to see them flying into the openings of the ship, gooping it's inner parts, like X-Wings strafing the Death Star:      Their run completed, they fly back out again:   We fade to Tassadar inside the ship, where we gradually zoom in:   Lacking things like mouths or eyebrows, it's hard to read the expression on his face. He looks… grimly determined? Back outside the ship again…    The Mutas are gathering. Our gradual Extreme Close-Up of Tassadar continues its slow but implacable pace:       A strange blue light appears as he begins to channel psionic energy.   And boom!            A blinding light bursts above the Overmind as a huge burst of energy is unleashed that then collapses in on itself, creating that… Storm? Wormhole? Thing.  Tassadar's not finished, though.   And we see the energy he's channelling…    …is doing something to the Gantrithor, which is now also thoroughly ravaged by meatbat poop.       Tassadar creates a burst of energy so great that he vanishes into it.  As the ship approaches the Overmind…     It bursts apart, becoming consumed by whatever Tassadar unleashed. This energy coalesces…           …and tears the Overmind asunder.              …which is then consumed by the maelstrom raging above it.   (Scrolling text, if you're wondering why those two pictures are almost identical)     With so many lengthy life interruptions, it's very satisfying to be finally done the base game. Killer last mission, too. It's a lot of fun being able to take the strengths of Terran and Protoss and twist them together, and even without that, the constant pressure really pushes you to make good use of your units. I think we used almost everything? No Vultures, no Dropships, no Scouts, and while we did use Shuttles and Reavers I don't think I got any footage of it. But everything else came together to beat the Overmind’s rear end like a bongo drum. Of course, we're not done the LP. Not by a long shot. We're going to be hitting up Brood War, but first we've got some side content to explore. Our next update will be following the story of a hapless lieutenant from Edmund Duke’s Alpha Squadron caught up in the final days of Chau Sara, shortly before Matt and Jimmy's story began… **************************** Voting Time Our player character needs a name. While the events of this upcoming campaign are canonical, the player character has never been given any sort of identity. So it's up to the thread to give our commander a name.
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Nov 24, 2023 22:57
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I'm surprised you didn't take the bottom left. There's so many goddamn minerals there. Easily enough to fund a bunch of cannons so you don't have to think too much about defending it.
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Nov 24, 2023 23:21
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JohnKilltrane posted:
No there is something more important I must do. I need to remind you to construct additional pylons.
Happy Litterbox fucked around with this message at 00:07 on Nov 25, 2023 |
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Nov 24, 2023 23:32
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I remember the attacks from the mutalisks during this cutscene confusing me. It would've been years later before I found out they originally had an acid spray attack during development and took the glave worm attack from the queen, who it would've made sense to be chucking parasites as a regular attacks until they removed it.
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Nov 24, 2023 23:38
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Poor Jimmy. Every mission on Aiur for the rest of Starcraft feels the need to include an infested Terran base.
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Nov 24, 2023 23:40
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If I remember right, that big storm of energy over the Overmind during that last cinematic is meant to be him opening a wormhole and trying to escape because he realizes what's about to happen. Also, I feel guilty about bringing it up constantly... but the UEDAIP version of this mission does something entertaining. Aside from completely changing the terrain of this map for the ground up, for reasons, it adds one final little addition to the end of that speech by Aldaris. : "Wow. Does that mean they're gonna send some backup for us?"At this point, a generic Carrier and a few shuttles appear in a corner of the map, on the other end of the entire zerg base from you and Jimmy, with the shuttles dropping some probes that go to work as a minor AI Ally. Carrier: "Affirmative." BlazetheInferno fucked around with this message at 23:44 on Nov 24, 2023 |
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Nov 24, 2023 23:40
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well done on getting through the first game! im thoroughly enjoying your lp
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Nov 24, 2023 23:54
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That ending cinematic always felt so epic. It's '90s jank, and Tassadar's also "inscrutable alien", but it feels very well done. Like, "less is more", y'know? No need to narrate what's happening, no dialogue.
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Nov 25, 2023 00:14
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From what I remember, it's fairly easy to get Zeratul and/or other DTs to the Terran base by sticking near the edges of the map. That's nice since the enemies seem to love sending ultralisks under Dark Swarm that way. Another fun use of the combined forces: since things near the center of a nuclear blast take 2/3 of their max HP if that's greater than 500, that means a direct nuke hit does 3,333 damage to the Overmind.
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Nov 25, 2023 00:26
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Warp tanks, I never even considered that, jeez. As for names... Gobbo Orbman
stryth fucked around with this message at 00:35 on Nov 25, 2023 |
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Nov 25, 2023 00:33
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Congrats!JohnKilltrane posted:
Butter bars.
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Nov 25, 2023 00:33
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Nice work on getting to the end of the base game! Getting to use combined forces against the Overmind is a fun surprise, and a treat! Although by now it's been two whole campaigns since you last played Terran so you'd better hope you remember how they work! Given how we named the player for the Terran campaign, let's play with the later canon a bit and call her Mira Han.
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Nov 25, 2023 00:39
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October Venus
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Nov 25, 2023 03:51
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A kind of fascinating idea occurred to me about the next protagonist. You know who was a lieutenant in Alpha Squadron? Samir Duran.
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Nov 25, 2023 04:10
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Such a cool final mission. I don't feel like they ever hit their stride quite this well again in any of their RTS games, though two of the three BW expansion campaigns have moments that get close.Tenebrais posted:Given how we named the player for the Terran campaign, let's play with the later canon a bit and call her Mira Han.
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Nov 25, 2023 04:29
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This final mission is great, getting to finally combine forces is incredible and also feels really thematically appropriate as a desperate gambit to a top the Overmind.ninjahedgehog posted:October Venus
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Nov 25, 2023 04:46
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Well we already have Jimmy. So we obviously need his secret twin brother, Bimmy.
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Nov 25, 2023 05:06
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This LP continues to rule.Tenebrais posted:Given how we named the player for the Terran campaign, let's play with the later canon a bit and call her Mira Han.
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Nov 25, 2023 07:08
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Starcraft: "thoroughly ravaged by meatbat poop."
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Nov 25, 2023 08:24
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Alpha3KV posted:A kind of fascinating idea occurred to me about the next protagonist. You know who was a lieutenant in Alpha Squadron? Samir Duran. This or Damir Suran
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Nov 25, 2023 11:50
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ilmucche posted:Damir Suran YESSSS. Master manipulator behind the scenes, this aeons-old rear end in a top hat still hasn't quite got the hang of concealing his name. EDIT: Just so we're clear, this is me voting for Damir Suran. CommissarMega fucked around with this message at 20:35 on Nov 25, 2023 |
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Nov 25, 2023 13:06
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Another fun Terran-Protoss cheese you can do in this mission is irradiating and defensive matrixing your archons and having them just tear through everything the Zerg can throw at you.ninjahedgehog posted:October Venus I don't get it but I'll vote for it.
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Nov 25, 2023 14:36
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ilmucche posted:Damir Suran
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Nov 25, 2023 14:44
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Decoy Badger posted:I don't get it but I'll vote for it. Nova's real name is, I kid you not, November Terra.
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Nov 25, 2023 14:45
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| # ? Jun 1, 2024 10:01 |
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Mira Han lfg
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Nov 25, 2023 14:46
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