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Aww. Will you still at least explain the extra wrinkles hard throws in?
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Feb 5, 2024 16:23
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BisbyWorl posted:Okay so I have to do some side recordings to make sure I cover everything, and I decided to just blitz through everything on Casual. why the gently caress????  why would they do that?!
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Feb 5, 2024 16:25
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I'm assuming the point is to prevent newbie players from accidentally rallying their SCV's off to a distant corner of the map? Does sound annoying when you're used to just right-clicking though.
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Feb 5, 2024 16:32
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Felinoid posted:Aww. Will you still at least explain the extra wrinkles hard throws in? Honestly, no, because those early ones in Wings were the only ones I knew off the top of my head and I'm not replaying things just to compare the moment to moment details. Also, Hatcheries on Casual cap out at 9 larvae instead of 6.
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Feb 5, 2024 16:38
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Fair enough. And I can certainly understand the desire to get through this malarkey at double speed.
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Feb 5, 2024 16:40
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BisbyWorl posted:Also, Hatcheries on Casual cap out at 9 larvae instead of 6. I think that's also the case on normal - that's what I played, and i remember having one larva on the second line in the UI whenever i selected all of them.
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Feb 5, 2024 17:20
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Tenebrais posted:That sounds like a bit much gameplay for a three-mission gimmick faction, but it would be cool if e.g. when a primal zergling kills one of your non-zergling units it turns into the primal version of that unit. On the one hand, I am familiar with How The Sausage is Made in game development, so I am aware of just how much work it would be to do this faction right, how much time, effort, and money it would take. On the other hand, it's loving Blizzard, it wasn't like they lacked the money or developers to do this right. They chose not to spend those resources on it, and if they don't care to make the primal zerg interesting in some way that justifies the mission chain, I don't have a lot of sympathy for it.
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Feb 5, 2024 22:38
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The thing is, they very easily could have done that. Look at all these model variants they made off of the Primal Zerg model! In no particular order and not counting the co-op models, the major variations are:
That is way more than enough variety to create a faction that mutates into unique forms branched off of a central basis.
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Feb 6, 2024 00:23
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So I decided to go back and add in all the 10th anniversary achievements to each mission. The list so far consists of:
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Feb 6, 2024 05:06
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Some of those anniversary ones were HARD, especially some of the timer based ones. Even thinking about them and the grind it took for all of them gives me nightmares. Completing all of them gives you a character we will meet much later as an announcer, I think the last Blizzard made before they slowed support for the game.
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Feb 6, 2024 05:18
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BisbyWorl posted:
This one was bugged when it was released, and it counted the AI's units as well as yours. It was effectively impossible, until a whole bunch of people who wanted their achievements made a route that killed one egg and all 3 buildings before any other eggs could hatch. Which was faster than the speedrun route at the time. They're all doable on Normal, at least, except one in the Nova DLC that doesn't spawn enough enemies.
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Feb 6, 2024 05:18
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I thought the HotS anniversary missions were for Hard mode, not normal. Oh God did I work way too hard on them for nothing?
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Feb 6, 2024 09:36
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GodFish posted:I thought the HotS anniversary missions were for Hard mode, not normal. Oh God did I work way too hard on them for nothing? No, you worked way too hard on them for bragging rights. 
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Feb 6, 2024 09:49
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GodFish posted:I thought the HotS anniversary missions were for Hard mode, not normal. Oh God did I work way too hard on them for nothing? Honestly I was surprised too when I realized. Admittedly though, I find normal a bit boring at this point. Too slow.
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Feb 6, 2024 15:18
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GodFish posted:I thought the HotS anniversary missions were for Hard mode, not normal. Oh God did I work way too hard on them for nothing? I did all the WoL ones on Brutal, haven't tried the other campaigns yet.
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Feb 6, 2024 16:09
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I find normal far too easy but the challenges to be quite difficult on Hard, at least for zerg because I'm by far the worst at them and a lot of them are pretty tight timers.
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Feb 6, 2024 17:42
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Unit Spotlight: Roach Overview:
Evolution Pool Upgrades:  Hydriodic Bile
Good on the surface, since 24 damage a shot will let it two shot a Marine in this predominantly ZvT campaign, but on higher difficulties the Dominion can and will use Armory upgrades on their own units which forces the Roach back to a three shot. I guess it's also useful against Zealots, but there are only four ZvP missions in Heart, one of them unlocks the Roach in the first place and another gives you a limitless number of units so you don't need the bulk of a Roach to begin with.  Adaptive Plating
Okay, so the Roach can actually work as a tank now, with a massive 7 armor once you unlock level 3 upgrades! Eeeeeeeeeexcept it runs right back into the issue we've been seeing ever since Vanadium Plating, where a more lethal army is better than a bulkier army. Still probably the best of the three just as a set-and-forget type deal.  Tunneling Claws
Moving while burrowed is incredibly niche in campaign, and an increase to regen speed only matters if you're burrowing mid-combat. And even then, with Swarm Queens flinging heals around you'll only shave off a few moments before they can unburrow. Evolutions  Corpser Recovered scantipede essence. Scantipede itself unremarkable. Parasite within more interesting. Sequences allow roach to inject microscopic parasites. Acidic saliva melts away flesh. Allows parasite to burrow within host and gestate. Upon death, roachlings break free. Emerge from any available orifice. Extremely efficient.  Infest Roachlings
 Vile Toxic ingesting, successful. Adaptation has produced powerful roach variant. Chemical byproducts of microbes altered compounds of acidic saliva. Constrictive agents will coat target as roach attacks. As newer layers apply, previous layers harden and tighten. Movement becomes difficult. Attacks less frequent. Debilitates enemies.  Debilitating Saliva
Field Manual Artwork   Not seen in Heart, but Legacy adds in the Ravager as a new unit the Roach can morph into so I'll throw the art in here.
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Feb 8, 2024 04:44
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the Ravager's backhole is clearly not its mouth, and so puke can be ruled out; given its general anatomy, the likelihood of a dorsal cloaca or butthole--and thereby, poop--is also extremely low
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Feb 8, 2024 11:52
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Roaches were the bane of my existence in WoL multiplayer
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Feb 8, 2024 12:51
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The tunneling claws can be very useful couple of times, when you send a team of roaches forward to snipe dangerous enemy unit (say a high templar). But mostly the upgrade is good for making "roach battery" for units that have Consume.
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Feb 8, 2024 13:26
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One cute detail with the evolutions: you'll notice that one is always colored green and one is colored purple, and it's often a choice between green offering tricks or utility and purple offering direct power.
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Feb 8, 2024 13:31
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I.... never realized that. 
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Feb 8, 2024 14:08
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Tunneling claws would be a lot better if Kerrigan didn’t exist so you had more reason to micro your other units. Could use burrow more effectively in the way that you micro Blink Stalkers to pull damage ones back midfight to get targeting off them. Something I really hate about Heart of the Swarm is anytime you’re not microing Kerrigan in a fight you’re vastly cutting down your combat strength so it’s really hard to justify bothering with anything in the rest of your army that you can’t A Move at the enemy.
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Feb 8, 2024 16:34
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There are modded versions of the campaigns and one of the more interesting HotS ones just... has Kerrigan sit around the base as an unselectable unit and turns her level upgrades into a choice of passive bonuses/unlocks.
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Feb 8, 2024 16:39
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Whenever Kerrigan isn't being microed, the other units should be saying "Where's Kerrigan?"
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Feb 8, 2024 20:41
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Cythereal posted:One cute detail with the evolutions: you'll notice that one is always colored green and one is colored purple, and it's often a choice between green offering tricks or utility and purple offering direct power. Oh, that's fab! I like that. Subtle visual shortcuts for defining upgrades is really good design.
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Feb 8, 2024 21:26
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Note however, that it's not ALWAYS the case with those. I can think of at least one example where that relationship is reversed - and one where neither one is tricks, just two different varieties of power. But we'll get there.
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Feb 8, 2024 21:31
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painedforever posted:Oh, that's fab! I like that. Subtle visual shortcuts for defining upgrades is really good design. It's not a perfect visual tell, there's a couple cases where the utility vs power choice is ambiguous like the roach, but yeah as a general rule the green choice adds some new functionality or ability or generally changes how the unit works, while the purple choice is typically the-same-thing-but-better. Zerglings, the green choice is the swarmlings while the purple choice is the raptor. Roaches, as seen here, corpsers are green and viles are purple.
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Feb 8, 2024 21:31
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Isn't that backwards, then? Raptors get a bunch of added abilities, while Swarmlings are literally just the Zergling increased by 50%. the only way swarmlings could even be considered a utility upgrade would be if they somehow contributed to baneling strats, but I have no way to know whether that's the case
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Feb 8, 2024 21:37
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orange got did dirty
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Feb 8, 2024 21:37
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Zulily Zoetrope posted:Isn't that backwards, then? Raptors get a bunch of added abilities, while Swarmlings are literally just the Zergling increased by 50%. Swarmlings are the 'get more zerglings for the same price.' Raptors are a straight stat improvement plus a jump. That's how I see it at any rate.
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Feb 8, 2024 21:39
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GunnerJ posted:There are modded versions of the campaigns and one of the more interesting HotS ones just... has Kerrigan sit around the base as an unselectable unit and turns her level upgrades into a choice of passive bonuses/unlocks. Ah yes, one of the Crew mods. Leviathan Crew this one is called, if I recall correctly. I've played only Hyperion Crew and it is awesome.
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Feb 8, 2024 21:50
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Zulily Zoetrope posted:Isn't that backwards, then? Raptors get a bunch of added abilities, while Swarmlings are literally just the Zergling increased by 50%. Raptors are straight power in that the leap and +2 damage just make them Better. Swarmlings also morph almost instantly, so apart from the aforementioned Baneling Strats, they become, as most people have pointed out, your vague panic button. It's really more 'utility for the swarm' than the unit, especially for these early units that we'll see become a lot less functional as we get further into the campaign.
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Feb 8, 2024 22:12
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Hey, do the manual's ESSENCES count. Cause I spy at least two.
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Feb 9, 2024 11:26
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RedSnapper posted:Hey, do the manual's ESSENCES count. Cause I spy at least two. I'm going to say no, mostly for my sanity and also to keep things in-game. I'd have to redo the counts on three separate things if I counted these.
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Feb 9, 2024 11:53
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Zerus 2: The Crucible Video: The Crucible  Time to see if Zerus' power is all it's cracked up to be.     Power to kill Mengsk. Tell me what I must do.      Abathur, send me the creature you've been working on - the swarm host.  Essence Count: 25  We saw the Swarm Host last time, and now Abathur's stolen the design for the Swarm's use. Oh, the hypocrisy.  An important thing to note is that Swarm Hosts do not have the Burrow command all the other zerg share, instead having Root.  That's because unlike the others, a rooted Swarm Host is still visible. If the enemy is able to get past the Locusts they spawn they don't need any form of detection to attack the Swarm Host. The marked circles around them indicated their automatic spawning range if an enemy gets close, but I can use the Spawn Locusts key that's popped up to send the Locusts out early if I see an attack coming.  Their weapon info is also a bit misleading, as it lists the damage of the Locusts but the range and cooldown of the Host's ability to spawn them. The Locust itself has 50 life, a range of 3 and attack speed of 0.43, making them rather high damage!   Once an enemy steps into range the Hosts pop out two eggs each.  After a second the Locusts hatch and automatically attack-move towards where the enemy approached from.  Locusts have a 15 second timed life, which lines up with the Host's spawn rate.  And that's the only pack of enemies in this segment.        Essence Count: 26           Good thing the Swarm was setting up a base just offscreen while this was happening!  Kerrigan is now stuck in the Chrysalis for 25 minutes, and won't be able to directly help for the rest of the mission.  Key word here being directly. Whatever passive she has on will still work.  The Crucible is pretty much the first part of Agent of the Swarm (the zerg mission in SC1 where, surprise surprise, you have to protect Kerrigan's Chrysalis) extended into a full mission.  Those two obvious map entrances on the left will have Brakk's remnants charge in.  I think you can tell what the gimmick of this mission is by now.  The Spine Crawlers give a bit more damage, but more importantly they keep the enemy away from my pricey Swarm Hosts between Locust waves.   drat, I wonder what this suspiciously breakable rock near this third entrance to my base means.  The annoying thing about the map layout is that I can't spread creep over the pool, so moving my Crawlers from one entrance to another takes ages since their movement speed plummets if they move a single claw off creep.   From the bottom right, a new pack walks in.  While more of Brakk's remnants start pouring in from the opposite side.  Essence Count: 27   We must remain focused on protecting the chrysalis.Thankfully, the primals coming in from the bottom corners will focus more on killing each other than trying to kill me.  I made a few Zerglings to make use of Reconstitution.  Essence Count: 28 Despite the different colors, Yagdra's pack is identical to Brakk's remnants.  And despite being right next to the path, Yagdra will only send a few small attacks at the expansion during the mission so I don't have to invest much in defense unlike The Dig or In Utter Darkness.  Swarm Hosts be expensive.    Essence Count: 29  Can use. Spawn many locusts to defend hive cluster from primal attacks. Another wave of primal zerg is inbound. Spawn the locusts now.Shortly after that Brakk's pack prepares a massive push and we get another Timed Defense Button like the energy nova from All In.  New button!    Essence Count: 30 The Primal Locusts fly down whichever lanes are currently being attacked and bombard any enemy they come across. They don't last long enough to clear out an entire wave, but only 4-5 primals will be left standing by the time the locusts die and they'll be pushed back far enough for my Swarm Hosts to recharge.  At this point I can start working on getting each entrance enough defenders to leave them there full time.   Eh, they start you off with a Spore Crawler on each side, and that's enough for the first attack.  At around 14:30 left on the timer the bonus objective starts and the bottom of the map is revealed.  Tyrannozor. Savage. Extreme physical prowess. Essence useful, must acquire.Essence Count: 31 That will not be easy. We will have to cross the battle between Brakk and Yagdra's packs.Big guy shows up, kill it, done. The running battle going on won't matter considering we, you know, got Mutalisks just last mission. The only thing that can hit them are Hydralisks, and they'll only have a few seconds to attack before I'm past them.   Just hit the Locust button, it'll be fine.  Turns out Yagdra sends Mutalisks at the expansion.  While all this has been going on I've been making a bunch of Mutas to deal with the Tyrannozor. While it's constantly picking fights with Quillgors that walk up to it, the Tyrannozor has enough regen to ignore the chip damage they deal so you can't wait for it to get worn down.  Were they expecting the player to send a pack of Zerglings over or something?  The Tyrannozor attacks multiple targets, stopping me from just having a few Mutas chip it down.  But with enough bodies, anything is possible. Essence Count: 32 And now I can make Swarm Hosts for the rest of the mission.  drat, I wonder what will happen in the near future.  drat, what are the odds.  Although the rocks blocking the path cut both ways, leaving the Locusts unable to get over to them.  Either way, at this point I have enough Swarm Hosts that I can safely split them three ways for the rest of the mission.   Six minutes left.  The Crucible is just sorta boring as a mission, honestly. It runs into the Wings problem where the devs can't tell what missions you've done prior so it has to softball things. It knows you'll have Mutalisks and Swarm Hosts here, so that's what the mission is designed around.  Once you have enough stuff to defend each entrance the mission is over, but they still make you sit through the last six minutes.  It's not Zero Hour bad, but it's worse than The Dig.  Essence Count: 33 The last of Brakk's remnants get wiped out.  Essence Count: 34 And Yagdra's pack starts to come in from the left side.  And here's the part where they constantly stream in for the last few minutes.  They also show off a second new unit! It's also a skirmish unit the zerg got in Heart, albeit a modified one akin to the Swarm Queen with some tweaked spells and an anti-air attack.  We get a preview of what they can do, at least.  For the last minute the chrysalis starts glowing and pulsating.     Aaaaaaaaaaaaaand...  Done.   Kerrigan's transformation gets a cinematic, naturally.         And Kerrigan's new form, born of the power of Zerus is-!    The exact loving same as the Queen of Blades!  Right down to the loving organic high heels!  Ignore the fact that the Queen of Blades is explicitly described as being designed by Abathur in this very game!  Everyone knows Kerrigan's iconic look, and by god is Blizzard going to stick with it!   So all Zerus amounts to is getting Kerrigan her old look back and slapping a coat of purple paint on her!    Dramatic cut to Mengsk!  He just watches the rain as the camera slowly pulls back.  Revealing a familiar artifact in his possession.   The Crucible - Complete the "The Crucible" mission in the Heart of the Swarm campaign. Epic Meal Time - Kill 75 enemy units with Primal Spawn Locusts in “The Crucible” mission. Can't Touch This Chrysalis - Complete “The Crucible” mission without Kerrigan’s Chrysalis taking damage on Normal difficulty. Short Life Expectancy - Kill the Tyrannozor in under 1 minute after it appears in “The Crucible” mission on Hard difficulty. Entomophobia - Complete "The Crucible" mission without spawning Primordial Spawn Locusts on Normal difficulty.
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Feb 10, 2024 06:12
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All those missions we spent in WoL turning Kerrigan into a human feel like a super productive way to have spent our time now that she's been turned right back into the Queen of Blades again!
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Feb 10, 2024 06:31
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 "Who asked you?"
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Feb 10, 2024 06:50
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gohuskies posted:All those missions we spent in WoL turning Kerrigan into a human feel like a super productive way to have spent our time now that she's been turned right back into the Queen of Blades again!
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Feb 10, 2024 06:55
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 James Raynor, you must turn your girlfriend into a human again or the universe dies!*five minutes later* Sarah Kerrigan, you must turn yourself into the Queen of Blades again or the universe dies!
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Feb 10, 2024 06:56
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