Starcraft 2: Legacy of the Void

[Corenat Rovarnus]

Previously, on Church of ProZ:
My thoughts on the HotS campaign: http://churchofproz.forumotion.net/t1292-heart-of-the-swarm-campaign
Vroop's review http://churchofproz.forumotion.net/t1493-legacy-of-the-void-campaign

I'm playing through the single player campaign, will continue to post my thoughts as I progress.

• They really went all out for this installment, there's a cutscene after nearly every mission and 3 different variations of every unit in the Protoss arsenal.
  
• The dialogue is kind of weird visually as since they don't have mouths, they just stare at each other meaningfully.
  
• The Spear of Adun is badass, although I was expecting to get an inside view of one of those Motherships instead. Still, the call-in abilities are amazing, reminds me of the god powers in Age of Mythology.
  
• The 'phase-smith' Karax's voice is just so...normal. They added barely any reverb to his lines so he sounds almost like a regular human being.
  
• The cultural differences between the Daelaam(mainstram Khalai) and Nerazim(Dark Templar) are finally brought into the light of day, which I really appreciate.
  
• Where are my Carriers? It's annoying that you have access to the entire tech tree in the Whispers of Oblivion prologue but it all gets reset to the basics when you start the campaign proper.
  

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For people who are past the first few missionsZeratul bit the dust pretty early, ripperoni

[Corenat Rovarnus]

Shakuras Last Stand mission was a bitch and a half, wish I'd done the Korhal missions beforehand.

Artanis really likes to get beamed out at the very last millisecond, even after he's already been dogpiled by zerg once. But man, being Protoss is great. Is the enemy about to destroy your weapons vault? Just beam the whole thing outta there.

That awkward moment when Fenix doesn't realize he's just a robot.

The Purifier faction emblem resembles the Overwatch logo.  intentional?

Also, where are my goddam Carriers?

[Corenat Rovarnus]

Oh I forgot to mention that the Dragoons are back baby, with OG sound effects! So you can have them AND Immortals.

[Corenat Rovarnus]

One thing the previous two campaigns had that LotV doesn't - a "museum" type area where you can view a big cinematic model each unit up close and personal.

I realize I have little to no experience handling the middle tier units of the Protoss faction - in the past I've only made Zealot+Stalker balls or Void Rays+Carriers.

[Corenat Rovarnus]

Comments after reaching the halfway point(just finished Ulnar missions):

At this point I can't really comment on the story without spoilerinos, so they'll all be in there.

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Ulnar Mission plot

• Kerrigan team-up, hooray!
  
• The weird murals in the temple got me thinking; it might just be the case that Terrans are actually one of the two destined races. I didn't see any Zerg depictions and some of the non-Protoss figures looked quite human. This was further reinforced by Artanis saying that Amon raised the Protoss to sentience. I'm probably wrong about this, I guess I'll see what develops later.
  
• Xel'naga is kill, rip
  
• Vorazun uses a scythe style psi-blade instead of the arm bracer. This is the first time I've seen one featured up close in a cutscene.
  
• wtf @ Alarak suddenly willing to cooperate? It seems kind of weird, as unless the Tal'darim also severed their nerve cords Amon could just ASSUME DIRECT CONTROL over them too rendering any betrayal moot.
  

I've gotten more acquainted with the "in-between" units, so here's what I have to say on them:

Sentries - The number 3 unit in the Protoss arsenal, a gas-heavy but solid support that can mitigate a lotta damage for your main force. In this campaign they have a shield recharging beam instead of forcefields which turns them into pseudo-medics. It's very easy to forget to make a couple of these whenever I mass warp a new infantry group.

The Immortal and its variations have proven very useful in putting the hurt on all those pesky hybrids that come in droves during the later missions. It's frankly astounding that I managed to get through the entirety of WoL and HotS without realizing that they all have the armored attribute, and took an eternity whittling them down one by one with stupid shit like banelings.


Of particular note is the Nerazim Annihilator with their Shadow Cannon ability, a long ranged barrage that can hit both ground and air. A pure mass of them isn't completely helpless versus air units, and in fact will do very well against a composition of heavy ground mech with a few capital ships. They're almost like Battlecruisers on land. You could even call them...Land Cruisers. 8)

High Templar - lmao I still can't use these, too much micro. At least they have a regular attack now.

Phoenixes - I didn't like them when the game launched in 2010, I still don't like them now. They serve as pseudo-ATG(air to ground) at best, and deal a measly 5 damage per hit at a slower rate than the Corsair, which you can replace it with in this campaign. Disruption Web is by far the superior ability as it's AoE, affects massive units and buildings, and doesn't have to be channeled so the casting unit can continue to attack while it's up. Sure, they can do ATA against Mutas and units that can't fight back like Banshees but Corsairs will do all of that better.

In general I'm kinda miffed that the Phoenix is the first air unit you get and the only one you'll have for a while in LotV. Speaking of which...still no Carriers

[Corenat Rovarnus]

So I FINALLY get Carriers in the second to last mission before the final arc, aaaand it turns out massing Void Rays is still superior because Vikings exist and interceptors don't do bonus damage vs armored. It was a fun mission though with the moving base and Karax proving himself.

The Final Arc was an ensemble blast featuring every main Protoss character as a hero unit, it's like an expanded version of Belly of the Beast in Wings of Liberty.

Unlike @Vroop, I went on to play the Into the Void epilogue.

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Epilogue Thoughts
these final three missions were grueling. first one took me over an hour, and I had to do the rest on hard difficulty because I couldn't keep my base from getting wiped on brutal.
Fighting void shade forces is a pain as they come in hordes of mixed regular units from all three races. It seems monotonous due to their color scheme but each unit retains all the stats of the original, meaning...you need to build everything you can with your one race to counter everything they throw at you.

I also don't like how you locked into a specific set of campaign customizations for each race, like upgrades for terran and evolutions for zerg. I would have greatly appreciated if they carried over the choices you made in the previous campaigns. Heck, even in the Whispers of Oblivion prologue to LotV I was kind of upset upon seeing Kerrigan's brood using the strain of roach I didn't pick.

ya boy artanis got shafted in terms of screentime, they had to play up the raynor-kerrigan ship to the max.
his force is fucking trash in essence of eternity, you have to babysit his base with half of your siege tanks and a bunker if you want him to live.
can't complain that much as technically the protoss got their closure already at the end of the main campaign.

Onwards to the Covert Ops DLC.

[SilkScarf]

Time to relive the AlphaGo hype

Tencent’s AI programs defeat Starcraft’s own AI - https://www.technologyreview.com/the-download/612188/tencents-ai-programs-defeat-starcrafts-own-ai/
^^^ https://thenextweb.com/artificial-intelligence/2018/09/20/tencent-created-ai-agents-that-can-beat-starcraft-2s-cheater-ai/

Maduk ft Veela - Ghost (Kerrigan's Anthem) [FREE DOWNLOAD] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEA2prf_x48
^^^ Dropbox download - https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ktgx6n25ijflxdj/AABdAnmTtHfbT829xQMk5lKOa

[Kaede]

Don't know why, but I'm downloading the free version of SC2 and probably going to play abit. Any tips?

Edit: Also off topic but does anyone know where I can buy Warcraft 3, Blizzard took the original down so it can't be bought anymore.

[Corenat Rovarnus]

On a blizzard nostalgia trip, are you?

Couple quick tips:
Ctrl + Left Click/Double click to select all units of the same type, Shift to select/deselect individually, Tab to cycle through different unit types in the same group.
Double tap a hotkey to jump to the control group's location. I usually hotkey my Command Center/Hatchery/Nexus to 1 or other key for quick jumps back to base to keep my macro game strong.
You can select multiple buildings in the same way as units and set their collective rally points.

I got more but it depends on whether you're doing singleplayer or multiplayer.

[Kaede]

Never really was a blizzard player growing up, I only played Starcraft 64 while growing up (which I still have...somewhere), but I own a couple of their games so figured I'd play them. Currently going through Diablo 3 on hard for the season with a Necromancer then going to finish the story mode with my lvl 51 crusader.

[Corenat Rovarnus]

Are you going solo with your Crusader? I found it's more of a support class and can't really do the deeps on their own...

[Kaede]

Yup was solo all the way with enchantress as a companion , I supplemented that by having gear that does nothing but regen health 1308 per hit, and a passive of 1183 per second. Also I know that there are much better gear and it's a dumb move, but I'm on Reaper of Souls and am still using Leoric's crown with a 25% XP gem with the crown's 100% bonus to socket effects to help level up a bit faster.

[Corenat Rovarnus]

Leoric's Crown is pretty legit as long as you have stats on par with your level, it's actually recommended in some pro builds. Only real downside is that it's not part of a set. How'd you get that XP gem? [also I should probably move this to the diablo thread]

[SilkScarf]

Google DeepMind has entered the fray - https://www.pcgamer.com/blizzard-will-show-off-googles-deepmind-ai-in-starcraft-2-later-this-week/

> The most recent developments will be revealed at 10 am PT/1 pm ET on January 24, on the StarCraft Twitch channel and Deepmind's YouTube channel.

[Corenat Rovarnus]

Replay commentary on a match with the Cartooned visuals https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4gwYbl8p4g