Druid Mastery Specialisations

Ok, so right now I am figuring that hey.. why don't you just write up your feedback and put the damm screenshots and all this jazz on the blog later, makes perfect sense right?

So what I am going to do, from now on, is basically write up zones as soon as I have finished them and/or topics of feedback and then every week, maybe a friday or something, go and fish around and put together the composition screenshots so the posts look prettier, the feedback overall is more crisp and actually some things make more sense for other viewers (LIKE THERE ARE ANY).

Ok, so tonight is going to be a very busy write up for me, Yesterday I finished the Northern Barrens (although 1 level short of 20, not sure why or if I missed some quests, but regardless). So I have around 6-7 posts incoming tonight with Northern Barrens and Northern Durotar Feedback.

Firstly though, some feedback on the Druid Specialisations you are presented with at level 10.

When dinging you are greeted with the UNLOCK FEATURE: TALENTS, on that little animation thing, quite cool I think, and like on live the talent button on the bar starts flickering when you ding to indicate you should click it.

When clicked you are prompted to choose your specialisation, you are presented with a summary of the specialisation spells and the signature spell in the middle, you can also view the talent trees by clicking the button saying "VIEW TALENT TREES"

Some comments on this generic feature.. GOOD :), overall, perhaps revolve a class quest around choosing your specialisation. (If a class quest has a place in wow I really think one based on choosing your specialisation would be great).

If we move onto the Druid specifics of the specialisations, we obviously have the 3 trees: Balance, Feral and Resto.

As Balance we get the ability Starsurge, a new ability in cataclysm, that does arcane/fire damage (can't remember the precise term used) and is going to be essential for generating eclipse procs by moving the eclipse bar by 10 each way.

We also get dreamstate to increase mana-regen for the spec and I think the last point is the eclipse bar, but it might be spell pushback for wrath,starfire etc. Whatever it is, its baked in stuff thats good for Balance Druids :).

Overall I think these are decent spells, can't argue with the smaller passive spells at all, definitly completely mandatory talents you would have to take anyway, so it's nice to have them baked into the specialisation.

As for the signature move, I'm a little half/half right now. Obviously I haven't played as a Moonkin on the Beta so I've no idea how crucial starsurge is to the rotation, Presumably it will work like you want to use it on cooldown, and inbetween you will want to proc eclipse with wrath and then move to spamming starfire as much as possible without triggering a solar eclipse early etc.

So I mean, there are arguments for and against it, It will be a signature ability of the balance druid, but I mean, when you think balance you think BOOMKIN, so I would really think moonkin form should be the specialised form, considering blizzard wants to appeal that resto is the spec without the dedicated form. I feel like boomkin should be given at level 10, and starsurge a talent in boomkins place.

However opposing this view is the fact that balance become very accustomed to the eclipse bar and starsurge mechanics from level 10 onwards, but I just feel that boomkin would be just so much more iconic as a specialisation ability.

Onto Feral Druids, we get some passive modifiers, (reducing rage/energy costs, 15% more damage and stuff), the vengeance mechanic for all tanks for bears. Pretty much most trees I think these passive stuff are good things, that you WOULD take and are rather boring talents.

The signature ability of Feral druids is mangle, definitely the right choice here in terms of both levelling progression and the fact that it has good crossover between tanking and dpsing. I mean the only other ability they could have used was like.. berserk, and a cooldown is something I ABSOLUTELY DO NOT WANT as a signature move, I mean a cooldown is almost always attrocious for levelling, because using it on mobs that die in like 5 seconds always feels superfluous. Obviously an ability that has a cooldown is fine, if it does damage and is like less than 30 seconds, but beyond that I always feel that a cooldown is like something you feel like you want to save and things die to quickly for the cooldown to be useful.

Lastly we have Resto, again the minor passives are good for the tree. However, I disagree with Swiftmend being the signature ability. I disagree with it because it has no damage output, I mean it accomplishes nothing to help soloing for levelling. Whilst I do agree that this is probably the best thing that druids could get as a signature ability, I feel like that it could be so much more awesome like if say it could also consume a moonfire on the target to do instant damage. I don't know if this sort of change would have pvp balance issues, however in terms of making resto more level friendly, this change to swiftmend would be awesome imo.

So finally onto my choice: I picked Feral (if it wasn't obvious by the screens :)) because well I think its much easier to level as feral compared to say balance, I don't really like casters so much because they always feel so much more vulnerable if you multipull.

I also chose it for the 30% movement speed increase you get as feral constantly, however I might add that actually feral has felt extremely weak when playing through northern barrens, having to swap out of cat form multiple times to heal and basically dying to any sort of chain pulling, where you just take too much damage. I may switch to balance for the next 10 levels or so to see if it feels stronger and isn't too bad mana wise.

I also want to test out the new eclipse bar, which I obviously haven't tried out yet :).

Anyway, moving on to the Northern Durotar write-up

Random Thoughts

Ok, haven't done anything today really, feeling kinda bad but hey I was like LOLTIRED and just meh felt so UN-INTO anything I tried to do. I thought I'd get some random ramblings out of the way in a post, and since this blog is mostly for my benefit... cos I mean, it's not like anyone else reads this at the moment, maybe if I'm lucky Blizzard bookmarked this page and was like YE FEEDBACK :DDD, but I doubt that somehow, I'm cool with that though cos like I like to get my ramblings down.

Maybe I will be less "SCARED" of public criticism of this blog, and start "tagging" posts so people in searches would randomly find this blog, but hey personally I just like writing stuff down in my twisted vision of well almost everything and well, having freedom instead of getting shut down, which inevitably i almost always get :D.

Anyway, onto ramblings on some current TOPICS in both my life, forums I read and such and I wanted to discuss a few things to myself and get my thoughts down on well a post :).

TOPIC NUMBER 1: WHINING

Ok, so I am pretty well mystified I guess is the best way to describe it at how some people have a constant ability to whine about almost anything, regardless of what happens. You have some people who whine about insignificant things like, idk, a model of a unit or npc or something and are like RAWR DON'T LIKE, and actually these sort of things are legit in my opinion, because hey thes insignificant whines are all about subject matter which is purely subjective. I mean, if I like something because it's pink/purple, I can tell you not everyone will. It's a world of free will after all so everyone has an opinion on well.. everything.

However we get to say more SIGNIFICANT WHINING, I mean at the moment I am experiencing this on 2 fronts: on Starcraft 2 balance and wow cataclysm balance. I'll start of f with the Starcraft 2 balance, because it is probably the least flawed of the 2 types.

At the moment theres alot of whine from people who are like TERRAN IS IMBALANCED!!??!?!?! both from zerg and protoss opponents, who seem to think terran is some kinda juggernaut that is impossible to take down. Firstly, I would like to state that I think nothing is imbalanced in this game, there are powerful things (LIKE EMP VS. PROTOSS) and there are also weak things, but nothing is so strong that it is "IMBA".

With that out of the way, I find it increasingly irritating that people claim that terran is imbalanced and whatever they do they are defeated by it. Firstly, lets just state some statistics, we have 6000 terrans 7250 protoss 5000 zerg 2000 Random in the diamond league across all regions approximatly.

People who have played over 100 games in diamond we have 1350 Terran, 1800 Protoss, 1200 Zerg, 100 random.

So we see that firstly in ladder Protoss is the most played and that Terran is second and Zerg is third most played. Again this doesn't say much other than perhaps protoss is slightly easier or more fun to play (you could draw either conclusion with different explanations easily).

However, they are pretty even mostly.

Now the biggest problem I have with say the whining is because people always seem to approach a problem with 0 creativity, they are like RAWR THIS IS OVERPOWERED, perhaps they even think they are some sort of god playing and won't dare look at their own play before looking at the opposing players.

What I mean by this is that they will be beaten by something they believed to be overpowered, maybe like EMP in a pvt matchup, but they won't approach the problem by like saying HUH? what can I do to make this thing less powerful, is there anyway I could have won, was it actually just inevitable I would lose because I got behind in the game.

Like they will look OUTWARDS, before looking INWARDS, also they will be like HUH WELL I FELT FORCED TO DO THIS AND THEN THIS GOT OWNED, like say zerg feel like they have to expand early vs. terran/protoss and obviously this leaves them open to early timing attacks, now sure you could argue this is a flaw with zerg mechanics, but a 1-basing zerg is going to be stronger than a ONLY JUST EXPANDED 2-basing zerg.

People want to whine that terran is "IMBALANCED" because they can do 50 different openings, and pretty much they are all viable, but I mean that is because protoss/zerg feel like they HAVE TO expand vs. Terran, so of course your army is going to be weaker and are going to be vulnerable to early timing attacks.

HOWEVER, my biggest concern rather than specifics, is the fact that people won't back up their facts with credible evidence, they back it up with anecdotal evidence, and because we are all human (hopefully) naturally everybody remembers the NEGATIVE EVENTS, over the positives, like say you go EXACTLY 50-50 in a matchup, you feel like you probably went 40-60 because you don't remember the wins unless they were like EPIC but you remember losses because LOL LOSS, so you end-up feeling you are playing against imbalance.

The next most annoying concern is that most people who complain haven't explored trying options against a certain tactic, like they think something is IMBA, but will keep throwing the same tactic against it and be like Huh? a build that defeats my build IMPOSSIBLE!?!?!, I remember a wise-man once saying that progress in builds goes like this you have a winning strategy, and then it gets stopped. The natural progression of this is to try your strategy but with MORE STRUCTURES or MORE UNITS, for an example of this see 3-gate -> 4-gate -> 5-gate all-in plays.

IF A STRAT DOESNT WORK BRUTE FORCE MAKES IT WORK!!!!

So yeh, people refuse to be creative and try out new things, its dangerous and stuff and somehow impossible, because the opposing player can somehow magically have every single unit en-masse in every single game at every single point. Somehow the opponent always dictates what you do, (this is the case in vs. Zerg really, but that's cos that is how zerg work) but yeh, sometimes the explanations are ludicrous.

One of the last things I don't like about whining is how like... people refuse to give in.. to whatever you do or say or suggest. THEY ARE RIGHT AND YOU ARE WRONG. Doesn't matter how legitimate or cool you are, unless you agree with them they are never happy, now in starcraft this whine is made prominent by suggesting strategies and stuff to combat this and it's immedietly rejected with either a petty pop at me/the suggester or it is deflected and replaced with BUT THIS IS IMBALANCED.

So you are left with these people are like, no matter what happens this is imbalanced in its current state and "WHATEVER THEY DO" (which is usually 1 thing every game) they lose to it.

Maybe you would ask, what would make an ability or unit imbalanced? well I would say a unit or ability is imbalanced, if like it meets a few criteria.

1) YOU HAVE TO USE IT, ie in a certain matchup you have to use it, or would be foolish not to. Lets say a ghost in TvP, I mean emp is very powerful so you would be foolish not to use it vs. Protoss.

2) You are in a scenario where like you have an army x and an army y, normally x beats y, adding the "imbalance" makes y beat x, and whatever you add to x can't turn the tables on y.

This second point is my major criterion for imbalance, and I don't think anything satisfies this, like lets say we have army x and army y, being like Army X is like 2 Ultralisks and Army Y is 10 marines, firstly X beats Y, now we add stim to marines and micro and (I BELIEVE) that 10 marines with stim and micro will beat 2 ultralisks but we can add infestors with fungal growth to stop the micro and again ultralisks win. This goes on forever basically, but the point is, there is nothing that beats something ALL THE TIME REGARDLESS.

The only thing that comes close is like maybe 15-20 void rays, which will demolish almost everything.

3) If in an even game, lets say nobody attacked and the 2 players macrod identically off of 2 bases, this 1 player can make this 1 unit or ability that is the other player cannot do anything about at that stage even if it was scouted.

What I am talking about here is, say somebody made like a mothership, and the fleet beacon was scouted early, and both players had the same resource income, the opposing player could not do ANYTHING, and it was basically an automatic loss. This could mean the player had to micro the unit, but basically if he did that it was an auto-win.

The idea is that although there is something you can do to combat the strategy and you saw the strategy, you don't have enough time or enough macro to beat it when the opposing player can get access to it.

There are probably more criteria, but I can't think of them right now, these are 3 fairly good stepping stones and note they ALL NEED TO BE satisfied for something to be deemed overpowered.

THINGS THAT DONT MAKE SOMETHING IMBALANCED:

1) If something you need to do to beat something requires more skill than the other player

Sure you are putting in more micro to beat something, but hey thats part of the game. (HOWEVER if say one race required more micro and more macro to be EVEN with another race that would be imbalanced, but only if it was in like 70%+ of scenarios imo)

2) It beat a strategy that was scouted.

3) You scouted it and still lost

(Yes this is controversial maybe but the point is, if you scout say LOTS OF HELLIONS and make LOTS OF ZERGLINGS, yes you are going to lose that battle.)

4) If something is unbeatable by YOUR BUILD.

Yeh, there are other criterion.. of course there are like playstyle choices and all that jazz, but hey, I hate the talk of imbalance, really I don't think anything is truly imbalanced unless it meets those criteria above, which nothing does really.

Think this post satisfied my rambling nature though, maybe i'll make another post about how I hate how much wow players whine and people whine in general, but hey it would probably turn into some 20,000 word thesis, and I'm not in the mood for writing THAT MUCH.

Hoping to start laddering in starcraft 2 later, urgh scary tiems :<. LOSING SUCKS IMBALANCED etc will be incoming :)).

Cataclysm Finally Re-installed

YES IT FINALLY REINSTALLED, 15gb download is seriously... way too much :<, although about 4.2gb hasn't been downloaded, not sure why but hell I can play so thats cool. Although I haven't uploaded the specialisation of druids or the last part of durotar... IM IN THE MOOD for blasting through barrens and ashenvale tomorrow, so I am going to do that.

GOING TO TAKE ME FOREVER TO WRITE UP ALL OF IT, but hey, better I get all the content done and then take 3 hours per area (ye.. it probably takes at least that long) to write it up. I am tempted to get to like around 55 or 60 and just take 2 days and write it all up, which might be cool and like CONDENSED so all the feedback is in consecutive posts.

But ye.. gonna be sort of MEGA CHINA LEVELLING/FEEDBACK GATHERING over the next few days, obviously testing the zone rigorously and taking screenshots means I probably end up taking around 3x longer in a zone than I normally would, tbh I would say I was a pretty damm fast leveller so maybe that's not that much longer for the average player.

Anyway, watching a bunch of starcraft 2 tournaments at the moment, my boyfriend entered a starcraft 2 tournament for tomorrow :OOOOO gonna try and support him and stuff, (he isn't actually that bad, hes like diamond level :<). Also going to a bbq tomorrow so WOAH BUSY DAY, but ye gonna try and post some stuff tomorrow, hopefully finished durotar + druid specialisation post.

Cataclysm Download Testing

Ok, so lets get some testing thoughts out here, 1) like the gnome starting area is here.. (and u don't have to do special stuff to test it) so I decided to just make a gnome char to test out the download.

Basically it took the download about 10 minutes on my shitty 5MBit/s connection (at best :/) downloading at around 300kb/s to able to play, (after having to install a 600mb part, which I presume

When going to the character selection screen it took around 10-15 seconds for the character stuff to be downloaded and to see a picture of my character on the generic background, if I selected a different character and went back to that character the background would be loaded after around 5-10 seconds. Overall pretty easy. When creating a char each specific "face" or facet of the char creation process took around 1 second to be loaded, it was pretty streamlined and you couldn't really notice you weren't playing the complete game.

When loading up into the game it took around 2-3 minutes for everything to be streamed properly, I presume this was like the animations of the races and this sort of thing, so I could have a streamlined experience. However, once all that loaded and I was in the game, it ran pretty much smoothly at around 300ms. I presume this was at the cost of downloading the overall game, but tbh I couldn't notice whether it was downloaded or full ingame.

All the sound files were present, and all this jazz. I couldn't put a finger on anything i saw that was missing, other than like the FINAL POLISH, but then I play on low graphics anyway (although all my screenshots previously were on ultra settings :D) so I doubt this change really affects me at all.

I really am liking this downloader, it is very impressive to be able to play after around 5 minutes of a 15.5gb (SERIOUSLY WTF!??!!??!) download, and currently my downloader is on like 6% and I can't really notice any difference.

Going to hold off on levelling the druid until after the download is complete in case questing is actually affected in someway, like missing textures for those awesome portrait things or perhaps missing animations.

Regardless though BIG THUMBS UP for this new downloader, although having to re-install the beta is rough and annoying as hell, I much prefer being able to play with seemlessly little interruption in play (apart from world server going down :DDDD) and surprisingly little lag. Kudos tbh.

Today O:

Just posting to say that I probably won't be writing anything today... mainly because all my bandwidth is going to be taken up by downloading Cataclysm beta.. again. Maybe if it's quick I'll do Mission 06 in my walkthrough, I might also comment on the patch changes for beta, again using my amazing (WAIT WHAT?) knowledge of classes :).

Depends though, mixed reports on how easy it is to download the client. I am gonna try and test out some simple gameplay whilst its downloading, but realistically I don't have good enough bandwidth to play.

Research Discussion

Right so in the Starcraft 2 Campaign there are Protoss Research upgrades and Zerg Research upgrades, 20 in total for each side, but you can only choose 10, and they come in pairs so you choose between 2 similar upgrades and decide what is best.

Basically the way it works out is that the "LEFT" side is the offensive option and the "RIGHT" side is the defensive option in a pair.

Firstly lets go on about Protoss Research

Ultra Capacitors - Your Attack upgrades now increase your unit's attack speed by 5% per upgrade

Vanadium Plating - Your Armor Upgrades now increase your unit's Hp by 5% per upgrade.

Now, this depends on your playstyle really, if you are ultra aggresive, I.E YOU WANT TO RUSH AND NOT TURTLE SO MUCH, then it actually turns out the life upgrade is better, it means you can move out that much faster.

If you want to turtle in your campaign, use bunkers, siege tanks etc to defend then the attack speed upgrade is better, because they mean you fire more often before the enemy hits you, and because you are in bunkers or your tanks are in entrenched positions, their hp doesn't matter so much.

This upgrade is entirely up to the individual player, I personally prefer the attack speed upgrade, I would recommend it if you like Siege tanks in anyway shape or form :D.

Orbital Depots - Supply Depots now Drop in "Instantly"

Micro-Filtering - Your Refineries now harvest gas 25% faster.

This research is more dependent on how "good" you are, if you are bad, like me, Orbital depots is BY FAR the best option, it means you don't have to constantly produce depots and can just produce 2-3 at a time by 1 scv every so often and not be supply blocked.

If though you are good at managing your supply, then Micro-filtering is better, but to be honest I have gone through all missions and there was no mission I really thought I needed my gas 25% faster, considering medic marine is like such a powerful strategy, you just don't need this upgrade unless you have no use for Orbital Depots because you are awesome :D.

Automated Refinery - Your Refineries now harvest Vespene Gas Automatically

Command Centre Reactor - Your Command Centres can now Produce 2 Scvs simultaneously.

Ok, this choice is pretty simple to me: AUTOMATED REFINERY, every time. Although the reactor is useful, the point is that on alot of missions you can't produce 2 scvs at a time at the start anyway because you don't have the mineral income to support it. Also the Automated Refinery means you usually get a few free scvs per mission because they were given to you to go on gas ideally at the start, but now you can put them on minerals instead.

There is also one mission, Supernova, that having the automated Refinery is just SO USEFUL. In my opinion this upgrade is mandatory.

Raven - Drops PDD, Turret and can use Hunter Seeker Missiles, Detector

Science Vessel - Can use Irradiate, Repairs Vehicles!!!!!!!!!!!!!!, Detector.

Now although you can't get science vessels in multiplayer, my god I wish you could, they are amazing, there is no choice here you HAVE to get vessels here in my opinion, the raven is just not worth the money in single player, it requires too much micro to be good, but to have a free heal on your mechanical units (IT DOESNT COST EXTRA MINERALS/GAS :D) from science vessels makes this upgrade pretty mandatory imo. Once you get vessels you will be making them, pretty much asap.

If you want to practice "TERRAN PLAYSTYLE" for multiplayer then get a raven sure, but science vessels are like 9000% better :D.

Tech Reactor - Combines the Tech Lab and the Reactor

Orbital Strike - Units from your barracks now arrive in drop-in pods at your barracks' rally point.

Now, this depends on your style, if you are protoss, or like their style over terrans. Orbital strike basically converts barracks into Warpgates, although you still queue, you get to reinforce anywhere, you can basically drop in a force anywhere on the map, which can be awesome for certain missions, Shatter the sky for one. It's also awesome if you basically only want to go medic/marine since you just need reactored barracks for that strategy (later on).

However, I personally prefer lots of siege tanks, banshees, medics and marines. So I would go for the tech reactor as it allows multiple siege tank and banshee production. It also means I don't have to buy the medic upgrade of course. This is really down to personal taste, neither of these are mandatory.

Right. ONTO THE ZERG UPGRADES.

Shrike Turret - Adds a turret to your bunkers that attacks ground and air.

Fortified Bunker - Adds 150 life to your bunkers.

There isn't much in this really, It really depends how you use your bunkers, if you use them primarily for defense, alone, then you are probably better with the Shrike Turret. If you use them, like I do, as like a stopper for your Siege Tanks to obliterate your enemy when defending then the Fortified Bunker is a better upgrade.

Really though, the differences here are minor, just go with what you feel like :D.

Planetary Fortress - Allows your Command Centre to be outfitted with a cannon at the expense of being able to lift

Perdition Turret - Flame Turret

This is again optional, HOWEVER, I will say that the final mission is MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH easier by going with the Planetary Fortress option, The Perdition turret is just really weak in the final mission compared to the fortress. The Perdition Turret has more uses in like other missions than the fortress does though, since mostly you can't expand on most maps in the campaign, where the fortress shines in multiplayer.

However I would personally go for PLANETARY FORTRESS, just because it makes the last mission so much easier.

Predator - Anti-Infantry Cat like Vehicle

Hercules Transport - Massive Transport that unloads units almost instantly

The difference between these 2 are minor, Hercules takes alot of tech to use and isn't that useful in most missions, however I would say it was better than the Predator because it means you can ignore medivacs in the campaign.

The predator is only really useful in like one mission (welcome to the jungle) otherwise it just isn't that great, you really won't make them once you can make siege tanks.

But again, it doesn't matter: neither play a pivotal part in the campaign, just go with how you feel.

Cellular Reactor - All units start with +100 Energy and +100 Maximum Energy

Regenerative Bio-Steel - All Mechanical units slowly regen life.

Basically: TAKE CELLULAR REACTOR, if you followed my advice and took the science vessel.

Regenerative Bio-Steel is kinda useless if you have a science vessel able to heal your units with your mech units. Cellular Reactor means all your energy units have 125 energy+ out of the gate, which is just immense and means they can use their abilities right at the start, it's particularly useful on the mission "Supernova" and on other missions aswell.

Hive Mind Emulator - Allows you to mind control zerg units in a SMALLLLLLLL!!!! radius around the target.

Psi Disruptor - Slows nearby zerg AND THEIR ATTACK SPEED by 50%.

Do not be conned by the hive mind emulator into thinking that it is cool, although you might want a pet ultralisk, on most missions they die too fast or don't go in range of your stinking emulator for you to be able to use it. Basically the Psi Disruptor is SOOOOOOOOOOOOO good, it means that the zerg units are 50% slower so your siege tanks have twice as long to kill them before they reach your lines, (Or even your bunkers).

So yeh take the Psi Disruptor, it is SOOOOOO useful, on sooo many missions (wherever you will be attacked by zerg) the hive emulator is too gimmicky to be of any real use D:.

a TLDR of Sorts will be listed here:

Protoss: Ultra Capacitors, Orbital Depots, Automated Refinery, Science Vessels, Tech Reactor

Zerg: Fortified Bunker, Planetary Fortress, Hercules Transport, Cellular Reactor, Psi-Disruptor.

Mission 05: The Evacuation

Ok, firstly onto what the Mission Introduces, gameplay style of the mission. This Mission introduces you to the Firebat (YAY BROOD WAR ONLY UNIT :D), however as i stated on the previous mission unless you fork out the cash they are really dire, especially against anything but lings, however if you do fork out the cash they are really powerful against zerg, they make excellent tanks and roast lings for breakfast. Just remember you marines are infinitly better, so don't make any firebats other than the 2 you are given.

The only other thing this mission introduces is the Mercenary Compound, basically when the mission begins a countdown begins and when it is up you can summon in the mercs, basically if I don't primarily state it call in these ASAP, skipping a round of unit production if necessary, they are simply your best troops and are worth it, they also produce instantly.

This mission is primarily an escort mission, the colonists are evacuating on the slowest truck possible (and indeed the weakest :D) and go whenever they want and not when you are ready, this leads to the weird scenario that the only difficult escort is the 2nd, instead of the last wave, which is stupid imo but ye.. inevitable.

Mission Objectives:

Main: Reach the Colonist Outpost

Escort Colonists to safety (50)

20 Colonists can't die

Bonus: Recover the Chrysalis (3 Zerg Research)

Achievements: Do not let a Colonist Truck be destroyed on Normal

Do not salvage or lose a structure on Hard Difficulty.

You Start with 2 firebats and 2 medics, and you see the colonist base to the west. It contains 1 CC, 1 Mercenary Compound, 1 Refinery, 1 Supply Depot, 1 Barracks with Tech lab and 4 SCVS.

These will eventually be yours, now an interesting thing you can do if you want to make the mission a little easier, is wait 5 minutes at the start with your firebats, the cooldown on the merc compound starts when you start the mission, so then you can automatically call in 6 troops and the mission goes alot smoother this way, regardless when you enter the zone with your firebats proceed west to the compound.

You have to fight zerglings and just attack-moving into them should kill them easily, if your medics get focused by zerglings, PULL THEM BACK!!!!!!, you don't want to produce any medics for the first 2 waves of escorts, and it is imperitive you don't lose one to a stupid zergling attack at the beginning. There are 2 cash rewards north of the road to the compound, 1 is gas and 1 is minerals, pick them up! and then proceed to the green mark on the ground.

Once you do this you get access to your base, put all your scvs on minerals and send your 4 man squad north of your barracks and slightly west and there is 1 100 mineral cash reward on the ground, pump marines and scvs exclusively.

Here is a somewhat flexible Build Order.

17 Supply Depot

24 Supply Depot

31 Supply Depot, Barracks

38 Supply Depot, Barracks, Reactor

44 Supply Depot, Engineering Bay, 3 Scvs in Gas

55 Supply Depot

61 Supply Depot (Constant), Reactor, Barracks, Attack Upgrade

73 - 2 Bunkers (1 at each choke already with a bunker)

91 - Armor Upgrade, Cut Scvs (you want extra to repair the bunkers, hence the late cut)

Macro (You may want to make the last Barracks a Reactor, but you will run out of Minerals before you can really make use out of the reactor though, so just 2 reactor, tech lab and no addon barracks are perfectly fine.)

Ok, so a few things, getting the normal achievement is pretty easy: the only time you will likely fail this is on the first/2nd waves. It's a similar story with the bunkers and the other achievement, basically the first 2 waves are much harder than the rest because you have a very limited force and only begin with 4 scvs (Seriously wtf...).

This is also the first mission that really taxes you to multitask, you have to constantly move your mobile force and macro, the build order above has lots of steps at similar times because basically they are good timings between waves to do stuff, a perfect player (not me) could do all this micro and have a better build order, but I try to be as simple as possible with the build order. If you find yourself getting supply blocked or just overrun just select your units with the convoy and right click the truck, they will follow it, just switch back when they get attacked.

At the end (after getting the chrysalis Bonus objective) Your money will spike, just don't worry about it, you want some spare minerals to repair the bunkers, if you run out of minerals just leave around 200 minerals in the bank for repairs.

Onto the actual Mission, at around 24 Supply the 1st Convoy truck thing will move out, take your entire force and rally your barracks to your units and produce on the way. Take an scv with you aswell, move up the road just staying around on the convoy, you will get shown that there is a bunker on the Road, Ignore this and continue to move up the road, a first stream of zerglings, and a Hydralisk will attack you.

Take them out but keep ahead and around the truck, pick up the Gas cash reward on the left side of the road and when you reach the path heading east another wave of zerg will attack you, take it out quickly and get the 1 mineral cash reward (DO NOT GO FURTHER IN AND TAKE THE OTHER YET).

After this RUSH AHEAD of the convoy and u will see another bunker, if you want the achievement send in your scv and repair it and take out this attack force quickly, after this there is a Hydralisk on the right side of the road next to a chrysalis, take it out along with some burrowed zerg and pick up the chrysalis and the 2 mineral cash rewards on either side of the road. Put 6 Marines in that bunker and leave your scv here. Make your way with the rest of your force back to base.

Hopefully you should have both your sets of mercenaries at your base or at least before the next convoy sets out, as soon as you have 6 marines (or 4 marines and 1 Marauder) head with them straight to the first bunker with an scv. The Rest of your force should be with the convoy.

Remember this is the hardest wave to Escort, make sure you bring an extra scv to repair the truck (this is optional, I didn't need it but if you want to be safe do it). Keep your Moveable force around the truck when you are moving, continue to rally all your unit producing structures to this force. On this wave the 1st choke gets attacked by 2 waves of zerglings (with the occasional roach/hydra).

After the 1st wave ends, ignore the next wave with your attack group, (your bunker can take care of it (DONT BE AFRAID TO STIM INSIDE THE BUNKER)) and rush again to that middle path, you will be hit by a wave of zerglings before you reach the path, and another once you reach the path, I think you get hit by mutalisks here after you go past the path along with a 3rd wave, remember you have a bunker at the third choke, don't rush to it until you have dealt with the waves from the middle path.

Once this escort is dealt with, you are through the worst of it, it's not that the waves don't get tougher, it's just you end up with like 80-100+supply for the rest of the waves so nothing can really stop that force the zerg send at you. Immedietly send 2 additional scvs, 1 to each bunker area, and make a second bunker (Don't block-off the south ramp entirely). Put in 6 marines (4 marines, 1 Marauder if you want) to each bunker. Also start producing Medics from your tech labbed Barracks from now on.

Just a small note on upgrades, mostly in these missions it doesnt matter what you upgrade first (until you get your research option) but if you are using lots of bunkers in missions it is more important to upgrade attack first for your infantry than armor.

Now, with your more substantial force, hopefully reinforced with a second set of war pigs and hammer securities (probably halfway through the escort on the marauders) move out, again there are 2 waves of zerg coming at the bunker, but this time there is a wave that unburrows on the left side of the road, take them out swiftly but DO NOT fall behind the convoy, zerglings will be streaming in from the east passage, take them out safely and keep up with the convoy, A final 2 waves of zerg will come streaming in from the north bunkers, and an additional force will unburrow directly north of these Bunkers.

Once dealt with it is time to get the chrysalises, Go to the Middle path heading east, and well head east and follow the path round to the south (DO NOT GO FURTHER EAST - there is a large Zerg base there) The Chrysalis is in the middle of the field, zerg forces will unburrow to defend it, just take them out with ease and head back out to the Road.

Now head to the south bunkers and head down the ramp, go further west and you hug the treeline and you will see the final Chrysalis, there are more zerg than before defending this, quite a few roaches but they should be no problem for your pretty large force. Grab the Chrysalis and head back to escort the convoy, which should be just about leaving.

During all this Matt Horner will be like ZERG HAVE ENTERED THE ATMOSPHERE, basically this means they will be raining zerglings at your convoy from above, this sounds scarier than it actually is, Basically in this 4th Escort you have the occasional 4 zerglings spawn from the sides of the road along with 2 waves of enemies from each path. (Note that the south and north bunkers have banelings attack them, these are suicidal zerg units that blow up and do massive aoe damage to both infantry and structures, focus these down if you want but they should never break your bunkers). This is a pretty easy wave really, just escort it and you will have 1 final wave to deal with.

This time Matt Horner is like WE HAVE DETECTED UNDERGROUND ZERG, these are basically Nydus Worms, these are a Zerg Structure that transfer units between them, on the campaign they actually spawn units, in multiplayer they are a cool way for zergs to transfer their units across the battlefield.

Again, this sounds much more dangerous than it actually is, there is only 1 dangerous Nydus Really, and it is only a Danger if you let it. Again, like the previous 2 escorts, you get 2 waves of zerg per path. You get a few of the dropped zerglings like in the 4th Escort but you also get Nydus Worms, take out the first Nydus Worm, which is at the bottom of the South Bunkers with marines from the overfacing cliff above it. (Just on the Road basically).

After this QUICKLY get ahead of the convoy to the middle path, STIM IF NECESSARY, do not hold back on stimming if you are far behind. A Nydus worm spawns in the path, take it out asap then run straight to the north bunkers, again stim if necessary.

Now a Nydus worm will spawn on the North path, DO NOT take this out. You don't need to take this out at all, just keep all your units on the right side of the road where a final nydus will spawn, THIS IS THE ONLY DANGEROUS ONE, take it out asap and then just sit back and finish the mission.

After finishing the mission you will gain access to the Ship's Laboratory and Research, I'm going to make a separate post about research options, which are optional and which are mandatory in a separate post.

Basically though you somehow should have 4 protoss research and 6? zerg research (I guess saving the rebels in the 3rd mission grants you 3 research). Which means you can choose between fortified bunker or Shrike turret, I would go with Fortified Bunker myself, but it really doesn't matter.

Onto the Armory and you have now unlocked the Firebat Upgrades

Firebat: Incinerator Gauntlets - 40% Bigger Aoe Damage

Juggernaut Plating - +2 Armor.

Basically if you want to actually use firebats, these 2 upgrades are mandatory, they turn them from nitpicky niche fighters to AWESOME TANKS, that take ALOT to kill. I would personally advise against taking their upgrades, unless you exploit the bug I told you about in mission 03. They are useful though if you get both those upgrades, if you don't like firebats, just ignore them: they aren't necessary for any mission other than a late mission, and thats only because you get them for free :D.

You should have 110,000 credits. I would go for Stabilizer Medpacks from the medics and skip firebat mercenaries. You don't need them for the next mission and having more efficient medics is just essential really. Definitly you want this upgrade, if not now then the next mission. Alternatively, if you want the firebat mercenaries, take the Combat shield upgrade for marines and buy the mercenaries.

Onto the next mission and Tosh O: :).