History YMMV / StarCraftII

* Rich resources is very seldomly used throughout the campaigns. Only a select few missions have the gold mineral fields, and the rich gas geysers don't appear ''at all''.

** The release of ''Legacy of the Void'' broke the base in a similar manner on the Terrans. The Marauder nerf, along with addition of the Adept and Disruptor to the Protoss, and the Lurker and Viper's Parasitic Bomb to the Zerg, makes the Terran's bread and butter strategy, MMM (Marines, Marauders, and Medivacs) ''much'' weaker. Some Terran players are complaining now that this makes them the weakest race since Terrans have a harder time doing a tech switch to transition into later-game Factory and Starport-based armies, while Protoss and Zerg players are mocking the Terrans for relying on the MMM strategy since ''Wings of Liberty'' and are now just upset they "have to learn how to ''really'' play" after using the same strategy for five years.

* EsotericHappyEnding: The ending has an uplifting tone with Amon and his armies eradicated, the terrans freed from the tyranny and aggression of Arcturus's Dominion, the protoss factions reunified and building a new future on Aiur, the Zerg Swarm destroyed with its largest successor under Zagara pulling a HeelFaceTurn thanks to Kerrigan's lessons, and all three races being friendly (well, the terrans and protoss are friendly, the zerg are "mostly not hostile"). But, partly due to its briefness, the ending really brushes over the sheer demographic and economic devastation caused by the wars of the last decade that would logically leave much of the Koprulu sector a post-apocalyptic wasteland. In the first game alone, nine of the thirteen main terran worlds were devastated and the vast majority of the protoss population was killed on Aiur. In ''Wings of Liberty'' those same terran worlds were devastated again just as they were rebuilding, with ''Heart of the Swarm'' adding even more planets to the butcher's bill. In ''Legacy of the Void'' the bulk of the protoss get mind-controlled and spend most of the game utterly eviscerating the already exhausted terrans and zerg, then suffer another huge loss when Shakuras is destroyed; and while they do get Aiur back, it's made clear that little of the retaken infrastructure is usable and everything needs to be built back from the ground up. The zerg take massive losses throughout the games as well, though for them it's [[ExplosiveBreeder not as big of a deal]]. There's also always the chance that Zagara or whoever succeeds her could simply rebuild their armies (Kerrigan managed it in just a few years after all) and start the war over again, which the depleted terrans and protoss would be hard-pressed to manage. The sequel novel ''Literature/StarCraftEvolution'' both downplays the implied damage and tries to address some issues, such as by showing that Zagara's turn was genuine, that she's using the zerg's resources to help the other two races speed along recovery efforts through bioengineered flora, and that her Swarm isn't powerful enough to overwhelm the sector even if she wanted to.

* CreatorsPet: The macro booster mechanics -- [=MULEs=]/Chrono Boost/Inject Larvae -- have always been a touchy subject for skewing the game balance in different ways. [=MULEs=] speed up Terran mining rate ridiculously and allow the Terran to run much fewer workers than other races, and lets them recover much easier from a worker raid to the point a Terran player may not even feel they need [=SCVs=] at all for mineral mining. Meanwhile Inject Larvae is busywork since the player must ''always'' be mindful of their Queen and Hatchery, and unlike the Orbital Command and Nexus' mechanics, Queens cannot quickly dump their reserve energy on multiple injections, the player must wait until the current injection finishes. A poll was set up on [[http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/closed-threads/494703-poll-macro-booster-community-feedback Team liquid]] to ask the community's thoughts on them, and an overwhelming majority voted "no macro boosters", yet Blizzard chose to retain them and try to balance them in other ways.

* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodCharacter: The Protoss as a whole are put on a pretty big backburner before they were finally brought into the spotlight when the ''Legacy of the Void'' expansion rolled around. The primary example being that it takes awhile for the Daelaam Protoss to actually get going in [=SC2=] due to how insignificant they are to the main stories of ''Wings of Liberty'' and ''Heart of the Swarm''. One can only wonder how different, or more interesting, the story would have been had they taken part in Valerian's attack on Char to cleanse Kerrigan, or when Kerrigan invaded Korhal with her Zerg Swarm to kill Arcturus. In addition, the Tal'darim didn't fare much better as they were basically a shallow one-dimensional villain that existed purely for missions to fight against Protoss. It's not until ''Legacy of the Void'' that the Tal'darim were finally provided some much needed depth.

* ScapegoatCreator:
** During the lead-up to ''Wings of Liberty'', it was lead designer Dustin Browder, who fans accused of trying to ruin the game on purpose and blamed every questionable gameplay element on him.
** With ''Legacy of the Void'', the title shifted to David Kim, a pro-level player who also works as a game balancer for Blizzard and is accused of advising Blizzard to make changes based on his personal preferences rather than good balance.

* AuthorsSavingThrow: A criticism of the ''Wings of Liberty'' campaign was that the developers included too many units, with every single mission dedicated to a unit. This not only created a massive tech tree (almost two dozen units in total), but some of the units weren't that good, even in the missions that focused on them -- on the other hand, there was criticism over many missions being ThisLooksLikeAJobForAquaman, being tailored to the strengths of its spotlight unit and coming off as gimmicky and easy. ''Heart of the Swarm'' dialed back on the unit count heavily, had several levels that didn't focus on one unit, and the levels that did focus on a new unit did so in ways that felt more organic and didn't try to shoehorn the unit into things.

* MostAnnoyingSound:
** Units now give a unique warning to players when they are being attacked offscreen, and it's always the same. Marines will cry for help, zealots will insist they "cannot hold," and so forth. They do this ''every time'' they enter battle; even if they're winning they'll call for help, and ''every'' unit does it, except for the zerg who don't talk. It gets very annoying very fast.
--->'''Adjutant:''' Base is under attack.\\
'''Player:''' '''[[AnnoyingVideoGameHelper I KNOW!! SHUT UP!!!!!]]'''
*** Battlecruiser commanders shout "Abandon ship!" as soon as the bullets start flying. Even if they are part of a nigh-unstoppable twenty-unit group and the offending unit is a single wimpy hydralisk. Annoyingly justified by how Battlecruiser commanders follow the stereotype of the cowardly Russian submarine commander, and would understandably overreact to the slightest threat. They also yell "[[Franchise/StarWars It's a trap!]]" every once in a while too.
*** This no longer seems the case as Blizzard became aware of this trope in late 2015 and changed the unit's cries for help to alerting you that they're in battle, while [[BloodKnight Blood Knight]] units, like the Zealot and Thor, become very enthusiastic when engaged in combat. [[SuicidalOverconfidence Even if the odds are not stacked in their favor]].
--->'''Zealot:''' We meet the enemy in glorious battle!\\
'''[[TheAhnold Thor]]:''' Dah! Come and fight me, eh ha ha!
** And then there's the classic trope namer: YouRequireMoreVespeneGas, "Not enough minerals", "You must construct additional pylons" (and their counterparts Zerg and Terran counterparts "Spawn more Overlords" and "Supply Depot required" respectively) and "Not enough energy" (and their Terran and Zerg equivalents).

-->'''Adjutant''': Pulse Cannon online.
-->'''Protoss Advisor:''' [[OrbitalBombardment Solar Bombardment]] available/[[TimeStandsStill Time Stop]] online.
-->'''Alarak:''' I am ready to [[OneManArmy be empowered]]/The Death Fleet is standing by.
-->'''Stukov:''' An [[{{Robeast}} Apocalisk]] is ready for spawning.

*** "[[Creator/HuskyStarcraft Banelings]], [[EarWorm banelings]], [[RuleOfThree banelings]] woaaahhh..."

** The Thor's Javelin Missile Launchers are called Colihue Rocket Launchers. The colihue (A mapudungun -Mapuche language- word) is a south american species of bamboo.
* WhatCouldHaveBeen: A number of features in the single player were cut.
** In Wings of Liberty, Raynor was supposed to be able to walk around the ship like in an adventure game, and there were several subplots including one where the Hyperion's crew staged a mutiny if you couldn't afford to pay them. The Hyperion was reduced to a few interactive objects and the side plots were cut entirely.
** In Heart of the Swarm, the concept of 'essence' was supposed to be worked into the plot more naturally. In the final product, it's mostly Dehaka and Abathur talking about it non-stop. A VAST number of units were also cut.
** In Legacy of the Void, Zeratul was originally supposed to be the protagonist. The gameplay was supposed to center around gaining the favor of various Protoss factions. While a part of this remains in the final product, it was vastly simplified.
** Several multiplayer units were also cut, including a flying builder unit for Terran called the Nomad, Zerg Queens that gained power as you increased your tech level, and a Protoss infantry unit that did more damage with the more kills it got.

* MisBlamed: Early in the game's development EVERYTHING that the fans didn't like was blamed on Dustin Browder, to the point some accused him of trying to ruin the game on purpose because he used to work on the ''VideoGame/CommandAndConquer'' series and saw ''VideoGame/StarCraft'' as a rival franchise. FanDumb indeed.

* CounterpartComparison: The similarities between Valerian and [[Characters/WarcraftTheAllianceStormwind Anduin Wrynn]] are far too much to ignore. Not only do they look a hell of a lot like each other and share a voice actor, but they also share similar backstories (with the main difference being that Valerian's dad was evil and Anduin's wasn't), especially now that Anduin's become king of Stormwind.

** Early in development there was a Broken Base on the Zerg. Some thought they're the weakest race and helpless before any competent Protoss or Terran, while others thought they wㄷre fine and the weaker players just [[DifficultButAwesome had yet to "click" with the race and realize their full potential and versatility]]. A related point of contention was the Infester, a unit so powerful it was considered a necessity for Zerg to have a chance, but perhaps was ''too'' powerful. Then Patch 1.4 talked about nerfing the Infester's Neural Parasite ability, and cue the arguments. Numerous fixes to the race come ''Heart of the Swarm'' helped mitigate the problems.

** In Co-Op, Zeratul is even more broken than Tychus. Despite the fact he's recommended for experienced players, he's both one of the most powerful and the easiest commanders to use. His gimmick is that he has to find artifact fragments in the world itself by the use of an ability, but once he does, all his units upgrade automatically. He's only got 1 tech structure you really need (Whereas other commanders have 2 or 3) unless you want to build specyfic tier 3 units. Zeratul gets by with just his upgraded Stalkers, Sentries and Immortals, the first having decent health and damage on top of an automatic dodge teleport which eliminates the need for micro on any difficulty except Brutal, the second keeping the army alive by being portable Shield Batteries, and the third erases air units from the map with 2-3 shots. His only real weakness - swarms of Zerg units - can be negated by building Tesseract Monolyths, a free and instant turret with insane range, Detector capabilities, and splashing stun. Three of them can stunlock entire armies, and with just the 2nd artifact fragment they can be "projected" onto the battlefield for about a minute, essentially giving you global control over the battlefield (so long as you have vision in the area). A half-decent player with can do Brutal missions with this guy as early as level 5, which is the "free to play" threshold.

** In Co-Op, Zeratul is even more broken than Tychus. Despite the fact he's recommended for experienced players, he's both one of the most powerful and the easiest commanders to use. His gimmick is that he has to find artifact fragments in the world itself by the use of an ability, but once he does, all his units upgrade automatically. He's only got 1 tech structure you really need (Whereas other commanders have 2 or 3) unless you want to build specyfic tier 3 units. Zeratul gets by with just his upgraded Stalkers, Sentries and Immortals, the former having decent health and damage on top of an automatic dodge teleport which eliminates the need for micro on any difficulty except Brutal, and the latter erases air units from the map with 2-3 shots. His only real weakness - swarms of Zerg units - can be negated by building Tesseract Monolyths, a free and instant turret with insane range, Detector capabilities, and splashing stun. Three of them can stunlock entire armies, and with just the 2nd artifact fragment they can be "projected" onto the battlefield for about a minute, essentially giving you global control over the battlefield (so long as you have vision in the area). A half-decent player with can do Brutal missions with this guy as early as level 5, which is the "free to play" threshold.

* MagnificentBastard: Alarak from the ''YMMV/StarcraftIILegacyOfTheVoid'' expansion counts. See that page for details.

* FanHater: The campaigns spawned a large group of haters who don't just hate the story itself, but go berserk on anyone who dares say anything good about it. [[InsaneTrollLogic Some of them even]] [[http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=402932 justify it by saying that they want Blizzard to suffer for making such a crappy story (which, they often say, is not an opinion, but fact), and in order to do so they need to ruin others' enjoyment of it so that they won't buy the next installment]].

* MostWonderfulSound: