Main page - StarCraft/Brood War - StarCraft II (Wings of Liberty - Heart of the Swarm - Legacy of the Void - Co-Op Missions)
This page is for the entries that span more than one game or all three of StarCraft II's levels. For individual game entries, check the related pages.
Fridge pages are Spoilers Off by default, so all spoilers are removed and all examples folderized, so proceed with caution. You Have Been Warned.
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Fridge Brilliance
- Protoss often greeted with each other with the phrase "En Taro Adun" during the first game and the Brood Wars, but after then they switched to "En Taro Tassadar" to honor their most recent hero. Immortals, however, show their age by still using "En Taro Adun."
- The Protoss race' very game mechanics are symbolic of their role in the plot. Unlike Terran units, which can be healed by medics or repaired, or Zerg units which can regenerate, Protoss units and buildings have replenishing Deflector Shields but can not otherwise regain their actual life points. That means that while Protoss units and buildings are formidable, any damage that makes it through their shields is permanent, and if the enemy is persistent enough, they would always eventually be able to defeat a Protoss unit through attrition - even if each wave of attackers only manages to cause 1 point of damage before being defeated, and the next one will still have to content with fully regained shields, they'll still have caused irreparable harm, that will eventually accumulate... This fits perfectly the Protoss' role as a stagnant, Dying Race who is keenly aware of its own coming doom.
- As it turns out in Legacy of the Void, the ancient Protoss did have ways of rejuvenating robotics, but had misguided policies regarding them. Under Artanis, the Purifiers, a race of robots with memory databases of deceased Protoss, were integrated and treated as equals, thus ensuring the rejuvenation of the Protoss as a race.
- When cooperating with different races like the Terrans to work towards a common goal, it was then that their their wounds could be healed and machines repaired, which can symbolize the Protoss dropping their old prejudices finding strength in dialog and teaching their technologies to other races and vice versa. In Legacy of the Void, the Daelaam gain the ability to repair their machines on their own but still need an ally from another race to heal the wounded and indeed, Artanis has good terms with the New Dominion & Kerrigan's Swarm. While the Terrans do get into conflict with the Tal'Darim, their ways aren't shared with the Daelaam. Dialog also makes sense considering many of the Protoss's interest in seeing the Terrans develop Psionically in addition to repair and healing expertise they possess. Notably, SCVs & MULEs can repair ancient machines like Motherships and Colossi, even in team matches.
- It seems odd at first that the original formula Stimpacks were phased out in favor of less potent ones issued in Wings of Liberty but the manual for StarCraft mentioned all kinds of nasty side effects from the classic Stimpacks including negative psychological effects for surviving Marines. Considering how high Marine casualties were back then, it's likely public pressure would mount to increase the survival rate of infantry and there would obviously be complaints about veterans suffering psychosis from Stimpacks. Thus it makes sense Marines would be issued Combat Shields to give a significant boost to their defenses and the next generation Stimpacks would be less effective but have less negative effects. Plus, the Dominion doesn't have infinite soldiers to throw away making it sensible help more live to fight again in the face of the Zerg menace. By the time of Nova Covert Ops the Stims could even heal instead harm.
- It seems strange at first that the Protoss lost their Dark Archons in multiplayer and their mind control spells by extension, but now that Terran SCVs are able to repair Protoss machines and Terran Medivacs can heal any biological unit, allowing the Protoss to mind control an SCV to build Terran units would be potentially overpowered, given that this makes it possible to heal and repair any damage to Hit Points. Thus, Mind Control was given to the Zerg in the form of Neural Parasite and made a temporary ability for good measure to mitigate Zerg players easily utilizing Game-Breaker hybrid strategies.
- In-universe, the creation of an archon sacrifices the templars performing the rituals, to make an entity with a greatly reduced lifespan. Further, the Dark Archons' usage of mind control and other terrifying spells may simply be considered controversial to the Nerazim, who are staunch individualists who broke with their Khalai brethren over the question of whether everyone is allowed to sense your thoughts and emotions. It isn't until the Insurrection by Aldaris, and later when the full extent of Amon's goals are revealed, that the player gains access to Dark Archons. Arguably, the threshold where the Nerazim can justify such desperate measures.
- The Dark Templar Saga series of novels makes a lot more sense now. With Wings of Liberty it seemed like the trilogy was just a cool side-story to introduce a few concepts important to the sequel. Now with the knowledge that Ulrezaj almost certainly worked for Amon, he and Zamara being sealed in a crystal kept on Shakuras, Valerian being friends with Jake and Rosemary, Zeratul being sent off to witness a bunch of energy creatures that we know from other novels absorb psionic energy. The trilogy is pretty much a novelized prequel to the sequel trilogy, its plot elements are weaved into the games much deeper than was apparent from just Wings of Liberty.
- A lot of the points that were first posited in the original StarCraft make a lot more sense under the lens of StarCraft II. For example, why would the Overmind go through the effort of infesting Kerrigan using the best methods at its disposal and giving her free will when he is trying to assimilate the Protoss to achieve perfection? To free the zerg of Amon's influence. Duran's reference to a far greater power that has slept for many millennia is elaborated upon by Kerrigan referring to Amon as "dead", for which the word "sleep" can allude to.
- "Sleep" can also mean how Amon is forced to remain in the Void until he is ready to once again venture beyond it.
- Indeed, all of the Overmind's actions in the first game make a lot of sense now where they did not before. Consider:
- The Overmind went through a great deal of trouble to find, isolate, capture, assimilate, and then train Kerrigan. He did this supposedly because assimilating her psionic potential into the Swarm would allow them to be able to fight the Protoss. Yet, when the time came to invade Aiur... he left her behind. This seems nonsensical, until we discover the Overmind wants her to live, and it doesn't plan on surviving Aiur...
- ...because the Overmind was the Eternal Will of the Swarm. A being with a purity of essence, without corporeal form. Then, after creating Kerrigan and watching her fight for a while, he suddenly decides to build himself a body. A mortal body. A completely immobile, mortal body. One he places on a planet full of people who have the potential to kill him. That sounds really stupid unless the plan is to get himself killed ASAP after creating Kerrigan.
- With the revelation that Narud was in charge of the Tal'darim and the implication that he was Duran, the Excuse Plot of the Protoss missions in Wings of Liberty becomes more clear. As the campaign progresses and Jim finishes more of the Artifact missions, the crew of the Hyperion becomes weary of them, to the point that even Tychus starts having second thoughts about doing them, even going as far as calling the last one a suicide mission, the thing is, they are. Jim is regarded as one of the most cunning commanders in the StarCraft universe, to the point that even the Queen of Blades acknowledged it. Duran knew this as well, so, by making him fight with the Tal'darim, he was in a win-win situation: if Jim survived all of the Artifact missions, then, he could still use him to de-infest Kerrigan, use Tychus to kill her and still pose as Narud without problem; if he died, then he would no longer had to deal with him, he could still assemble the Artifact offscreen and the Dominion expedition to Char would have failed, leaving the Terrans with less defenses against the Zerg. This is somewhat reinforced by Word of God which states that there were various agents to get the job done, Tychus was simply the one that was the closest to accomplish the deed.
- Across the whole lore, Amon had accounted for everything. Every plan, every counter-plan, every counter-counter-plan. No matter what anyone ever did the pieces were always in a way such that they would come out ahead. Who ultimately screwed this up and introduced a variable that caused everything to fall apart? Not Mengsk. Not the Overmind. Not Zeratul. Not Kerrigan. Not Raynor. Not Artanis. Stukov! Because Amon assumed Narud had Stukov under control when he didn't and Narud assumed Stukov was not a threat when he was, Stukov was the only one able to interfere with their plans. Even with all the prophecies, all the victories, all the help from Ouros, Narud still had Kerrigan dead to rights until Stukov - that one forgotten variable - helped Kerrigan win. Had Stukov not been there Amon still would have won in the end because Kerrigan would be dead and the whole of the Zerg would have been his.
- The order of the StarCraft II overall campaign is Terran/Zerg/Protoss, the order of the original game's original campaign. However, in the Epilogue missions, the missions' order is Protoss/Terran/Zerg, the order of Brood War. And, for bonus points, the Brood War campaign and the Epilogue campaign of this game were finished by the same person.
- Remember how Amon's portrait in Wings... is an edited Protoss unit? That could have been his disguise in ancient times, as he walked on Aiur among the Protoss before he and his team chose to reveal themselves to them. As their uplifter god, he obviously thinks that they are unworthy of seeing his true form.
- It's been known since the novelizations that Xel'Naga reproduce by allowing the merging of two uplifted species, one with purity of essence and the other with purity of form. In this game, Amon complains about this, as well as stating he did not become a Xel'Naga by choice... which makes perfect sense given how new Xel'Naga are formed. From his point of view, he feels he was a tool... of course he'd complain!
- Downplayed with Ouros, who is all too happy to give his essence to Kerrigan and end the cycle peacefully instead of by force.
- In the Brood War bonus mission "Dark Origin", Duran tells Zeratul that the hybrids are the culmination of a cycle. The cycle he is actually talking about is the endless Xel'Naga cycle.
- The reason why the Terrans ultimately didn't matter in the old Xel'Naga prophecies involving Amon is because unlike the Protoss and Zerg, who were both uplifted by Amon, humanity's been following its own path without extraterrestrial intervention... which was the actual Xel'Naga policy. This can explain why Amon and even Zeratul never really saw Terrans coming as they threw a wrench in said prophecies and why Amon underestimates Kerrigan.
- One extra little note that can make one realize that Tassadar's spirit was Ouros all along is the voice. The voice actor used for Tassadar in StarCraft 2 is Michael Dorn. Initially, when the game came out, it seemed just like Blizzard using a new actor to replace a possibly absent voice actor, as it was done for Zeratul. Later, when Heroes of the Storm came out, Tassadar's voice in that game was very similar to his old classic voice from StarCraft 1. So, the reason for the different voice actor for Tassadar's spirit can actually become more apparent here, because it never was Tassadar all along, but Ouros!
- Remember how many characters have commented on the Conclave's "arrogance" or "hubris"? With the revelation that the Khala was created by Amon, it makes sense that a tool meant for controlling his "minions" would make them act like him: arrogant and full of hubris.
- The Zerg insistence that they collect essence from species they kill rather than DNA, and then spin "strands" to make new Zerg strains, makes more sense in Legacy of the Void when Karax is discussing the Keystone. To the Xel'Naga, essence, energy, information, and matter were the same thing, particularly within the Keystone itself. DNA is just genetic instructions on how a living being is structured, and the energy-like essence taken from a living creature can be converted by Abathur and Primal Zerg into information and then spun into DNA for new Zerg strains.
Fridge Horror
- A mission in the Protoss mini-campaign in Wings.. has a part where you rescue Protoss who were stuck mid-warp in time-space due to pylon power being cut off. Just imagine what would have happened to them if Zeratul never restored power... or, for that matter, imagine that happening in any multiplayer game where a player manages to destroy a pylon field before units manage to finish warping in...
- Dark Origins showed that Terrans somehow had access to Protoss Tech and genetic data for making Hybrids. Wings of Liberty showed the Dominion, who are not exactly on good terms with any Protoss faction, having access to Protoss genetic data. Granted, they could have been scavenging battlefields and possibly kidnapping Protoss for this expressed purpose, but it would make more sense that Narud was manipulating the Tal'Darim to hand over "volunteers" for experimentation. Given their subsequent connection, this might be where all the Protoss genetics came from for their Hybrids. Who the "volunteers" are is also pretty obvious: the Tal'Darim have been shown, on several occasions, kidnapping their Shakuras kin for no other explicit purpose.
- A small one spanning the entire lore of the franchise. Arcturus's father, Augustus Mengsk, was so brutally murdered by Kerrigan that they never found his head. While possibly unintentional, when Kerrigan killed Arcturus, she also blew up his head, making him die in the same way his father did.
