Starcraft 2

That'd be the Zombie one, yeah?

Zombie one is where you just mass reapers and win.

Lol, yeah. I remember the first time I did it I was paranoid and spend so much time building up my defenses and never exploring... and then when I got really close to the deadline I decided to sent some units out... and tore through everything like tissue paper, even on hard, only failing to get the side-objectives because I waited so long to do it... so I said "screw that" and sent people out to hunt from the beginning, which made everything else so much easier.

But which one are you guys talking about where Matt comes to save you? I thought that was the zombie one... wasn't that a "hold out for X days" sort of deal? I know I've played the mission you're talking about, but because there was such a break since I started playing campaign to when I just picked it up again this week (last time I played this game before this Monday was last August...), they kind of run together. What planet was the one you were talking about on?

edited 17th Apr '11 12:43:28 AM by KnownUnknown

It's the last Mar Sara one, where all you have available is Marines, Medics, and Bunkers.

You hold 2 bridges, make marines, bunkers and medics to win.

The zombie mission ends when you destroy all the buildings. You get to go out by day and the zombies come by night.

Am I the only one who felt that the whole "even greater evil who just wants everything to die" feel like a total cop-out?

In SC 1, we had 3 warring races and a freaky dude in the background who created a hybrid.

Now it turns out that hybrid's sole purpose was to just... wipe out everything. Couldn't they be a little more subtle about who's E-V-I-L? The first Starcraft was about... Terrans discovering the zerg, terrans betraying other terrans, protoss killing terrans, terrans killing protoss, zerg killing protoss, terrans allying with protoss, protoss allying with other protoss, more terrans come to take over the other terrans, protoss rebelling against protoss, protoss allying with zerg, zerg subverting the protoss, "terran" subverting everyone...

now it's just... "look, giant extra-evil dude is going to kill absolutely everyone! We'd better set aside our differences and fight it!" I dunno, but I think I've seen something like it before.

I think it'd be interesting if the story continued a little ways after the hybrids are defeated and the inevitable storm of double-crosses and springing gambits were included in the story of Starcraft 2.

Ah yeah, now I remember. I remember thinking... "oh lord, it's the first game's Mar Sara all over again," and then playing it and thinking all in all it wasn't all that bad.

The second installment had better toss in plenty of backstabbing and subplots. but it's the Zerg campaign. The Zerg don't exactly double-cross each other that often. And they also don't worry too much about Terran or Protoss politics- it's more just burn and pillage and eat the dead, isn't it?

And Kerrigan's no longer Zerg, so she won't be controlling the swarms any more. Pity.

Actually, Kerrigan is the main character for Heart of the Swarm.

EDIT: Here's the info.

edited 17th Apr '11 7:03:17 PM by Tofunator

what? but didn't they just un-zergify her?

Yes, though Blizzard has confirmed she can still control zerg even without being infested. Unfortunately, that means at least some zerg are going the "WCIII Orc route", even if most of them will be under the control of the "Fallen One."

More like WCII Orc route. (Which is similar to SC:BW) Splintering factions emerge within the Zerg or they just roll mindlessly attacking each other and everyone else.

but... all the cerebrates are dead. And so is the overmind. Kerrigan hunted all of them down to establish her complete control over the Zerg.

Just about everything below cerebrate-level is just a mindless drone or killing machine... how could there be factions?

I really, really hope that Mengsk invested more into the Psi emitter project or something and is starting to command zerg of his own. or something like that. If it's more of the "dark evil darkness from space" controlling the zerg and just getting them to kill everybody then I'm going to be pissed.

Or that research group that Tychus was working for.

edited 17th Apr '11 7:39:56 PM by willyolio

There's a reason why I don't give a —— about the plot.

The continued adventures of the several months overdue playthrough of Known Unknown!

Well, I did it. I hunkered down and retried it, and after a total of of 14 saves, 3 retries (well, two and a half, really), and eight or nine months (including, of course, the seven or eight month hiatus), I finally just decided to stop going half assed and actually complete Safe Haven.

Like most of them thus far, it got... less difficult when I actually put my mind to it. Certainly not easy, but not too difficult. I even managed to kill all the terror squads, which I hated for their "whittle down my air units" purpose, until I realized you didn't exactly need the Vikings for the Nexi.

In fact, you don't really need the Vikings at all, except for the side missions and the occasional base support. I killed the Purifier by building six missile launchers close together at the final base and waiting for it to show up - the launcher ripped it to shreds, without any input from my other units, who were busy stopping it's support.

Then, now in stride, I went and did The Dig as well. Not nearly as hard as Safe Haven, but it kept me so haggard running my base defense I didn't have time to do the side missions... so I redid the mission in Normal later for the extra research and damn.' Between Normal and Hard there's a huge difficulty gap - compared to Hard Normal is barely a challenge.

edited 17th Apr '11 10:50:31 PM by KnownUnknown

I thought tha the normal version was really easy, so who much harder is hard? For me the campaign is very easy, you just need to know the right mission order and get the right upgrades. I you could let me know what you are known as on the game, I could drop you some tips. Then again, I do have a game guide (I mostly use it for the maps, it makes The Great Train Robbery much easier if you have 6 or 7 Diamondbacks when the first one shows up.)

edited 18th Apr '11 11:19:00 AM by nuclearneo

I never made diamondbacks for the great train robbery. They sucked. At least on brutal. I just scouted around for the ones lying arouda nd then just massed up tanks. Otherwise, do as Day9, the Thoughthammer says.

"Just make marines marauders and medics for every single mission"

edited 18th Apr '11 1:21:20 PM by neobowman

Diamondbacks tend to suck for every mission but the great train robbery. Since all one needs to do is take out the trains, and not do anything else, massing diamondbacks are great for that purpose(especially since they're the only things that can catch up with the train if you don't take it out before it passes).

Granted, once one learns the pattern of where each train comes from, it's not as necessary to have them for that mission...

I also did Whispers Of Doom. I love "Infiltration" missions. They're such a nice break. This one was... interesting too. I noticed this while I was fighting against the Protoss as Terran, but it's really obvious here: Stalkers kind of suck. They don't do too much damage, and they die really fast, which kind of sucks because you need them around, forcing you to take the stages really cautiously. Were Dragoons this bad?

However, everything else about that mission was great, so I'm still happy.

Also, the CGI for that first Zeratul/Kerrigan cutscene (the one where she regrows her... wing, I guess) was beautiful. Amazing, even.

^^^ For Hard, there are more/faster attacks and they have more units in each one -> you get a lot of heavy hitters even early on, and you constantly have to be checking to make su. I couldn't do the secondary missions and get the research on that stage because my defensive line was constantly taking casualties, so all my effort went to replenishing it time and again.

In Normal, I build a simple defense early on: two siege tanks and a single bunker at each ramp, and I had no problem leaving it at that to focus on other stuff. Later on, I decided to add another bunker and siege tank just to make sure I wasn't disturbed, and unlike the Hard mode, where I never seemed to be able to get my defenses high before my "extras" turned into "replacements," I was able to do this extremely early on, get the research and not be bothered. By the end of the mission I had stopped using the drill to take out the tripods and Archons, and I even left the mission running for like 10 minutes to make dinner without any problems whatsoever.

edited 18th Apr '11 1:49:22 PM by KnownUnknown

diamondbacks are too slow. M+M+M is much faster and more mobile- simply being prepared and moving into position will let you kill the train and escorts every time, more than having the diamondbacks chase after the train for a while.

I ended up using Diamondbacks as a back-up. Most times I didn't kill the train right off the bat, and so the Diamondbacks became essential in taking them out.

more marauders, then. stimpack marauders > diamondbacks.

<shrug> What works, works.