Subjective tropes applicable specifically to StarCraft I and its expansions only, please. For the series as a whole, see YMMV.StarCraft. SC2 subjectives go here.
- Alternative Character Interpretation:
- Samir Duran was influencing DuGalle's mind. Despite supposedly being one of the best admirals in the UED, their invasion of the Koprulu Sector only got as far as it did on the aid of DuGalle's Hypercompetent Sidekick Stukov. On his own DuGalle repeatedly shows himself to be a terrible tactician and a Horrible Judge of Character, culminating when he very quickly presumes Stukov has betrayed the UED and orders Duran to assassinate him. While some fans accept that DuGalle really was just that terrible an admiral, others believe that it makes more sense that Duran was subtly manipulating his mind. This theory is so widespread that some of the fanbase consider it as good as canon. A good bit of possible Foreshadowing that the fans like to point out is that there are a few times when DuGalle and Duran are talking with one another where Duran's "infested voice" will seep through the cracks.
- Despite how at odds they were, Kerrigan viewed Zasz as a friend. This theory comes from the moment in Brood War where Kerrigan decides to let Zeratul go after he kills Raszagal, because she views what happened as sweet revenge that Zeratul has to go on living in agonizing guilt from now on over having to kill his dark templar Matriarch. Overall, it's always been a question as to what Kerrigan is seeking revenge for when Zeratul hasn't exactly done anything to her except that he took part in Tassadar's trick in Episode 2 that embarrassed Kerrigan, and got Zasz killed. As a result, one possible explanation is that Kerrigan didn't like Zasz getting killed off, which she got revenge for him.
- Anti-Climax Boss: In mission five of the sixth campaign, you've got two superpowered boss units to fight, each with thousands of HP and powerful attacks. One is a biological ground units, fodder for the Queen's Spawn Broodling which kills it instantly, and the other is an air unit rendered helpless against the Defiler's Dark Swarm.
- Arc Fatigue: For some, playing through Episode IV, The Stand, can get a bit tiresome since it's another Protoss campaign following Episode III, The Fall. The feeling of being sick of playing Protoss usually starts to hit people part way through Episode IV. Not helping is that your tech tree is reset with a Hand Wave as to why, and two of the missions (and parts of two others) are "installation" types where the player commands a small number of units and doesn't build a base; such missions by their nature tend to be long, dull, and of limited replay value.
- Artificial Stupidity: The AI in campaign mode is very predictable. It sends small bands against your base at regular intervals rather than a large all-out attack. This makes it quite easy to build a defence capable of repelling each attack as long as you watch out for certain units such as Reavers and Guardians.
- They will often send flying attacks which seem to be drawn to your effective anti-aircraft weapons.
- They don't seem to replace destroyed turret type weapons.
- They don't appear to spend all of their resources, and they don't attempt to establish bases around available mineral forests and gas mines.
- Their Queens and Arbiters attack with their paralysing effects for no apparent reason other than to be annoying or for something to do, i.e. not as a prelude to attack.
- Frustratingly, the AI controlling the players units is also flawed. Goliaths and Dragoons will run around seemingly aimlessly like startled ants if you get attacked and there isn't a clear path to get in range of the attacker.
- Your units will automatically try to attack a unit who had attacked them personally. This results in them often getting drawn out of position if you don't keep an eye on them.
- Ass Pull:
- The Protoss Conclave being confirmed to be dead at the start of Episode 4 can really catch people off-guard due to how sudden the revelation was. It was only a mission ago that Aldaris and the Conclave were wishing Tassadar and the Executor the best of luck for the final assault on the Overmind.
- For some, Blizzard confirming years after Brood War was released that Artanis was actually the player character of Episode 3 this entire time is viewed as this. Artanis' dialogue throughout Episode 4 comes off as a naive newcomer who was just recently promoted to a high ranking position, yet people are supposed to believe that he's actually been a seasoned Executor this entire time.
- Kerrigan's power spike can come off as this. She may be an incredibly powerful psionic warrior who can go toe-to-toe with Protoss, but it's still a leap from that to "able to command her own Brood, mind-control Protoss, and eventually can take over the entire Zerg Hive Mind". The latter implies that Kerrigan, who at her core is still just an abnormally strong infested Terran, has powers on-par with the Overmind.
- Awesome Music: "Terran 1"
. The second part in particular is spectacular. - Breather Level:
- The final Zerg mission of Episode II, "Full Circle," is much easier than the previous two missions for several reasons. For one, you start off with a ton of mineral fields, which makes it incredibly easy to just build up Hatcheries and precede to flood out Zerglings all around the map. The second reason is that there's a flaw with the Red Protoss enemy in that it's coded to come online way too late into the level. Red will remain inactive all the way until the Temple for the quest objective is destroyed, which is basically right when the mission is about over anyway since all the player has to do from that point to complete the level is bring the Drone carrying the Khaydarin Crystal to the beacon at the newly destroyed Temple. At most, this gives the Red Protoss just a one minute window to actually get going and pose a threat to the player before the mission ends.
- "The Reckoning" comes between "To Slay The Beast" and "Omega", both incredibly difficult levels. All you have to do is build up an army strong enough to destroy the Protoss base (which, compared to what you've dealt with up to this point, is tiny) within half an hour, which is easier than it sounds. You start at the top of the tech tree, have two hatcheries to pump out units, enough space to make a third if you want, and the attacks from the UED are so pathetic that you could leave a hydralisk at each entrance and not have to worry about losing a single structure, while the Protoss won't counter attack you at all. The only real threat is a carrier and the occasional mind controlling Dark Archon, which are easily countered.
- Even "Omega" itself can be considered one - even though it pits you against three enemies (Two Terrans and one Protoss) at the top of their tech tree, your base is simpler to defend and has much more resources compared to "To Slay The Best". The fact enemies don't combine their units makes it even easier.
- Cheese Strategy: The infamous Zerg Rush. Starcraft matches generally follow a typical pattern of early-game build-up, poking and prodding to figure out your opponent's base and army comp, and then finally the lategame where the battles happen. The Zerg Rush utilizes the Zerg faction's ability to churn out cheap units quickly and simply bum-rushes them at the opponent, trying to overwhelm them with sheer numbers, possibly before they've even built up a base defense.
- Cliché Storm: While there is a fair amount of Lampshade Hanging, the whole formula still is formulaic/cheesy enough to qualify as one.
- Complacent Gaming Syndrome: Many players only play Lost Temple, Big Game Hunters, Python and/or Destination. From the user-created side of things, we have Fastest Map Ever, which was designed initially to speed up the beginning game by stacking minerals directly next to the beginning buildings making mining for resource instantaneous. To say that there are several variations of the map would be an understatement.
- Disappointing Last Level: "Full Circle" makes for a rather underwhelming ending to Episode II. Mainly because the Red Protoss AI that's supposed to serve as the last line of defense for the Temple you need to destroy will remain inactive for pretty much the entire level.
- Ensemble Dark Horse:
- The zerg Cerebrates have a surprisingly strong fandom for giving the mindless swarm a lot of personality.
- For a long time leading up to the sequel, there was fans hoping Fenix will be revived a second time, or even infested, and come back for another showing. With no sign of him leading up to Legacy of the Void, hopes shifted to a cameo or a flashback. Ironically the way in which he did "return" caused a Broken Base.
- Epileptic Trees:
- Anything at all concerning Duran. The fans have had more than decade to speculate and some very strange, exotic theories have been put forth.
- Some insist that the factions are expies of the Imperium of Man, Tyranids, and Eldar, and StarCraft is based on 40k. And the reverse was guessed as well, some claim the Tyranids were changed in appearance to match the Zerg better and that the Tau were based off the Protoss. What's more likely is that both draw inspiration from the same numerous Sci-Fi works (Alien and Battlestar Galactica chief among them).
- Even Better Sequel: While the first game was perfectly fine in terms of story and gameplay, it had problems on both fronts. Brood War upped the stakes with a more complex and involving story, as well as more creative and fun missions, and refined the multiplayer gameplay into the titan of RTS gameplay the series is now known for.
- Fanon:
- While nothing's been outright confirmed, there's a good chunk of players out there who believe that Selendis was the unknown Executor player from Episode 4.
- It's pretty much a universal agreement that the music tracks introduced in Brood War act as the theme songs for the expansion campaigns. The BW Protoss theme is for the Dark Templar, the BW Terran theme is for the UED, and the BW Zerg theme is for Infested Kerrigan.
- Fan-Preferred Cut Content:
- In the 3rd Terran mission, "Desperate Alliance," there's a cut alternative objective where it was possible to end the mission earlier than it's supposed to if you go out and destroy the Zerg hatcheries. This alternative objective is restored in the Nintendo 64 port of the game, which for pc gamers, it leaves some fans wishing that the alternative mission objective was there since waiting out the entire 30 minutes for a Hold the Line mission can be quite tedious. This is especially the case on repeat playthroughs of the campaigns.
- Some kind of wish the axed "Biting the Bullet" mission for Episode 1 stayed in the game as it would have been Tassadar's first introduction to the story, and not in Episode 2 where there's a bit of a Plot Hole with him claiming that he's met Kerrigan before. Most likely a leftover bit of dialogue that wasn't changed after the mission cut. In addition, it would have strengthened Tassadar and Raynor being allies by the time of Episode 3 given that they would have fought together in "Biting the Bullet."
- Germans Love David Hasselhoff: They don't call it the "national sport of South Korea" for nothing.
- Good Bad Bugs: The computer players can have a moment of Artificial Stupidity if you set up two computers to duel each other in a skirmish or similar "use map settings" scenario. If they both launch their first attack simultaneously, they may both become so fixated on going to the opposing base that both armies may just walk past each other without engaging and proceed to easily start wrecking the opposing base with little opposition.
- Harsher in Hindsight: When Zeratul delivers a killing blow to brainwashed Raszagal — so she would not be captured by Kerrigan again — she briefly reverts to her original persona, thanks him for releasing her from the Queen of Blades' influence and tells him to take good care of their people before succumbing to her wounds. After this event, he flees in shame in search of answers and becomes persona non grata with his people. At the beginning of the main Legacy of the Void campaign, he is killed by Artanis who was possessed by Amon at the time and thus will never be able to fulfill Raszagal's final wishes.
- It Was His Sled:
- Arcturus and his Sons of Korhal faction turn out to be evil after they overthrew the Confederacy to become the dominant Terran rulers of the sector as the newly established Terran Dominion. When it comes to the Starcraft marketing, it will usually have Arcturus portrayed as one of the series' main villains.
- Kerrigan gets infested, which results in her becoming the Zerg's Queen of Blades. Her appearance as Infested Kerrigan is so iconic to the series that it's almost impossible to not see it amongst the marketing.
- Lady Mondegreen: Not the names in particular, but the quotes units (Mostly Protoss) say get misinterpreted, especially the Khalai language ones.
- Terran Units
- Marines: "You want a piece of meat, boy"!note
- Tanks: "Need logic to, sir!" "Rose eatin'!"note
- Ghost: "Call me Jacque!"note
- Dropship "In the pipe, bye bye bye!"note
- Wraith: "Read the winning launch orders."note
- Valkyrie: "Octo!" "Of course, my dear!" "Yabousk!" "Keflex!"note
- Battlecruiser: "Alien frequencies open."note
- Zerg Units
- Zerg Guardians might sound like they're saying "Brood War!" once they finish mutating.
- When Zerg upgrades and research are done, it says "Evolution complete!", but for some, it may sound like "Caboose incomplete!"
- When Zerg hive clusters are under attack, it could be interpreted as "Die Cloyster is under attack!"
- Protoss Units
- Zealot: "My life for hire!", "My wife for hire!", and "I am a fryer/friar!" (My Life for Aiur), as well as "Loss of serve", "Thus I serve", and "Crush the Zerg!" (Khas I serve). Also "Me so Achtoo!" (Issah'tu!), "What now, Ghloz!?" (What battle calls?), and "Geeyouch!" (Gee'hous!)
- Interesting enough to notice that the Spanish dub took "Khas I Serve" as "Thus I serve" therefore translated it to "Asà sirvo"
- Probes and Reavers sound like they're saying "Protoss!" One Probe line sounds like "long ago."
- One quote the Dragoon says sounds like it's saying "Stop killing us!" (Khalai language), "Galactois" (Khalai Language), and "Thank you something" (Make use of me)
- Dark Templars sound like they're saying "Yeah squeal!" and "Give voy!"
- Dark Archons might sound like they're saying "Must inflame us!" (Thoughts in Chaos) and "Old Navy in the way!" (Oblivion awaits)
- High Templars might have sounded like they say "It's one hell of a party!" (Khassar de Templari) and "Yeetah!" (Zzz'togh.)
- And one of the Archon's select quotes may sound like it's saying "Oh shit!"
- One of the "attack" quotes of the Scouts sound like it's saying "Lucas sectionized" (Locus acknowledged).
- Arbiters. Yes. "We are fisherman" (We are vigilant), "Goodnight wing", "In chastity", and "Jikakazoid".
- Corsairs. "Lettuce attack!" (Let us attack!)
- Terran Units
- Low-Tier Letdown:
- Competitively, the Protoss Scout is seen as this for costing too much minerals and gas for the little that it can accomplish; which only sees little use to take down bulky enemy air units. A pair of Dragoons cost less and generally more cost-effective for a wider variety of Anti-Armor roles.
- The Zerg Devourer and Terran Valkyrie are usually seen as too situational to be worth the sunk costs. The Devourers tend to be passed over for Scourge as the latter perform a similar air-to-air role and usually have much higher bang for the buck with proper micromanagement. Valkyries are also highly situational air-to-air fighters that usually only see use in niche strategies to counter a Zerg Mutalisk threat and support a vehicle-based army.
- Memetic Mutation:
- The sound samples of the Terran Marine dying tend to stand out for how immediately recognizable they are like Starcraft's equivalent of a Stock Scream. As Terran Marines are very fragile, players can expect to hear a lot of "Awaaaah!" and "Aaaaagh!" during heated battles involving Marines.
- "Mass Carriers = instant win!" Not quite as much in the StarCraft II trim though. Explanation
- Once Original, Now Common: While still popular, they are definitely areas where the game shows its age, like that most multiplayer matches consist of rushes or unit spams, the unit selection cap of 12 making management of a large army very cumbersome, the lack of unit formations making micromanagement more intensive, and most of the campaign missions consisting of objectives that always boil down to "destroy the enemy base", which in later missions take up most of the map. Players familiar with StarCraft II will find these differences especially noticeable.
- Padding: Some missions are obviously there just to fill up the quota of 10/8 missions between the base and expansion campaigns, having little plot development that couldn't have been handled in another mission much more simply. Two such examples are Episode IV Mission 5 and Episode VI Mission 6. The first has the Protoss breaking a UED missile blockade over Braxis, but the UED have nothing to do with the Protoss storyline and are just a distraction keeping them from leaving the planet to continue with their mission. Meanwhile Episode VI Mission 6 has Kerrigan's base on Tarsonis attacked, and the player has to rally and defend themselves and push back the attackers.
- Ironically, there were two missions cut from Episode I, Biting the Bullet and Operation: Silent Scream because they were seen as this exact reason; especially the former mission. Another reason for the cut was to even out the campaign level totals so that each race was given ten levels.
- Strangely enough, the omission of Biting the Bullet ended up turning Kerrigan's and Tassadar's first meeting from before she was infested (referenced in The Dark Templar) into a Noodle Incident.
- Ironically, there were two missions cut from Episode I, Biting the Bullet and Operation: Silent Scream because they were seen as this exact reason; especially the former mission. Another reason for the cut was to even out the campaign level totals so that each race was given ten levels.
- Player Punch: "True Colors", Kerrigan turns on her old allies. Betraying Mengsk is no big deal, but in the same level you are betraying the Protoss and kill the fan favorite Fenix.
- Porting Disaster: Starcraft 64, being the only console port of Starcraft I, is generally considered this which is unfortunate because it really was pretty damn good, given the respectable effort to put both the original game and the expansion into a cartridge. Although a LOT of concessions had to be made in order to fit the content that was necessary which is something expected for that console.
- Video Resolution is only a minuscule 320W-by-240H which really drops the graphics details and makes it harder to keep track of what's happening on the larger maps.
- The Audio File Library had been modified tremendously: Character Speeches in the Campaign have been dropped for even shorter Textboxes. Sound Effects and Unit Quotes have been cut in length or simply left out. And the Music Tracks have been drastically shortened.
- There is only Two-Player Competitive or Co-Operative Multiplayer which is further compounded during gameplay by a 320W-by-120H splitscreen.
- A.I. Opponents play the with the same competency as in the PC-version which makes them far more dangerous.
- Very few FMV cutscenes have been left in which have been shortened and have unsurprisingly poor quality, making them ambiguous and unreliable for story narraration.
- Players can select 18 units instead of 12 which is a significant improvement that predates Starcraft II by 10 years.
- The Control Scheme is both awkward and user-unfriendly: The Analog Stick moves the Cursor slowly and most commands had to be mapped to the C-Buttons as a substitute for Hotkeys, increasing the difficulty of proper and efficient Micro and Macro.
- And finally, if you didn't have the Nintendo 64 Expansion Pak, you could only play the base game's campaign (and only single-player). If you wanted to play the Brood War campaign OR against another person, you needed the Expansion Pak.
- Questionable Casting: In the original Spanish dub, the Dropship pilot, a woman, is dubbed by a man, a fact made stranger by the fact the other female characters are dubbed by women.
- Rooting for the Empire: The United Earth Directorate overthrew Mengsk and temporarily dissolved the Dominion, enslaved the Zerg and took control of them, and used their power afterwards to try and take down Kerrigan's Brood. True, they were infesting their own men to use infested terrans as troops against their enemies, were probably planning to exterminate the protoss, and are implied by the lore to be a futuristic version of Nazi Germany. Still, most of their campaign is an eight-mission long bout where they Pay Evil unto Evil, desposing of Mengsk and kill a lot of zerg, so a lot of fans were on their side and hoped for their return in Starcraft II.
- Scrappy Mechanic:
- With the release of Starcraft II, several old-school mechanics just don't hold up well for some folk when they return to Starcraft I. Particularly:
- Only being limited to holding 12 units at a time. This disproportionately affected the Zerg as they rely upon low-supply units that you swarm with. This is especially noticeable with Zerglings which cost a half supply each out of your cap of 200.
- Units lining up single-file when they walk long distances, and no formation mechanics like in the sequel.
- Not being able to rally workers to mine minerals/gas when they spawn. By extension, at the beginning of a map/melee, workers need to be manually sent to individual mineral fields or they'll try and mine the same one and lose mining time.
- Ramps in general, especially the ones for the installation missions, which are just too shallow a choke-point to traverse. One particularly noteworthy moment you'll see this happen is with the Dragoon that the player receives in the "Into the Darkness" mission of Episode 3.
- The pathing in general is very lackluster. Units would have trouble squeezing through small openings and such that the unit would go off in a random direction to try to find a way around. This is usually seen with larger scale ground-units such as Dragoons and Goliaths.
- There's a trigger during the single-player campaigns where the player will automatically lose if all workers die. This causes a rather annoying mishap on the second Zerg mission of Brood War, "Reign Of Fire" where players not paying attention will automatically lose, because they tried to morph two structures with their starting two drones; which makes the game think that you have no workers left.
- Hero units tend to be looked down upon throughout the six original campaigns due to all the missions with hero units having some sort of "hero must survive" secondary objective. The result is an added annoyance for the player to constantly look to the hero unit if there's signs of trouble to make sure that it doesn't die. It's particularly rage inducing if you're playing through a level for well over half an hour only for a loss to suddenly hit ya due to your hero unit dying, and forcing a complete restart of the level if you hadn't been saving progress. Thus, it's quite common for players to just leave the hero unit in the corner of your main base so that the hero unit isn't suddenly axed off the moment you're not paying attention.
- With the release of Starcraft II, several old-school mechanics just don't hold up well for some folk when they return to Starcraft I. Particularly:
- Slow-Paced Beginning:
- It's common for people to think that the storytelling takes a while to get going due to how slow and easy Episode I is. It's not until missions 7 and 8, "The Trump Card" and "The Big Push" respectively, that you finally start tackling some much more difficult enemy AI. Some will even say that the story doesn't truly start until mission 9 when Mengsk's betrayal goes down at the end of "New Gettysburg."
- Episode III also takes a bit to get going due to the first 3 missions just being about the war on Aiur, and trying to fight back against the Zerg for Aldaris' Conclave. It's not until mission 4 when you meet, and decide to team up, with Tassadar that the campaign really gets rolling.
- That One Attack: Though these abilities don't break Competitive Balance, some abilities can be considered cheap.
- Zerg players can really learn to despise the Terrans' Irradiate spell. It's technically a death spell for all Zerg units except Devourers and Ultralisks and there's no way to undo it once it's cast.note As a result, professional Zerg players will attempt to eliminate this threat by sniping a Science Vessel(s) with a pair a Scourge each, or using the Defiler's Plague spell as an HP to One spell that renders Vessels vulnerable a One-Hit Kill from any Anti-Air capable unit.
- Protoss players are also not much of a fan of Science Vessels due to their EMP Shockwave ability. The shockwave's primary use is to drain enemy units of their energy, but for Protoss, it also drains all plasma shields. And it's not like the shields are slowly drained over time like Irradiate is for health. No, all shields hit in the EMP Shockwave's Area of Effect are just gone instantly. This is absolutely devastating to Protoss units or structures that rely on a lot of shields, such as the two Archon variants.
- The iconic High Templar Psionic Storm, while powerful, is infamous for making Terran Infantry unfeasible against Protoss Players due to how quickly the storms will kill infantry hordes requiring Terran players to almost always resort to Factory play against Protoss players (as well as other Terran players because of Siege Tanks being just as devastating against infantry). It's telling that in the sequel, this spell was nerfed to deal less damage and have a warning animation so that attentive players can dodge out of the spell and thus Terran Infantry are no longer made obsolete from the presence of High Templar; similarly, the Protoss no longer have Reavers for melee matches which eat infantry for breakfast with devastating splash damage.
- The Dark Archon's Maelstrom rarely pops up against Terran and Protoss as it's usually not worth getting for the few low-tier biological units said races have. However, it's absolutely devastating against the Zerg due to their entire tech-tree being biological. You'll pretty much always see Dark Archons used against Zerg because freezing a group of Zerg units with Maelstrom will always be a viable counter against any Zerg strategy.
- The Defiler's Plague can be major nuisance for Protoss players, as it completely bypasses their shields and can leave any unit with only their shields and virtually one hitpoint of physical health (causing up to 300 HP of damage). This is very bad news if a Plague hits a feet of Carriers, depleting 2/3 of their total health.
- That One Level:
- "Desperate Alliance" is an extremely easy Hold the Line Terran mission that goes on for a long and tedious 30 minutes where only a couple Zerg attacks near the end actually poses a threat to the player. Thus, leaving some players wishing that the cut alternative objective to end the mission earlier by going out and destroying the Zerg hatcheries was there. This Hold the Line mission was even copy-and-pasted into StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty, which it's no surprise that the mission there was shortened to 20 minutes.
- "The Trump Card" can be this just based on the fact that your main base only starts you off with a paltry 5 mineral patches, which makes your initial build-up really slow. Doesn't help that you're up against a relatively tough Terran AI as this is the first mission where they start sending Siege Tanks at ya.
- "Eye for an Eye" can be somewhat tricky due to needing to do a lot of multitasking. The mission comes in two objectives: to not allow a single Dark Templar escape, and to destroy the two Protoss bases. The multitask part comes into play in that the player has to constantly send reinforcements to three separate exit locations to defend against Protoss attacks that are trying to help a Dark Templar escape. At worst, the player will suddenly lose detection at one of the exits without noticing, and not realize that the cloaked Dark Templar has already made it through. And while that's going on, the player also has to continue building up the main base and army to eventually have a large enough strike force that will dispose of the enemy Protoss bases. The rough part about this is that you start off with no tech structures whatsoever. Not even a starting Spawning Pool. Meaning that the Protoss could be heading towards the 3 exits before you've even gotten your first Hydralisk out.
- "Into the Darkness" might as well be known as the Gotcha! level for first timers. It's an installation mission with numerous Infested Terrans, suicide bombers who deal 500 splash damage and can quickly wipe out your army before you even realize they were coming for you, and if one of them hits Tassadar he's probably a goner. Two specific Infested Terran locations are incredibly nasty as they don't pop up until a Marine walks over the trigger that causes them to say a voice-line. Once you know about them and start using Tassadar's Hallucinations as decoys or running sacrificial Marines ahead to scout and draw them out, the mission becomes a lot easier, but also a lot longer and boring as you wait for Tassadar's energy to regenerate.
- "Homeland" suffers from a nasty Difficulty Spike if you deal with it conventionally. You're fighting the Conclave in a Civil Warcraft scenario, and they are well-armed. The opponent has a full arsenal available, and will send it against you. Reavers are a major threat to your ground army, as they can 2-shot your basic infantry units. On top of that, prepare to be pestered by Carriers and Arbiters. Thankfully, the bottom of the map is relatively undefended by detection and your Dark Templar can sneak to the bottom-right and snipe a Nexus and complete the mission objective.
- The following fight against the Conclave mission, "The Trial of Tassadar," can be a bit tough to handle due to Early Game Hell. At least with "Homeland," you start off with a whopping 2500/2500 minerals and gas, and a majority of your tech structures, to get your base up and running. Here, you're basically starting from scratch with very little resources, and a Forge as your only starting tech structure. You also only get a small starting force to defend with (Raynor's Hyperion does help a lot with the only issue being you can't repair him), which you have to fend off decently sized attacks from two Protoss factions where the Purple Protoss sends ground forces that could include Reavers and the Red Protoss sends air attacks that may include Carriers and Arbiters. A minor bit of added annoyance is that your main base's vespene geyser is in an awful spot being situated right next to the east entrance, so you're very likely to have to watch over it so it's not destroyed by enemy attacks from that side. The kicker that makes this even tougher is that there's no open nearby expansion to take unless you go for the one on the opposite side of the map, which means that you're pretty much forced to just remain turtled up working on one base of resources for the first 15 to 20 minutes until you have a large enough force (mass Carriers usually being the case for this level) that can start clearing away the nearby enemy Purple bases for new resources.
- "To Chain the Beast" starts off with most of your base surrounded by invincible Sunken Colonies that will shred any ground force you may attempt to put together. At fifteen minutes, just as you're getting your momentum going, the Torrasque spawns, a hero Ultralisk that can single-handedly rip through your entire base, and it might be supported by a Defiler to give it immunity to ranged attacks. And late in the mission, the third Zerg force starts sending Infested Terrans at you. The mission boils down to turtling in your starting base and pouring all your resources into a battlecruiser fleet to try and take down the red Cerebrate to disable the Sunken Colonies. After that the mission lets up a little, but Torrasque and the Infested Terrans are still coming, so a ground army is still out of the question — all that the Sunken Colonies being disabled really does is let you safely take the one expansion node nearby so you can keep building your Battlecruiser fleet.
- "The Kel-Morian Combine" is a highly disliked mission. Its overall map plan is not particularly notable among the Difficulty Spike that Brood War entails, but what makes it hated is its objective. You are told you have to gather ten thousand Minerals, but what is actually the truth is that you have to have 10,000 Minerals in your resource reserves, which, as it's the primary resource, means that anything you produce will make the mission last longer, and if you manage to defeat the enemy Terran forces, this mission just becomes a wait until you get all the Minerals you need. Its only satisfactory gimmick is the secondary objective, where, if you Infest any Command Center, it will be present in the following mission. Subsequent playthroughs can make this mission extremely boring to play, and it says enough that, when it was remade in Warcraft III in "The Spirits of Ashenvale", the requirement was changed to the secondary resource (Lumber), so there are some units that can be trained without spending it, and it has secondary objectives that allow this mission to be shortened (destroying Trees of Life gives you Lumber, and helping the Goblins gives you access to the Goblin Shredder, the best Lumber gatherer in the game).
- "To Slay the Beast" is widely considered harder than the final level. Like "To Chain the Beast", you have little breathing room in the beginning and not a lot of resource income. You have enemy bases directly north and east of your starting position, and if you can't take them out early they'll quickly start to snowball you until they're unstoppable. Further, while there are only two enemies forces on the map, the unique feature of the map is that they command both Zerg and Terran forces each, meaning you effectively have to deal with an 800 supply enemy force. The AI is also going to use both races' units liberally, and eventually creates a massive air force of mixed Terran and Zerg forces that will obliterate any counter air force you try, and will do the same to ground units if you don't have Defilers around. Finally, you have to be able to use Dark Templar at all times; if you command none and your Protoss buildings are destroyed, you lose the mission. Such a pity that those buildings are located in the northern part of your base in almost direct fire of enemy attacks. The mission is simply a long, difficult slog as you slowly push the enemy back to the Overmind plateau so you can send in your Dark Templar to kill it.
- While "To Slay the Beast" is held by some to be harder for the abovementioned reasons, others will swear (and curse, and cuss, and scream...) that "Omega" is the worse of the bunch. The biggest point of contention seems to be that, whereas all levels that came before always had a "winning strategy" - an army composition, attack tactic, build order, etc. which, once figured out, would make the level easily manageable with a modicum of attention and focus (including To Slay the Beast), Omega has none. It's not a test of strategy, it's a practically luck based test of the player's ability to manage 200 unit armies using an interface meant for 12 at a time with bad AI and worse pathfinding to beat a computer that can coordinate 600 with perfect reflexes and micromanagement at its own game. While the level may be harder to lose, because none of the three AI players behaves very aggressive, it's also near impossible to win, because they each start off with such an insanely fortified position and controlling so much of the map that 200 units minus whatever you need to defend your base from the other 2 at any given point may well just end up smashing against their defenses like spitballs on a brick wall, and by the time the player can build another attack they'd have rebuilt everything. "Loss" in Omega is as likely as not to come because, three hours in, having made no progress whatsoever against any of the AI enemies, the player has literally ran out of resources and can no longer replenish their units as fast as the AI cherrytaps them away. There's a reason that one of the only concrete pieces of advice available online about beating this hellishly, hair-pullingly, forth-inducingly, maddeningly hard level is "if three enemy bases are still standing at 30 minutes, restart" (some go as far as to say "if you attack the Protoss and find out they've researched Psionic Storm, restart; at that point, it's too well entrenched for any army composition you could possibly field to be able to make it").
- They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
- Despite being around since Episode I, Duke's role in the overall story continued to dwindle to the point that many weren't that bummed to see him go when he finally kicked the bucket in "True Colors."
- Daggoth, the senior Cerebrate to the player in Episode II, gets no screen-time at all afterwards. It's only mentioned in dialogue that following the death of the original Overmind, he led the other Cerebrates to form the Second Overmind. It also takes a Word of God to confirm that Daggoth died to Kerrigan sometime off-screen when she took control of the Swarm following Brood War.
- The Second Overmind in Brood War has no speaking role whatsoever during the time it was alive. It's there just so that the UED has a means to take control of the Renegade Zerg not controlled by Kerrigan.
- They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The whole Zerg Civil War aspect of the Brood War expansion between Kerrigan's Zerg and Daggoth's Renegades is quite underutilized. Mainly because Daggoth is a complete no-show, which results in the player never getting to see the Zerg's two opposing faction leaders cross paths. In fact, Kerrigan ends up having no interactions with any of the remaining Cerebrates that oppose her, or even the Second Overmind for that matter. Not helping is that the UED eventually hijacked the war amongst the Zerg by taking control of the Second Overmind, which rather than needing to defeat Daggoth and his allies, it turned into a story where everyone had to defeat the UED and its pet Zerg.
- Underused Game Mechanic:
- Elite variants of standard units. The only time you ever saw them for Terran is if you played through the Loomings precursor campaign, which showed off Cerberus Firebats and Goliaths. The elite Zerg units at least made it into the main campaigns, but were still very rare to see as you only get to play around with Hunter Killers in four of the missions, and just a single mission for the Devouring Ones and Torrasque. The Protoss never even gets any elite units aside from perhaps the unique Dark Templar units in the original campaign before they became buildable units in Brood War.
- Both Protoss campaigns have a major shortage of missions where you get to fight Terran opponents, with "The Fall" standing out due to the only real Terran opponent being Edmund Duke's fleet of Wraiths and a single Battlecruiser. The Terran presence in "The Stand" isn't much better, as your opponent only fights with small Tier-2 attack groups in the one mission where they have a base. The downloadable "Enslavers Dark Vengeance" bonus maps do compensate for this, however.
- Similarly, Protoss opponents in the Terran campaign are few and far in between, and when they so appear, they're either not at full strength or don't do much to attack your forces. The Protoss opponent in "The Iron Fist" campaign is the most impressive in scope, but usually doesn't attack you as they're distracted by the Zerg faction who is hostile to everyone.
