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I really love Blizzard RTS games...as I can somewhat imagine is the case for the majority of you, here on a website dedicated to the updates and discussions of Starcraft. In my youth and coming back around now that I'm nearing the end of my 20s I find myself looping back to my original passions. Not ladder, not the competitive scene, but single player and custom game content. These campaigns were my childhood. As a kid the stories were captivating, the worlds were fun to explore and the challenge was more than enough to handle an 8 year old Cricketer.
I took a couple hours out of the day and asked myself the titular question of this blog, and ended up taking a few hours to identify what I found to be my top 10 missions of BW, WC3 and SC2 respectfully. There are a lot of reasons to enjoy a mission, the story, the atmosphere, the difficulty, the balance. You may enjoy no build missions or long macro affairs, hold outs or timed rushes. There's quite a bit of variety.
For myself personally, I tend to enjoy two extremes that share a commonality: Big Macro Maps, usually the final missions of campaigns, and Small Micro Maps (usually but not necessarily No-Builds). These missions tend to lack time limits, allowing the player to surgically carve out a victory with as much or as little methodical care as desired...(they also lend themselves well to challenge runs like the BW Deathless I did last year).
My personal top 10 across all 3 games are as follows:
10. Death From Above (HotS)
9. Sky Shield (LotV)
8. Dungeons of Dalaran (FT Blood Elf)
7. Gates of Hell (WoL)
6. Old Hatreds (FT Orc)
5. The Battle of Braxis (BW Protoss)
4. To Chain the Beast (BW Terran)
3. Lord of Outland (FT Blood Elf)
2. The Reckoning (HotS)
1. Countdown (BW Protoss)
What are your favorite missions and why?
Note this blog was somewhat inspired by the release of Stormgate Early Access and its first three missions...I think there is potential with Stormgate but if you take a look at those missions...there is certainly something off about them.
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Lotta nostalgia for Desperate Alliance (Terran mission #3 in original SC1 campaign). I know "defend the base until the timer runs out" has been done to death at this point, but it was cool as hell the first time I played it.
I also have a soft spot for The Trump Card (mission #7, same campaign) because the first time playing it as a kid, I cheesed it by bringing the psi emitter straight to the objective with a dropship and a bunch of Wraiths, bypassing basically the whole mission, and I was super proud of myself for pulling it off.
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to chain the beast = the best campaign mission
big epic campaign map with unique triggers and a great cliffhanger ending
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The Hammer Falls. It took me and my best friend 6 months to get past it on the N64. Mengsk speech at the end was epic. It is way more fun reading it in text than seeing it on the PC version.
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Northern Ireland26225 Posts
Tough, tough question. Especially as I have to look up all the mission names!
I think as a kid and sucking at the games mechanically, definitely had more of a challenge just beating campaigns, but simultaneously more rewarding at times. As an adult I probably prefer some of the more micro-challenge hero missions, or ones where the scales are really tipped against me as to play a more regular mission can be a bit trivial if you’re even semi-decent at multiplayer.
It’s been a while so maybe they added it later, the BW campaigns really needed difficulty levels added for that reason.
Thematically in terms of gameplay-related stuff I really like some of the ‘last stand’ missions, all is lost and doom. Trying to stop Archimonde ascending Mount Hyjal in WC3 as Jaina and Thrall fall in turn. Or that SC2 mission where the Toss race get wiped out and it’s up to you to take as many down with you as you can.
Narratively I don’t think Blizz ever delivered a singular gut punch better than Mengsk abandoning Kerrigan. I think overall I prefer the arcs of Arthas and Illidan, but those were across whole campaigns and their falls were kinda coming. Kerrigan being abandoned is a moment that kinda comes from nowhere.
As an aside what non-Blizz RTS games have particularly good campaigns?
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Netherlands5209 Posts
Mostly vague or gone memories by now:
1. Stukov mission (BW Terran)
rest:
3rd level you finally get to play a real game where the enemy has a base and you get a new mage unit. (WC Orc)
2nd level after getting Balista available (WC2 Human)
The level first getting Paladins, golden eyes = deity (WC2 Human)
First Sarah Kerrigan level felt like having Tanya from Red Alert but polite and with nicer graphics (SC Terran)
The infest Duran vs Protoss level. (BW Zerg)
And some more WC2, SC & BW memories of getting to use a new unit the first time
Basically all child memories of "Wow, this is sooo cool!"
4-10 years ago playing those custom single player BW campaigns by community members gave me the same feeling as a kid playing those above missions. I remember some Protoss level similar to the 1st BW Protoss level, but waaay cooler and a Terran level where lava is rising every x interval that will prevent you from mining and kill your SCVs if you don't take action in time. I believe those levels are by 2 different creators. Anyway, if I don't forget I'll come back and give links to the TL threads so you can play 'em too if you haven't already.
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On August 02 2024 19:10 WombaT wrote:
As an aside what non-Blizz RTS games have particularly good campaigns?
Command and Conquer Red Alert series. Especially 2.
Homeworld
Battle For Middle-Earth
I personally enjoyed Supreme Commander as well.
Perhaps Company of Heroes.
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As for the topic. Final WC3 mission is the one I recall the most.
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True Colors, Brood War.
It's when Zerg does the backstab.
Good speedrun map too.
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EPT
