Its obviously a bio terran tanking unit that i will estimate to be around 100-125 heath with either 1 or 2 base armor, and it will likely do low splash damage like 4 + 4 vs light at 1.5 seconds and it will reduce the attacks of the enemies with its frozen nitrogen cannon (either reducing damage by 1 or 2, or reducing attack speed by a small factor, etc...) I doubt that it will have the classic "concussive" effect, but that may not be too far off... however it will be a bio tanking / control unit that is fo sho!

No flamethrower because blizzard said it would be found in arctic environments.

spbelky

United States623 Posts

October 05 2011 04:12 GMT

#610

I'm guessing its a factory caster unit. Hopefully with some defensive spells.

Deployable bunkers with short duration?
Spirit Link type shielding ability?
Guardian Shield type ability that nerfs aoe damage (think protecting vs banelings/storms)
Mech Suit - allows biological unit to board, giving different stats based on unit mounted.

I dunno, I'd really like to see each race get a good defensive / crowd controll support unit in HotS. Think Spirit Walk / Druid of the Talon / Sorceress from wc3, defense matrix from sc1, that type of stuff.

KaBoom300

United States225 Posts

October 05 2011 04:12 GMT

#611

i would be willing to bet money that its a transforming hellion. you can tell by the wheels being the exact same as hellion wheels

jarhead271

United States160 Posts

October 05 2011 04:13 GMT

#612

Hmm, are we sure that thing in his right hand is another shield? What if this is melee unit? If they are going to add anything to Terran, I'd say a melee unit would be the most interesting.

Teim

Australia373 Posts

October 05 2011 04:14 GMT

#613

It's the unit Tasteless always wanted, a Waterbat.

Or I guess an Icebat.

DarkPlasmaBall

United States45527 Posts

October 05 2011 04:17 GMT

#614

On October 05 2011 11:10 Ben... wrote:

Show nested quote +

I would instantly switch to Terran if you could build a Banjo-Kazooie. Imagine it doing the jump peck attack to a battlecruiser.

Upgrade the rat-a-tat-rap in the tech lab?

Fuck yes.

I think it's going to be a new hybrid of lurker + reaver though. We all wanted them back right? What better race to get both of those units than the Terran?

+ Show Spoiler +

lol

badcop

United States176 Posts

October 05 2011 04:18 GMT

#615

This has probably already been said, but Blizzard has decided to combine the maurader and the hellion. I can only dream...

Ktk

Korea (South)753 Posts

October 05 2011 04:19 GMT

#616

The mod actually said chill because they said it was based on the campaign order, correct? They aren't hinting that the weapon is a freeze-ray because marauders can already do that. We've seen that there are levels in the campaign that are based in cold regions. Based off of the aforementioned statement the hint actually suggests that the unit will keep the Terran warm on the frozen planet, though presently we only have Protoss enemies shown on screenshots with frozen tilesets. However the first levels shown were on a lava-tiled planet, but we've already seen many zerg units from that, so this is actually still in order of the campaign. Or he's just saying chill out to the guy who thinks Blizzard only develops for Terran; we'll just see shadows of Zerg and Protoss units next, in that order. herp overanalysis

There are lots of issues to be discussed...

It could be a hellion transformer that goes from a hellion that can only attack ground to a slower walking or even hardly mobile unit that can shoot into the air - look at the preigniter in the OP picture, it is clearly facing upwards signifying its capability to shoot air units, based on the hinge and length of the pre-igniter. It is possible that it could attack ground units too, since it is so susceptible to ground assault as it transforms. I don't expect a transformation to be quick like in Transformers the movie because 5 hellions that transform in a mineral line with good spread would be ridiculous. As defense against mass light air (however this conflicts with the thor's purpose - however at no gas; which leads me to believe that this upgrade will be available in the tech lab for a gas cost). This leads me to believe that instead of more flames, the upgrade provides balls of fire that weaken (by damage or otherwise enhancing other attacks similar to how the Corrupt ability works), or DOT similar to that of irradiate but of course much much weaker and affecting all units - what isn't immune to superheated projectiles? The pre-igniter won't serve much purpose in the air really, so the 1on1 DOT makes a lot more sense than a transformable flame turret (which could be abused in so many ways, especially multi-pronged in-based harass). Personally I don't think it's a hellion transformer because it looks too wide and not tall enough.

I would personally like to see an optical flare upgrade from the pre-igniter as well, the lore is easily manipulable in that direction (pre-igniter heats material in the sky to blind units and detector(s)) and it would be an interesting mechanic against small air contingents (blinded mutas, phoenixes, vikings) quickly diminishing in value unless it can affect more than one unit at a time (the horror, Terran AOE). However since there is no restoration in this game it'll probably be a temporary sight_range=1 vision spell, if it exists at all. Any of the changes I mentioned turns the Hellion into not just a harass unit but also a unit that can support an army in any situation, which means you'll be more likely to see the unit in any matchup - although it is very common regardless in any matchup but TvP. The blinding of observers could be useful if optical flare becomes reality.

Now on the other hand, Blizzard has gotten a lot of crap about how Marauders are so un-terran like (can tank a significant amount of damage, basically overkill armored anything, hard counter too much, op as f*, kill yourself Terrans, etc) and I suspect the Thor has similar traits as the Marauder - but at least that unit fulfills a similar purpose as the tank but in the air - air spacing and positioning. I feel the Thor has a good role in that sense so that it remains in HotS, but not the stimmable 20armordmg 100/25/2 marauder. To fill the anti-armor vacuum that now exists in TvP this will result in changes to the siege tank once again to make tvp incorporate tanks because any match up with tanks makes it infinitely more interesting to watch - TvT tanks: great. TvZ tanks: great. TvP: bio all day every day. Fewer options result in playstyles that get quite boring. If you're thinking: 1-1-1 timings- it's not a playstyle, it's an all-in. That's sort of like calling 6pool an "playstyle". Far too rigid to call it one. Mech: Competent blink stalkers actually destroy mech. Sky Terran: lol. You have to start with a lot of bio to not lose to 1000 timings before you get enough air units versus units that can shoot up and have equal range of a banshee anyways. It could be a unit that deals with this issue effectively - marauders can stim and run in, but a single-targetting (thing on top = grenade launcher, a la marauder), slow-moving anti-armor unit with a rate of fire significantly better than that of a siege tank could work wonders.

Now, here's what I thought of when I saw this at first glance. The Nomad was scrapped in the alpha of WoL because it was a bit risky in the mid-late-game department since it could repair air units instantly, and had defense matrix. Furthermore,

the Seismic Thumper was a Nomad ability which was not available in the BlizzCon 2008 build. It slowed down ground units by 50%[18] and prevented zerg from burrowing.

This could theoretically replace the marauder concussive shell, while removing it from the game. Again, the vacuum against a lot of armored units comes into play and we know mass siege tanks loses to blink stalkers and chargelots, and... most things Protoss really.
The abilities of the science vessel in SC1 included irradiate, EMP, and defensive matrix. The Nomad would effectively replace the science vessel then, as the Ghost has EMP. If we wanted to bring lots of things back from BW there remains Restoration and Optical Flare, like I've said before. Restoration could be used extremely well against fungals on a general army to save valuable [armored] units such as siege tanks from taking the full 40? (probably going to be changed again in future patches past 1.4) damage from a fungal. In team games, even cooler. Also, Neural Parasite would be hard countered by a few of these. Also game-breaking. Optical flare, like I said, is just a really cool spell / wasn't used as often as other spells (others were just better to get). This picture has four wheels. There are wheels on the Nomad. It looks ugly. the Nomad looks ugly. There you have it.

tl;dr: It's not a ground Void Ray with Freeze.

Hemling

Sweden93 Posts

October 05 2011 04:19 GMT

#617

hellion transforming into a walking drillbot laying mines?

emc

United States3088 Posts

October 05 2011 04:22 GMT

#618

http://sclegacy.com/news/23-sc2/1076-heart-of-the-swarm-unit-teaser-1

read this:

These three units, as well as the rest of the new Heart of the Swarm multiplayer units and abilities, will be unveiled and playable at the show on October 21 and 22.

MP will be playable at blizzcon.

TBone-

United States2309 Posts

October 05 2011 04:23 GMT

#619

I sincerely hope this is a factory unit, and I sincerely hope it makes mech viable in tvp.