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United Kingdom2950 Posts
Will the campaign feature the ability to play any of the races, like the Zeratul missions in the Wings campaign? Might we see Raynor trying to chase Kerrigan and go on his own adventure? How will the upgrade system differ from Wings, the mutations seem cool but seem similar to how you would upgrade units in the armory.
Thanks in advance!
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TIM! The only concern I have is how "terran-centric" the zerg expansion is going to be. Less Raynor - more hydralisks!
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will there be another minigame like the lost viking arcade game?
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On January 17 2013 15:32 Wunder wrote: Will the campaign feature the ability to play any of the races, like the Zeratul missions in the Wings campaign? Might we see Raynor trying to chase Kerrigan and go on his own adventure? How will the upgrade system differ from Wings, the mutations seem cool but seem similar to how you would upgrade units in the armory.
Thanks in advance!
The zeratul question was asked in the last preview, I'll try to see if they have a more solid answer this time around.
Q: Are there going to be any more bonus missions, like the Zera'tul prophecies in WoL?
A: We're really working on that, we've heard how much fun those missions were to play and we had a blast making them; however, as you can imagine, Kerrigan doesn't really have a lot of friends. I don't see Zera'tul showing up, we need to work out the story for that and kind of figure out where it goes. It needs to feel like it's a part of it, and we need to see that there's a reason for it.
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what non-multiplayer units can we expect to see in the campaign?
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On January 17 2013 15:58 dAPhREAk wrote: what non-multiplayer units can we expect to see in the campaign?
Will there be a "comeback" of broodwar / starcraft Zerg units in the heart of the swarm campaign like for Golliaths, Firebats, Wraiths and Medics in the WOL campaign? (Just to specifiy )
Last edit there were also vultures!!! Never forget them :'(
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How long will the campaign be compared to the WOL one?
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Will there be player decisions again that don't count in the story canon?
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How far along is the resume from replay feature for HotS? How will it work on Battle.net? Will there be public lobbies for it or will it only be private invite only?
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How much does marketability factor into new unit design compared to balance?
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Will we be able to play another race in the campagin (like Protoss in WoL)?
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Are they adding the zoom out for observing? (some arcade maps let observers zoom out much further than normal)
Any more features for replays (sharing and watching together through battlenet) or to have Major tournament streams built into the UI.? I still meet a lot of players who know nothing of all the great content that's out there!
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Will we see some of the "newer" units in the CGI cutscenes? For example, there were no brood lords, infestors, or roaches in the WoL cutscenes (I imagine because those cutscenes had to be finalized before it was determined what units would or wouldn't make it into the game).
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Do they have plans to decrease the minimum spec of HoTS back to pre-1.5 WoL?
Performance on 'Low' noticeably decreased with this patch.
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Yes! Thank you guys! Campaign is what I'm mostly pumped for hots in march.
Question: will there be a mini campaign like the Zeratul campaign in WoL?
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Will there be new achievable portraits featuring the new units? Will they replace any current WoL portraits?
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How "Brutal" will the campaign's Brutal difficulty be? Will it be much more difficult than Wings of Liberty's campaign, or easier?
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Do they plan to change Overseer and Corrupter for MP like they talked about many times?
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A lot of fans responded very negatively to the cheesy dialogue, and the retarded storyline that heavily contradicted with Brood War's depiction of the characters: ("Queen Bitch of the Universe" to damsel in distress; "I'm going to kill you for murdering Fenix" to I want to save my girlfriend).
What they have changed to the HOTS script in response to the very negative reception to WoL's shitty writing?
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Kerrigan as Queen of Blades has obviously become very popular and an iconic figure in SC universe.
1. Did they expect Kerrigan to become that popular and has this had an impact on how they decided to write the story for future SC 2 lore/campaigns?
Such as it will be harder for Raynor to get a "happy ending and getting the girl - Kerrigan back"?
2. When she was created, was it "planned" to make her a new iconic figure in Blizzard or did she just happened to be liked by all fans and grew to be a big figure in Blizzard universe?
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On January 17 2013 17:31 Gamegene wrote: A lot of fans responded very negatively to the cheesy dialogue, and the retarded storyline that heavily contradicted with Brood War's depiction of the characters: ("Queen Bitch of the Universe" to damsel in distress; "I'm going to kill you for murdering Fenix" to I want to save my girlfriend).
What they have changed to the HOTS script in response to the very negative reception to WoL's shitty writing?
I have the same complaint about WoL for sure, but I think you have to be a little more cooperative to get such a question answered. Surely their answer to a jab like that will be a generic "We're really proud of the storylines we're developing and we hope you like them as much as we do."
In a similar vein though I would ask if they're going to keep the same approach to campaign progress and mission selection as WoL. I felt like the branching-in-almost-no-particular-order design of the WoL campaign painted the writers into a corner because there were too many potential paths through the same missions. This made it difficult for the plot to reference past events (because even "required" missions may or may not have been played yet) and forced all the character's motivations to be very local. I want to know if they were happy with that design decision and whether they'll be taking the same approach or maybe shifting to a more traditional linear/branching (rather than... web?) design for HotS.
Of course that says nothing about the admittedly cheesy plot
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With view towards the "awesome games done quick 2013", what do you think is the minimum amount of time one needs to beat the campaign?
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So will there be an infested jukebox?
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Why do they refuse to buff tanks to help terran against the swarm and against protoss deathball when going mech ? Do they think buffing the tank would lead to a bad game design ? I would like to enlight the following arguments : - Zerg now have viper's blinding cloud and abduct as a hardcounter to tanks - Protoss only had difficulties early game against tank, but it gone with the MSC photon overcharge - Terran bio had difficulties against mech, but its gone thanks to medivac speed. And they could give back a medivac heal upgrade.
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Do you consider removing upgrade requirements (ie siege mode, evo for spore) as an actually direction of balancing the game or they are just situational? Please elaborate more on this matter
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I want as detailed a description of the campaign unit upgrades as they can give. WoL had credits and research and HotS will of course have something similar yet very different. Taking one of two routes for every unit, is that still in place? What other upgrade mechanisms exist?
Also, can we expect something like a "reversed terran holdout" where we take the Zerg attacking side of the popular bunker-up-and-survive missions?
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On January 17 2013 16:08 Destroyr wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 15:58 dAPhREAk wrote: what non-multiplayer units can we expect to see in the campaign? Will there be a "comeback" of broodwar / starcraft Zerg units in the heart of the swarm campaign like for Golliaths, Firebats, Wraiths and Medics in the WOL campaign? (Just to specifiy  ) Last edit there were also vultures!!! Never forget them :'( There were scourges in the zeratul missions And scouts but kinda hoping for a lot more old school bw units as well.
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How did the last Overmind come into being and how come there is not a new Overmind? How come a human girl can just come in and -- on and off -- fill this role without the Zerg minding it at all?
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On January 17 2013 18:06 Insoleet wrote: Why do they refuse to buff tanks to help terran against the swarm and against protoss deathball when going mech ? Do they think buffing the tank would lead to a bad game design ? I would like to enlight the following arguments : - Zerg now have viper's blinding cloud and abduct as a hardcounter to tanks - Protoss only had difficulties early game against tank, but it gone with the MSC photon overcharge - Terran bio had difficulties against mech, but its gone thanks to medivac speed. And they could give back a medivac heal upgrade.
Sadly this Q&A is only about the campaigne. But I 100% support this question!
Edit: @imPermanenCe I remember them now too so many cool units that have no relevance for the true game. I have to play the campaign again to have fun with the little wraiths
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On January 17 2013 17:31 Gamegene wrote: A lot of fans responded very negatively to the cheesy dialogue, and the retarded storyline that heavily contradicted with Brood War's depiction of the characters: ("Queen Bitch of the Universe" to damsel in distress; "I'm going to kill you for murdering Fenix" to I want to save my girlfriend).
What they have changed to the HOTS script in response to the very negative reception to WoL's shitty writing?
Man... the way Blizzard has utterly failed with everything in SC2 makes me so sad :'(
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On January 17 2013 19:32 Destroyr wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 18:06 Insoleet wrote: Why do they refuse to buff tanks to help terran against the swarm and against protoss deathball when going mech ? Do they think buffing the tank would lead to a bad game design ? I would like to enlight the following arguments : - Zerg now have viper's blinding cloud and abduct as a hardcounter to tanks - Protoss only had difficulties early game against tank, but it gone with the MSC photon overcharge - Terran bio had difficulties against mech, but its gone thanks to medivac speed. And they could give back a medivac heal upgrade.
Sadly this Q&A is only about the campaigne. But I 100% support this question! Edit: @imPermanenCe I remember them now too  so many cool units that have no relevance for the true game. I have to play the campaign again to have fun with the little wraiths 
Aah sorry i misunderstood 
Well, i'd love so much if a interviewer would agree to ask theses question to dustin and davidkim, because nobody understand their choice about refusing to buff the tank in hots
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I stated that the focus would be the campaign, but I'm sure there will be room for discussion on multiplayer and other features. I've just been told that most hands-on stuff is campaign (makes sense since the multiplayer part is public!)
Any question is cool and I'll be working the list of what to ask until we get to the interview. Not sure if I can disclose the exact time/date so just keep posting. Even if we don't get a chance to ask a question, I'll try to read through them all to see if they were answered in the opening presentation or another portion. Also we may find an opportunity to answer a question when we are doing the post write up.
Just trying to see what people are curious about in all aspects of the game. Also I think a some of the lore questions may be answered in the Creative Q&A series Blizzard has been posting.
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Is there a new map dynamics like the lava mission where the map characteristics plays a major factor during a mission? Are there any female critters or baneling critters in the campaign/new multiplayer maps?
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Hi, I had some questions in mind : - Can we expect somes missions were we control two races at once (like Raynor's Terran and Kerrigan's Zerg) ? - Does the building will be upgradable like the units ? (Like hatch producing more larva or can defend herself) - Does Kerrigan will be able to change her form (between the "ghost form" shows in 2011 and the "swarm form" shows couple of months later) in every mission, or at some point she'll just evolved for the rest of the campaign ? - In the Beta UI, we have Kerrigan's ghost form in lab, can we expected to have more animated wallpaper (maybe "Kerrigan's swarm form with somes zergs running around" unlocked after complainting the campaign ?) - Compair to WoL, will be more or less cinematics/in-game cutscenes ?
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so... what's new units coming up after HoTs expansion?
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Can we expect to have a more 'sandbox' type of campaign this time around? In WoL, whenever you got a new unit of some kind, you pretty much were expected to only use that unit. There weren't that many missions where it was simply "DESTROY EVERYTHING (however you want)" that just let you have at it with all the different units and stuff.
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Are/were you considering any units designed for campaign to also be used for multiplayer ? Is there a different thought process behind campaign unit and multiplayer unit ?
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Can we expect different endings to the story in HOTS. Like in WoL you could choose your "own" path between missions but at the end it didn't change the outcome of the scenario. Can we expect different ends like bad ends or "true ends" that would lead to LotV?
Will the unit be less one dimensional when you unlock them, as stated before, when you got the X unit in WoL, you knew you could just spam this unit and win the next mission.
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Are portrait pictures and icons mostly rewarded through the campaign or multiplayer ?
Are there mini games like lost vikings ?
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In reference to this thread: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=393707
Will there ever be the option to edit the variables file so we can play on true low settings with high shaders/forcefields being visible again; and similarly will they ever introduce Stronger Team Colors for people who elect to use it, assuming they continue to restrict us from using a perfectly working version of the mod already out?
edit: I guess my other question about the campaign would be: How long do they estimate the average play time through it in each expansion will be?
Though I much prefer the first question >.>
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If you meet Dustin Browder, ask him what is, in his opinion, Starcraft 2 thing that most of the fans just straight up hate. If he responds 20 minutes of nothing into 10 sec of blob vs blob into GG, the he got the correct answer. And ask him what they plan to do about it in HotS, if they are talking about/considering/trying the things like changing economy so more than 3 bases are actually useful, improving defenders advantage etc etc...
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Will Samir Duran make a reappearance?
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On January 17 2013 17:08 Timetwister22 wrote: Will there be new achievable portraits featuring the new units? Will they replace any current WoL portraits?
They have expressed that there are new portraits for the new units via their new experience system, though I don't doubt that they will have some for campaign, various achievements, etc. Suffice it to say, I suspect they will keep the old portraits as well.
On January 17 2013 16:23 Gaius Baltar wrote: Will there be player decisions again that don't count in the story canon?
They've also said that the decisions you made in the first campaign will affect the new campaign, so.
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I would expect all the answers to strong and direct critique questions to be generic, non-objective and filled with lots of nothing.
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On January 17 2013 17:31 Gamegene wrote: A lot of fans responded very negatively to the cheesy dialogue, and the retarded storyline that heavily contradicted with Brood War's depiction of the characters: ("Queen Bitch of the Universe" to damsel in distress; "I'm going to kill you for murdering Fenix" to I want to save my girlfriend).
What they have changed to the HOTS script in response to the very negative reception to WoL's shitty writing?
I second this question.
My own question would be: How important was the lore/storyline of the campaign in comparison to the game-play or mission design? Was there more emphasis in developing the plot or was there more emphasis in making the missions diverse?
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On January 17 2013 23:39 fabiano wrote: I would expect all the answers to strong and direct critique questions to be generic, non-objective and filled with lots of nothing.
Sure but we can try.
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On January 17 2013 23:35 S1eth wrote: Will Samir Duran make a reappearance?
I forgot about that SOB :O , good question
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You'll go to blizzard HQ this week or the next week (21th - 27th) ?
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Will we be able to play a non-multiplayer race (Xel'naga or Hybrids) in the campaign like in WC3?
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Are we going to finally see anything from the Xel Naga? Is a fourth race being considered for Starcraft 2?
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a few questions: I tried to write them the way you can understand what i mean (to avoid misconceptions) if you pick one (would be awesome) feel free to ask it differently, my english isn't the best. i just don't know if you already do it c:
1: can they clarify the difference between behemoth/leviathan and which of those (maybe both) will be in HotS? (kerrigan uses leviathans, in the cgi-snippet it look more like behemoth)
2: WoL tried (and failed hard) to be funny/comical. Will HotS be more serious and less cheesy? (praying to Gaga 4 this)
3: will the ultra-settings need better specs? (mine hardly pulls sc2 off on ultra, i doubt it will hots)
4: will HotS feature longer missions than WoL? those 4-minute missions (WoL) didn't do anything and a campaign with only 20 of those (HotS) will be drastically shorter if "tutorial-like" missions make like 3 of all.
5: How did Kerrigan come in touch with her brood again after escaping the lab? she has her brood + leviathan... any lore explanation?
6: Blizzard pretty much spoiled everything of WoL before it was even released. Did they learn out of it? Is there more story to come than we expect? Is Korhal not the biggest event in HotS? (the website depicted it, hoping it's not the end)
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Also, when will the update go live? we don't even know when you will go there
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This a question I am really curious about;
How does balancing dramatic changes to the functionality and power of units affect the campaign level design and controlling for difficulty? (A sub question would be how do they tweak difficulty).
Less important: Would they consider and cameo tributes to great players / Why aren't those sorts of easter eggs in the game with the history StarCraft has? (A Boxer Marine, A Stork Carrier, ZerO Queen, A reach Manlot, a Tyrant Muta)
edit: One last question I don't know if this is tactful but it's true:
How would they respond to the criticism that the music design for WoL was far less memorable and even inferior to the racial music for the original StarCraft and Brood War? *How are they changing their approach to solve this problem?
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again one question: Isn't it easier to export cinematics (the ingame ones) in good quality as a video so people with low settings don't feel like they are in the 90s? Again being pessimistic about how HotS will melt graphic cards
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Slightly campaign related - When is the intro cinematic being revealed? :D
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Will brutal be even more difficult this time around? Will the story be more serious considering the plot was very cheesy in WoL (saving a girlfriend...)
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@nAgeDitto I guess on the event itself... maybe. Still, i hope Blizz won't spoil anything.
what i find a bit strange: we have ~20 mission and ~3 for every planet. so basically char + kaldir + umoja for example make already the half of the campaign/story? ._.
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Denda, not every planet has 3 missions, and some of the planets have different tilesets (Char has the regular one plus the fortress, but also the marshlands or whatever they've called). There are 16 tilesets, so I wouldn't be worried. It seems some of them might be used more than once (Kaldir and Zerus seems most obvious), but not all.
My questions:
1. Why was Zeratul surprised to learn about a Hybrid, and seemingly unaware of who could have made it? He actually uses the word "could" too, apparently not even wanting to guess it might be Duran (which, admittedly, is a pretty good guess). It seems kinda like a Catch-22. Why? Because he's trekking through the galaxy because he found hybrids, now looking for more of them, and when he does find more, he is... surprised. And yet he can't be surprised, because the reason he stumbled upon one is that he had found one earlier.
2. There was a lot of artifact-grabbing in WOL, and a lot of people wanted them. I can understand why Raynor wanted them (money), why the Moebius Foundation wanted them (to assemble the artifact), why Kerrigan wanted them (to hinder the artifact being assembled), why the Tal'Darim wanted them (they were holy relics), but in the second mission, Tychus, under commands of Mengsk, asks Raynor to steal them from the Dominion. Why did the Dominion want them? It seems like a small detail, but considering the importance of the artifacts, it really can't be.
3. A lot of the novels have stories that exist on the sidelines, with plot points that aren't vital to know if one wants to follow the game's stories. But the latest entry, Flashpoint, had events so important that I wonder how HOTS will play for people who didn't read the book. I'm sure Blizzard doesn't expect everyone who plays the campaign to play the book, so how will this go about?
4. Is Kerrigan being a "Class 12 psionic" the same as being 12 on the psi index scale, the same which rates Nova a ten?
5. Will there be branched missions in HOTS as it was in WOL?
6. Once you've landed on planet, will you be able to leave before finishing all missions on it?
7. The trailer shows what looks the Hyperion fighting in a mission. Will there be a mission (or more) where we control Terran, most likely Raynor and the Raiders?
8. The Blizzcon trailer showed in-game Kerrigan on a moving, flying vehicle. Please ask about that, because it looks awesome.
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My question:
With the succes of games like The Witcher 2 or Deus Ex : Human Revolution, do you concider a more mature and adult approch to the Starcraft IP in singleplayer ? Wing of Liberty showcased a very " holywood" and easy scenario and presentation in comparaison to the original Starcraft game and many people were disapointed by this choice.
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@Dustin Browder: How has your experience with the C&C series affected how you design SC2?
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My question is:
How will you change Terran's late game unit production to compete with Zergs and Protoss? Zerg can instantly re-max with banked injects and protoss can warp-in and chrono the cool downs of warp-in; while Terran takes significantly longer to re-max.
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Don't get me wrong the WoL cinematics were incredibly well done but they always seemed to show hero characters in various environnement. In Hots can we expect to see cinematics that reminds us a bit more of the game like a terran base or a protoss drop etc.
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On January 20 2013 12:17 KentHenry wrote: My question is:
How will you change Terran's late game unit production to compete with Zergs and Protoss? Zerg can instantly re-max with banked injects and protoss can warp-in and chrono the cool downs of warp-in; while Terran takes significantly longer to re-max.
How can we remind posters that the preview is mainly about campaign other than stating that and bold it in the OP = =?
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On January 20 2013 12:41 Roarer wrote:Show nested quote +On January 20 2013 12:17 KentHenry wrote: My question is:
How will you change Terran's late game unit production to compete with Zergs and Protoss? Zerg can instantly re-max with banked injects and protoss can warp-in and chrono the cool downs of warp-in; while Terran takes significantly longer to re-max. How can we remind posters that the preview is mainly about campaign other than stating that and bold it in the OP = =? OP said mainly around campaign but also multiplayer, just wanted to throw my question into the lotto.
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Ask them if they would ever implement a custom campaign option, ala WCIII.
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The BW campaign were significantly harder than the Vanilla ones. Will it be the same in Heart Of The Swarm ?
In terms of multiplayer gameplay and viewer experience, what in your opinion was the major flaw of Starcraft 2 Wings of Liberty that you hope to be (partially or entirely) adressed with Heart Of The Swarm ?
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how many planets will HotS feature we already know? WoL had some more irrelevant planets that were only for 1 mission (Agria, Typhon, Redstone etc.) while Broodwar for example had more important fights on more important planets (Zerg campaign had Tarsonis, Braxis, Moria, Korhal etc.) In BW it didn't feel like it was some minor fight one some irrelevant planet no one will ever hear about and the impact was very little. So Korhal was invaded, the Psi-Disruptor destroyed, the UED wiped out and all that in the first few missions. Overall even BW with the bad graphics and "mission-design" (was more simple ---> destroy everything) felt even more epic than WoL. I don't even know why.
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Compare the amount of unit model work that went into HotS and WoL. Did you reuse many models that have been thrown out for WoL's needs, but were already made? Are there many new zerg buildings to be featured only in the campaign?
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Will the missions for the campaign be more for on small thing like in WoL (gathering vespene, etc.) and go step by step, or will the arching storyline be more prevalent in each mission (ala BW)?
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1) What about replay sharing? Why are all ladder replays not saved serverside? (Let's say for a month since last view). I could make all replays private/public in settings and change it with particular replay in case I'd not like to have those all of replays shared.
2) What about maphacks, are you planning to change game engine to disable this kind of cheating. (Maphacks in HoN are not possible)
3) When I will be able to join to ongoing game in case I had disconnect? Or in case I want to observe ongoing game//tournament game w/o commentary.
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