Adding cocoons to control groups without larvae

Zerg Discussion
1

Subject: QoL Suggestion: Allow adding only eggs (cocoons) to control groups with Shift, excluding leftover larvae

Message:

Hello, StarCraft II development team and Balance Council.

I would like to suggest a quality-of-life improvement for Zerg mechanics that would streamline control group management and reduce unnecessary actions.

Current Problem & Workflow:
The standard Zerg macro cycle for adding units to a control group is:

Select all Hatcheries (e.g., Ctrl+5).

Select all Larvae (e.g., Ctrl+Click a Larva).

Morph the desired units (e.g., ZZZZZ for Zerglings).

Attempt to add the new eggs to a control group: Press Shift + [Control Group Number].

The issue: When performing step 4, the game adds both the newly created eggs AND all remaining idle larvae to the control group. This clutters the control group with non-combat entities.

The player is then forced to perform an extra, tedious step:
5. Deselect the larvae: Hold Ctrl and click on a larva model in the selection panel (or on the screen) to remove all larvae from the selection, leaving only eggs.
6. Finally, press Shift + [Control Group Number] to add only the eggs.

Suggested Solution:
Please consider implementing a logic rule for Zerg:
If the current selection contains at least one egg (cocoon), and the player presses Shift + [Control Group Number], automatically exclude all larvae from the selection before adding to the group.

Why this change would be beneficial:

Reduces APM waste: Eliminates 1-2 extra, purely mechanical actions every production cycle. For Zerg, who produce in waves, this adds up significantly over a game.

Improves clarity: Keeps control groups clean, containing only actual combat units or eggs that will become units. This reduces misclicks and selection errors during engagements.

Lowers the skill floor slightly: Makes Zerg macro more intuitive for newer players, removing a “hidden” extra step that is not obvious.

Preserves all functionality: Does not remove any existing control. Players who want to add larvae to a control group for any reason can still do so by manually selecting only larvae. This change only affects selections that are a mix of larvae and eggs.

This is not a balance change, but a UX improvement that would make controlling the Zerg race feel smoother and more responsive. Many players in the community have discussed this minor frustration for years.

Thank you for your time and for continually supporting StarCraft II.

2

so the balance council is no longer doing things, and there is no development team, as sc2 has been out of development since 2020

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3

But there were updates coming out, someone has to do it.

4

again the game is out of developement, updates are done not through development, as the updates are balance, and done through editor. and even thos might stop at some point the way blizz is treating sc2. the last one we got was done by the legacy games department, before that we had 3 done by the balance council which was made up of pros players, and they were superbad patchs. which is why legacy game department stepped in.

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5

well, I’m not asking for any balance changes, just a simpler game mechanic

6

Balance changes are some of the only changes we do still get. I believe we are at one balance patch per year right now.

One which, unless I am mistaken, would require a fundamental change to the game’s engine. I am not certain that you can do this with changes to existing data objects in the editor.

7

is it that hard to ban maggots from appearing in a binder?

8

Yes. You would have to change the rules about unit selection, which would most likely require engine changes instead of a new data object or field. The SC2 editor is very flexible, but I don’t believe it has any built-in mechanics to do something like this.

9

Yes, this is a very good idea. I often run into this problem, accidentally selecting some units along with buildings.
Implementing this would make things much clearer for players, and it seems like it could be done with relatively low development effort.

1 Like
10

Do I understand the necessary logic of actions correctly?
We want to add a simple conditional filter:

IF (the current selection S contains at least one object of type egg) AND (the player presses Shift + [Control Group Number]), THEN:

  1. Create a new filtered selection F.

  2. Add to F all objects from S that are NOT of type larva. (This includes eggs, queens, workers, and any existing combat units present in the selection).

  3. Execute the standard Shift + [Control Group Number] command using this new filtered selection F instead of the original S.

  4. Result: Only eggs and valid units are added to the control group. All larvae are automatically ignored.

ELSE (if the selection contains no eggs):
Fall back to the current behavior. The game adds the entire selection (including larvae) to the group, preserving all existing functionality.

11

That involves a very specific code change. It is not something that can be done in the editor. Code changes are very unlikely to go through.

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12

Why should it be so difficult?
Is it possible to do this through the editor’s hacks?

13

I have already answered this multiple times.

It is not possible to implement this behavior by changing objects in the data editor. Pretty much everything in multiplayer is built using objects created by the data editor. If you can’t build something by adding or manipulating data objects in the data editor, then it is unlikely you can implement it at all, and it certainly won’t be implemented considering that this game is out of development.

I ran into this problem in my custom mod when trying to figure out how to change Microbial Shroud to apply after armor. There just wasn’t support for that, so I wasn’t able to do it. Applying Microbial Shroud after armor would require the developers to modify the way that damage response behaviors work, and it would likely require new fields to be created within those behaviors. The game is out of development, so it is extremely likely that anyone would bother modifying the code that way. Modern balance patches are exclusively made through the data editor.

I don’t think you can mimic this behavior with triggers either, so there is just no way to do it without changing the game’s underlying code.

14

The fact that zerg can hotkey their units before they even spawn puts it ahead of Terran and protoss in that respect. I don’t think control click is that hard.

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15

This. Honestly, ctrl clicking on the eggs and then adding them to a control group isn’t really that bad. It actually becomes second nature after a while.