What are Kerry’s ideals anyway? She’s a bipolar psychopath even as a human, so that’s not a great start. It should be hugely concerning to everyone that Zagara looks up to a mad woman infamous for constantly killing innocent people on flimsy pretenses.
Heck, even the Overmind wasn’t that petty and wasteful. It invaded the sector specifically to infest the populace because it genuinely believed that was a better use of human life. Indeed, that improved the zerg with several new breeds like aberrations and changelings.
Again, it’s difficult to believe that zerg can ever hold ideals that contradict purity of essence. That’s like saying humans can easily hold ideals like “eating babies is synonymous with moral goodness” or “removing our ability to feel pain and keeping ourselves constantly doped up is a moral imperative.”
The motivations of all beings with purity of essence is suspect. Kerry and the other xel’naga claimed to be good, but all the evidence is stacked against them. Before Amon went crazy and decided to kill everyone, the xel’naga were content to create life as an elaborate attempt to keep themselves immortal. Their own backstory states that creatures just like the horrific zerg have come into existence an infinite number of times in the past/future, viciously exterminated and devoured the protoss-like races, and then were “gifted” the xel’naga essence. When you think about it critically, Amon’s statements about the cycle promoting suffering make a lot of sense. And since Kerry created a new generation of xel’naga, we know the cycle will continue (or at least in some new horrible zerg-dominated cycle, since apparently the normal cycle ended in SC2 because plot?).
Did Blizzard ever once stop to actually read what they were writing? Despite trying to turn the zerg into space orcs, they simultaneously made the zerg inherently irredeemable monsters. Not only that, but they added pointless nihilism (that proves Amon’s point) by explicitly stating that purity of essence (and the other xel’naga baggage) is a requirement for all life to continue existing past its expiry date.
That’s way worse than any of the suggestions I made to reboot. I don’t pretend the zerg aren’t monsters and I don’t contrive a sadist universe built on trillion year zerg dinner cycles.
Yeah, there’s a huge thematic disconnect between having a planet destroying swarm of bug monsters whose biology is tuned for killing, and having them be peaceful.
It all started when Kerrigan took over and subjected the swarm to human whims & emotions. She took the main thing that made the zerg alien and just threw it out the airlock.
The incongruity is that SC2 doubled down on the biological horror at the same time it tried to make the zerg heroic. All the science notes read like torture sessions if you stop and think about what’s going on.
Judging from what little we were told about development, Blizzard had no idea what to with the zerg. Despite defying genre conventions by giving the zerg their own characters in the first place, Blizz still thought that Kerry needed to be added to humanize them and connect to Raynor’s plot. The zerg were doomed from the start.
Her behavior isn’t consistent between appearances either. In SC1 she was obsessed with becoming a better killing machine. In BW she suddenly decided to take over the zerg in opposition to her former comrades for reasons that are never explained. Between BW and SC2 she apparently fulfilled the same role as the Overmind, except she never pushed the offensive against her enemies after winning BW. According to her monologue after being freed, she didn’t have any higher goal other than torturing Mengsk. Although Duran claimed she was his pawn.
In HotS she basically acts in service to the plot. Her behavior is bipolar due to the story being rewritten from an originally morally dark version. Apparently in the prior draft she brainwashed Lasarra and tricked Abathur into getting himself killed.
Anyway, I keep seeing people saying that the Overmind would have been a boring leader because the cerebrates can’t defy it. Considering the inherently horrific nature of their biology at every level of inspection, like their encouraging zerglings to commit fratricide at birth, I think you could argue for the zerg to have politics of their own.
The one thing worth pointing out in this Kerrigan rant is that that’s actually explained. In SC1, Kerrigan is a servant to the Overmind (and supposedly the trump card against the Protoss, which is why the Overmind personally went to Aiur and left Kerrigan on Char /s). I’ll have to replay the missions to be sure, but at the very least Kerrigan was left to scour the remaining Terran and Protoss forces from Char.
Kerrigan outright says in Brood War that she’d been severed from the control of the Overmind, and throughout the campaigns she acts in resistance to it’s directive. I believe it’s also stated during the campaign that she didn’t want to fall back under its control, and most actions taken were to ensure that she could take total control of the Swarm.
I think it could’ve been more interesting if we kept the Cerebrates around, even without the Overmind. If Blizz contrived a way (IE not saying that the Cerebrates needed an Overmind at all) that the Cerebrates could’ve survived, I think we may have been better off.
At least, some of the older ones shouldn’t have been killed off in this case (or died of natural, Overmind-withdrawal related causes) for the sake of having a Zerg organism (besides Abathur) that is older than Kerrigan. Someone in Zerg “politics” to at least be opposed to Kerrigan in method, because of seniority.
The thing is, the Zerg gain very little from antagonising the other races.
Protoss genes are incompatible with them. Terran genes have little physical strength and manly add intellectual ability that the Zerg don’t need outside of their leadership which already has it. No matter the conflict, it’s going to be a net loss for the Zerg just because of how little they gain.
Low ranking Zerg can be aggressive, but it’s Zagara’s job to see the big picture and decide what conflicts benefit the Zerg as a whole, and war with the other two sapient races doesn’t.
On top of this, the Terrans and Protoss are done screwing around with the Zerg. The Swarm is the weakest its been in a long time, concentrated on a relatively few planets with its numbers immensely depleted by Amon’s destructive use of them, and by his breaking the Swarm at Ulnar. The terrans and protoss are also at a previously unseen state of unity, so the balance of power is pretty firmly not in the Swarm’s favor at the moment. Maybe Zagara will eventually be overthrown by a more bloodthirsty queen, but I suspect if that happens, the Swarm will erupt into civil war and eventually factionize much like the terrans, and never regain their full strength due to their lack of a leader on the scale of Kerrigan or the Overmind.
It would sort of be like if the Brood War had more than two zerg parties. Or if individual egos like Zasz were actually capable of defying the Overmind with their dissent. Could be neat.
It was actually a rather brilliant move by Blizzard to not just make Zagara undisputed Overqueen of the swarm by sheer psychic strength. It allows the Zerg to be useful as threats and antagonists without having them crush everybody and then back off for the umpteenth time. The feudal system that they seem to be going for allows for varying levels of resources and commitment from the Swarm overall, as well as dissidents and rebellions, as needed.
If that’s your standard for brilliant, ok, but I’d say it’s more just a continuation of the plot than it is writing brilliance. There’s nothing that makes Zagara that much more special from the other queens, and most certainly not her psychic abilities considering they’re all the same strain. What else were they gonna do?
And why is that good? I’m all aboard for that if you were talking about terrans or protoss, not a relentless swarm that’s known for crushing everyone and backing off, like a force of nature. You’ve got a hive mind that isn’t a hive mind. You’ve got a swarm of killing machines that no longer kill. Everything that was cool and alien about them is gone.
Instead of finding more creative ways to include conflict or drama they’re just taking the easy way out. Let’s just make all the aliens in this game be like humans.
I mean, technically Kerrigan had Abathur enhance her intelligence above that of a normal brood mother. So at this point there is something separating her from the other brood mothers.
Simply put, because now the zerg have a greater ability to be actual characters than they did before. Before they were, as you said, a force of nature. And in that sense more plot devices and catalysts than anything else. Now we can have them as all of the above.
Yeah but then those adaptations should be extended to the rest of the queens. The only reason the queens weren’t given every adaptation in the book is because Abathur doesn’t believe in wasting biomass/energy.
I disagree. Making them more like humans takes away from their alienness.
They could have kept the unity of the swarm and still had distinct characters/branches within it. Rebellion/dissent by a Cerebrate would merely be a form of introspection by the Overmind. I tried to do this in my Origins campaign.
To what end? The Swarm doesn’t need 20 Overqueens, it just needs one. At best, you end up with the Swarm suddenly becoming The Horde, where every leader is equally capable, and they backstab their superiors at the first sign of weakness because they can get away with it without hurting the overall group as much.
The Cerebrates aren’t actually facets of the Overmind’s intelligence and personality any more than an Overlord or Defiler is. Theyre all individuals, they just have hard coded behavioral limitations.
Anyway, the big advantage is that you can involve the zerg in any number of things now without implicitly having the entire Swarm behind it. Some brood ends up on a terran world where they shouldn’t be? Its just a queen pushing her own agenda, no need to worry about ticking off Zagara by offing her.
The Broodmothers can be cool and alien, they are boring because nobody has done anything interesting with them yet, the only ones we’ve seen with a personality are Zagara and to a lesser degree Niadra. Entirely possible the next installment pulls a Tal’darim on the Broodmothers and they actually become interesting once they are fleshed out.
Isn’t that kind of the point? There was a Q&A a while back saying so:
She made broodmothers powerful and independent because she had also seen that the Zerg were strongest when they continually strove against something, when they had to adapt and change and grow. And she made multiples for the same reason. She wasn’t grooming a successor that she would deem worthy. She was creating many cunning, vicious beings, knowing that only one could claw her way to the top if the Queen disappeared.
The broodmothers were told by Kerrigan to be strong, to fight, to conquer, and that the zerg led by force of will.
Otherwise Kerrigan could have just kept the Cerebrates.
The manual says “the Overmind represents the collective consciousness of the Zerg race” and he says “Truly, no Zerg can stray from my will. For all that you are lies wholly within me.”
I think it can be interpreted either way. As a gestalt, the individual personalities are just facets of the Overmind’s personality, the same way that you as an individual are multifaceted. You have an angry side, a cunning side, a benevolent side, etc.
Might as well be a human controlling some zerg then. I think it’s completely possible to have cerebrates with their own agendas like Zargil or Auza. The fact of “implicitly having the entire Swarm behind it” when a zergling/hydra/cerebrate shows up was one of the coolest things about them IMO.
Doesn’t a rogue queen go against Zagara’s guarantee of peace? You still essentially have the same status quo where there’s a main controller dominating the rest.
Kerrigan couldn’t have kept the Cerebrates because they died, but ignoring that for the moment, she clearly reconsidered when she saw how that actually ended working out in practice. She very definitely chose Zagara as her successor, and gave her the tools needed to assure her place as such. Her Brood Mothers were weakening the Swarm by splintering it and factionalizing it to the degree that they did, directly fighting each other and allowing their enemies to come in and clean them up piecemeal.
You know, there is a substantial gulf between “The Overmind” and “exactly like a human.” The Brood Mothers have their own agendas, desires, beliefs and personalities. Listening to Zagara’s dialogue, for example, you can see how theyre all still different from humans, even if they are individuals now.
Anyway, yes, it does go against her guarantee, but we already have a rogue queen causing problems with Niadra, so clearly that’s not constraining the writing at all. So how Zagara deals with this is something else they can do with the Swarm. Will she crush Niadra out of hand? Will she try and return her to the Swarm? How will the other Brood Mothers feel about Zagara’s methods? Does Niadra’s mere existence threaten Zagara?