Heart of the Swarm Napkin Thoughts

Of the four campaigns we got for StarCraft 2 - Wings of Liberty, Heart of the Swarm, Legacy of the Void, and Nova Covert Ops - HotS came out as the weakest for me, the awkward middle child. This stings especially hard because zerg is my favorite race.

So, I had thought of things I personally would’ve changed in the campaign. As I can’t fit them all in a post, here’s a link to the compilation if you’re interested: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1v9_CCAeGK3wbXbK0iKPIBZQpFX0smOdl1RfGlVOuh5E/edit?usp=sharing

Be aware it doesn’t go into anything about the story, just game mechanics I would’ve liked to see implemented.

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One by one. First off, know that I agree with your general statement that HotS is the “meh” campaign.

Zerg have an issue in terms of making a good character. By their nature they shouldn’t feel like true individuals… yet they somehow pulled it off at least with Abathur. And by the way… Izsha is the worst and should be deleted from the game.

First three missions having identical gameplay is understandable. They are kind of a tutorial. And by the way Spear of Adun and Zero Hour are nothing alike (holdout vs push).

Yeah, the unit diversity wasn’t there and evolution choices being irreversible didn’t help that at all. Lack of Air to Air combat is hard to forgive.

I really like the work you put into Kerrigan. That would obviously require some testing, but damn son… good work.

Same for the Base Evolutions, although I do have to say that Toxic Creep is busted.

Might get to other stuff later.

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I beat HotS a few days ago and it made me disinterested in LotV. The characters for the most part were not likeable. Stukov seemed kind of bland, izsha was just uh, kind of gross. Abathur was all right. I’m very new to zerg in SC2. 4 missions in I decided the campaign was far too easy on normal mode, so I beat the rest on a mix of hard and brutal. It seemed way too easy with the evolution options and Kerrigan as a permanent hero.

The reasoning for all the missions just wasn’t really there. Was all of this really just based on killing Mengsk at the end? Why didn’t Kerrigan kill him when she had the chance during Brood War?

The primal zerg were silly, Amon and all that business is a bit disinteresting to me.

Kerrigan makes herself very unlikable over the course of the campaign, though I never liked her to begin with. That’s a personal thing, though, rather than an inherent flaw in the writing. I just dislike her and pretty much everything she did.

HotS is imho the weakest link.

WoL has plotholes, but it has a redeeming trait known as… being fun and challenging.

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WoL felt like a completely different campaign compared to HotS. I must say I was disappointed.

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With HotS I gather?

I must say that WoL is my favorite of the three main ones. I have a clear Terran bias, but the missions and characters also feel more memorable somehow. Just make Haven’s Fall canon. Have some guts and kill off that hypocrite Hanson.

LotV is pretty good though. The main campaign. Not talking about the epilogue.

My actual favorite is Nova Covert Ops of all things though.

I have always been a terran player but I do share equal interest in zerg. As i said earlier, a good part of my disdain at HotS was because of Kerrigan and my dislike for her in general. I also understand how zerg characters can be, well, not very memorable or likeable. I imagine it is difficult to write zerg characters and make them the same quality as terrans or protoss.

LotV might be good, but the Amon story arc combined with the protoss is a bit discouraging. When it comes to SC2 I do not enjoy playing the protoss much. Despite that I’ll check it out I suppose.

I also haven’t played the Nova Covert ops business; I might give it a whirl if or when I complete LotV.

You would have fit here well around the release of HotS when we had… you know, activity.
I mean they succeeded in Abathur, who is largely considered a well-written unique Zerg character. I have to add that I appreciate that you hated on Izsha. I hate her voice, I hate her “character” and I hate her look.

LotV has one great thing going for it and that is actually making Tal’Darim interesting.
If you end up playing it I recommend armoring yourself before Epilogue or just straight up ignoring it.

Yeah Izsha is… ugh. I agree on that front. Abathur is all right, his role was pretty good as well.

I will get LotV then; if the people here are correct than I can expect something better than HotS.

I can actually send you my no-spoiler summary of LotV. I just have to find it.

No need, I appreciate the offer though. Thanks for the feedback by the way

No problemo. I am trying my best to kill this Forum by dragging everyone to Discord, but it would be a waste not to discuss with people who came to this game later.

SC2 single player is for all its flaws still a good game.

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It is a delightful game I recently got back into due to a friend. What discord are you speaking of?

My personal server where I moved bunch of longtimers to discuss off-topic stuff. We have discussed the game over and over for years and since there was no need to beat the dead horse we had that Blizzard Abridged thread for majority of the off-topic.

The precedessor to the current thread you can find was deleted for no reason.

The actual reason was that for some time, some people couldn’t actually login and post, not to mention we somehow ended up getting temporary bans for minor infractions (always in autumn for some reason - probably because Blizzcon).

https://discord.gg/PPeSqTTN

It’s easier to discuss stuff in free time, people can voice chat when they play together and you can bash the local dictatorship (me).

No offense but I think the HOTS campaign is super fun. Clearly, you guys are not very fair on a campaign that literally gives the Zerg, well, their perfect portrayal and Kerrigan is a badass!!!

Whenever someone necros a thread. Just think of Mengsk during HotS defiantly saying “KORHAL WILL ENDURE!”

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