Overmind Commander

So I have some ideas for an Overmind Commander.

The basic premise is that the commander will follow the unit and build base of Brood War. Hatcheries are limited to 3 larvae, with a limit of four hatcheries. There can only be one hatchery that can be upgraded. Units are upgradable into their respective hero units from Brood War. After a unit hatches from the larvae, the player would have the option to upgrade the unit for an additional cost and supply. The Overmind can call down additional reinforcements from allied brood. Resource caches, as well as use psionic powers to weaken and suppress enemies.

Certain Units (Torrasque and Greater Kukuzla cannot be directly controlled, but rather directed in a similar fashion to Zeratuls calldowns). Players will be limited to 2 (3 after level 14) immortal units.

One of my ideas behind all of this was that I wanted to have a co-op commander that had specialized “tanking” units. I felt that Starcraft Zerg under the Overmind had the traits for this sort of scorched earth warfare, and that the unit base from the original starcraft would be perfect. I also wanted to improve on the idea of units acting as production centers, hence the queen now cannot infest command centers, but rather can spawn infested terrans and roverlisks.

The commander will have 125 supply cap. My reasoning for this is because I felt that if the Overmind wasn’t killed on Aiur, the attack by Tassadar would have greatly weakened its psionic power. Hence. When it comes to the tank units (Torraque and Greater Kukuzla) the Overmind cannot directly control them, but instead direct them, similar to Zeratuls calldowns.

The base cost for the units would be the same for those in brood war.

Units

Ground

Zergling > Devouring One
Hydralisk > Hunter Killer
Ultralisk > Torrasque
Defiler > Unclean One
Infested Terran
Roverlisk

Air
Overlord > Yggdrasil
Mutalisk > Kukuzla
Guardian > Greater Kukuzla
Queen > Matriarch

Unique Buildings

Queens Nest
Creep Coloy > Sunken Colony/Spore Colony
Defiler Mound
Nydus Canal
Evolution Pit

Units can be upgraded from their base form to heroic form for a cost.

Devouring One
(1+) 1 supply
50 minerals, 25 gas
125 HP
Armor 3 (+1 upgrades)
Damage 10 (+2 upgrades)
Movement speed: 3.95 (5.50 with MB)
Devouring One is affected by all Zergling upgrades.

Zergling Upgrades
Metabolic boost
Adrenal Glands

Inherent Upgrade: Devouring One evades 10% of all attacks.

Devouring One specific upgrades
Hip Extensors: Devouring One leap towards target stunning light and armored units in a small area for 2.5 seconds. Massive and heroic units are slowed.

Hive: Rapid Ingestion: When an enemy unit is killed near Devouring One, devouring one is healed 10% of the enemies HP.

Hunter Killer
(2+) 2 supply
125 minerals, 50 gas
180 HP
Armor 3 (+1 upgrades)
Damage 20 (+2 upgrades)
Range 6 (7 with upgrades)
Movement speed: 2.75 (3.25 with upgrades)
Hunter Killer is affected by all Hydralisk upgrades.

Hydralisk Upgrades
Grooved Spines
Muscular Augments

Inherent upgrade: Hunter Killers regenerate health at an increased rate while in combat.

Hunter Killer upgrades
Tunneling Claws: Hunter Killers can move while burrowed.

Tetrodotoxic Glands: Hunter Killer attacks do area damage and slow the attack of their target.

Torrasque
(6+) 8 supply
300 minerals, 250 gas
600 HP
Armor 4 (6 with upgrades, +1 from EC)
Damage 40 (+3 upgrades)
Movement Speed: 3 (4 with upgrades)
Torraque benefit from all Ultralisk upgrades

Ultralisk upgrades
Chitinous plating
Anabolic Synthesis

Inherent upgrade
Resuscitation Tissues: Upon death, Torraque will revive after 2 minutes at the hive. This will happen for the entirety of the game

Torraque upgrades:

Psionic Assimilation: Enemies near Torrasque have their energy drained at a 10 point per second rate

Rage inducing pheromones: Enemies will attack Torraque instead of other units.

Unclean One
(3+) 4 supply
100 minerals, 150 gas
200 HP
Armor 3 (1+ upgrades)
Energy: 300 (350 with upgrades)
Attack Damage: 14 (+6 biological, not upgradable, air and ground)
Attack speed 1.35
Attack range: 5
Movement Speed: 3

Inherent abilities
Dark Swarm
Plague (this does not stack)
Consume

Defiler Upgrades
Metasynaptic Nodes

Inherent Upgrade: Unclean one is able to teleport to whereever there is a friendly creep colony or zerg building on the map, this ability has a 1 minute cool down.

Unclean One Upgrades

Carcinogenesis plasma: Unclean One gains the ability to attack while burrowed.

Pathogenic Carapace: When Uncleaned One is attacked, enemy units within 3 range of Unclean One lose 1% of their health.

Air Units

Yggdrasil
75 minerals
400 HP
Armor 2 (+1)
15 sight range
Detector
Energy: 200

Yggdrasil can be individually upgraded with Ventral Sacs, and Pneumatic carapace.

Kukuzla
2 (+2) supply
100 minerals, 100 gas
250 hitpoints
Armor 3 (+1)
Damage: 22 (+2)
Range: 4

Mutalisk upgrades

Sundering Glave
Rapid Regeneration

Inherent Upgrade: Kukuzla does additional damage (+5) to cloaked units.

Shifting Tissues: Kukuzla gains a 10% evasion rate.

Acidic Mucus Discharge: Every 15 seconds Kukuzla sprays enemies within 2 range with a acidic substance that lowers their armor by 2. This effect lasts for 6 seconds and does not stack.

Greater Kukuzla
Greater Kukuzla is upgraded from Kukuzla, upon upgrading the player no longer has direct control. Much like Torraque, the player can direct the unit. Greater Kukuzla benefits from the Shifting Tissue upgrade and the Acidic Mucus Discharge upgrade.

Greater Kukuzla
250 minerals, 150 gas
4 (6 supply)
600 hitpoints
Armor 5 (+1)
Damage 35 (+2)
Range: 10
Attack speed: 1.5

Inherent Ability: Upon death, greater Kukuzla respawns after 2 minutes at the hive. This will happen for the entirety of the game.

Shifting tissues: Evades 20% of all attacks.

Acidic Mucus Discharge: Range is increase to 4, armor reduction by 3.

Greater Kukuzula upgrades

Scourage Host: Upon death greater Kukuzla will release 4 scourages.

Rage inducing pheromones: See Torrasque

Matriach
150 minerals, 100 gas
3 (3 supply)
300 hit points
3 armor (+1)
300 energy (350 with upgrades)

Queen inherent abilities
Spawn Broodling
Ensare

Queen upgrades
Gamete meiosis

Matriarch inherent ability: Matriarchs gain the ability to spawn infested terrans and roverlisks for 50 energy and a resource cost.

Matriarchs do not have upgrades.

Infested Terran
75 minerals, 25 gas
70 HP
2 armor
Movement speed: 4.5
Suicide damage: 40 (150 vs structures)

Infested Terrans spawn for 15 seconds before exploding, they are controllable. If they reach their target, they will explode before that. They do not attack and they do not cost supply.

Infested Terran upgrades.

Siege munitions: Infested Terrans are equipped with explosive munitions and have a 50% increased blast radius.

Roverlisk (infested dog)
50 minerals
40 hp
1 armor
Movement speed: 6
Attacks 2
Attack damage 7 (+2 to biological, +1 EC)
Attack speed .8

Upon death roverlisks explode causing 20 damage in a small radius.

Because roverlisks move so quickly and are so small, they are automatically cloaked until they attack or within detector range. Upon attacking they are decloaked. Roverlisks only live for 15 seconds before exploding. Roverlisks do not cost supply.

Roverlisk upgrades

Specialized strains: Roverlisks gain an additional 10 seconds of life and 5+ increased life.

Building upgrades

Sunken Colony

Barbed Tentacle: Sunken Colony attacks do area damage.

Spore Colony

Corrosive buildup: Each spore attack adds an additional 5+ damage, stacks up to 5 times.

Call downs

Brood reinforcement. Each brood will come down for 60 seconds, or until killed.

Select 1 (240 second cool down)

Jormungand brood: 6 zerglings, 2 ultralisks, and 4 hydralisks.

Tiamat Brood: 2 devourers, 4 mutalisks, 2 guardians.

Fenris Brood: 8 roverlisks, 6 infested terrans, and 3 queens.

Select one

Resource cache (240 second cool down)

  1. 400 gas

  2. 500 minerals

3 250 minerals and 200 gas.

Your teammate will also receive a cache.

Overmind Powers (180 second cooldown)

Psionic Pulsewave: Enemies within a radius of 7 range have their movement speed and attack speed greatly slowed. All cloaked and burrowed enemies are revealed and attackable.

Psionic buffing: All units receive a 150 hitpoint shield and gain an additional +10 damage for 20 seconds.

Levels

  1. The Overmind uses specialized units and surviving broods from the brood wars to bring down Amons forces.

  2. Lairs and Hives spawn an additional (1+, 2+) larve. Hatcheries, Lairs, and Hives get an additional 500 HP.

  3. Unlock Greater Kukuzla, drones receive an additional 10 hp and 1 armor.

  4. Devouring one upgrade cache

  5. Evolution chamber becomes Evolution Pit. Upgrades take half the time.

  6. hunter killer and kukuzla upgrade cache

  7. Drones now bring 7 minerals (instead of 5) and 1 additional vespene

  8. Creep colonies are now 25 minerals, creep spreads slightly faster

  9. Matriarch and unclean one upgrade cache

  10. Larve spawn time decreased.

  11. Roverlisks now spawn in pairs.

  12. Greater kukuzla and torrasque upgrade cache

  13. Nydus Canal now cost half and build in 20 seconds.

  14. You can call down an additional torrasque or greater Kukuzla.

  15. The first 20 drones no longer count as supplies.

Masteries.

1

Increase supply (+1)

Decrease upgrade costs (2%)
2

Increase upgraded unit attack speed (1.25%)

Increased energy regeneration per second (.5)

3

Increase unit evasion rate (.3%)

Increase infested unit explosion damage (10%)

3 Likes

I think a lot of the content can be simplified. The concept as a whole is a supply-limited commander with hero-esque units.

  1. Given that the supply is limited and Larvae is limited to a maximum of 14 (3 x hatch + 5 x Hive, again limited). This means maximizing army and replacing is inherently more challenging. So why not allow these hero-esque versions of regular units to be producible in the first place? Saving many unneeded research cost, upgrade cost, and Larvae lost.
  2. This one relatively minor but Overmind was suppose to be the all consuming one that controlled the Zerg (until it made plans to form Kerrigan). So why would Torrasque and Greater Kukulza not be controllable? What benefit (if any) would this bring since these units’ stats/abilities aren’t game breaking by giving player control.
  3. Any concept of simply giving x amount of resource can be dangerous and seemingly unnecessary. Why give the commander Drones to harvest but allow a huge resource boost every y minutes?
  4. First mastery set option 1 and level 15 render the concept of supply limitation null. If you are going to effectively increase the total potential supply to (+30 mastery and +20 no-Drone, giving total potential 175) then might as well allow 200 total and work from there? Freeing up level 15 key upgrade and a mastery slot.

Just points to ponder.

3 Likes

Any concept of “let’s click the button once it’s available, no tactical decision required” is the problem. It would get tedious and boring.
Yes, extra resources can be dangerous.
But with a reasonable amount and involving tactical decisions, it could be fine.
Kerrigan and swann is a good example.

Vespene drones aren’t exactly just a free resource drop. There are some requirements for it. As far as Kerrigan goes, you have to kill stuff to get resources and one use doesn’t necessarily yield a whole lot.

1 Like

The nature of the point is different. Calldowns that deal exuberant amount of damage (as all of them do in coop) can help avoid timing punishment per map design.

Giving 500min at 3min provide nothing at all, in the context of workers harvesting. To streamline concepts, either limit workers to only harvest gas as an example (and then this concept makes sense by tweaking timing of the mineral/time ability). Or remove workers altogether and limit this mechanism to sole-resource from ability concept. Or increase harvest rate period and freeing up an ability slot.

Having both workers harvest and giving this without any ‘work’ is the issue. Unlike your examples of Kerrigan and Swann. Assimilation Aura requires micro to activate and kill to maximize return. Vespene Drones are a one-time investment for game-long return.

In the end, the point of the post is to improve OP’s concept. I guess we can agree to disagree but I find it redundant.

1 Like

No cerebrates?
https://starcraft.fandom.com/wiki/Cerebrate

I imagine cerebrates as structure units that enable the hero versions of specific units…and maybe give a call down choice. Kind of like Dehaka’s pits/Zeratul’s artifacts…

Sorry if this is in a totally different direction…

Oh… I missed that.

Yeah, in lore, Daggoth had the ability to create Hunter Killers, but they had to be birthed by him in close proximity, so make him/it, or his equivalent a prereq.

Torrasques had to be closeby to a cerebrate, so one could make them less effectively as they stray away from base I suppose.

Similar idea to mine with extra resources, and BW style units with hero version

In my Overmind idea, the extra resources come from captured enemy buildings (and Greater than normal max supply instead of less)
The “Hero units” are mostly soaks for the extra resources. (no more supply needed)

OVERMIND : Infestor of Worlds
What if: After being driven into the void by Tassadar, the Overmind was eventually able to return free of Amon’s corruption. It now seeks to destroy Amon and reunite the Swarm.
Key ideas:
Infestor of worlds: enemy buildings killed on creep or while infested by a Matriarch/Empress become an “Infestation” that generates resources for the Overmind (more depending on size of building), Creep gradually spreads from Overmind+Cerebrates over entire map.
Special strains: the extra resources can be used to convert units from standard zerg strains to special versions for substantial expense
Essence of the Swarm: Overmind replaces starting Hatchery providing Supply (increasing with upgrade) and Larva (additional Supply from Cerebrates, additional Larva from Matriarchs)
Unending Swarm : 230 max supply (299 with Mastery)

Units/Buildings:
Morphalisk Larva (produced by OM/Matriarch, produce units faster)
Zergling-Devouring One, BW Hydralisk-Hunter Killer, Mutalisk-Kukulza, Devourer, Defiler-Unclean One, BW Ultralisk-Omegalisk, Matriarch-Empress
Sunken Colony-Deep Sunken colony, Spore Colony-Spore Cannon
Creep Colonies produced by Overmind anywhere in vision+creep
Drop off resources at Overmind, Cerebrate, or Infestation

Abilities:
Cerebrate (permanent, max # on map, give supply and heals in area), Infested CC calldown, Warp rift (temporary gate between two points), global Swarm infestation