Do it. It’s been months since you released this spell. You’ve buffed it numerous times, only for it to be used maybe once or twice in a pro game? Maybe a few other times when pros streamed ladder, just to test it out, only to be never used again?
Like let’s be real, the spell isn’t seeing play because there just aren’t that many uses for it. When is zerg ever fighting air with ground units past the early game?
Why would I ever want mass hydralisks to fight skytoss, like does Blizzard want me to stay and fight/kite into zealot /archon /storm with hydralisks? VR’s are practically non existent, not that hydras needed help to win that fight, similar with tempests. Phoenixes of course are unaffected. Maybe if MS affected damage taken from collosi it’d be useful, but that might delete any niche use collosi have left in the matchup.
So my ultras take half damage from liberator shots, but if I’m at ultra tech, why wouldn’t I just make a viper for 50/50 more and remove all ground damage from liberators with mass abduct? If I’m trying to make hydras vs BC’s I’ve already lost, and medivacs and ravens are unaffected. When exactly am I supposed to use MS, against banshees?
Even the mirror, where muta styles are very much viable, does not incorporate MS. Zerg fights mutas with mutas, with hydras, with roach all-in, speedling counter aggression, corruptors, queen nydus, lurker hydra, even with fungal growth and/or parasitic bomb, but never with MS. Sure the upgrade might contribute to its lack of use as infestor timing’s window vs mutas is very small, but if zerg is favouring literally every other option in their arsenal to MS in one of the few scenarios where theoretically it’d be really useful, then there is an undying problem. This underlying problem is either the stupidity of the vast majority of zerg players to not use a FANTASTIC spell, or an underlying problem with the spell itself.
Furthermore the spell has no resemblance with the identity of the infestor. An infestor is supposed to INFEST, and the infested terran, despite its many flaws, at least fit in with that idea, as do neural and to a lesser extent fungal. However microbial shroud does not in any way, in fact it would almost seem more fitting for the viper to have this spell and to give the infestor consume and/or abduct. The viper seems like a unit that can throw out a microbial shroud much like a blinding cloud or parasitic bomb. And like maybe the tentacle the infestor uses for mind control, can also grab stuff, or consume life from other zerg? Would fit in more with the idea that he’s sc2’s ‘defiler’.
In summary, MS doesn’t fit the infestor from a lore perspective, nor is it useful from a gameplay one. That much should be evident given its nonexistence in proplay despite numerous significant buffs. Removing the upgrade requirement is nice, but, and I think I speak for most zerg players when I say this, I would prefer a different spell altogether. It doesn’t have to be IT’s, but make a spell that zerg might actually want instead of buffing this unwanted one to the moon.
/end rant