I made a resurrection-themed Cerebrate commander concept on the old forum, but since there’s supposedly a Games Workshop agreement that prevents cerebrates from being used I decided to make a SC1 Zerg faction without the cerebrate. This draft uses an obscure character (Eschueta the Wicked) as a stand-in for infested Kerrigan. I think I’ll center the next version around the Overmind.
Faction Features
Improved Overlords- Yggdrasil Overlords hatch instantly and have increased supply. The Yggdrasils are detectors and can spawn creep tumors. Yggdrasils have higher HP and regeneration to encourage using infested Terrans for bombing runs.
Infested Command Center- The hatchery can instantly drop an infested command center at your expansion for 350 minerals. The infested CC produces larvae and can train infested Terrans, but cannot advance the tech level.
Automated Extractors
Impaler Colonies and Spore Cannons- tougher defensive structures that regenerate quickly but cannot uproot.
Internal Creep Colonies- All structures generate creep. Additionally defensive structures can be placed off creep.
Reduced Spawning Times- Advancing the tech level reduces the spawning time for all units.
Eschueta the Wicked- Hero unit is based on Kerrigan’s de-infested form.
Cloak- Eschueta isn’t a tank so she depends on cloaking to keep her safe.
Consume- Devours a zergling for energy.
Kinetic Blast- Single-target attack that can be upgraded with Implosion, which paralyzes any target lucky enough to survive the blast. Objectives are slowed by Implosion.
Razor Swarm- A psionic storm that can be upgraded with Constricting Slime to keep enemies in the area of effect longer.
Mass Resurrection- Eschueta’s ultimate ability allows her to resurrect a small army of dead units (randomly chosen from both friendly and enemy casualties) which automatically seek out the enemy until their life runs out. The total size of the army is limited by the resources cost of the dead units. Resurrected units have maximum upgrades and are spawned at Eschueta’s location regardless of where they died. Protoss and robots are excluded for now, but there’s room for a PAX facility creep upgrade if this needs to be buffed.
Units- Classic skins with brown faction color
Zergling- drop health power-ups when they die which can be picked up by any friendly unit. Larva can morph into four Zerglings.
Chrysalid Hydralisk- Can temporarily shelter inside an armored egg to absorb damage. It’s attack is disabled in egg form, so it’s best used by the front row of hydra while the rest fire away.
Volatile Marine- Explosive suicide unit with a damage boost when dropped from an Overlord.
Ultralisk- Upgraded with the enrage ability, which gradually increases attack and movement speed of the Ultralisk and nearby allies during longer battles.
Defiler- Dark Swarm and Plague have been combined into a single spell. Can consume Zerglings to restore energy.
Kukulza- This Mutalisk variant can temporarily morph into a Guardian. Reverts to Mutalisk form if the Guardian is killed or the ability times out.
Scourge- When they explode nearby enemies (air and ground) will be covered in acid spores which amplify the damage they take from your forces.
Eschutriarch- For now it will have the same abilities as Stukov’s Brood Queens. Can consume Zerglings for energy.
Cutting room floor ideas
Beta abilities- Ultralisks apparently once used the Bloodlust spell from Warcraft 2. Defilers also had some sort of acid spit attack.
Choice of Heroic Unit- An idea I may use in the next draft. The player can choose to create a hero unit from any type that costs gas, but doing so disables spawning standard versions of that unit.
Consumption spells- One idea I considered was having all spells sacrifice a minion instead of costing energy, but abandoned it for being too expensive.
Egg litters- A macro mechanic where spawning multiple units of the same type would make them develop in the same egg.
Instant Spawning- All units (from lings to Ultras) would be able to spawn instantly.
Thanks for reading. I’ll post the first concept below for comparison and use the best ideas of both whenever I get around to making an Overmind commander concept.
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Kerrigan’s Cerebrate (original)
Faction Features
Gene Mutation- I feel this mechanic is wasted on Dehaka’s army so I’m recycling it. Every time a unit earns a kill it has a small chance of gaining benefecial mutations (e.g. +1 attack, rapid healing, etc) An alternative to the RNG would be to give units mutations when they reach certain kill counts. The Defiler will count kill assists and/or Zerglings consumed. Additionally, the minion with the most kills will be awarded a gene mutation once per minute.
Reincarnation- The cerebrate’s units do not truly stay dead. The cerebrate has manifested a lesser version of the Overmind’s reincarnation ability to preserve its minions. When the Cerebrate’s units die they go onto a wait list (ranked by number of mutations and kills) and will be reborn when the same unit type is ordered at the hatchery. Reincarnated units hatch faster each time they are reborn. When larvae are selected the player will see how many mutants of each type are awaiting rebirth. Reincarnated units retain their kill count and remember which control group they were assigned to.
Cerebrate- The cerebrate structure allowed players to choose which gene mutations are most likely to appear (default 50% chance for chosen gene). Mousing over a gene will cause any minions with that gene to flash.
Mass Resurrection- Instantly resurrects some of your dead units for free (prioritizes cost, then mutations, then kills). Mass Rez drops the units in sacs at a target location. Mass Rez has reduced cooldown if you only have a few dead units or it resurrects cheap units like Zerglings.
Calldown Infested Command Center- Spend 400 minerals to instantly summon an infested cc. Infested cc serves as resource drop-off point and produces larvae and Ghouls, but your hatchery is still needed for tech level.
Improved Overlords (Yggdrasil Strain) hatch instantly, increased control, detector
Internal Creep Colonies Upgrade- structures now generate creep. Sunken and Spore colonies can now be placed off creep.
Universal speed upgrade at evolution chamber
Automated Extractors and Nydus Worms
Past Life Experience- Allied heroes and self-reviving units (e.q. Torrasque, Primal Mutalisk, Sentinel, Immortality Protocal) will resurrect faster
Units
Twinling- A Zergling that shares gene mutations with it’s twin sibling. This psychic link resets everytime it’s reborn with a new sibling.
Chrysalid Hydralisk- This Hydralisk can temporarily morph into a armored cocoon (like a lurker egg) to protect itself. It’s usually best to morph only the front row of Hydralisks to serve as a defensive wall for the others.
Ghoul- The Cerebrate has experimented on infested terrans in an attempt to make field commanders for its Brood. They are trained at the Infested CC and have two health bars. Ghouls use their rifles until their primary health bar runs out then they become powerful suicide units. Due to the constant experiments, Ghouls recieve a new gene mutation each time they are reborn. Furthermore, Ghouls always choose the cerebrate’s desired mutation and may acquire any gene multiple times.
Gigalisk- An Ultralisk variant recovered from the Surtur Brood
[Impale]- Shoots subterranean spikes out in a straight line, dealing damage
[Zergling Reconstitution]- If the Gigalisk dies then 4-6 Zerglings will spawn from its remains. All Zerglings reborn in this manner are linked.
[Rampage]- when activated this unleashes the full might of the Gigalisk, but these enraged beasts no longer follow orders. Rampaging Gigalisks will move as a herd as they stampede across the map in search of enemies. The only thing that stops a rampage is death, so it should only be used if you can support them or can afford to replace Ultras.
Defiler- Dark Swarm and Plague have been combined into a single spell. Can periodically cast a small Dark Swarm on itself to increase survivability.
Kukulza (Mutalisk/ Guardian)- A Mutalisk variant that depends on long range and enhanced speed for hit and run attacks. Can convert between Mutalisk and Guardian forms at will. The armored cocoon may allow Kukulzas to survive Parasitic Bombs. Guardian form knocks back enemies like a Reaper charge.
Scourge- Splashes damage amplifying acid spores on it’s target as well as ground units below. Scourge share their gene mutations with all other Scourge.
Matriarch- uses Ensnare and Parasitic Broodlings. Parasitic Broodlings dominates a target and drains its health until it dies, spawning a number of broodlings based on target health. If the enemy cannot be dominated the damage over time will be increased.
My original idea for this concept was much more ambitious but possibly too difficult to balance. The plan was imitate the gameplay of Tug-of-War style games like Nexus Wars or Desert Strike. The Cerebrate would build any tech structure like a Spawning Pool and it would maintain a certain number of free Zerglings. Each new tech structure would radically increase in price. That version had an extremely expendable (and fairly generic) army and losing buildings would be much more painful than for other commanders. I might return to that design if I find a nice way to balance it. Thanks for reading.
Just to share some of my tips to make an easy to read concept.
- You can put everything that are related to a profile into a quote. For example, normally i make detailed profile of an unit or ability or mechanic so i put all of them in a quote box as below.
Mechanic
…
…
…
+++
…
+++
…
to highlight the headline of that quote box i made the headline bold
- You can also use thing like
+++++++++++++++++++++++
or
///////////////////////////////////////////
to divide your post into sections. For example,
Unit list
Zergling
Have … health, … damage
Hydra
Have … Health, … damage
////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
Building list
Hatchery
Have … Health, … cost
- You can also use the “Preformatted text” as some extra highlight if you don’t use special format in that section.
May be like this
Kerrigan
Leaping Strike (active) Target a unit, jump to its location. Deal damage if it’s an enemy.
Psionic Shift (active) Kerrigan dashes forward, dealing 50 damage to all enemies in her path.
- You can also use headings and the list function
Hero list
Kerrigan
- Leaping Strike (active)
- Psionic shift (active)
Tychus
Or make a combination of all of these. I think the quote box is better use if you put all related thing into it.
Either this
Mastery
set 1
Set 2
set 3
++++++++++++++++++++
Mastery
set 1
Set 2
set 3
++++++++++++++++++++
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