StarCraft II Official! (Pictures)

[Xenon]

In addition to the advantage of getting the units when you pay for them instead of having to pay beforehand, the system gives increased flexibility and improved response time over the standard training model. Say you've been building Immortals and are 10 seconds away from being able to get another one, and you're suddenly attacked by Marines, Zerglings or something else that Zealots are more effective against. Under the standard training model you'd have to cancel your previous Immortal training, wasting the seconds you spent training it (or let it finish, losing 10 seconds and likely having the unit wasted) and then spend 40 or so more seconds training the next Zealot. In this system, the Zealot is likely available already, and you can immediately summon it. Conversely, if you're building Zealots and need Immortals you can simply wait a few more seconds and get one.

Perhaps there will be a way to queue or auto-produce units as they become available (probably only for units that appear by the gate structure), but then again in SC1 the Zerg could not queue units; you had to wait for the larva to appear before selecting the unit type.

[IskatuMesk]

I really doubt that. They'd be ruining the sc gameplay they're trying to capture if they make it a fucking spam war.

[Infiltrator]

Wait... you mean like... War3?

But even then, I doubt they could turn SC into a spam war, unless they tried really hard to mess it all up.

[chris]

index.php?topic=256.0

alright!
so carriers are still in the game!

[Meta]

From the Battle.net site, the description on the magazine where carriers, etc are featured.

Zealot: Zealots are the standard infantry unit of the Protoss from starcraft. Still equipped with a pair of glowing psionic blades for melee combat, the zealot will now charge the enemy to close distance with ranged units quicker than before.

Stalker: Stalkers are a new type of dark dragoon. Theyre fast moving and lightly armored with a powerful anti-air and anti-infantry weapon, but their secret weapon is there blink ability that will allow them to teleport anywhere in visual range in an instant.

Immortal: A new type of heavy dragoon, the Immortals will be equipped with a shield that activates only when hit by heavy weapons like Siege Tanks, making them excellent for assaulting heavily defended positions but weak against raiding parties with light weapons.

Observer: The invisible flying eyes of the Protoss are back. We can confirm they'll be in the game, but further details are shrouded in secrecy.

Colossus: True to its name, the Colossus is an enormous four-legged walker that rakes the ground with a heavy beam weapon. They will be extremely effective against small swarming units like Zerglings or Marines -their beams target one unit at a time, and instantly sweep to a new target when the first is destroyed. Using their long legs, they can step up and down ledges with ease.

Phoenix: When its standard fighter weapon won't do the job, the Phoenix will be able to activate its overload ability to damage all enemy air units nearby, which also disables the Phoenix itself for a few moments. If the overload doesnt demolish the enemy you'll be a sitting duck.

Phase Prism: .The new Phase Prism will act as both a troop transport and a mobile power pylon allowing you to restore functionality to a base when your pylons are destroyed by raiders or when you build away from your base. Combined with the warp-in tech,you'll be able to use them to create and army anywhere on the map.

Warp Ray: These flying weapons inflict additional damage the longer they fire on a single target as they bring as they bring more beams online, which will make them extremely powerful against large targets like Battle Cruisers and structures. Their focused fire makes them vulnerable against small anti-air units like Marines.

High Templar: The High Templar is back and he'll bring his powerful psionic storm area attack with him. But hes gotten a handy new power, he'll be able to create a force field to trap enemy units temporarily or create barriers. Blizzard testing has revealed some extremely effective bottlenecks tactics using him. The ability to say you cant go there anymore will be very powerful.

Dark Templar: Just like in the first game the Dark Templar is a stealth unit that wreaks havoc to any force foolish enough to leave home without a detector. Any new special abilities have yet to be revealed.

Twilight Archon: Blizzard hasn't exactly worked out what its doing with the Twilight Archon in terms of his powers. But the team promises that he will be just as powerful as he was in starcraft 1.

Tempest: The Tempest is a dark carrier with a disc fighter and a strong shield that activates when attacked from the ground. It will have no defense whatsoever against air units.

Soul Hunter: Soul Hunters are anti infantry units that float around on hover boards and suck the souls out of enemies. The more souls they consume the more powerful they get, going from firing one beam at a time to three. They'll be effective against organic units but practically useless against robotic units like the Protoss own reaver.

Reaver: The armored slug like Reaver artillery is as nasty as ever. While we didnt see any upgrades abilities, we witnessed a new version of the old Reaver drop attack (putting one right in the middle of an enemy resource collectors and watching the fireworks) when combined with the Pase Prism.

Phase Cannon: This stationary base defense is no longer stationary. The Phase Cannon can now convert into energy form and relocate and redeploy as long as you stay in a pylon power range. But if the pylon is destroyed while the cannon is in energy form it'll go poof.

Star Relic: When it comes to casting spells the Star Relic makes the High Templar look like an armature. It'll be able to create a cloak field that will conceal even buildings, and fire a fusion beam that slowly damages a target until it dies -and when it dies it'll explode and cause damage to everything around it. Remember the larger the target the bigger the boom.

Mothership: At the top of the tech tree you'll find the Mothership. It comes equipped with a time bomb field that stops incoming projectiles, matrix style, in mid air. When the field shuts off, all missiles will fall harmlessly to the ground. Like any good mothership, it'll be able to fire devastating Planet Cracker beam straight down to annihilate ground units below. Finally it will be able to generate a mini nlack hole to suck enemy air units into oblivion. Theres nothing quite like watching a fleet of enemies battlecruisers circle the drain!

http://www.battle.net/forums/thread.asp ... s=new&#new

I'm not sure if I like the soul hunter unit, it seems too similar to a Vulture, which used to be a completely unique and micro-intensive Terran unit, with no Terran or Zerg counterparts. Also "soul" is not a word you'd expect to find in a SC unit name. -_-

On the other hand, yay, carriers are back! And even if they're weaker now - which could be the case since they got 1-Yamato killed by BCs - if they still deal the same amount of damage, they'll be perfectly usable. Maybe they had just been previously damaged in the video.

Star Relic unit sounds very interesting, looks like it'll be the ultimate counter for Ultras, BCs, Carriers and Motherships with the "plague" ability that explodes a target.

[chris]

wow! so now we know all the protoss units that are coming out. excellent!
now they need to update www.starcraft2.com with this info....

[IskatuMesk]

It will have no defense whatsoever against air units.

So wait, does that mean Carriers can't hit air? If that's so, then FUCK DAT SHIT.

[jiong]

nope, carrier i think can hit air
however, their shield is only activated by ground attack. which is pretty obvious if u watch carefully, that the shield graphic from tempest only covers the bottom half of the ship

which is also why a yamato can one shot kill a tempest

[IskatuMesk]

Yeah. That's a little more reasonable. If carriers couldn't hit air, then the only answer you'd have at all in a air-vs-air fight when heavy weapons show up is the Warp Ray, while previously the Carrier was the main tanking unit since it had so much health.

[Meta]

I'm not sure if I dig the idea of Carriers having no defense at all vs air. It looks like a serious regression if compared to what they did in SC1.

However, a nerfed Carrier could still be interesting enough for players to use - let's say, a Carrier with less armor value or with less hit points and/or shields. Or maybe with a smaller Interceptor count.

And I still don't like the Soul Hunters. 

[WB]

full list of units?

http://limitedgaming.com/files/18/scan0046ab4.jpg
http://limitedgaming.com/files/18/scan0047ub8.jpg

[Anonymous]

I see the Pink player color. Thus we can assume -

SC2 at least has a larger player color count then SC1.

This indicates the possibility they are keeping the 12 player limit, or even more (Sweet!)

I hear carriers can't even attack air. I'm really on the fence about that. I doubt a Warp Ray can stand toe-to-toe with a BC alone, and Carriers were the only truly formidable protoss air power in SC1, playing an extremely important role both in endgame play and in the story. They were also my favorite rush unit, and a well-micoed Carrier could kill a heck of a lot of dudes.

This is going to give protoss a really difficult time vs terran and zerg if they still get some of their old air superiority units, such as the Valkyrie, Devourer, and scourge.

Star Relic, eh? Looks like a giant flying disco ball.

[WB]

I think they are defenseless against air in that their defenses (shields) don't work against air.

As for valks, devs, and scourge. I think only scourge are making a comeback, its that lovely emphasis on suicide bombing for the zerg, ya know? As for terran, what units were realllllly important to them? medics, siege, BCs, wraith, drophships? Valks, while an awesome, powerful unit (especially against zerg >_>) aren't as "terran" as wraith. Get what I mean? I mean, if arbiters, corsairs and scouts got the axe, the valk doesn't have a chance.

Also, blizzard had said that they wont be adding units, just replacing. Count em, Protoss have more units now than in SC1. That gives me hope that the game will be an improvement over SC2, and add a greater amount of variety.

Now all the zerg need is to be able to build a cerebrate, and it'll "r0x"

I grabbed the hi-res version of the PC Gamer video, so lets settle some things.

The reaver? He moves (the platers contract, spread, etc) as if he was crawling like before, though it does look like he is sorta floating. but im gonna have to say hes crawling, because floating would probably mean a speed boost. In addition, before he fires, he sticks his legs into the ground...so he has legs.

the Tempests completely ignore the BCs, though whether or not they can't attack them, we don't know. They should be able to.

The terrain is beautiful. The jungle, especially, that misty canyon look, I think its perfect, they needed something like that. I'm sure we will have water too, but those deep canyons are perfect.

Ashworld is also looking sweet.

[Xenon]

Has anyone seen the Tempest's fighters fire any projectiles? It looks more like they attack by slicing into things; they're certainly shaped for it.

[WB]

They fire a projectile, but they don't fire it with forward guns, it looks like they have a weapon that fires down, so they "bomb" the target as they fly over. This raises the possibility that the carriers cant attack BCs, but who knows? I could be wrong.

They definitely have projectile weaponry though.