It’s not that big…oh yeah wait, it totally is.
We’re thinking of a ruler – maybe wooden like the ones elementary schools used to stock for both measuring objects and beating problem students, but instead of inch or centimeter marks, there would be “degrees of awesome”.
Now sure, this is an imaginary ruler and we have absolutely no standardization for these units aside from what we carry around in our heads, but if you can’t trust our random interpretations of events and their values, who can you trust?
Not Tychus Findlay, that’s for damn sure.
The purpose of our new ruler is to evaluate the some of the new units that have come to light in the Starcraft II campaign. Obviously, these are Terran units, since we don’t have access to the Zerg or Protoss campaigners yet, but even these few new units we’ve been exposed to in the first third of the Terran campaign have given us hope for the glorious pew-pewing future of the franchise.
Let’s start with the Medic.
Score: 12 Awsomers.
A handy little unit, you get these girls almost right off the bat in the Terran campaign. In multiplayer, it’s the flying/transporting Medivac that does the job of healing, and players have no access to Medics. In the campaign, Medics are female foot soldiers that come from the Barracks, require a Tech Lab and say things like “the doctor is in” with just a hint of sexiness that is slightly out of place.
They can do nothing effectively except heal other units, but are an absolute necessity in any light biological unit group for attack and defense. They’re weak – only a non-lethal “flash grenade”, light armor and somewhat slow healing – which is why they don’t push higher on the AS (awesome scale), but we can see why they were left out of the multiplayer.
Targeting Medivacs is easy – they fly and are big ships. Targeting Medics is hard – they can hide among groups of Marines, quietly healing while their aggressive companions fire away. Medics in multiplayer would make a Terran infantry force just too dangerous.
Next up – the Firebat.
Score: 32.5 Awesomers.
The Firebat is like the Terran Marauder, and in fact the Marauder suit is built off of the Firebat plans but “only 23% of Marauder operators have committed first-degree murder”, or so says the Hyperion’s info on them in the Armory.
Instead of concussive shells though, Firebats get double flamethrowers.
That’s right. Not one, but two flamethrowers, combined with a badass red suit and an ability to torch large amounts of Zerg, owing to the fact that their flamethrowers can strike more than one target. Sure, they’re homicidal maniacs, but that doesn’t mean they don’t know their jobs.
Aaannnndd Here it comes – The Hercules Dropship.
Score: 1,500 Awesomers.
Yeah, the scale ramps up pretty quickly here, but there’s a reason. The Hercules Dropship is acquired through Zerg research points in the Hyperion Lab and not only allows Terran players to transport a massive amount of units at once – 24 to be exact – but when it gets blown up, the units survive.
That’s right – someone actually thought to install life pods in the damn thing, and if the Herc gets blown out of the sky the units inside will drop to the ground, taking a small amount of damage but surviving. Add to this the fact that it can drop units almost instantly once it reaches its target destination and it’s easy to see why it gets such a stellar AS rating.
We can see, again, why this would not work in multiplayer. It would be absolutely hilarious to see in action, but would simply be too much for most opponents to handle.
So there you go folks, your first unbiased (there’s a scientific scale here, c’mon!) look at some of the keenest new units in the SCII campaign.
Hey, we’re just here to help.
