Starcraft II: Heart of the Swarm Multiplayer Changes

By Michael Shelton / April 13, 2012

Starcraft II. Much fear has come from fans of the beloved RTS title, in regards to new units being unbalanced and overpowered. Luckily, Blizzard is taking all of your concerns into account and has been hard at work refining the expansion. Here's a quick breakdown of what's in store for each of the armies.

Zerg armies will remain the most unchanged BlizzCon. The viper will be able to blind biological units with an area of effect. These blinded units will have a reduced range of 1, which is very effective against the Terran infantry, Zerg roach, and Hydra. Allow the Viper to feed off of minerals and it will regain energy, but prevents the mineral patch from harvesting. Additional abilities are appearing on the nydus network that enables you to spawn different forms of nydus worms. One worm in particular can unleash a spew that moves its way across several screens and builds a zerg assault highway. Terran armies have gone through the most drastic changes. The shredder unit is axed, as it was confusing to players. Capable of killing large numbers of workers it was not used for map control, as it was originally intended. The warhound is now on the edge of extinction. Feeling too much like a small thor, Blizzard doesn't feel that it will be enough to give players new gameplay strategies. They are also working on units created from the factory, in an effort to expand the smaller offerings it brings to the strategy table. Blizzard claims that they are having difficulties with the Terran army due to their flexibility and already impressive effectiveness

Protoss armies will still be getting the oracle which functions as a protoss raider. This will enable the army to have a little bit of reach in the mid-game in order to disrupt your enemies elaborate plans. Replicant units have been cut because developers felt that it was removing diversity, as opposed to adding diversity to play styles. The tempest will still be making its way into the expansion however it won't be the splash anti-air capital ship it was originally revealed to be. Now it will act as a long-ranged aerial siege weapon that is capable of striking both air and ground targets. There are also nexus abilities that are being experimented with. A mass recall allows the Protoss army to become more aggressive and move out onto the map with slower sentry/zealot forces. While there are sure to be many more changes to Starcraft II: Heart of the Swarm, it's good to know that Blizzard is truly remaining true to the strategic elements of the series. If it's one thing you can count on Blizzard for, it's perfecting the gameplay designs they implement. Be sure to head over and check out the full developer write-up.