Mengsk is shaping up to be the main villain of HotS; bad move for the story?

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Originally Posted by Laurentian

Yeah, the problem I'm having with SCII is that the storyline is looking to be rather disconnected, meandering and pointless. Seems they have at least three different main storylines (The fall of Arcturus, redemption of Kerrigan and the threat of the Hybrids) that are not congealing very well into a solid narrative. The hybrids should be the overall focus of the trilogy, especially if LOTV ends like pretty much everyone expects with Kerrigan, Raynor and Zeratul teaming up to defeat them. For the ostensible villains they don't appear to have much of a role. They were barely mentioned in WOL and nothing shown so far in HOTS shows that Raynor or Kerrigan even care about them.

WOL was ostensibly about Raynor overthrowing Mengsk (who according to Blizz had his story "told") but that petered out in favour of Raynor deinfesting Kerrigan which was the only event of actual consequence that occured in the game (a theme in WOL according to Metzen, hell the only one that amounted to something). However there is a good chance that HOTS will be about Kerrigan being reinfested (seems that theme didn't end up meaning much) and then killing Arcturus (meaning that his story has not in fact been told) essentially rendering WOL pointless.

Kerrigan's character arc besides being prompted by a convenient magic rock doesn't seem to going much beyond being less of bitch than she was before. Not sure if she needed to be (mostly) human in order to accomplish that. I mean when didn't infested Kerrigan embrace her zerg side? And she has to fight to gain control of the zerg swarm, again. Raynor I guess is going to have to get over her being zerg for eternity or whatever and how she likes it and how it is her fate even though he was going to have to do that anyway and infact people complained that he hadn't!

Judging by that leaked ending they don't seem interested in setting up the DV or the Protoss for that matter which is what LOTV is presumably going to be about. Hell they don't seem that all interested in providing closure to the Kerrigan-Raynor relationship! Are they waiting for LOTV, SCIII or WOS?

I also fear that Narud is in fact Duran. Maybe it will work as a untwist but I doubt it.

I also fear that LOTV will only feature the hybrids in a major fashion near the end (since it is supposed to be about Zeratul uniting the Protoss tribes) or worse as a cliffhanger for SCIII!

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I feel your pain, mate!

I'm bracing myself for the inevitable link-up/connection between Mengsk and the DV to justify Mengsk's continued and heavy exposure within SC2 current saga.

Also, the idea of Kerrigan killing Mengsk in HotS is an issue I touched on in another thread somewhere. I find it alarming that the pre-WoL/BW Kerrigan, who had more than enough opportunity and reason to kill Mengsk but does not, would then decide to actually carry out the task of killing Mengsk after becoming more human.

Sure you can explain that away by saying she needed Mengsk to help against the UED, but she did not kill him even after they were dealt with. Now, the universe is even greater peril due to an all-powerful enemy and only now she casually wants to kill the figurehead of a major power and thereby potentially destabilising something which can actually help her? Go figure!

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I'm bracing myself for the inevitable link-up/connection between Mengsk and the DV to justify Mengsk's continued and heavy exposure within SC2 current saga.

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That's what the secret mission is for. Problem is that still makes him a pawn of the DV and Kerrigan and Raynor are planning to kill him anyway.

I'm pretty sure Kerrigan didn't kill Mengsk in BW because the Status Quo is Good and the game needs to make sure that Raynor doesn't accomplish anything.

Also wanna bet that Valerian will also turn out to be evil? He sounds so trustworthy! This will be what, the fifth time that everything Raynor has accomplished turns out to be pointless?

Apparently WC3 featured the orcs turning out to not be evil and then going into exile and according to the leaked ending the zerg are doing exactly that. Not to mention they seem to be going for a "there must always be a zerg hivemind" rather similar to the Warcraft character the Lich King. Oh and there is Valerian's apparent similarity to a Warcraft character Arthas. And WC3 featured all three races teaming up to defeat a greater threat and SC2 is looking to be exactly that!

Now I understand that Blizz's games are going to have similar themes and characters but these seem a bit too similar. Metzen's joking "I'm a one trick pony" remark starts to sound not very funny. Not to mention that Warcraft started to resemble Starcraft only for Starcraft to start resembling Warcraft.

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Originally Posted by Zeraszana

disagree - she removed all the crap when she was infested - Amerigo anyone? :) he only got her out of the facility that was doing experiments with her and the zerg

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http://starcraft.wikia.com/wiki/Sarah_Kerrigan

"Arcturus Mengsk, leader of the recently-formed Sons of Korhal and son of Angus Mengsk, discovered Kerrigan was at Fujita through Umojan sources. He organized a raid on the facility to retrieve her... The rebel raid was successful and an unconscious Kerrigan... There Kerrigan's neural inhibitor was removed. A number of cybernetic implants were left; years later, Kerrigan suggested this was to prevent the onset of insanity by inhibiting her ability to read thoughts."

Arcturus was behind the removal of some of her implants when he took her in as his own. He left some to prevent Kerrigan from going insane, since she was so powerful. I wouldn't be surprised if at this time he also planted in the device/nanomachines/serum that causes her pain.

Another time at which he could have done this is between WoL and HotS, since in the teaser we see that Kerrigan was being held at a Dominion (you see the Dominion logo marked at one of the doors) facility with Raynor there 'breaking her out'.

Pain stuff? Are you talking about the leaked "ending", or something else?

Yeah, the leaked ending.

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Originally Posted by Laurentian

I'm pretty sure Kerrigan didn't kill Mengsk in BW because the Status Quo is Good and the game needs to make sure that Raynor doesn't accomplish anything.

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This is a problem. As soon as you get the feeling that the story is not organically/naturally moving along at it's own pace but rather being dictated by the perceived needs of the author/reader, the whole immersion/believability factor goes out the window. All the obvious plot devices that keep cropping up don't help either, especially the kind that have always seemingly been there from the start and have a major influence at a certain point in the story which was hitherto unknown until it was conveniently exposed now (or rather really invented on the spot).

The mini-campaign should be raynor breaking into mengsk's palace just before the ending.

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Originally Posted by Gradius

The mini-campaign should be raynor breaking into mengsk's palace just before the ending.

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And the ending could be more interesting. Like, sure, we killed Mengsk...But something sinister and dangerous is coming, and the last few missions would revolve around that and perhaps lead into LotV.

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Originally Posted by Triceron

http://starcraft.wikia.com/wiki/Sarah_Kerrigan

"Arcturus Mengsk, leader of the recently-formed Sons of Korhal and son of Angus Mengsk, discovered Kerrigan was at Fujita through Umojan sources. He organized a raid on the facility to retrieve her... The rebel raid was successful and an unconscious Kerrigan... There Kerrigan's neural inhibitor was removed. A number of cybernetic implants were left; years later, Kerrigan suggested this was to prevent the onset of insanity by inhibiting her ability to read thoughts."

Arcturus was behind the removal of some of her implants when he took her in as his own. He left some to prevent Kerrigan from going insane, since she was so powerful. I wouldn't be surprised if at this time he also planted in the device/nanomachines/serum that causes her pain.

Another time at which he could have done this is between WoL and HotS, since in the teaser we see that Kerrigan was being held at a Dominion (you see the Dominion logo marked at one of the doors) facility with Raynor there 'breaking her out'.

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I stand corrected :)
but i still disagree with the last paragraph - i believe she is held in there for treatment and stuff, but on her own will (that it's vals moebius and raynor there, not mengsk owning it) and that raynor doesn't come to bust her out (of prison style) but rather to make sure no one can get her..something like that :D you know she said it herself - raynor has the knight in shiny armor complex :D

I don't think its a bad move. The dark voice doesn't really come in until the end of the WoL mini campaign. In WoL, the Zerg was the main threat along with Mengsk. Now that you are going to be controlling a part of the zerg. What I think will happen, is that you will fight to gain control of the zerg, and then Mengsk starts taking over the zerg or something else that makes the zerg want to kill him. Then they all the zerg go and try to take down Mengsk. That's probably what will happen. At least something along those lines.