Unit Pictures

[Shadow Archon]

I really don't get this line of thought. Maybe it's because I didn't see much, if any signs of incompetance from Mengsk in the game,

Not really incompetence in a sense. More of, I don't know, seemingly not using his placed agent. I got a sense there was more involvement between Mengsk and Tychus than the first and last cinematic.

Merely speculation though.

but why use the Raiders instead of a conventional unit (surely he can spare one the size of the Raiders).

One, we're not sure exactly the military state of the Dominion during that war. We're away from the largest battles that occur in the game, so to say that he could spare one is merely guessing. Warfield was off trying to purge the Zerg from the Sara systems during some of the missions and the Zerg were attacking all over Terran space.

The Zerg were unstoppable to the Confederacy. The fact that Dominion held them off speaks volumes of their capability.

Two, Raider's were involved with fighting the Overmind's forces at the end of the first game, were involved in the civil war with the Protoss, helpful in removing Mengsk from UED hands on Korhal, helpful in taking out UED defenses around the Psi Disruptor, and generally a well experienced fight force. Raynor has more experience combating the two alien forces than Warfield seemingly does, the only notable General the Dominion has in SC2.

Three, the Dominion was helping the Raider's through either indirectly or directly depending upon the choices made. The Moebius Foundation was a Dominion puppet, helping them by supplying funds for Research pieces, giving forces in a few missions, and giving well needed intelligence.

You are also able to acquire Dominion in the non-canon choice.

Four, Raynor's connection to Kerrigan. In direct contact with her, he's been let go without harm twice. Raynors appearance in my mind causes the Queen of Blade's persona and Kerrigan's true persona to have inner conflict.

Five, Tychus was placed on Raynor's ship intentionally for the artifacts with the plant to kill Kerrigan. Saying that Mengsk didn't tell Tychus about the artifacts seems a little far fetched to me.

And why set the Raiders on Mar Sara for instance when the Dominion is extracting an artifact anyway?

Because the Raider's were already there? Tychus Findlay was sent out by Mengsk after Raynor had been on the planet for a while. Also, it shows Tychus helping Raynor against the Dominion, possibly giving viable validation to trust the Moebius foundation as it is through that line of thinking not connected to the dominion.

That we get the Overmind's POV in Queen of Blades aside,

His POV though is not necessarily only his part.

there's still an issue here. Even if the Overmind is the Dark Voice speaking all that time, it makes his concentration on Kerrigan iffy, as if the Dark Voice chose Kerrigan himself. IMO, the Overmind is still his own character, he's simply operating within the confines of the mandate the Dark Voice has given (bar Kerrigan being the wildcard).

I'm thinking more a long the lines of a merged twisted personality. The God view that the Overmind has is not his own, yet he still wants to merge with the Protoss since that is his purpose. He doesn't want it to happen as the Fallen One plans as it is not the "true" way. Therefore Kerrigan, to possibly give the Zerg a chance to combine with the Protoss the natural way.

Instead of talking to two people, or one person forced to operate under another's mandate, I see it as a merging of two minds into a unified existence, each with their own thoughts, ideas, visions, etc. underneath, but only showing a unified being to the outside working in unity. A complicated view I guess.

Think of it as Jesus doing one thing over here, the Father doing one thing over here, but the Holy Spirit acting as both do. Or something like that.

This is just an opinion, but I actually think that Tassadar's spirit is entwined with the Overmind's true self, a true mixture of Protoss and Zerg. Similar to an Archon.

I wouldn't say I dislike it though. I've said it many times, the mission could have easily lost its suspension of disbelief aspect with just a few lines of dialogue.

It could have, but it doesn't have any dialogue to do that for us. Remember, a Super Carrier can take out a squadron of Battle cruisers by itself. A mothership is suppose to be able to obliterate fleets and planets instantly.

The Protoss main capital ship should be beyond a single Battlecruiser's reach in terms of what can be destroyed.

[Turalyon]

Umm... as much as I love this banter, shouldn't you guys continue this in another thread? You're taking the limelight away from Robear's lovely work.

[Shadow Archon]

Umm... as much as I love this banter, shouldn't you guys continue this in another thread? You're taking the limelight away from Robear's lovely work.

Whoops. Sorry.

[Robear]

Haha, I don't mind, guys, we all enjoy the same lore discussions. :P

On the mutalisk size, mentioned a page or two ago, I try to go with Ghost's sizes over SC2's for the few units where that's an option. In SC2, the ones in the pre-rendered betrayal of Kerrigan cinematic seemed so small, and the ones in that in-game cutscene with the Hyperion seemed so big—In-game Ghost screenshots aren't super clear, but Ghost's intro cinematic gives us a good look at them with some dropships, and that's the main source I used. These are just a couple of shots showing how it's hard to tell from the in-game model, as screenshots are usually looking up or down, without anything to compare with.



While we're on the topic of Ghost screenshots, I was looking around for more shots of the elusive male ghost from SCG (of which there only seems to be this one picture, hosted on IGN and nowhere else)...


And I found a few screens I hadn't seen before; here are a couple of noteworthy ones:


There was a Nexus model in the game! I'd only seen pylons and gateways before.


This is why Blizzard never shows Hydralisks from behind; it's just too silly. :P

Sorry this is off-topic and isn't an update, I'll try to have the new drawings up soon.

[Hawki]

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

Kind of shameless plugging, but the article has a good picture of the nexus from Ghost (since you brought it up).

[solidsamurai]

Might as well throw in the brutalisk and aberration, too.

Did you already do infested terran? Lol.
----

One thing I just noticed: All big terran ships (valkyrie and upwards) have european pilots. Romanian, scottish and russian. :P

I dunno, just funny is all.

[Robear]

Did you already do infested terran?

Yup, he looks like this:

One thing I just noticed: All big terran ships (valkyrie and upwards) have european pilots. Romanian, scottish and russian. :P

Science Vessel's American. Hah, when I was younger I always figured the Valkyrie was European because she came along with the UED, like Stukov and DuGalle, while the terrans in the Koprulu sector were all descended from Americans. But, of course, the Battlecruiser was European-sounding too, and somehow that never occurred to my younger self. Hmm.

[Shadow Archon]

It's surprising how diverse the earth races are in the Korpulu Sector seeing as billions came from thousands.

[solidsamurai]

Some mutalisks are huge compared to the Hyperion

The mutas were flying next to turrets on the Hyperion. They were about the size of the turrets. The turrets don't make up the whole ship. I think the vid zooms out to the whole ship for a second and then you see the whole muta ball.

Science Vessel's American. Hah, when I was younger I always figured the Valkyrie was European because she came along with the UED, like Stukov and DuGalle, while the terrans in the Koprulu sector were all descended from Americans. But, of course, the Battlecruiser was European-sounding too, and somehow that never occurred to my younger self. Hmm.

The only official american in the lore is the old families, which have a 'drawl'. Every other american sounding person probably extends from former old family members and considering terran breeding rates, that's still a lot of people (like, hundreds of millions if blizz really insists there's going to be billions of people; so that's enough to diversify the accents and southern american themes throughout the south, including, I dunno... texas, arkansas, carolina, utah, etc.). America is just one of the themes, I suppose.

Duran doesn't really sound classic american either (although he is american maybe, just further north I think; much more straight forward whitecollar) - yeah, I know he's not human, but still. Another example.

[Shadow Archon]

The mutas were flying next to turrets on the Hyperion. They were about the size of the turrets. The turrets don't make up the whole ship.

Those turrets are 30 meters long. That's how tall an AT-AT is in Star Wars.