Incompetent Enemies & You Always Win Syndrome

[Gradius]

A huge problem in WoL is how it marginalizes your enemies. I've always enjoyed writing where the antagonists are both intelligent and a force to be reckoned with. This makes the world seem realistic and believable, since real life itself is very competitive. In a RTS game setting it makes your victories that much sweeter. With RTS games it is possible to both lose the battle, but win the war, or to lose both the battle and the war and still have the story continue. This contributed to the fact that when you played Brood War you felt like you were always in danger, which added to the immersion. In Wings of Liberty you never feel truly threatened except at the Char missions at the end.

In Wings of Liberty we play Jim Raynor, a prodigy commander who is able to steal a victory at every turn. In the WoL universe, the player character (Raynor) is simply a mastermind and everyone else is a notch below him. All these problems are exacerbated by the fact that Raynor's Raiders is apparently a single battlecruiser and its skeleton crew.

Before we get into the meat of this, let's go over a little bit of history. I would like to highlight the difference in strength & numbers of the Raiders when they were just created in SC1 to right now in WoL. This information was taken from the Queen of Blades novel, which Metzen considers the definitive take of what happend to Raynor during the Zerg campaign.

1) After New Gettysburg, everybody who disagreed with Mengsk's betrayal rebelled and joined the Raiders. At this time the Raiders are at their highest numbers. The books say 300 people. As part of his motivational speech to rebel against Mengsk, Raynor tells the Raiders that tonight they dine in hell.

2) They were heavily outnumbered when they escaped Tarsonis, so they suffered losses there.

3) They raided the Dylarian shipyards and stole Hyperion as well as several other ships. At this time, the Raiders are at their highest strength. They have an actual fleet of ships.

4) The Raiders went to Char to find Kerrigan. Here they suffered their greatest losses. Their total man count went down to 40 according to Queen of Blades. ALL of their battlecruisers were destroyed before they could do anything, except Hyperion. A huge waste and stupid move on the part of Aaron Rosenburg considering that these battlecruisers might have made the battle of Aiur more realistic. How Raynor is supposed to do anything with a single battlecruiser & handful of people is actually a problem that has existed since SC1.

5) So, with a total of 40 people Raynor somehow manages to fight on Aiur, which is a total joke. If the Raiders are not all dead at this point, it's really a god damn miracle.

6) After helping destroy the Overmind, the Raiders decided to STRAND themselves on Aiur in order to help evacuate the Khalai survivors.

7) Raynor helps save Mengsk from the UED. His Command Center is destroyed in the Emperor's Flight mission, and he suffers yet another defeat.

8) At this point, it's a miracle he's still alive. There is just no way.

9) After BW Raynor still fights Zerg in his biography, a nod to the SC: Alternity board game most likely. He also helps Artanis & Taldarin to deinfest Stukov in Resurrection IV.

10) Then in the 4 years after that, he apparently does nothing but drink and hide from Mengsk. This is where WoL starts off.

Where did he get his strength in WoL? We still don't know if he actually has a fleet or anything. He has spectres helping him, but that mission doesn't have to be completed until very late in the game. Did he receive an increase in numbers from the colonists he helped save? Perhaps, but there is no dialog indicating anything like that.

====

Now to discuss the real issues with the game. Right as the game begins, we see a newscast which claims that Mengsk has squandered trillions hunting down Jim Raynor. This immediately sets up Mengsk as an unworthy opponent for Raynor. In Liberation Day, we see holos of Mengsk spouting standard communist rhetoric: "Keep a close watch on your neighbors. Dissent will only slow our progress."

Any individual would immediately associate this propaganda with that of a dictator. But we know that Mengsk is trying to maintain a public image of a benevolent and selfless leader, therefore Mengsk looks like a moron for even considering putting up such holoboards.

Horner Missions - First off we have Orlan, a classic cartoon villain with lines such as "I'll show you what happens to double-dealing backstabbers!" Orlan is another unworthy enemy who Raynor outsmarted & steamrolled. But at least Raynor still values his decryption skills.

The rest of the Matt Horner storyline culminates in a bizarre scenario where Matt was able to steal the Dominion's newest superweapon, all the while making sure that they didn't know about it. The logistics of realistically pulling something like that off are mind-boggling, and a million things would have realistically gone wrong. Either the Dominion is staffed by incompetent buffoons, or Matt Horner, like Raynor and most of his crew, is simply a prodigy.

Seriously, look at the profiles for the rest of Raynor's crew:
http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/game/hero/egon-stetmann
http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/game/hero/milo-kachinsky
http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/game/hero/ariel-hanson
http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/game/hero/rory-swann

Raynor is a prodigy surrounded by prodigies. Hanson was reading chemistry "tomes" at the age of 6, which just sounds ridiculous, 6 is really really young. Kachinsky, having a "knack" for robotics, abandoned his life of wealth to go on and become a prodigy mechanic for the Hyperion. Stetmann, yet another brilliant scientist, had a contrived story detailing his escape from the Dominion. Though Hanson calls Stetmann's science expertise "nonexistent," he still singlehandedly manages to create technologies that even the Dominion doesn't appear to have, all from a shoddy battlecruiser laboratory. Impressive.

Another mechanical guru genius, Swann can "modify" any machine to suit the Raiders' needs. He was born into a long line of tech-savvy miners, and even from a young age he displayed a much deeper understanding of machinery and technology than anyone else in his family’s history.

His creation of the Thor was particularly laughable. One of the recent Frontline stories established that the Thor existed before Wings of Liberty, created by the Dominion. Since Blizzard doesn't follow even their own lore, this was retconned in WoL. Instead we stole the Odin from the Dominion, which is essentially a giant unprecendented superweapon. The sheer amount of technical engineering & know-how required to create such a lumbering machine & have it able to stand so much punishment must have been mind boggling. We can only assume a team of scientists & engineers worked on the Odin for months. The schematics for the thing must have taken days if not weeks to merely analyze.

So then the mechanical savant Swann comes in and says "bah humbug! forget the scale, i'll create something a damn sight more practical than that showpiece!" Try to keep in mind how nonchalant he is about miniaturizing such a gargantuan machine. And he does it all within the span of one mission, ready to use on Korhal right away.

The thing about miniaturizing machines is that it generally requires a whole new level of technology and engineering skills to achieve. The first computers were the size of entire rooms, and it was decades before we could get them to fit in our lap. Though the Thor does not have the firepower & durability of the Odin, the fact that Swann basically remade the thing within the span of one mission aboard a battlecruiser is unbelievable. We also don't know if Swann even had access to the Odin schematics. There's no reason for him to have that info.

Now, for the finale of the Horner missions, Raynor actually breaks through Korhal's planetary defenses, and lands on Augustgrad itself, the capital world of the Dominion. Of all the things in the game, this is truly absurd. He could have ended the whole thing and probably attacked Mengsk's palace if he wanted to. Apparently the most heavily fortified planet in the sector, Raynor was able to pierce its defenses with his 1 battlecruiser. Amazing.

Tosh Missions - The player's ego is further boosted by lines such as:

"Finished already? You really are as good as they say Mr. Raynor. I'm thinking you and I got a lot more business we can be talking about.

With the end choice, Raynor ends up being in the right no matter what he picks. He has no reason to believe Nova's claims, but even if he does Hanson neglects to mention the fact that "Nova lied to us" about the spectres. The universe & reality shifts based on Raynor's choice to make him look like he can do no wrong.

Tychus Missions - In SC1 the Protoss were powerful, mysterious, and enigmatic. They burned entire planets, and when these guys warped in, you knew they were playing hardball, as Raynor said. Though they did lose in the lore several times, it was not for a lack of brains, but more because of betrayal and just being straight up outnumbered.

Yet what we have in Wings of Liberty is arguably the worst faction ever created: the Tal'Darim. These guys, despite being Protoss and having bigger brains, come out on the losing end every single time, say nothing valuable other than how the player will fail this time, and generally don't even have a real character to represent them.

I had absolutely zero suspension of disbelief during these missions, but instead simply marveled that Protoss could be so inexplicably ineffective.

Ariel Hanson Missions - As with most missions fighting random zerg, Raynor plows through them with no problems and has very little if any dialog indicating that he has run into a difficulty/snag, unless the player has performed the mission sub-optimally.

At the end, the High Executor of the Protoss, Selendis, comes to cleanse the planet Haven which still has colonists. There are a few things we're supposed to know about Selendis:
1) She is a Protoss. Protoss have larger brains and superior intellect to that of humans, not to mention eidetic memory. This is the reason why it took them only about 2 millenia to rise from a stone age level and create advanced technology that could bend space and time itself to their whim.
2) As the High Executor of the Protoss Protectorate, we have to assume that when it comes to Protoss military commanders Selendis is the cream of the crop.

It is a surprise then when Selendis goes on to commit sublime acts of stupidity. The fact that she even lost makes zero sense, but that aside, let's look at the "A" canon choice.

Selendis
If you choose to resist us, we will meet in glorious combat.

Is this really the only diplomacy that Selendis is willing to give Raynor, who 4 years ago risked his own life to help the khalai survivors evacuate Aiur and thus saved thousands if not millions of Protoss lives? And why is combat glorious? You would think she would be less willing to risk protoss lives (a rare commodity these days) for the sake of a pissing contest. Even Raynor says it's stupid to fight each other when they should be fighting the Zerg.

Selendis
Our Observers detected zerg hive spores infesting the colonists. They must be purified

This is only true if you side with the Protoss. If you side with Hanson then no colonists are actually infested in-game, and Selendis is made to look like a fool for overreacting so much.

Selendis
The only cure for zerg infestation is purification by fire. You know this to be true, James Raynor.

Now the Protoss look like idiots because a Terran invented a cure during the course of several hours on some "medieval" lab on a battlecruiser.

Selendis
You are as cunning as the stories say, James Raynor. I hope your belief in these colonists will be vindicated.

Now after losing several Carriers and a Mothership, which I imagine must be expensive for the Protoss empire, Selendis is made to look like a fool yet again, all the while praising Raynor for his intellectual superiority.

It's almost like she thought they were engaging in some computer simulation battle instead of one where people would actually die. It's something that she should have considered if she respected him so much.

Final Missions - Despite Kerrigan being the most powerful force in the sector, she still managed to lose. All the Zerg were recalled to Char during a newcast, invalidating the excuse that Raynor had a chance only because the Swarm was too spread out all over the sector. Kerrigan only dispenses generic threatening banter and despite how scary the designers wanted her to feel, Kerrigan achieved virtually zero victories.

I think that with how large the sector is and how numerous the swarm is, Kerrigan could have at least captured one artifact, but again, she failed in virtually all of her endeavors. Compare this to BW where she was the main character instead and prevailed against pretty much everyone (which was still stupid IMO).

Simply saying that "billions of people died" or "kerrigan was toying with us" does not make it meaningful to the player. In Brood War, when Kerrigan actually toyed with people, we got to see how and what she actually did (force Zeratul to murder his matriarch and help her kill the overmind, use mengsk & raynor & fenix to beat the UED, etc.) These things were plot relevant and we could see the results of her power/scheming. In WoL, simply hearing that "she killed billions of people" or "she was toying with us" does not do much for me.

Kerrigan's enemies were all superior to her for the following reasons:

1) Kerrigan had the swarm literally all over the sector, but could only manage to find one artifact and didn't know where to even look for the rest of them. In the meantime, the Moebius team/Valerian seems to know where every artifact is.
2) Kerrigan "forgot how resourceful Jim was" on Monlyth and let his small force sneak away with the artifact from under both her and the Protoss, proving once again that Raynor is a prodigy. She lets Zeratul escape in the whispers of doom mission as well despite having millions of Zerg at her command. With how far he had to run, it's obvious Zeratul was a long distance from the Void seeker. We just see this kind of thing from Kerrigan again & again throughout the campaign.
3) Kerrigan was stupid to have vulnerabilities like the Space Station which was the hub for the majority of zerg fliers.
4) Kerrigan said "Warfield won't be alive for very much longer". She failed. Raynor keeps all of his promises, but Kerrigan can't seem to do so.
5) It was stupid of Kerrigan to be at ground zero when the artifact went off. If she knew what it did, why did she let herself get vaporized? Furthermore, why not wait for them to use a pulse and take advantage of the recharge time by sending everything at once?
6) Kerrigan fails yet again when she tries to reach the Mobius data cores. She "senses" that Jim is hiding something from her, but can't find out what. Yet in the first Zeratul mission she straight up reads Zeratul's mind:
"if you can so easily read my mind kerrigan, you know I'll never give up!"

Wow, so Raynor has more mental discipline/barriers than Zeratul himself. What a guy. <_<

In conclusion, incompetent enemies make the game feel like it's not worth playing. All I ask is that in the future the dialog be changed from: "aww hell, not these tal'darim guys again. how many times do I have to steamroll them?"

to something more like: "We need to watch our backs. These guys pose an actual threat to us and they are not incompetent morons."

Maybe have the character suffer a setback once in a while, but find a new way to accomplish what he needs. A plot twist if you will.

To be realistic and meaningful, a character should be made to seem as if he has evaluated all possible decisions, and chose the best one. Only then, when the player feels like every character is making the kind of choices that he himself could possibly make in that situation, can the player truly become immersed into the story.

[Rake]

I think you are too harsh on one or two points, but I pretty much completely agree with you. Most of those things occurred to me in the first play (especially the Selendis stuff) through and it diminished my enjoyment.

I would say though, that Kerrigan did feel like a threat to me in the Char missions because she flattened me many, many times before I finally won on hard and brutal. That said it was still pretty stupid that she got herself zapped. Maybe she was an egoist and simply wanted to do it herself, but even then why didn't she simply leave when the artifact was nearly charged up?

A minor point in Blizzard favor, even though the swarms had been recalled it would take some time for them to reach Char, which added to the feeling of impending doom. However, that just makes Kerrigan's decision to stay and fight even stupider. It wasn't like the terrans could escape and come back another day. She could have simply left, waited for them to be crushed and then returned and danced on their infested bodies.

How much better would it have been if Kerrigan's forces had chased Raynor and a half-finished artifact half-way across the system, gradually killing his men and depleting his strength and then, at the final moment when only Tychus and Horner are left alive, Kerrigan turns up personally to relish her victory only to find that Raynor has sold out to Mengsk for the other half of the artifact. Kerrigan gets de-infested but Raynor has to sacrifice all his men and his honour.

Something better anyway.

[mr. peasant]

A huge problem in WoL is how it marginalizes your enemies. I've always enjoyed writing where the antagonists are both intelligent and a force to be reckoned with. This makes the world seem realistic and believable, since real life itself is very competitive. In a RTS game setting it makes your victories that much sweeter. With RTS games it is possible to both lose the battle, but win the war, or to lose both the battle and the war and still have the story continue. This contributed to the fact that when you played Brood War you felt like you were always in danger, which added to the immersion. In Wings of Liberty you never feel truly threatened except at the Char missions at the end.

In Wings of Liberty we play Jim Raynor, a prodigy commander who is able to steal a victory at every turn. In the WoL universe, the player character (Raynor) is simply a mastermind and everyone else is a notch below him. All these problems are exacerbated by the fact that Raynor's Raiders is apparently a single battlecruiser and its skeleton crew. Here are some examples of this:
......

The problem isn't that Raynor is an unrivaled prodigy who is hyper-competent relative to other characters and never suffers defeat but rather the enemy never succeeds. The latter is needed to create immersive tension come the climax where we wonder if the heroes will somehow pull through (even though we know at the back of our mind that they probably will).

As an example: Say, there's a story where the enemy routinely gets defeated time and time again but in the process, the main character loses a number of close friends/allies (meaning, he too doesn't win). Come the climax, there isn't much doubt that the hero will succeed (since the enemy never defeats him), with the question instead being at what cost.

As such, it's the successes of the enemy (as a collective) that is more important than the hero's failures. The way this was done in SC1 was by having the player be part of a larger group. So, even though the player himself never actually loses, setbacks off-screen by other members of the group help establish the enemy as a threat. One good example was in the original Zerg campaign. Even though the player succeeds in pushing back the Protoss forces, Zasz gets himself killed by them - thereby establishing the Protoss as a credible threat in-story against the Zerg.

This doesn't happen in WoL since Raynor is not part of a larger group. And while the Zerg do deal significant damage in their invasion of the K-Sector, it happens so early in the game and sits so peripherally to the plot that it feels more as setup.


Regarding the inability to suspend disbelief at Raynor's various successes, there is the Theory of Narrative Causality; in that he doesn't miraculously succeed because he's the main character but rather that he is the main character because he's the one who succeeds.

[Turalyon]

Fully agree with the sentiment. Not only is the illusion of having a worthwhile enemy or the possibility of making a potentially wrong decision completely missing in WoL, the pacing of the story itself kills any real sense of urgency or suspense that WoL could ever have.

It's a pity that the enemies only show real competency (when you play it on Brutal especially) during the actual missions only for it then to be disconnected from reality when the story "continues" after the end of the mission where Raynor pretty much just dusts off his hands and bides his time, wondering what to do next for his money.


@Gradius

It's interesting that you note how ineffective the Protoss are in WoL.

It's clear that the game's lore has it in for the Protoss - starting from their defeat at News Gettysberg against the Sons of Korhal militia (was this retconned as Tassadar and the Protoss retreating and not an actual defeat-in-detail by the SoK?), having their victory over the Overmind being turned into the worst definition of a 'Pyrrhic victory' and their secret remaining homeworld of Shakuras being completely devastated by their own hands. I'm actually not surprised that Raynor can defeat them with his rag-tag teamin WoL! According to what has happened so far, despite the Protoss having the best technology lorewise, they are the most ineffective and incompetent fighting force ever!

However, the most unforgivable part in Selendis' confrontation with Raynor in WoL is that she frivolously risks Protoss lives (something that you would think would be a rare commodity given the setbacks mentioned above and their generally limited numbers) for the sake of a pissing contest!! Since the lore (so far) has essentially made the Protoss an endangered species it beggars belief that Selendis would regard such an inane action against Raynor as being something that was worth doing, let alone 'glorious'.

[Visions of Khas]

This horse still has some life in it.

I beg to differ. He's dead, Jim.

Yes. The whole thing could have been done better. The Protoss missions were insulting. But we run into a lot of similar things in StarCraft and Brood War as well. All we can do at this point is make up excuses for either game.

The only other thing I wanted to say is, you wonder how and why Kerrigan could only find one of the Artifacts. It's a bit obvious, isn't it? Raynor had Duran as an ally, in cognito as he was. He probably knew where everything was.

[Gradius]

The problem isn't that Raynor is an unrivaled prodigy who is hyper-competent relative to other characters and never suffers defeat but rather the enemy never succeeds. The latter is needed to create immersive tension come the climax where we wonder if the heroes will somehow pull through (even though we know at the back of our mind that they probably will).

I hadn't thought of it that way, but that makes sense.

It's interesting that you note how ineffective the Protoss are in WoL.

It's clear that the game's lore has it in for the Protoss - starting from their defeat at News Gettysberg against the Sons of Korhal militia (was this retconned as Tassadar and the Protoss retreating and not an actual defeat-in-detail by the SoK?), having their victory over the Overmind being turned into the worst definition of a 'Pyrrhic victory' and their secret remaining homeworld of Shakuras being completely devastated by their own hands.

Well, in New Gettysburg, they were fighting two opponents at once. They're still on the planet in the beginning of the Zerg campaign, so they did get through, even though Mengsk's goal was achieved. It also says the main protoss fleet left the sector, so I'm assuming the only Protoss left were Tassadar's stragglers, but I'm not really sure.

I'm actually not surprised that Raynor can defeat them with his rag-tag teamin WoL! According to what has happened so far, despite the Protoss having the best technology lorewise, they are the most ineffective and incompetent fighting force ever!

The pyrrhic victory was definitely no victory, but BW is where it got really bad for the brotoss. BW existed for the purpose of making Kerrigan look good with its moments of plot induced stupidity, but at least in BW Kerrigan still acknowledges that her enemies are competent.

The only other thing I wanted to say is, you wonder how and why Kerrigan could only find one of the Artifacts. It's a bit obvious, isn't it? Raynor had Duran as an ally, in cognito as he was. He probably knew where everything was.

Of course, but as a standalone game, WoL does not account for this at all.

[The_Blade]

I have to agree with most of these points.

Playing through WoL was like watching "2012"

[Twilice]

I agree with the protoss part, it seems rather stupid of Selendis to just go "herp derp, I'ma firing my lazars!" just because.

There is no real development at all why she would even consider it, not even a cinematic or something with colonist's turning into zombies.

About Swann, well that was just a device to make the unit upgrades work. I wasn't really making it part of the story, and I don't think anyone should really do that much.

The character development of the protagonist's isn't big enough. Taldarim they are evil, but they fail at everything. Kerrigan is evil, but she fails at everything. Mengst is evil, but he fails at everything. And all 3 of these are evil because they kill things, which they fail to do. End of story.

[Turalyon]

Taldarim they are evil, but they fail at everything. Kerrigan is evil, but she fails at everything. Mengst is evil, but he fails at everything. And all 3 of these are evil because they kill things, which they fail to do. End of story.

No, the Tal'Darim, Kerrigan and Mengsk are not evil because they kill things (Raynor does enough of this himself) but because they oppose the living saint and pinnacle of goodness that is Raynor.

[Gradius]

About Swann, well that was just a device to make the unit upgrades work. I wasn't really making it part of the story, and I don't think anyone should really do that much.

Here was an interesting post about this topic from another forum:

Swann's business with the Thor is a flaw that was created because Blizzard acually tries to explain how Raynor gained some of his tech overtime compared to having units just given to ya as you moved up the mission line in SC/BW. If this was like SC/BW we would of just had a Thor sitting in our base at the start without any explanation of how we can all-of-a-sudden start building Thors.

I like the direction Blizzard took reguarding this; the unit introductions now acually feel like part of the story. But now, Blizzard has to deal with coming up with "reasonable explanations" as to how the Raiders came across this tech compared to just using the excuse that as you go further down the mission line, higher tech would simply open up. Some examples are VERY reasonable while there are some that are somewhat flawed.

I've written this somewhere before, but when it comes to unit introductions in WoL's story you got...

Marines/Medics: You can assume Raynor had these before hand because it's the tech Raynor starts out with before Raynor even returned to the Hyperion. It's tech that he SHOULD know before hand since they existed in SC/BW.

Hellions: Swann learns how to build them after seeing them function on Mar Sara.

Reapers: Given from Tosh.

Spectres/Ghosts: End rewards from Tosh/Nova.

Diamondbacks: Recovered disabled proto-types on Tarsonis.

Medivacs: Given from Narud.

Vultures: Given from Mira.

Thors: Rebuilt by Swann based on the Odin schematics.

Battlecrusiers: Given from Valerian.

Ravens/Science Vessels: Learned from Stettman's Protoss research

Predators/Hercules': Learned from Stettman's Zerg research



Then there was every other unit not mentioned that got the SC/BW treatment and were just given to ya without explanation.

Firebats: Given by Swann at the start of the mission.

Marauders: Given by Swann at the start of the mission.

Siege Tanks: Given by Swann after Raynor complains that hes in need of them.

Goliaths: Given at the start of the mission.

Vikings: Given at the start of either Haven branch-mission.

Banshees: Given by Swann at the start of the mission.

Wraiths: Given by Swann when the Odin is "threatened" by Battlecrusiers.



Now comes the nit-picking... ...the Vulture one is acually a pretty big one

(1)Like SCVs/Marines/Medics, you can at least assume that Raynor already has the Firebat/Siege Tank/Goliath/Wraith tech due to it being old tech seen in SC/BW but then you just simply ask yourself, why can't you use this tech beforehand? Why do you have to wait until those specific moments just to bring the Firebats/Siege Tanks/Goliaths/Wraiths out of retirement?

(2)Where's the explanations for how the Raiders aquired Marauder/Viking/Banshee tech? Blizzard took the time to explain where all the other new units came from so why were these left out?

(3)Vultures is a SC/BW tech. Raynors even used one himself throughout SC/BW.... So WHY-IN-GODS-NAME does he have to learn the Vulture tech AGAIN when he encounters Mira!?!?

(4)Hellions is a tech Swann learned how to make based on seeing the Hellions on Mar Sara or supposedly savaged after destroying the Dominion base. So why does he have to wait for the Outbreak mission specificly to officially introduce his newly aquired Hellions?

(5)Ravens and Science Vessels were added to Raynor's arsenal thanks to Stettman's Protoss research...only it's completely flawed. The Dominion are showen to be using Ravens exactly the same way without the need for the research. Am I to assume that the Dominion did the exact same research as Stettman to create the Ravens? Then what's the point of the research for the Raven? Why not just steal the tech like usual if the Dominion can already produce Ravens? Even Tosh's men were seen using Ravens, why not just ask for the Raven tech from him?

And the Science Vessel's an old tech that Raynor should already know about so there's no need for the research to learn how to make it again other then to add that new mechanical-repair function which at least somewhat justifies this.