Terrans are the ultimate beings in the SC Universe.

[TheProgramer]

Terrans were able to domesticate (or perhaps a better word would be control) the Zerg, and had them completly under their power, to the point where Terrans and Zerg were fighting side by side - their buildings were sharing the same base area.

Any stray Zerg attempt to regain control of the swarm was pacified by an device (PSI DISRUPTER). If it wern't for other Terrans destorying the DIUSRUPTER - and providing a Zerg entity (Kerrigan) the counter-device (the PSI EMMITER) the Terrans would remain the domesticators of the Zerg! A feat the Protoss couldnt' acheive - they had to sacrfice EVERYTHING they held dear ... twice ... just to hold the Zerg at bay - not even removing them as a threat entirely.

Not to mention the control Alan Schezar had performed.

Human's lust for Power and their ability to never Lose Hope gave them the ability to pacify and use the Zerg - ending their threat and turign them into allies.
Yet Human's lust for Power and their ability to never Lose Hope destroyed them - Arcturus in his persuit of Power was willing to interfere and provide Kerrigan with the PSI EMMITER; and Raynor's trust and uncurrptable hope that Kerrigan was 'good' again led him to side with Kerrigan. This cost human's their control of the Zerg.

Human's lust for Power and their ability to never Lose Hope is their greatest strength, and their greatest weakness.

[Kimera757]

There was an academic study saying terrans were the best race (in multiplayer), but obviously that's not what you're talking about...

The UED might be considered "the best race", as they have that combination of daring and technology that the protoss don't have (they have the tech, but the protoss wouldn't dare to control zerg). However, to do so, the UED had to strike the zerg when they were especially weak (taking control of the second sleeping Overmind), and it's not something that can happen again. So it boils down to "strike your opponents at their weakest with your best", which is good tactics... the UED had the best tactics early on. (I wonder how much of that was luck, though.)

Then the UED threw it all away. I guess lightning doesn't strike twice.

I don't count Schezar. He controlled a single brood. If the zerg even cared they could have gone, killed that cerebrate, and not bothered to reincarnate it.

[TheProgramer]

I feel the Terrans have an... ingenuity that the Protoss lack. Sure the Protoss have technologies Terran can't understand, and have a far-greater knowledge of PSI an dhow to control and use it. But the Terrans have knowledge of how the brain works chemically, and created a batch of chemicals to control the greatest brain-like entity. Protoss may be able to control energy and psi, but Terrans know how to alter the chemical make up of it.

[Hawki]

Despite being a human myself (as far as you know...), I think you're giving humanity too much credit. Looking at your examples, and looking at the greater picture:

-Humans enslave cerebrates and Overmind, comes back to bite them. Protoss are badass enough to just kill them.

-UED wouldn't have had their initial success against the zerg if not for a Confederate piece of tech. That's humanity in a nutshell. Too many factions that'll never work together, ensuring that they'll be divided.

-Terrans may use the scientific method to increase their tech, but the protoss obviously had to go along the same path to develop their even more advanced tech, and even then it's been stated that they haven't utilized its full potential, whereas terrans always have to get that extra edge in just to survive.

Looking at terrans as a whole, it's obvious that they're very much a minor race who just happens to be up there with the big guys because of their tech and arguably, numbers. But looking at the greater scheme of things...Great War, caught in the middle of the zerg and protoss, Mengsk founding the Dominion would have meant nothing to the Overmind as a whole. Brood War, UED comes, fails, and we're left with a weakened Dominion that fails to stay allied with the KMC and UP. Second Great War, terrans come into their own a bit, but win the first phase because of xel'naga technology, lose the second, and only survive because Kerrigan is only interested in killing Mengsk than wiping out humanity, and the (primal) zerg are repeatedly stated to be unimpressed with terran essence. That's the setting for you. Terrans scrap around in the K-sector, zerg get to fight living gods.

Not that I'm complaining per se. I've said good and bad things about HotS, and one thing I will say is that it's kind of BWish, reminding us that "okay terrans, you had your fun in WoL, now get back in your place you insignificant little creatures" (that's actually a net pro kind of). Unless the UED makes a return (which I'm not exactly rooting for), I don't see the terrans ever really being a true contender against the zerg or protoss anytime soon.

[Gradius]

Terrans are the ultimate beings in the SC Universe.

Agreed. In the meantime, Protoss largely fulfill the role of comic relief as the universe's biggest losers. The irony of being the superior elder race while constantly getting manhandled by weaker opponents never seems to lose its entertainment value.

[Robear]

Agreed. In the meantime, Protoss largely fulfill the role of comic relief as the universe's biggest losers. The irony of being the superior elder race while constantly getting manhandled by weaker opponents never seems to lose its entertainment value.

I always used to imagine that the Protoss were never really superior (their Judicator-led society's failure to adequately respond to the Zerg threat in SC1 reinforcing this), just elder. I had thought that their race had basically existed in a state of stagnation since immediately following the Aeon of Strife, and that all their advanced technologies like Warp Gates were simply reproductions of what the Xel'Naga had had. And them having that full level of technological sophistication back then makes them turning on the Xel'Naga that much more frightening. But, no, a couple of dudes discovered maps and writing and philosophy and shit all in the same week, the Aeon of Strife was just normal prehistory (thanks, Dark Templar Saga), and the vast majority of Protoss are just pathetic losers now for no reason.

Damnit I miss pre-SC2/SCG everything.

[Hawki]

You realize the DTS takes place at the end of the AoE, post-period where the protoss were fighting so fiercely that they devastated entire continents, and that they'd already spread to other planets prior to said period.

Never seen "pre-SCG" as a mark of change. Given some of the reactions to SC2, I got the feeling that Ghost was a game that many people forgot even existed.

[FanaticTemplar]

Sometimes I really wish they'd stuck with the original idea of having all three races be more or less equal. Sure, at the beginning of the series the Terrans were weakest, but they were divided and unfocused. I actually saw Arcturus' ascension as being the moment where Terrans really started being a factor in the setting, and with the Protoss and Zerg expending their strength against each other on Aiur I was predicting that Terrans would be the dominant force in the sequel (unfortunately, I don't count the UED as Terrans, so I can't claim I was right.)

Blizzard evidently decided that the Protoss and Terrans were 'good guys' and that the good guys had to overcome impossible odds, so they made the Zerg all-powerful. The same reasoning is why we almost never get any PvT in the campaigns.

[TheEconomist]

That'll all change when the Hybrids/Xel'Naga/Amon come into play, hopefully in LotV. See WarCraft 3 for spoilers.

Damnit I miss pre-SC2/SCG everything.

You and me both, brother. It seems like they go out of their way to fuck it up with them needless changing the foundations of what the StarCraft plot progression is about to making needless retcons when slightly different wording would have worked better,

[Robear]

You realize the DTS takes place at the end of the AoE, post-period where the protoss were fighting so fiercely that they devastated entire continents, and that they'd already spread to other planets prior to said period.

Yeah, I guess I was just confused by its portrayal in DTS. Having them using warp gates and traveling between planets didn't mesh at all with the idea of pictograms being a totally new thing to Khas, at least to me. It's been a while since the one time I read it, though.

Never seen "pre-SCG" as a mark of change. Given some of the reactions to SC2, I got the feeling that Ghost was a game that many people forgot even existed.

Heh, I'm basically one of those people who hates change, so at first I hated Ghost's redesigns. Of course, after SC2 was announced, I suddenly realized that I loved Ghost. That said, Starcraft: Ghost: Nova marked a major increase in fake "space slang" swear words— now that the stories are full of "fekking," it feels on the same level as Star Wars novels or something.

(Ghost also changed Zerg blood to green instead of red, and had terrans die completely bloodlessly. I get that it was keep the rating at a T level, but, at the time I didn't like it. WoL's cutscenes brought the Zerg gore and swearing back where it belonged, though; that was good.)