Are Dragoons "Realistic?"

[Turalyon]

I have always interpreted the manual more or less literally even though I think the numbers have always been questionable.

Isn't this just an admission that you interpret things that support your preference (confirmation bias) though? Grad does have a point. You question the numbers (low millions at most for the apparently largest brood) of the Zerg broods because it doesn't meet your preference for the Zerg being a "galactic power" whilst on the other hand, don't doubt that the number (hundreds) of worlds that the Protoss conquered doesn't necessarily mean they are a "galactic power" (they could just watch them or left them to their original inhabitants as part of their Dae'Uhl but considered them as part of their territory, afterall) because you prefer to see the Protoss' feats as being something that only a "galactic power" can do.

[Mislagnissa]

Isn't this just an admission that you interpret things that support your preference (confirmation bias) though? Grad does have a point. You question the numbers (low millions at most for the apparently largest brood) of the Zerg broods because it doesn't meet your preference for the Zerg being a "galactic power" whilst on the other hand, don't doubt that the number (hundreds) of worlds that the Protoss conquered doesn't necessarily mean they are a "galactic power" (they could just watch them or left them to their original inhabitants as part of their Dae'Uhl but considered them as part of their territory, afterall) because you prefer to see the Protoss' feats as being something that only a "galactic power" can do.

We are all biased if that be the case. The manual is annoyingly vague and sometimes inconsistent, which isn’t helped by the inconsistencies and retcons introduced by the games and expanded universe materials. I interpret things differently from Gradius, but that doesn’t make him more right.

I certainly have difficulty articulating myself. Long story short, I interpret the zerg and protoss as galactic powers who sent token forces to Koprulu sector.

[Gradius]

You’re in a rough spot though because I feel like you want SC to be like WH40k and it’s clearly not.

[Turalyon]

Long story short, I interpret the zerg and protoss as galactic powers who sent token forces to Koprulu sector.

Ok then, if we consider this you have to consider Grads other point. How would you reconcile this interpretation with the continued existence of the Terrans and maintenance of this three-way tussle when the Terrans are not a "galactic power"? The manual seems to position the Terrans as being the weakest and most limited in terms of power and scope, so we can't use any vagueness of the manual to even interpret the Terrans as being a galactic power. It's all easy and good to say their tenacity will see them through, but if you're trying to do an "honest" interpretation of what you have in the manual, then that's an "unrealistic" handwave just like any other established conceit that's been contrived to have them engage each other on the first place. The Zerg will never be able to capture any psionics from the Terrans/gain their determinant because if they do, by your interpretation, they'd be "realistically" wiped out and easily done so. The manual may suggest a three-way war but it doesn't necessarily suggest that they're equal or that the status-quo will/should be maintained.

[Mislagnissa]

You’re in a rough spot though because I feel like you want SC to be like WH40k and it’s clearly not.

I do not think I ever wanted that. WH40K has a ridiculous scale where countless planets are lost due to rounding errors in the bureaucratic process. StarCraft was always much smaller. I like having the Koprulu wars be a smaller scale thing with dozens of worlds in the balance rather than millions because that is impossible for my limited mind to comprehend.

That said, StarCraft has always maintained a pretense of galactic significance even if the execution ended up botching that by making single characters or planets responsible for the fate of the observable universe. On the '96 website the terrans and protoss were both implied to hold large territories. The terrans, for example, held Earth, Tau Ceti and the Koprulu sector.

The SC1 manual had a much smaller scale of "over a dozen" planets in the Koprulu "sector". The three terran homeworlds of Umoja, Moria and Tarsonis were located in the same star system. The naming of some planets with Roman numerals suggested that either this system had multiple stars or that the terrans expanded to nearby systems.

But back to another point I had which you have not addressed to my satisfaction: why do you think the zerg would not create new breeds derived from terran genes? How else do you think they would make use of the determinant?

I made that assumption based on the zerg's past behavior. When they encounter new species with useful traits, they assimilate those traits. This can range from the species' basic body plan being used as a chassis (which is what the "core genus" refers to) or splicing useful traits into existing breeds. Not only that, but the zerg selectively breed their creations to maximize their potential. Obviously they cannot create new traits on demand this way otherwise they would never assimilate other species to acquire new traits, but as we know from domesticating and breeding animals on Earth this can create dramatic changes in gross anatomy (e.g. compare the Chihuahua with the Saint Bernard).

For example, during development of SC2 the infestor, swarm host and blightbringer all derived from the same development path. The blightbringer model was the one reworked into the infestor and swarm host models. You can see a clear resemblance.

Therefore, it stands to reason that the zerg would apply the same experimentation to the terrans. There are loads of possibilities for this: e.g. breeds with a terran core genus, breeds with terran genes added to a different core genus, or breeds created by conjoining multiple terrans for that extra bit of body horror.

Ok then, if we consider this you have to consider Grads other point. How would you reconcile this interpretation with the continued existence of the Terrans and maintenance of this three-way tussle when the Terrans are not a "galactic power"? The manual seems to position the Terrans as being the weakest and most limited in terms of power and scope, so we can't use any vagueness of the manual to even interpret the Terrans as being a galactic power. It's all easy and good to say their tenacity will see them through, but if you're trying to do an "honest" interpretation of what you have in the manual, then that's an "unrealistic" handwave just like any other established conceit that's been contrived to have them engage each other on the first place. The Zerg will never be able to capture any psionics from the Terrans/gain their determinant because if they do, by your interpretation, they'd be "realistically" wiped out and easily done so. The manual may suggest a three-way war but it doesn't necessarily suggest that they're equal or that the status-quo will/should be maintained.

Yes, the Koprulu war is contrived and always has been. What matters is whether you can convince the audience to suspend disbelief with sufficiently palatable reasoning.

The forces present in the Koprulu sector are contrived to be roughly balanced against one another as in game play, barring plot powers like psi-disruptors and the carriers' planet-glassing laser. If the terrans got their act together, they could repel the alien threat (this is stated in the Liberty's Crusade novel).

The zerg and protoss are not going to invest undue amounts of resources in this conflict. The conflict with the terrans is not a real war to them: it is a harvest or pest control.

The narrative has always flip-flopped over how seriously the protoss empire took the threat of the zerg prior to the invasion of Aiur, but we can assume this is considered pest control as far as their civilization is concerned. The terran sympathizer faction dragged the conflict out by forcing the templar to fight the zerg conventionally so that the terrans may be protected. The callous purifier faction made things worse when judicators like Syndrea decided to start a civil war that weakened their forces against the zerg and terrans.

The zerg are going to focus on acquiring the determinant, but after getting it they are not suddenly going to dedicate their resources to exterminating the terrans. Most of their resources will be focused on preparing the swarms to invade the protoss empire. The games and expanded universe may have trivialized the time it takes for them to research and develop new weapons (Shadow of the Xel'naga depicted the zerg infesting a domestic dog and then mass cloning it into an army of what were essentially banelings within what could not have been more than a few days), but for the purposes of storytelling we can assume the time is whatever we need to tell a good story of how they made their new weapons. Whatever broods remain to continue the harvest of Koprulu's biospheres will not be those of strategic importance.

[Turalyon]

The forces present in the Koprulu sector are contrived to be roughly balanced against one another as in game play, barring plot powers like psi-disruptors and the carriers' planet-glassing laser. If the terrans got their act together, they could repel the alien threat (this is stated in the Liberty's Crusade novel).

Aren't you basing it solely on the manual though? If you were, the Terrans were never contrived, implied nor suggested to be anywhere near a level playing field with either the Zerg or the Protoss. If the Zerg and Protoss are assumed galactic powers, the K-sector Terrans cannot also be assumed to be the same. They're isolated, have fewer numbers and nowhere near the raw power as any of the two, as suggested by the manual.

The zerg and protoss are not going to invest undue amounts of resources in this conflict. The conflict with the terrans is not a real war to them: it is a harvest or pest control.

That's because both of those races know they can curbstomp the Terrans at any time. It kinda undermines the whole "3 equal sides battling each other" shtick you're supposedly aiming for doesn't it?

The narrative has always flip-flopped over how seriously the protoss empire took the threat of the zerg prior to the invasion of Aiur, but we can assume this is considered pest control as far as their civilization is concerned. The terran sympathizer faction dragged the conflict out by forcing the templar to fight the zerg conventionally so that the terrans may be protected. The callous purifier faction made things worse when judicators like Syndrea decided to start a civil war that weakened their forces against the zerg and terrans.

I agree with the first point about the Protoss' estimation of the threat the Zerg posed. Not sure about your reimagining/rebooting of New Gettysburg as the Terrans "forcing" the Protoss templar to fight the Zerg though, since I can't imagine the Terrans having any influence of any kind on the Protoss based on what we get solely from the manual. It makes more sense if there was a defector in this callous purifier faction as represented in the Sc1 we did get in the form of bleeding-heart, Tassadar. I'm also not sure about foisting the blame of the civil war on the Judicators as it renders it too simplistically and not so different from what we did get (afterall, you do view Aldaris as nothing more than two-bit villain - which I disagree on). I've always liked to consider Tassadar as the reason for why the Protoss are in such a pickle as they become are in Sc1. If he had followed orders from the get-go, the Zerg could've (not would've mind you) been more manageable as in the Zerg may never have had enough time to find their determinant due to their infestation of Terran worlds be speedily responded to with purification fire. Tassadar was the one to then enlist the DT, a cultural sore-spot that has never healed, and bring them back at a time of an unprecedent crisis (an alien invasion of their world!), so it's really he that started the civil war if anything. Can one still consider Tass a "hero" if all he really did was just fix up the mess that he himself had a part in creating?

The zerg are going to focus on acquiring the determinant, but after getting it they are not suddenly going to dedicate their resources to exterminating the terrans. Most of their resources will be focused on preparing the swarms to invade the protoss empire.

I used this very same argument to counter a previous position you stated in another thread in which you denied the very same thing you're saying now because the Zerg would further "purify the strains" by destroying the now useless race they encountered after acquiring what they wanted from them. Sounds like you're back-flipping...

[Mislagnissa]

You misunderstood a few of my points.

The forces currently present in Koprulu are balanced against one another as in gameplay. Gameplay trumps lore. Consider the Vietnam war, where the USA lost against an inferior force despite having nukes at the time. Same principle applies here. There may be extreme decadence and arrogance inhibiting otherwise competent leaders.

By “terran sympathizer” I mean the protoss who sympathize with the terrans, e.g. Tassadar and Andraxxus. You are parsing the grammar wrong and I don’t know how to better articulate it. Maybe if we spoke Latin...

I don’t like how the narrative shrunk the scale so that one person was key to a entire empire’s conflict. War is more complicated than that, but history books have to condense things. The writing of that whole plot definitely could have used more work.

The zerg will still have broods exterminating the terrans, but it won’t be the important conflict. We don’t spend our military budget on pest control or mining, after all.

[Gradius]

why do you think the zerg would not create new breeds derived from terran genes? How else do you think they would make use of the determinant?

It could be integrated to every Zerg strain instead of making a new breed specifically. It could be used for a battlefield commander like Kerrigan to cripple enemy morale.

But infested humans were never promised in the manual. The only thing the manual said was that the Overmind was afraid of the protoss military and there are other ways to get around it. Looking for Terran psychics is just an excuse for the races to meet up.

[Turalyon]

The forces currently present in Koprulu are balanced against one another as in gameplay. Gameplay trumps lore.

Thought you were invoking gameplay-story/lore segregation given that most of your grief with Sc1 is in regard to the story/setup not matching between the manual and the story in the game.

Consider the Vietnam war, where the USA lost against an inferior force despite having nukes at the time. Same principle applies here. There may be extreme decadence and arrogance inhibiting otherwise competent leaders.

Not really an appropriate analogy since it's such a broad generalisation you're making here. The Terrans are not at a home advantage, are exposed and have no awareness of their enemy along with their general inferiority as a fighting force and limited number compared to their alien opponents. The aliens/superior force also have no compunction in using their superweapons against the Terran either. Sure the Protoss may have an internal pressure that could mitigate the use of such weapons (eg: in the case of mutinous elements within the army like Tassadar) but that's only one element. The Protoss didn't have domestic pressure or general incompetency affecting their capabilities until that mutinous element (ie: Tassadar) reared itself. As to the Zerg, they are even less likely to be defeated by decadence or arrogance (unlike the Overmind's pursuit of its determinant in Sc1 - which was an act of hubris that ultimately contributed to its defeat) if their task was simply to wipe out the Terrans.

By “terran sympathizer” I mean the protoss who sympathize with the terrans, e.g. Tassadar and Andraxxus.

Definitely my bad here.

I don’t like how the narrative shrunk the scale so that one person was key to a entire empire’s conflict. War is more complicated than that, but history books have to condense things. The writing of that whole plot definitely could have used more work.

Thing is, we're talking about story and narratives. Unfortunately, you have to focus it on single characters if you want the narrative to have momentum and to be engaging. A story without a protagonist is not much of a story since it'll all just be about stuff in general. Sure, you can focus on smaller stories of generals/individuals in a single battle in that war (which I wouldn't mind) but then it wouldn't address appropriately address the big things the manual hints at. I dunno, it seems like you want to address the "big things" the manual hints at but not directly address/sideskirt them at the same time.

The zerg will still have broods exterminating the terrans, but it won’t be the important conflict. We don’t spend our military budget on pest control or mining, after all.

But that's part of the issue of you wanting it to be an equal three-way war at all times. If the Terran aren't important or that the Zerg have acquired what they want from the Terrans, it's not exactly an equal three-way war anymore. It's pointless having the Terrans involved at all if they contribute nothing else but being pests (if they're even that) that can really just be ignored.

[ragnarok]

It could be integrated to every Zerg strain instead of making a new breed specifically. It could be used for a battlefield commander like Kerrigan to cripple enemy morale.

But infested humans were never promised in the manual. The only thing the manual said was that the Overmind was afraid of the protoss military and there are other ways to get around it. Looking for Terran psychics is just an excuse for the races to meet up.

I thought the Overmind merely wanted to assimilate human psionics because it was like a stop-gap solution (since assimilating the protoss didn't seem to work just yet)