Gameplay:

You can queue maximal 5 production orders.
There are "neutral observatories" which give a sight radius when captured.
Ramps can be blocked by destroyable rocks.

Protoss:

• If the Gateway is upgraded to the Warpgate you can warp a unit every 30 seconds into pylon range.
• Phase Cannons disappear if they leave Pylon range in energy form (although this contradicts Blizzard's statement from last week).
• Cybernetic Core is the tech-building required to build the Stalkers and the Immortals (another contradiction - Blizzard said on E3 the building is the Twilight Council).
• High Templars can stasis enemy troops for 15 seconds.
• Browder said Shield Batteries don't exist, yet.
• Colossi are about double as expensive as Reavers.
• Star Relics are visible when they create a cloaking field and they cannot move while it's active.
• Star Relics can use hallucination.
• Star Relics got a "Detonate" ability, which kills a unit after a certain amount of time.
• The Mothership's current price is: 400 minerals, 400 gas and 10 supply. Both upgrades for it cost 300/300 each.

Terran:

• Cobras can attack air and ground.
• Vikings has low armor when in air-firm.
• Banshees can fire rapidly at ground units.
• Reaper are able to attach a timebomb at units or buildings every 30 seconds. A sign and a red bar show where the bomb is placed. The bomb is destroyable by the opponent.
• It is not decided yet if the Planetary Fortress could attack air too.
• Thor: His special ability is to perform an artillery strike, which uses his four cannons on his back to fire long-ranged projectiles. Nevertheless, he is helpless against air-strikes and he is very slow. He can be killed by a few Cobras because he turns slowly.
• Ghosts: In "sniper-mode" they can kill lonely soldiers or lesser Zerg units with a single hit. They can also call for an air-drop with 8 Marines.
• Blizzard still debates if the medic is implanted. Dustin Browder: "We have to test if they fit Starcraft II and don't mess up the balance."

PS: Edited for easier reading

Err... did you manage to see the new units? And their distinctive capabilities?

Cut him some slack

He's been fighting for the weak against Duke, trusted Mengsk and got betrayed, then screwed a second time by Kerrigan. He became the hero but like the guy from Die Hard 4.0, he did everything, but nobody thanked him. Worse, he got betrayed. At least Zeratul and Tassadar is on his side, but the former was almost killed while the latter is dead already. And now he's got a whole crew on the verse of mutiny. I wouldn't be surprised that he'd aged more than he physically is. Poor Raynor.

Dude, you ever played Starcraft at all? Hydralisk existed way before the what... valiumancer or something. For your information, Starcraft existed BEFORE warcraft 3, and the hydralisks as well as zerglings were included into WC3 as an easter egg. Then DOTARD.. i mean, DOTA put it in the hero list and called it Valiumancer.

So who copied who? Get your facts right dude.

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Added on August 12, 2007, 5:37 pmI was referring to the bleached sideburns.

This post has been edited by soggie: Aug 12 2007, 05:37 PM

Actually, I'm quite amused that you claimed you played starcraft but never knew hydralisks were your valiumancers. I mean... c'mon!

And BTW, DOTA's a mod, which stands for modification, and is built under the Warcraft 3 engine. FYI, it resembles a map in WC3, and thus uses WC3's mechanics. This does not make it a game. Yes, a very popular mod, like Counterstrike is a mod for Half Life (bet you didn't know that huh?), but please don't confuse it as a RTS, because it is NOT an RTS. Thinking it as so would be like calling CS an FPS with an excellent story.

Besides, you don't need to know kerrigan's bra size to know Starcraft. There's a big difference in not knowing the Hydralisk and not knowing Kerrigan's sexual position preference, for obvious reasons.

This is my last pot shot at dotards. Now get back to the discussion!

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Added on August 13, 2007, 10:00 amHydralisk spits spikes. Green spikes to be certain. And it don't spit them. It fires them from their chest cavity. Re-play starcraft, and there is a cinematic with Hydralisks rushing a marine squad in a science vessel. Or, play Starcraft, move your mouse cursor over to the weapon icon in an individual Hydralisk's portrait (the one that shows your weapon upgrade level). Then read the description text (Needle Spines).

There is no indication that Hydralisks ever used any poison or venom at all. Not in the manual, not in the game, not anywhere. I suspect the green stuff is the mucus that goes with the spikes like those drool from aliens.

BTW, I DO think that Hydralisks were inspired by the Aliens from... well, duh, Aliens.

This post has been edited by soggie: Aug 13 2007, 10:00 AM

Well thing about novel spin-offs is sometimes the authors get the facts wrong. I remember reading somewhere about the SC novel's inconsistencies with the official game story, so I don't really consider them canon.

Anyway, how do you think SC2 will change the way SC is played?

In the old SC days, terran was both noob friendly and versatile at the same time. A really good race to invest time into mastering, because of its flexibility. Protoss was more of a hard handed artillery race - sacrificing mobility and flexibility for durability and firepower, while zerg takes on the other extreme. Will this racial philosophy change with SC2? So far I see, the team in SC2 are starting to abandon these racial philosophy and instead cater for more varied playstyle with units like stalkers for protoss (high mobility) and heavier and more durable terran units (marine shield upgrade?).

What do you guys think?

err I think you better watch it again. He got his head impaled from behind by a claw instead of kena acid.

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Added on August 13, 2007, 4:34 pmLook tell you what - if you still insist that it is acid spit, go e-mail Blizzard. Who knows, it might be a huge conspiracy to have us believe that it is needle spines when it is truly acid! Perhaps this would benefit the Zerg when they invade Earth... devilish Blizzard!

To answer your question in a more intelligent manner, cut Blizzard some slack! Design changes now and then, and it is not easy to draw animations in 2D, let alone something so polished as starcraft. Maybe in the early stages they were meant to be spitting acid, but down the line it changed into spines and the sprite didn't get change due to time constraints. Who knows? The game canon says needle spines, so it might do your image a bit better if you just accept it as so.

This post has been edited by soggie: Aug 13 2007, 04:34 PM

Being hot headed sometimes aint nice.

An apology to fujkenasai for the sarcasm!

Let's get back on track. The thing about the new Starcraft is, each race has kind of everything. Fast, mobile but expandable units (zerglings and reapers and maybe stalkers?), siege units, and such, and I fear that when it comes to balancing eventually the differences between races would be only cosmetic. I mean, yep, I love the way the Colossus works, and I know that it might be the reaver replacement, but hell, walking across hills? This gives it the mobility that reavers lack and makes it a hell of a hard unit to fight if you have a technologically inferior army at that time of skirmish.

Wanna discuss about it?

Mobility != Speed.

Reaver move like a turtle and needs shuttle to ferry it around. That's my point - it's weakness, it's mobility. The Colossus can move up hills and such, giving it excellent mobility.

I disagree. How many of us actually use reavers as an anti-building siege unit? More often than not we use them as counters to swarms of small units (e.g. marines/zerglings/hydralisks). The colossus serves the same purpose, with extra mobility. That's why I quoted the colossus. I think it is a fair comparison.

My point being, a reaver needs a shuttle to ferry it around. By itself it doesn't have much of a mobility to talk about. Using a shuttle to ferry it around is a tactic, a way to compensate for its weakness. It is not built in mobility - it is a compensation. Which the colossus don't need.

Anyway, yeah I know overpowered units won't exist in SC2, but well I did kept the discussion going on didn't I?

Wonder if the colossus could walk on water

Does the new protoss still use shuttles? From the looks of it they seemed to have changed to teleporters.

Yeah fields, it just got teleported 40,000 years into the future into Starcraft's era and guess what, they actually loved em.

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Added on August 14, 2007, 10:39 pmActually, I am quite baffled as to how you can compare DOTA to starcraft when you don't know anything about starcraft at all. Firstly, there are no heroes in Starcraft, only units with stronger stats. Secondsly, terrain? Haih, I dun wanna go on lar, I just pity SC for being compared as equals to a mod. Heck, not even warcraft 3 itself can come close to SC's popularity and cult status, and here we have TeckPeow comparing its mod to SC.

But anyway, people make mistakes. Hope you read properly next time my friend, the one who posted the pics DID say it was from SC ONE.

This post has been edited by soggie: Aug 14 2007, 10:39 PM

I'm sure Blizzard will retain the venomancer's skills, making the Hydralisks (or maybe the Hunter Killers) the most uber non-hero unit in the entire game. Talk about ovepowered.

BTW, the marines are actually in WC3 too.

Actually, it is Daggoth's elite Hydralisks. Zasz's brood is more of a special ops type.

No actually, we have no problem with DOTA players in here. I just have a personal problem when DOTA players don't realize that DOTA is a mod and assumes that DOTA and SC are the same thing. And almost killed hizperion when he insisted that Hydralisks are Venomancers.

Protoss communicate psionically, so they don't really need mouth. I just wonder how they eat and err... procreate.

Sigh, after the dotards left, here comes the spammers "

Actually, I noticed that the bulky style exist in every terran unit. Marines for example - even bulkier than their SC1 counterpart. Heck, the siege tank now looks like an artillery platform than an actual tank! Even the buildings gained some fat, but they look great.

The slim wraiths are gone, and the spiny Goliaths replaced with bulky vikings. What else? Ah yes, the reapers. Big arse jumpjets.

I guess that's the new theme for terrans? Bulk.

For the protoss it is much different. Their buildings look more delicate, and sophisticated (artistically). Heck even the colossus exudes style with its archaic built and spidery legs.

Good thing eh?

Well traditionally Protoss is the more durable race, and terrans coming close to seconds (marines with 40 HP vs technicians with 30 HP... and they dare call it power armor). I think the bulk refers not to their durability but to their inferior technology compared to the protoss. Same thing like overengineering things vs precise engineering.

It can be argued that the Protoss are durable only because of their shields, and it makes sense because with the shields giving them extra durability they wouldn't have needed extra metal to protect them right? Not so for the terrans. No shield means they need thicker armor plates. Hehe.

Well it is still in its early stages now, we still don't know the various damage types vs armor types stats yet. In the first gameplay demo, the siege tanks were annihilated because the Immortals have anti-siege tank shields. This gives some indication to what Blizzard intends to do - to make SC a more varied game in which unlike SC1 where siege tank's firepower pwns all type of ground armor, now there are units that are unafraid of the siege tanks's archlite cannons.

I think an ideal way of portraying the siege tank would be to make it vulnerable to melee, strong against small arms and average against heavy weapons. Extra damage from air would be even better . All in all, I would like to see the siege tanks turned into more dedicated artillery units, needing protection from other ground skirmish units like the grounded vikings and thor.

Humans have brains, and psionics communicate directly into your brain. So it's like "hearing" a voice in your head. Think telepathy. As for the Zerg, they don't communicate - the Overmind does all the talking and thinking, and the Overmind's a big eyeball without mouths too. It communicates via psionics too. The thing I can't understand is how Raynor can talk to Zeratul, because obviously the latter don't have ears. Unless the psionics also work on soundwaves... haha

I don't. It limits the effectiveness of the Vikings, which is a good thing. Make the player micro it to send it into the air to face aerial threats. C'mon, dun be lazy!