First of all, I love the Mass Recall project going on right now (led by Jones, Telenil, Jimm3110, etc.), and wish nothing more but its successful, glorious completion.
That being said, there's a few things that I've thought about changing, especially since, while playing some SCBW:MR missions, some aspects and possibilities from SC2 are completely thrown out the window for the sake of the "recall". For example, the Mercenary system utilized in the WoL Campaign. Seems like a great aspect that could be tied somehow into the original and Brood War campaigns. Then there are the literally TONS of unused or limited-use units from the Campaigns and the development process(es) of SC1, BW, SC2, and HotS that might just never see the light of day. Tons more stuff.
But that's for another day.
Well, I had a breakthrough while brainstorming, after I had read about how LotV will supposedly be based on a "diplomacy" mechanism, where Zeratul is supposed to unite/placate the different Protoss tribes.
I looked back on the many SC2 Protoss units, and found that there are some based off of the Aiur Khalai scheme (gold+blue), and some of the Dark Templar Nerazim scheme (silver+green).
Well, isn't Episode 4 of the Brood War campaign based on the fact that the Khalai and the Nerazim are getting back together and their technology is merging once again? So why don't the Nerazim have a different tech tree than the Khalai, or at least why do they have the same units with the same palette as the Khalai units?
So I basically created a parallel tech tree for the Nerazim, which contain several of the same units as the Khalai do, but which would have different models, skins, and stats. The Nerazim would end up studying Khalai tech while the player is off on a mission, then a certain branch or a certain unit of the Nerazim tech tree would be updated to contain that new unit for the subsequent missions. So long as the Protoss are together, they could choose to build either the Khalai variant or the Nerazim variant of a unit, but once they're separate so are their tech trees.
This would work even better once, say, Scenario 7 : The Insurgent , comes around. Instead of having just the High Templar, the Arbiters, and the Archons blocked from he Tech Tree, why not have the entire Khalai blocked and force the player to use Nerazim units? Of course, by that time the player will have the whole Nerazim tech tree unlocked, so it'd basically be Nerazim vs. Khalai for that mission.
And as a reward, Scenario 8 would have both tech trees in their entirety once again, just in time for the last mission.
That was basically my idea for a new take on the campaign; any interest in seeing this take place? Comments, critiques?
I'll post have I have so far for the parallel units:
Khalai / Nerazim = unlocked Scenario
NOTE: the "unlocked scenario" number is the number of the BW mission from Episode 4 where the player gets his/her earliest chance to produce that unit, not necessarily how early he/she get to use one in a mission without a Nexus and Probes. For this reason, Scenarios 1 and 5 are not found in the following list, and I think that Scenario 7 (The Insurgent) should have the whole tech tree unlocked.
Probe / (same name, maybe same model?) = 2 Zealot / Dark Templar (In truth, I think this is the best match for these two units.) = 2 Dragoon / Stalker (Yeah, nobody said that the units would completely parallel.) = 3 High Templar / ?? = ? Archon / Dark Archon (Archon is a fighter, Dark Archon is a specialist. Rebalancing is required.) = 7
Observer / ?? (same? Mechanoids don't really need to be that different between the two tribes IMO, but what could be altered here?) = 6? Reaver / ?? = 4? Shuttle / Star Relic (take away the rumored "Phasing Mode" abilities and the OP attack power) = 4
Scout / ?? (could actually be the Corsair, actually, in which case the as-of-yet unnamed Nerazim Arbiter unit would have to be a bomber unit) = 6 (but some used in 5) Carrier / Typhoon (Can't call it the "Tempest" because of the HotS unit, but this would theoretically be the same Tempest as the betas show.) = 7 Interceptor / Shuriken (Because we have yet to see a flying unit do melee damage that isn't suicidal.) = 7
Arbiter / ?? (unsure what, but something that works like the Oracle of HotS does) = ?
xx / Corsair (Introduced in Scenario 3 as the first new unit of Brood War. The fact that it was needed is probably explained by the fact that there is no Khalai parallel unit.) = 3
Oh, and an afterthought: The same way that SC2 randomly generates either a Dark Templar with a single blade or one with a double-scythe at random... that should apply to male / female Protoss infantry, too. Female Zealots, female Dark Templar, female High Templar, WHY NOT?
First of all, I love the Mass Recall project going on right now (led by Jones, Telenil, Jimm3110, etc.), and wish nothing more but its successful, glorious completion.
That being said, there's a few things that I've thought about changing, especially since, while playing some SCBW:MR missions, some aspects and possibilities from SC2 are completely thrown out the window for the sake of the "recall". For example, the Mercenary system utilized in the WoL Campaign. Seems like a great aspect that could be tied somehow into the original and Brood War campaigns. Then there are the literally TONS of unused or limited-use units from the Campaigns and the development process(es) of SC1, BW, SC2, and HotS that might just never see the light of day. Tons more stuff.
But that's for another day.
Well, I had a breakthrough while brainstorming, after I had read about how LotV will supposedly be based on a "diplomacy" mechanism, where Zeratul is supposed to unite/placate the different Protoss tribes.
I looked back on the many SC2 Protoss units, and found that there are some based off of the Aiur Khalai scheme (gold+blue), and some of the Dark Templar Nerazim scheme (silver+green).
Well, isn't Episode 4 of the Brood War campaign based on the fact that the Khalai and the Nerazim are getting back together and their technology is merging once again? So why don't the Nerazim have a different tech tree than the Khalai, or at least why do they have the same units with the same palette as the Khalai units?
So I basically created a parallel tech tree for the Nerazim, which contain several of the same units as the Khalai do, but which would have different models, skins, and stats. The Nerazim would end up studying Khalai tech while the player is off on a mission, then a certain branch or a certain unit of the Nerazim tech tree would be updated to contain that new unit for the subsequent missions. So long as the Protoss are together, they could choose to build either the Khalai variant or the Nerazim variant of a unit, but once they're separate so are their tech trees.
This would work even better once, say, Scenario 7 : The Insurgent , comes around. Instead of having just the High Templar, the Arbiters, and the Archons blocked from he Tech Tree, why not have the entire Khalai blocked and force the player to use Nerazim units? Of course, by that time the player will have the whole Nerazim tech tree unlocked, so it'd basically be Nerazim vs. Khalai for that mission.
And as a reward, Scenario 8 would have both tech trees in their entirety once again, just in time for the last mission.
That was basically my idea for a new take on the campaign; any interest in seeing this take place? Comments, critiques?
I'll post have I have so far for the parallel units:
Khalai / Nerazim = unlocked Scenario
NOTE: the "unlocked scenario" number is the number of the BW mission from Episode 4 where the player gets his/her earliest chance to produce that unit, not necessarily how early he/she get to use one in a mission without a Nexus and Probes. For this reason, Scenarios 1 and 5 are not found in the following list, and I think that Scenario 7 (The Insurgent) should have the whole tech tree unlocked.
Probe / (same name, maybe same model?) = 2
Zealot / Dark Templar (In truth, I think this is the best match for these two units.) = 2
Dragoon / Stalker (Yeah, nobody said that the units would completely parallel.) = 3
High Templar / ?? = ?
Archon / Dark Archon (Archon is a fighter, Dark Archon is a specialist. Rebalancing is required.) = 7
Observer / ?? (same? Mechanoids don't really need to be that different between the two tribes IMO, but what could be altered here?) = 6?
Reaver / ?? = 4?
Shuttle / Star Relic (take away the rumored "Phasing Mode" abilities and the OP attack power) = 4
Scout / ?? (could actually be the Corsair, actually, in which case the as-of-yet unnamed Nerazim Arbiter unit would have to be a bomber unit) = 6 (but some used in 5)
Carrier / Typhoon (Can't call it the "Tempest" because of the HotS unit, but this would theoretically be the same Tempest as the betas show.) = 7
Interceptor / Shuriken (Because we have yet to see a flying unit do melee damage that isn't suicidal.) = 7
Arbiter / ?? (unsure what, but something that works like the Oracle of HotS does) = ?
xx / Corsair (Introduced in Scenario 3 as the first new unit of Brood War. The fact that it was needed is probably explained by the fact that there is no Khalai parallel unit.) = 3
Oh, and an afterthought: The same way that SC2 randomly generates either a Dark Templar with a single blade or one with a double-scythe at random... that should apply to male / female Protoss infantry, too. Female Zealots, female Dark Templar, female High Templar, WHY NOT?
I think the idea is interesting. Doing more than a HD remake of Starcraft 1 might be very interesting ! It might be then more a reboot than a remake.
And as far as you don't modify the story it could be awesome