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So, is the LotV campaign any good?

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I'm planning on buying LotV, but merely for the singleplayer campaign.

Is it worth the money? I loved the Wings of Liberty campaign, but HotS was a bit of a letdown for me...
Does it feel more like WoL or more like HotS?

Feel free to tell me if the story is engaging, but please don't spoiler while doing that.
 

Dr Super Good

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Does it feel more like WoL or more like HotS?
It feels like neither of them. Where as WoL was serious and HotS was devoted, LotV is kind of.... Funny?

I am not kidding you. Despite all the killing going on and the end of the universe fast approaching you will be laughing your head off towards the middle and end of the main campaign. Be it Karrax making fun of the Terran researchers, the Fenix clone recalling his movie ripoff past or Alarak just being sarcastic at you for wasting his time you will find it hard to keep a straight face.

I understand WoL had also its funny moments such as Tychus in the Odin, Tychus being voodooed by Tosh or Horner's poker game wife however none of them come close to how funny LotV is.
 

SpasMaster

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Gonna share my opinion. Before I get into this, I should point out that the Protoss have always been my favorite race in terms of characters, storyline, culture and so on. I have loved their theme and the idea of a technologically advanced spiritual race led by sense of honor and tradition. All ready to give their lives for the greater good of the entire race. I've loved how Tassadar sacrificed his life in Starcraft 1. It gave me this sense of great power and might of the Protoss race. That being said... there are a few points that should be looked at when talking about the LotV campaign experience.

Everything below will be spoiler free
  • Storyline: So the campaign starts in a great way and hypes you up about the events to come. You get a spectacular event with an interesting scene very early in the campaign. It was true to what the Protoss are and it touched me in a deeper level. Unfortunately, to me, that's where it all ends. In terms of storyline, nothing significant happens up until the very end. And I would've been totally ok with that if the end paid off (Note: I am talking about the LotV campaign experience on its own - not the epilogue meant for the entire Starcraft 2). But it didn't. The campaign ended abruptly, without any emotional event. I was stunned at all that build up that was going through the campaign - all of that for an abrupt and devoid of emotion end. You could argue the Epilogue after it is meant to do that, but I'll never agree with it. You have the 3 campaigns for all 3 races and the Epilogue of Starcraft 2. It should not be viewed as a part of the LotV campaign. And while the epilogue was a much nicer wrap up to the overall stroyline, the LotV end was not. It lacked the epic endings of WoL and HotS. It started greatly but ended abruptly.
  • Gameplay: The game experience is unique. The way you select units is different than before and is much more dynamic. I loved that. Each unit had some unique powers to it and you had to make choices for each mission as a player. Again, there is a major negative for me to this section aswell. 75% of the missions in the game followed the same exact structure. Let me explain it this way: Most of the missions had something that I will call POI (Point Of Interest). POIs are points in the map which do or do not contain a structure which has to be either:
    A) Guarded.
    B) Destroyed.
    C) Reclaimed.
    So, where am I going with this? Each mission you have 2-5 POIs that you have to get to and do something with them.
    "Hey, look - 3 disabled structures! Go enable them! (+2 side objectives)"
    "Hey, look - 5 infested structures! Go destroy them! (+3 side objectives)"
    "Hey, look - 2 important structures! Go protect them! (+1 side objective)"
    Each mission felt repetitive, because of the given objectives. The replayability came from the AI and the units it used against you. In each mission, you had to consider what units you will construct, but that wasn't due to the map strucure, layout and objectives, but rather because of the units the AI was throwing at you.
    There are the other 25% of the missions which were your typical "Defend your base", "Control your Heroes" objectives. Despite being present in every single campaign in Starcraft 1 and Starcraft 2, they felt like a breath of fresh air due to the repetitiveness of the objectives in the rest of the missions.

As I was playing through, I felt these problems, but I was closing my eyes and moving on for the hope of an epic conclusion to the Protoss storyline AND the Starcraft 2 story as a whole. Ended up disappointed on the one side and left wanting for more on the other.

That's my take on it.
 

Dr Super Good

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Looking at the end they might have decided to change it half way. Specifically at the start the last Aiur missions was probably meant to be with Raynor, Kerrigan and Artanis as they faced off against Amon and his new body which was activated at the end of Aiur 5. Instead they decided to have that body destroyed by an orbital attack and have the other Protoss guys help you out.

They then came up with the Void epilogue where you face Amon with the over powered Kerrigan so they could show off some other stuff and explain some final plot points (Amon doing what he does because he had his original life taken away from him when he ascended).

You may even find Aiur 4-6 were originally meant to be with Raynor and Kerrigan but they were pushed back to Epilogue 1-3 instead.

This change is obvious by how un-polished the Aiur 6 and Epilogue 2 missions are. Specifically Alarak and Artanis have the tendency to suicide solo right at the start of the missions leaving their boarders without a hero for as good as all the mission. Karax also has no real place in Aiur 6 and his VO is clearly incomplete in Aiur 4, using campaign style quotes for his pissed sayings instead of unique content like Alarak does.
 
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Small spoilers.

Coming from Starcraft 1, I feel the story really went... haywire.

From Starcraft 1 the story was about 3 distinct different races with a mysterious Xel'Naga hanging around in the background, being mostly defeated by the Zerg.
Like one other person commented, in Starcraft 1 you were mostly grapsing to stay alive, in LOTV you were doing a cakewalk over your enemy, you never really feel threatened.

In LOTV, the Xel'Naga is back in the form of A GREAT GREAT EVIL, spoken about in PROPHECIES and the history has already been written, that the QUEEN OF BLADES is the CHOSEN ONE.

I just felt it took the story to far away from what Starcraft is and more into a religious prophecy fantasy with space marines mixed into it.

If the way to remove Amon's grasph from the protoss was to get their hair cut, shouldn't the protoss be able to cut the hair off the corrupted protoss folks quite easily?

Why does the Queen of blades, the commander of the Zerg, have such a small army?

Why is the GOLDEN ARMADA so small?

Where are the Terrans in all of this? Amon is the biggest threat to the entire universe, and all we see of the other races are either under the control of Amon, a small part Kerrigan and Raynor in a few missions.

And why does Artanis suddenly become involved in an alliance with the Queen of Blades, the person who have betrayed the protoss multiple times?
 

Dr Super Good

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in LOTV you were doing a cakewalk over your enemy, you never really feel threatened
Someone seems to have overlooked the "Brutal" pulldown menu option...

If the way to remove Amon's grasph from the protoss was to get their hair cut, shouldn't the protoss be able to cut the hair off the corrupted protoss folks quite easily?
As Zeratul proved, no. It would be like trying to pull teeth from an awake Lion, it will not go well. Especially instead of teeth, claws and strength they have plasma blades, shields and psionic strength.

Good luck even reaching the ones controlling the Golden Amada. They will not hesitate to fire their phase disruption beam at you and do not care if you are turned into a pile of burned jelly.

Why does the Queen of blades, the commander of the Zerg, have such a small army?
Most of it was killed by Warfield on Charr during her absence when they went feral (shooting fish in the barrel with his Battlecruisers). The remainder suffered heavy casualties during the attack on the Imperial Palace as Mengsk threw everything the Dominion had at them. Finally all remaining Zerg that were not under her absolute control defected to Amon, and proceeded to mercilessly attack her forces. Let us not forget that she probably ran into Amon's Golden Amada more than once as it tore up the sector, and those Protoss ships are filled with anti-Zerg weaponry as seen in WoL.

Why is the GOLDEN ARMADA so small?
It is small? You only ever destroy a tiny part of it that attack you in Aiur 6. The rest was still in space. In fact most of it was attacking the Spear of Adun, by literally kamikaze attacking it to the point that the ship was forced to hobble away before the solar core exploded.

Where are the Terrans in all of this? Amon is the biggest threat to the entire universe, and all we see of the other races are either under the control of Amon, a small part Kerrigan and Raynor in a few missions.
The Terrans were being totally wasted by a combination of merciless Mobius (with Hybrid) assaults and the Golden Amada. On top of that Valarian was still having problems consolidating power and rebuilding after the madman of a father he had fell so the Dominion had extremely limited military capabilities to the point that all they could do was try their best to keep people alive in the Dominion core planets.

The UED was not involved at all. The only UED person that knows what was happening was Alexi who was right beside Kerrigan as one of her Zerg generals. Further more the combined efforts of Amon's Mobius, Zerg and Golden Amada would not have even scratched the UED fleet which is not only vastly technologically superior to the Dominion but also several orders of magnitude larger than the Golden Amada. Amon only focused on the sector, and it is not even clear if he would go beyond it.

And why does Artanis suddenly become involved in an alliance with the Queen of Blades, the person who have betrayed the protoss multiple times?
Because he realises that she is now a very different person from what he knew. The old Queen of Blades was not Kerrigan, but rather a product of Amon entrapping Kerrigan within. The new Queen of Blades was Kerrigan. Even then, he was still reluctant to accept this, watching her suffer for extended periods before intervening.

Also by the looks of things she was a non-threat to Artanis in person. Artanis could probably solo her any day as he appears physically a lot more capable than Kerrigan. So much for perfect form...
 
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