StarCraft: 3.13 and Fenix Impressions

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“I fear no enemy, for the Khala is my strength. I fear not death, for our strength is eternal.”

Fenix's Praetor suit in StarCraft II co-opAfter a minor content drought, StarCraft II has come roaring back with a big update to co-op. The star attraction is a new commander, Fenix.

Well, sort of. It’s not really Fenix; it’s Talandar. But the name “Fenix” is more recognized, so I guess it makes sense that’s what they went with, even if it gives us lore fans eye twitches. Either way, he still captures the essence of the OG Protoss badass.

I had hoped for Selendis next, but I can’t say I’m heartbroken by Fenix. A proper Purifier commander without Karax’s baggage is very welcome.

He’s got some interesting mechanics, too. His theme is around downloading AI consciousnesses between various bodies, which confirms with certainty that Purifiers are Protoss Cylons.

Fenix himself can swap between three bodies at will. Each has their own unique stats and abilities, but they only regenerate health and energy when they aren’t deployed, so you have to swap them out regularly.

Probably a good thing, too, because otherwise I’d never use anything but the Dragoon body. That thing’s damage is nuts.

The army of Fenix in StarCraft II co-opFenix can also call upon AI champions based on the personas of legendary heroes from throughout Protoss history. The champion will inhabit the body of one your units, greatly increasing their stats and granting new abilities. If a champion is killed, it will transfer to another unit of the same time at no cost. So you basically can’t ever lose them.

Each of these is an actual character from within the lore, though some are sufficiently obscure even I barely know who they are. The biggest name is probably Kaldalis, the Ahkundelar champion featured in Reclamation and the Legacy of the Void cinematic.

Unfortunately, they didn’t bring back any of the original voice actors, so Kaldalis, for example, still sounds like a regular Zealot. I realize it’d be a lot of investment for just one commander, but it would have been cool.

They did put a lot of work into his visuals, though. Not only does he have all-new Purifier skins for all his buildings and units, but even a unique UI, which is a first.

I’m still pretty low level, but my initial impressions of Fenix are positive. He’s not as overpowered as he seemed from the initial previews, but he is pretty strong. Like Nova, he’s very versatile, with many viable builds and no obvious weaknesses.

Fenix's Purifiers assault the enemy in StarCraft II co-opSimilarly, he’s probably not going to be my favourite commander, but he is pretty fun. He has a lot of my favourite Protoss units that were either missing or consigned to Karax: Adepts, Scouts, Colossi, Carriers.

I’m sure it’s not the most efficient strategy, but I’ve been having a lot of fun just going for mass infantry. I love the aesthetics of the Protoss warriors (or reasonable facsimiles thereof) heroically charging into battle with Fenix at their head.

My only real concern is that Fenix may be the last Protoss commander to be added. I can’t really imagine what’s left to do with the race at this point, which is a shame because I still want to see Selendis get some love.

Scythe of Amon:

Patch 3.13 also included a surprise new co-op map, Scythe of Amon.

The map’s been getting a lot of criticism for being so similar to Rifts to Korhal, which it definitely is. Go around, kill Void Shards Slivers, and beat the time limit. The bonus objective is an escort mission, with all the annoyance that entails, which doesn’t help, either.

The new Scythe of Amon map in StarCraft II co-opThat said, there are a few things that make it a bit more interesting than Rifts to Korhal. The time limit is tighter, making it more challenging. You have more choice in what order to tackle the objectives in. You have enemy forces of all three races. The Slivers have more diverse and deadly attacks to avoid.

So really it’s an improved version of Rifts to Korhal. If Rifts didn’t already exist, it probably would have been received much better.

It’s very pretty, too. The lighting and rain effects are gorgeous.

The colours, children!

Finally, Blizzard has at long last enabled custom team colours in co-op. It’s the same system as in ladder, meaning it requires some tinkering in the depths of the options menu and then hitting a button next to the mini-map in-game to work, and your ally won’t see what you’ve picked, but it’s still a lot better than just being blue or orange every single game.

I’ve been trying to find the best colour for every commander. I highly recommend white for Fenix. It looks fantastic with the Purifier skins.

Review: The Warcraft Chronicle, Volume Two

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Continuing their efforts to provide a unified record of the vast Warcraft lore, Blizzard has now released the second installment of the Warcraft Chronicle.

Cover art for the Warcraft Chronicle, volume twoThis time, focus shifts away from Azeroth to cover the history of Draenor, before jumping back to Azeroth and reciting the history of the First and Second Wars, up to and including the events of Beyond the Dark Portal.

The first installment was for the most part of a fascinating dive into a lot of mostly unknown lore, but perhaps inevitably, volume two is less impressive.

My favourite part was learning about Draenor’s pre-history. This was for the most part totally new lore, and while it may not have been quite as thrilling as learning of Azeroth’s origins and the days of the Black Empire, it was nonetheless an interesting read. I particularly enjoyed learning the history of the Arrakoa civilization.

However, once it got around to more familiar history, it became much less impressive.

This is perhaps to be expected, as it’s all stuff I’m already familiar with, but the familiarity wasn’t the thing that bothered me most. Quite the opposite, actually.

When this whole Chronicle business started, I had the vague worry this might be another excuse to start retconning everything willy-nilly. Seems I was right to worry.

Much of the history of Draenor leading up to the First War has now been changed. It’s mostly smaller changes more than total rewrites, but when you add up all the little changes, it starts to become a rather different story.

A mighty Sporemound as depicted in the Warcraft Chronicle, volume twoThe intention seems to have been to unify history by incorporating elements of the alternate versions of Draenor seen in Warlords of Draenor and the film, but I’m not sure why they felt the need to do that. Both of those were pretty clearly alternate realities, and attempting to combine all the different versions of Draenor causes more confusion than it solves.

It’s doubly confusing when you consider that neither WoD nor the movie were terribly well-received. I really don’t think any Warcraft lore fan was like, “You know what we need? For Warlords of Draenor to be more canon!”

Hilariously, Garona’s origin story has been retconned yet again. I believe this is the fourth backstory she’s been given now? It’s getting hard to keep count. I think she officially takes the crown as the most heavily retconned part of the Warcraft universe now.

To be fair, most of these retcons don’t make the story any worse. Some even make it better. There’s finally a clear explanation of how the Twilight’s Hammer went from being a Draenic Orc clan to a multi-racial cult of Azerothian Old God worshippers, and it actually makes pretty good sense. I’m glad of that.

But sadly they do invalidate a good chunk of Warcraft literature, including a lot of Christie Golden’s work. And that’s a real shame. Rise of the Horde was one of the better novels.

Where it all began...In the end, volume two of the Warcraft Chronicle occupies an uncomfortable middle ground where the people who are most likely to read it are hardcore lore fans, but the people who are most likely to enjoy it are those with only minimal experience of the lore to date.

Overall rating: 6.2/10