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The tempest: This unit will ultimately shut down mutalisks entirely for protoss, and will hopefully spark a more dominant protoss in the air, I've always felt that protoss needs to take to the skies more often, and feel like this is a great addition to the protoss arsenal, though once they come out, I'll probably be bitching about how I can't make air units anymore. lol

The Oracle: Oooooh s**t.....The anti-macro unit is going to be devastating, I you thought force fields at your ramp were a pain, try having your tech buildings under phase shift, with a big push coming, good luck trying to make units to defend. Not to mention shutting down your resource gathering, almost instantly.

The preordian I don't think will be too commonly used especially in pro scene when if a pro see's a unit being made at all, or an upgrade being researched, they should already know what it is, simply based on game sense.

I can definitely see these Oracles becoming a huge problem, especially for zerg and in some PvP match ups, but not terribly effective in terran, aside from perhaps using the Entomb ability to waste Terran's CC energy after throwing down multiple mules.


The Replicants I don't expect to see very often in PvZ, and only once in a while for PvP, but I can definitely see them becoming a pivotal unit for PvT by transforming into tanks and perhaps some of the new terran units under certain circumstances. I'll be really excited to see what creative ideas people come up with for use of this unit.

The New Abilities For Protoss:

Arc Shield: Oh good, Protoss gets their own mini PF, it's a good thing mutalisks will become obsolete in PvZ anyways, because I'm pretty sure this ability would shut down a lot of mutalisk harass.

Mass Recall on the Nexus: So protoss will be able to push out with their large forces, and once the odds are no longer in their favour, they can just warp back without the need for a massive investment with the mothership? Or they will instantly be able to defend any one of their outlying bases that is getting attacked, allowing them to spread out their armies across the map more freely, without worrying about leaving their bases undefended? This sounds to me like THE biggest deal for protoss more than any unit or upgrade or ability, I think this new mass recall has the potential to completely change every protoss match up!

However with the mothership and carriers down, I'll be most disappointed to see the mass cloak leave, even though let's face it, we all knew the mothership was not long for this world. It was just such a useless LOL unit that served little to no real purpose. The carrier on the other hand I am really sad to see, I think it just needed some tweaks to find it's usefulness in the game rather than removed entirely, it's just too bad no one found a way to use it effectively.

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The Terran Shredder:Oh good, more splash damage for terran, sounds like they'll be able to not only shut down movement paths with this unit entirely, but it'll help them with turtleing, I think this item is a result of the change made to Thor in order to restrict the mutalisks from becoming too overwhelming. Although it sounds scary for a zerg player, I think this will be a really cool unit that has a lot of potential to change up the game the most out of all the new terran features.

Warhound: Never mind worrying about the loss of your Thors terran, looks like you get some faster ones instead, I actually think this is more balanced than the original thor, it will mean, zerg we'll actually be able to kill these warhounds with zerglings, rather than burning away infinite units trying to put down the mass repaired thors. Though I think it's usefullness in TvP will be mostly ineffective.

The Super Thor: Sounds like a LOL unit too me, but hopefully with the new battlecruiser upgrade someone will find a way to incorporate it, also with terran's ability to mass repair, we could be seeing a potential invincible thor rush in some match ups that which could be devastating for anyone.

Transformed Hellion, just as everyone predicted, do firebats really still have a roll in this game? I dunno, perhaps in some TvZ match ups, but I thought terran was already in good shape to deal with zerglings to begin with, so we'll have to see if people can find a way to use this unit effectively.

Also ghosts are pretty much on their way to becoming a hero unit with an upgrade to their cloak, now being able to regenerate energy while cloaked and being able to use them more effectively based upon specific timings, protoss you thought ghosts were hard to deal with before? They just got a whole lot more scary, I think zergs got a lot to worry about as well. Really expect to see ghosts become more utilized in all match ups, especially with the heavy mech focused additions to their arsenal, with the ghost mech play as strong as it is now, it's scary to think how much worse it's about to become.

Also battle cruiser got a speed upgrade....meh, gunna have to see how effective that speed upgrade really is before I have any kind of opinion on it.

And of course, my favourite part, all of my new zerg goodies, what we zergs have been waiting for, for so long!

The Viper: Or rather the flying defiler? Oh hell yes! With the addition of the swarm host, we'll once again be able to throw down the clouds and protect our units while they get into position to do the sick damages, also giving units like the infestor some cover to get into position for fungals, or for banelings to overrun siege tank lines. Also we have the abduct ability, so we can steal those collosus pulling them out from being protected by the protoss death ball and left vulnerable and easy to snipe. Also the ocular parasite, will make any unit of our choice able to detect? Brilliant, and whats more, it's rumoured to not be a spire unit, but rather made specifically from the lair. Ohohoho, I can hear the protoss and terrans shivering in fear already!

Swarm Host: It's essentially the love child of a lurker and a broodlord, what's not to love?!

The real tastiness though is in our new upgrades.

Baneling tunneling claws? I got three words for you: Mobile burrowed landmines. Ooooh yes, good luck ever moving a ground army without a detector against zerg now.

Hydralisk speed? Thank God! Finally zerg will be able to use those hydras more effectively, without needing to commit so much time and attention to creep spread, it's great to see an old BW upgrade coming back.

Ultralisk charge? Mmmm, I can see those marine balls melting before my eyes already, this is really going to help make the ultralisks less awkward and clumsy, and therefor way more effective at not only getting to the front of the army to soak up hits, but getting into the best possible positions to do exceptional splash damage hits.

And finally Siphon for the corruptors will give them a mid game use against terran while zerg waits for broodlords, but also make them a great unit in big air wars against protoss with an alternate use. I think this is the ability I am most excited to see in action.

I figured I'd post another post to add some stuff to your post instead of adding to my wall of text.

I can only imagine mass recall and the defense buff will cost energy, and we might not be able to use certain ones till we have tech buildings. So, it's not as bad as a PF, but will help with normal cannons a lot, since it's difficult to place cannons behind mineral lines and in front without many pylons.

I feel the Protoss only really got stuff to help vs zerg, and nothing vs terran. But Terran just got a global buff that made PvT even more in favor of Terran than it already is. I. Really. Hate. Ghosts. ********. Ghosts. ********. Ghosts. ********. Ghosts.

I'm guessing we're going to have to wait until the third expo for toss to be balanced vs terran. Sigh.

Tempest - really cool unit, I bet it'll be a lot better than the carrier.

Oracle - I'm going to hate this thing so, so much. gonk

Replicant - ehh...they seem to cost more than they're worth. I could only see them being cost-effective if they were made into spellcasting units like the ghost or the infestor. Imagine PvP with one side able to cast fungal growth and the other EMP; that'd be pretty cool. cool

I don't like the nexus upgrades. Makes muta harass harder, especially with tempests floating around.

Shredder - How much more static defense does terran need?? I'm going to hate these things too.

Warhound - being a zerg player, I don't think I'll have much trouble dealing with this unit, lol.

New thor - dunno how I feel about this one. I'm glad it doesn't have anti-air though.

I like the new hellion transformation, it'll make them more useful. I just hope they compensate by making the hellion more expensive or making the transformation an upgrade. I don't wanna be dealing with super firebats 7 minutes into the game. gonk
Dunno why they even bothered messing with the reaper. Nobody ever uses them.
I'm kind of jealous that terran's getting all of this new, op s**t. Zerg's only got 2 new units and 4 upgrades to existing ones. Woohoo.

Viper - pretty much zerg's answer to giant death-balls. Blind everything with Blinding Cloud while picking off important units like colossi, medivacs, and spellcasters with Abduct. Ocular Parasite is just like the BW Queen's Parasite ability, except with limitations. Kind of hope infected units aren't completely obvious.

Swarm Host - the stuff on this thing's back really grosses me out. Reminds me of all the disturbing photos that the LD got spammed with that one time. Otherwise, I really like this unit. I hope he's tier 2.

Glad they finally made corruptors useful. Wonder how much money can be made off of this new ability. 1/1 for every point of damage would be nice. =D

Banelings can now move underground??? ******** YES!! So many new opportunities and strategies have been provided with just one upgrade. whee

<3 for Hydra speed upgrade.

The Viper is 100x better than the overseer so I don't really care that it's being cut.

I'm glad that the burrow upgrade is a little more important now. Maybe even mandatory if Swarm Hosts need it to burrow.

Yeah, it'd be a pain in the a** to have to research burrow before being able to use them. But still, mobile burrowed banelings and ultralisk charge are huge incentives for the upgrade.

"Swarm Host - the stuff on this thing's back really grosses me out. Reminds me of all the disturbing photos that the LD got spammed with that one time. Otherwise, I really like this unit. I hope he's tier 2. "

There was a thread on TL about this, apparently some people (25% in the poll) get REALLY disgusted from that and might have typtophobia or something. I know what images you're talking about and that s**t is sooo gross, but Swarm Hosts I don't find as bad.

The replicant feels like a joke to toss. They couldn't think of something, so they just gave us something to copy something else. The unit itself, seems very game changing, but I wanted another protoss unit to help counter things. Not a unit that copies terran/zerg units to counter.

The cannons, iirc, is only on your nexus. As in, you activate it on your nexus, and it works from there. Not place on building any building and activate it since they said it gives the nexus extra shield and armor. If it works how you are saying so, I can only imagine it requires a tech structure to work, not just out of the box start the game and you can use it.

Viper is Defiler+, swarm host is lurker+. Zerg lost overseer, but got two new units (overseer isn't exactly an icon for the zerg anyways). Terran had a redone thor, buffs to units, and two new units.

Toss loses TWO units (one of which is a icon for toss. The carrier), replaced with one that will be used probably just as much as the mothership/carrier (tempest), oracle seems like harassment light, but I can see it's uses if it is tweaked a bit and balanced correctly. Replicant is a lame idea, and would much rather have a true protoss unit. Not a protoss unit that turns into something else.

The spell the viper has will probably need to be balanced, but the reducing range to melee doesn't seem op. That ability was in brood war with the defiler. The no casting seems a bit much though.

Last I heard, baneling tunneling claws is hive tech. I have little complaints now.

No comment on battle hellion yet, other than don't roast all me zealots.

Yeah. But if so, it would make the gateway make the majority of our units. Air needs to be explored and balanced I agree, but it just feels like we're back at phase one with the tempest. It's going to be just like the carrier. I honestly don't know why they didn't even try to balance the carrier.