Karune, Blizzard’s RTS Community Manager, has released a 9th batch of answers. Now that BlizzCon is over, and the Terran race has been officially introduced, Karune is asking for questions about the Terrans.

Terran questions are open for discussion now in Q&A batches, so to all the Terran lovers out there, “Fire Away” on the questions!

There are six answers in this batch, a 20% increase! A cause for celebration, indeed.

1) In the gameplay video the UI is toggled on/off several times. Will that be an option in-game?

 

Currently, the UI will only toggle off during game cinematics. There are currently no plans to implement this for single-player or multiplayer as it would give some players an advantage over others.

I don’t see how this could give anyone an advantage, since all players would have access to the toggle. This feature is already present in many recent RTS games, including Command and Conquer 3 and Supreme Commander (which actually has a completely modable GUI).

2) Will the Twilight Archon have abilities?

 

Yes. In the BlizzCon build, the Twilight Archon had the feedback ability. We are still doing much work on this unit, so none of this is final.

A useless question: We’ve already heard about the Archon’s feedback ability in BlizzCon. Nevertheless, we’re glad to see that the unit that represents a merge between High and Dark Templars is going to be more interesting that StarCraft 1’s Archon.

3) Can Protoss Units be attacked during the Warp-In process?

 

Yes. When units are warping in, the unit will increase in hit points until they are at max hit points and at that point youll be able to control the unit.

 

4) Will there be some old units from StarCraft be included in the Map Editor for StarCraft II?

 

There will be units included in the Map Editor which will not be in the standard multiplayer skirmish mode. These will include various units from the original StarCraft, such as the Protoss Dragoon.

 

5) Will different races have different max-squad caps?

 

Currently all 3 races will have the same maximum population cap at 200.

 

6) Can the Planetary Fortress lift off?

 

Once the Command Center has been upgraded to be a Planetary Fortress, it can no longer lift off. Furthermore, the Planetary Fortress cannot be changed back into a normal Command Center with lift off capabilities.

Since people have heard about the Planetary Fortress upgrade, they’ve been fantasizing about mobilizing it to the front lines and using it as a heavily armed, heavily fortified assault weapon. Karune now verifies that this won’t actually happen in the game… though, again, this has already been known since BlizzCon.

Related Posts:

• » Battle Report 3: StarCraft 2 is Freaking Awesome
• » Karunology: EMP Vs Protoss Shields; Q&A 52: MapMaker Series
• » StarCraft 2 Beta Key Contests: 38 Beta Keys to Earn
• » Death Animations, StarCraft 2 Q&A 51 and Fansite Q&A 5

6 Comments to “Q&A 9: GUI, Archon, Warp-In, Map Editor, Pop-Cap, Lift off”

1. Eros — August 11, 2007 @ 5:07 pm
   

   Aaah.. *snif* dragoons… i missed you so much

   But anyway, a question that could be lead from that one is:
   Will the Starcraft 1 units be at the SC1 quality or in a superior visual quality? Because if they’ll be on superior quality i wanna see ALL units!

2. whiteknight — August 11, 2007 @ 11:41 pm
   

   er
   what is UI ?

3. ArgamgedBunny — August 11, 2007 @ 11:52 pm
   

   That what you clicky on, when playing the game.
   UI – User Interface.

4. Longhorn — August 12, 2007 @ 5:14 am
   

   GUI = Graphical User Interface

5. whiteknight — August 13, 2007 @ 12:51 am
   

   i have heard that
   Duke
   from
   sc 1 will come back as dragoon

   so he will be only one dragoon in the game

   PS. not sure

6. Asker — August 17, 2007 @ 1:01 am
   

   Have these questions been asked already and if so, are there any answers?
   - Can reapers jump over buildings?
   - Can the cobra’s speed be upgraded?
   - Can the falling debris damage units that are under them?
   - Can the timed-grenades of the reapers be destroyed before they explode?