Starcraft II Dev Tracker

VERSUS (BALANCE TEST MOD ONLY!)

• Zerg
  • Baneling
    • Weapon damage changed from 18(+17 vs light) to 15(+20 vs light).
• Protoss
  • Oracle
    • Revelation duration increased from 15 seconds to 20 seconds.
  • Void Ray
    • Cost decreased from 250/150 to 200/150.
    • Void Ray build time decreased from 43 to 37 seconds.
    • Movement speed increased from 3.5 to 3.85.
    • Flux Vanes movement speed increased from 4.65 to 5.11.
  • Carrier
    • Interceptors belonging to a Carrier that has been Neural Parasited will no longer draw aggression from units belonging to the Carrier’s original owner.
  • Tempest
    • New upgrade found on the Fleet Beacon: Tecto...

Defeated and captured by a formidable opponent, Ghost operative Stone must fight to escape a prison created by his own mind. Check out this excerpt, then download Waking Dreams by E.C. Myers, second in a new series of StarCraft II short stories to celebrate the game's 10th anniversary.

Stone knows who is on the other side of the door before it opens.

He’s heard the explosions and gunfire, the panicked reports from Defenders of Man troopers that a ghost has infiltrated General Carolina Davis’s compound, the deafening silence on the comms as they fell in battle. The Dominion agent can have only one target, and Stone is the general’s last line of defense.

General Davis and the Defenders of Man are humanity’s best hope against...

Part I: Wings of Liberty | Part II: Heart of the Swarm | Part III: Legacy of the Void

Part I: Wings of Liberty | Part II: Heart of the Swarm | Part III: Legacy of the Void

In our last article, we went through the best competitive games of the formative years of StarCraft II. As gameplay advanced and mechanics were honed, StarCraft II’s first expansion, Heart of the Swarm, loomed. With the addition of now-iconic units such as Widow Mines, Vipers, and Oracles, StarCraft was about to get a lot more dynamic. Here are our picks for the best games from this era.

2013

INnoVati...

Part 1: Wings of Liberty | Part II: Heart of the Swarm | Part III: Legacy of the Void

Everyone remembers the first time they saw the StarCraft II announcement trailer. For some of us at Blizzard, it was during an internal Show & Tell session when the cinematics team revealed what they were working on. For others, it was May 19, 2007, when the cinematic debuted onstage at a StarCraft tournament in South Korea. Either way, we all saw the same thing. Tychus Findlay stepped into that now-famous gunmetal chamber and was outfitted with complex mechanical armor. The cigar moved around in his mouth.

“Hell, it’s about time,” he said (in Korean, for those of us watching the tournament).

From that primordial moment, StarCraft II would go on to hold a position of prominence within the storied arc of Blizzard esports. The competitive scene took off when the game entered beta in 2010; ten years later, it’s still going strong.

As StarCraf...

Investigating a strange death among the protoss, High Executor Selendis must face a difficult truth about her people in order to stop an unexpected enemy. Check out this excerpt, then download One People, One Purpose, first in a new series of StarCraft II short stories to celebrate the game's 10th anniversary.

“High Executor, there has been a death.”

Selendis considered the protoss who had spoken, sunk to one knee on the newly replaced stones of the temple square. He wore light armor that looked new in manufacture but old in design, the sort of Golden Age style that had recently come into fashion among some of the Templar—or rather, former Templar. She did not approve of such backward-looking styles; her own armor was just as new,...

GENERAL

• Countdown to Start Timer
  • In Versus games, a short countdown timer will now count down to the beginning of the game after all players have loaded.
• Game Server Choice on Lobby Creation
  • Lobby hosts may now select their game server when creating a custom lobby.
  • Note: Requires enabling an option in your “Language and Region” options.
• New Announcer: White-Ra
  • “More GG, More Skill”
• New Announcer: Stone
  • A Dominion Ghost with a mysterious past. He is simply known as "Stone".

NEW CAMPAIGN ACHIEVEMENTS

• A new campaign achievement has been added for every mission in Wings of Liberty, Heart of the Swarm, Legacy of the Void, and Nova Covert Ops. Upon completion of all 10th Anniversary Campaign Achievements, players will receive the new Stone announcer.
• Note: These achievements c...

Ten years isn’t terribly long in Supercarrier-crossing-the-galaxy time. But here on Earth, it’s pretty significant—10 years of playing, developing, and straight-up loving StarCraft II. The decade has spanned 3 full titles, more than a hundred major tournaments, and countless custom maps and mods. Those are some milestones worthy of celebration.

If you want to join us in looking back and looking ahead, we’ve got a few plans:

...

GENERAL

• Custom Campaigns
  • A new genre has been added for Arcade maps called “Campaign”. (Introduced in the 4.13 PTR)
  • StarCraft II now supports transitioning a multiplayer lobby between two maps. For more information, see here. (Introduced in the 4.13 PTR)
  • A new subsection under “Custom” has been added called “Campaigns”, and displays maps published using the “Campaign” genre.
• Editor Improvements (Introduced in the 4.13 PTR)
  • This update includes the largest number of Editor changes we’ve ever introduced. For more informa...

EDITOR UPDATE

We’re excited to announce a major update to the StarCraft II Map Editor!

Since Wings of Liberty, your feedback has been consistent: The Editor should be easier to use. This patch aims to address this feedback without losing depth of customization. As such, we’ve absorbed elements from the Warcraft III editor designed for ease of use without sacrificing existing capability of the StarCraft II Editor. We have also expanded the SCII Editor’s capability even further.

We encourage map makers and mod makers to jump in, explore, and send us your feedback as we’re always interested in adding more exciting changes in the future. This is the largest Editor update we've ever made, and we're excited to hear what you think! Below is an overview of some of the exciting new features. It is critical for us to get feedback about how your maps are behaving with these changes. So please try publishing your custom maps to the PTR and let us know if you run into...

As we mentioned in the War Chest 6 announcement, we’re teaming up with Wardi (@Wardixo) and committing $150,000 of War Chest proceeds to a community-run t...

VERSUS

• Maps
  • Golden Wall LE
    • Expanded the Reaper path near the natural base locations to require more than one structure for a wall off.
  • Heavy Artillery LE
    • Updated the terrain in the middle of the map to allow for increased maneuverability.

BUG FIXES

• Collection
  • Fixed an issue where the default skin for the Armory had altered textures.
• War Chest 6
  • Fixed an issue where several Ihan-rii structure models would appear to warp-in/out during their warp-in animation.
  • RCZ Spine Crawlers will now correctly have range indicators displayed with their pre-placement models.
  • Tyrador Missile Turrets will now correctly have range indicators displayed with their pre-placement models.
  • Th...

The StarCraft II War Chest is here, with new skins and a brand-new community tournament! In addition to granting you access to a bounty of goodies—like new skins, sprays, emojis, and more—War Chest 6 allows you to lend some crucial support to War Chest Team League, an upcoming community tournament we’re bringing you in partnership with Wardi. Read on to find out what’s coming, how War Chest works, and details on what you can unlock. Is this your first War Chest? Check out the full explainer at the bottom of the post.

SUPPORT COMMUNITY-RUN
STARCRAFT II ESPORTS

Our goal for War Chest 6 is to make War Chest Team League a success. To that end, we’re committing the first USD $150,000 of the proceeds (less taxes) to prizing and tournament operations for the event. We’ll have full details about the tournament in another upcoming post, but in short, we’re selecting 9 prominent StarCraft II commentators to draft teams of four players each, who will then duke it o...

GENERAL

• The War Chest 6 has been added in preparation for its global launch on June 11, PDT.
  • Play StarCraft II to unlock XP for the War Chest and gain access to over 100 new items including army-wide skins, sprays, emoticons, exclusive portraits, and a Co-op XP boost.
  • Purchasing the War Chest Complete Bundle grants you a special random race Broken World banner in StarCraft II, plus a Tal’darim Probe Pet in Diablo III, a Hearthstone Classic Card Pack, and a Heroes of the Storm rare Loot Chest. In addition, purchasing any War Chest Skin Bundle will grant you an immediate access to Ranked play.
  • Also, throughout the duration of the War Chest 6, players will be able to unlock free rewards, including classic StarCraft: Remastered skins for Command Center, Hatchery, and Nexus, with no additional purchase necessary.
• 2020 Ladder Season 2 has started with Patch 4.12.0. Learn more about the ...

*NOTE: Upon further consideration, we’ll be swapping out Purity and Industry for Eternal Empire in the upcoming 2020 Ladder Season 2 map pool.

2020 Ladder Season 2 brings new 1v1 and Team maps to ladder!

These maps will be available for playtesting or exploration in the Custom Games section of Multiplayer today. Below are some descriptions from the creators of the maps. Please click on the images to see the detailed views.

Marras:...

Greetings StarCraft fans,

Last month, we put together our thoughts on the current state of the game and proposed some changes we’ve been considering for the next balance patch. In addition, we tried something a bit different and sponsored WardiTV’s Balance Test Mod Invitational to help gather additional feedback and observe the proposed changes in a professional setting. Today, we’d like to share which changes will make it to live in a future patch, which was based both on your feedback and what we saw from the BTM Invitational. Specifically, we’ll address the two major pieces of feedback we’ve received regarding the patch, which includes:

...

Update on May 6, 2020

• Fixed an issue where burrowed Widow Mines were always revealed before an Armory was built.
• Fixed an issue where an overcharged Shield Battery would only restore 3 shields per point of energy instead of the intended 6.
• Baneling’s anti structure damage will no longer be affected by armor.

Update on April 30, 2020

• Fixed an issue where multiple Shield Batteries could target the same unit.
• A range indicator for the Battery Overcharge ability will now always display when a Nexus is selected.

First and foremost, we hope everyone is staying safe in these unprecedented times. While we’ve been hunkered down and large-scale live events have been temporarily halted, we’ve been very fortunate that the community's content creators have stepped up to provide us with a seemingly endless amount of StarCraft. We're always thankful for your passion and ...

Pop quiz, hotshot: are the setting and story of StarCraft part of the military sci-fi, space opera, or sci-fi horror genres? If you answered, “All three!” then congratulations—you really know your science fiction subgenres. There’s a lot going on in the StarCraft universe, and it’s not always easy to keep it all straight. If you’re looking for a refresher—or just a simple way to explain StarCraft’s story to your friends—this blog has you covered.

Part 1: The Distant Past

Eons ago, the xel’naga arrived in our galaxy and kindled life on countless worlds throughout the Milky Way. Their goal: wait for two species to achieve what the xel’naga called “purity of essence” and “purity of form,” and help them ascend into a new form of life which would take the xel’naga’s place, thus restarting the cycle.

The xel’naga called this the Infinite Cycle. Unfortunately, that turned out to be a bit of a misnomer.

Amon, one of the xel’naga, resolved to break the cyc...

With so many around the world staying safe indoors right now, we wanted to make it a little easier for everyone to connect with each other through StarCraft II. So reach out to your friends on Battle.net to join forces and triumph over the battlefield: from Friday March 20 PT through Thursday April 2 PT, we are lifting the free-play level cap on all Co-op Commanders. We’ll also be enabling 100% Co-op bonus XP through Thursday, April 16 PT. With every Commander, every unit, and every ability now open to everyone, the Koprulu Sector is here for you and your friends to come together and stand against those who would oppose you.

Additionally, as always, everyone is welcome to experience the free StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty single-player campaign. Whether you’re looking to explore the StarCraft II universe for the first time or just want to relive this thrilling chapter, immerse yourself in a story of sacrifice, betrayal, and courage among the stars.

And if you’d lik...

Maps

• Ever Dream LE
  • Battlecruiser
    • Fixed an issue that caused the Battlecruiser’s Tactical Jump ability to incorrectly go on cooldown when it tries to Tactical Jump to a location with air pathing blockers. The Battlecruiser will now try its best to teleport to a location near the air pathing blockers, and the game will display a red error text if there is not enough room.
  • Reduced the size of the doodads at certain starting locations to improve the pathing for workers when they are gathering resources.
  • Fixed the color of certain plant doodads to be more consistent with other plant doodads.
  • Fixed the cliff type of some cliffs near the natural base.
  • Fixed the height of certain trim doodads to prevent visual distortions with other nearby doodads.
• Golden Wall LE
  • Fixed the location of rocks on certain ramps so that ...