StarCraft II patch rebalances Zerg

By Fred Dutton Published 7 October, 2010

RTS whipping boys get beefed up.

A new patch for StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty will tweak the Zerg race to make them a more tempting proposition, developer Blizzard has announced.

The change has been prompted by stats which show the Zerg are far and away the least popular of StarCraft's three species. A posting on Battle.net reveals that they're only used by players 25.3 per cent of the time.

Not only that but the Zerg are on the receiving end of a disproportionate number of beatings at the hands of the Protoss.

No exact date has been announced for the patch yet, but here's a list of what it does, courtesy of Blizzard's design director Dustin Browder.

  • We're increasing roach range. This will allow roaches to be more effective in large groups, giving the zerg more options in the mid to end game.
  • Fungal Growth will now prevent Blink, which will give zerg a way to stop endlessly Blinking stalkers which can be very challenging to deal with in large numbers.
  • The Barracks are going to require a Supply Depot, which will impact a lot of early terran reaper pushes.
  • The reaper speed upgrade will require the Factory, which is meant to weaken a lot of the early terran reaper attacks that dominate so many matches, especially in team games.
  • We're making a number of increases to the health of zerg buildings, which will make the very vulnerable zerg technology structures more resistant to raids. We don't expect these hit point changes to have a super significant impact on the game, but the current numbers felt way too low.

Eurogamer's Oli Welsh awarded Blizzard's long-awaited sequel a resounding 9/10 when it arrived on PCs back in August.

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About Fred Dutton

Fred Dutton is Eurogamer's US news editor, based in Washington DC.

Read more articles from Fred by visiting the Fred Dutton archive page.

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Comments (18) Latest comment 2 years ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • riceNpea #1 2 years ago

    South Korea will be pleased

  • HiredMan #2 2 years ago

    my name is HiredMan, and i SUCK... at Starcraft two-ah

    No really. I play zerg so this should be nice, though I doubt it will slow my rampant suckiness at this game.

  • jack_klugman #3 2 years ago

    On a completely unrelated note I've been enjoying reading this article on the prospect of a Halo movie:

    http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/201...

  • BuddyChrist #4 2 years ago

    On a progressively unrelated note.....
    Look behind you- a three headed monkey!

    Zerg are awesome, I never won anything with them back in the day, just had the most fun being them.....

  • HeNiCiDe1988 #5 2 years ago

    zerg just rip off the tyranids but thats interesting that they bothering to tweek stuff hopefully they will keep it balanced because the slightest changes and dramatically change stuff, but it does sound if they always losing that they are needed to level up.

  • NimbusTLD #6 2 years ago

    They did say it would take about a year or so after release to balance the three races properly :)

  • zoweewowee #7 2 years ago

    The double reaper nerf is huge. I guess if you learnt to counter reaper rushes you will now never have to worry about them again. I don't play terrans but that seems a bit too harsh of a nerf for me. Having to build a supply depot before barracks was enough, as it will also delay any kind of proxy barracks. Anyway, good news for zerg and toss players !

  • ruslan74 #8 2 years ago

    So what was the benefit of an extended MP beta if the online portion is still not balanced? SC1 FTW!

  • rivuzu #9 2 years ago

    Brilliant. I'm a Pure Zerg player, and fall into that 25% it seems, but will admit they're a bit shit at present. Bring on the patch!

  • Freek #10 2 years ago

    They kept on balancing SC1 for years and years as play styles change. SC2 will be no different, this is a good thing. They'll probably beef up the terrans in the next path as this all sounds pretty harsh.

  • Canyarion #11 2 years ago

    A Supply Depot needed to build a Barracks, sweet. :) That will stop a lot of Terran rushes. And the Reavers do get nerfed, but they're still very annoying without the speed upgrade. I think it will balance things out.

    @ruslan74 Don't be naive. SC1 was still receiving balance patches after more than 5 years. SC2 is out how long, 2.5 months?

    @Freek (Dutch btw?) Beef the Terran? I wonder if that's necessary. Most people are complaining that they're overpowered. I've personaly as a Protoss player learned how to deal with their mm/mmm strategies, but it's hard.

  • levitate #12 2 years ago

    "The Barracks are going to require a Supply Depot, which will impact a lot of early terran reaper pushes."

    Holy backtrack, Batman! Blizzard have come to their senses.

  • Judas_Priest #13 2 years ago

    Well, Terran still have their marauders at the same level of absolute rapeage that they used to be at when stimmed. So high level play will still feature MMM and ghost annihilating anything Protoss or Zerg can muster up.

    Happy days still. My ghost snipe/EMP micro and marine marauder kites will still win me my matches.
    Edited by Judas_Priest at 08/10/10 @ 08:50

  • RealityCheque #14 2 years ago

    @Henicide!: zerg just rip off the tyranids

    Which in turn are rip offs of Aliens. And Protoss are Eldar rip offs, which in turn are just Elves In Space. And Terrans are Space Marine ripoffs, which in turn are rip offs of pretty much every human in super armour from the dawn of time.

  • figgis #15 2 years ago

    zerg just rip off the tyranids...

    ...and Tyranids are just a rip off of the Alien films.

    Edit - Or what he said above.
    Edited by figgis at 08/10/10 @ 09:19

  • wellzy4eva #16 2 years ago

    Have Blizzard taken into account that Terran will be the most popular as lots of players have played through the Terran Single player and feel most comfortable with that team?

  • NorfolkNClue #17 2 years ago

    @wellzy4eva No, I don't think Blizzard have taken into that account. Never. Never eva eva.

  • Canyarion #18 2 years ago

    I personally dislike playing as Zerg because they're so unpersonal. You can't really hear what they're saying, they don't have any heroes that we know of..