Starcraft 2 League - Protoss - Info about the Protoss race in Blizzard's Starcraft 2

» News

May 23, 2007 - 8:54 PM - by Cotton

If you would like to discuss the Protoss more please visit our Protoss Strategy Forum.

Overview:
The Protoss are a technically advanced race, putting all there energies into advancing there technology. They are able to project shields around themselves and generate worm holes in the galaxy through Warpgates. There strengths are there high health units with additional shielding making them very tuff to kill. A fairly direct technology tree and a lower level of micromanagement than the other two races. The down side is unit production is slow and rebuilding an army can take quite some time.

Ground Units:

Probe

Builds From: Unkown
Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Building / Gathering

We don't know to much about the Probe in SC2. We assume it's still built from the Nexus, and probably has the same health/shield. We have seen it gather gas and minerals in the game play trailer. That's about it.

Zealot

Builds From: Gateway
Shield: 60
Health: 100
Armament: Does physical melee damage with its Psionic Blades

The Protoss's most basic melee unit. These little guys have recived a new ability. They are able to quickly charge an enemy allowing them to close the gap very quickly. This makes them much more effective against medium ranged ground units. Beyond that the Zealot remains largely unchanged.

Immortal

Builds From: Gateway
Shield: 100
Health: 240
Armament: Does ranged damage with two mount blasters, has a heavy blast shield which will block any powerful attacks but allows weaker attacks through

The Immortal is the replacement to the Dragoon. After the destruction of Auir and the events of Brood War the Dragoons were all but wiped out. The remaining Dragoons were refitted with a new battle suit. But this is a dying breed as the Protoss cannot create any more.

Stalker

Builds From: Gateway
Shield: 60
Health: 120
Armament: Single ranged blaster. Also has one special ability:

Blink
Cooldown: 4 sec (timed by stop watch, at normal game speed)
The Blink ability allows the Stalker to warp a short distance to either run from or catch up to its enemies.

The Stalkers are a new unit created from the energies of the Dark Templar. They are able to warp a short distance to either run from or catch-up to its enemies, they also have a powerful blaster dealing 46-50 damage per blast to a Terran Reaper. (based on the game-play trailer and some assumption, thanks Chibiabos)

Soul Hunter

Builds From: Unkown
Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Unknown

This is a new unit added to SC2, it looks to possibly be a basic ground unit. The Soul hunter is a ranged unit that seems to have a large cannon mounted on one arm and sits atop a small floating platform.

Dark Templar

Builds From: Unkown
Shield: Unknown
Health: Unknown
Armament: Permanently stealthed melee unit

Based on the PC Gamer magazine, this unit is unchanged from the original at this point. So expect it to be the same trap setting stealth unit it always was.

High Templar

Builds From: Unkown
Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Can cast Psi Storm as seen in the Artwork trailer.

Only a small glimpse of the High Templar are shown in the Artwork trailer. You can clearly see the casting animation and a Psi Storm looking attack show up over some zerglings, which is why we belive these are the High Templar.

Twilight Archon

Builds From: Unkown
Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Unknown

This seems to be the SC2 version of the Archon. As of right now we do not know if the Twilight Archon is created through the merging of two High Templar.

Colossus

Builds From: Robotics Facility
Shield: 325
Health: 400
Armament: Fires a red beam at its enemies that will sweep to another enemy as soon as its target dies (no need to re-fire the weapon). Allowing the Colossus to switch between targets with no down time to its attack.

The Colossus can use there long legs to step up and down cliffs, to cross terrain. It's sweeping beam allows it to deal large amounts of damage to small swarming units. We've seen Terran missile turrets attack the Colossus and at SC2.com the unit description says that the Colossus is vulnerable to ground and air attacks. Which means is safe to say air only attacks can target the Colossus.

Reaver

Builds From: Unkown
Shield: Unknown
Health: Unknown
Armament: Fires a ball that explodes on contact (maybe scarabs?)

You can see this unit at the very end of the leaked video. It slides along like a worm and moves up to the front of the battle. Once there you can clearly see it fire a small blue ball out that explodes on a Terran unit killing it. (thanks to bufferzz for the heads up)

976 Views

Protoss - Page 2

Jun 09, 2007 - 4:13 AM - by Cotton

Air Units:

Observer

Builds From: Unknown
Shield: Unknown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Permanently stealthed and can detect stealthed units

This one comes from the PC Gamer feature of Starcraft 2. There is very little detail about this unit in the magazine other than it seems to have remained largely unchanged from the original Starcraft.

Phase Prisim

Builds From: Unknown
Shield: 40
Health: 100
Armament: We believe this may replace the transport but that is un-comfirmed. This unit also has one special ability:

Phasing Mode
Resource: Shows a stop watch with a 2 and a Psi symbol with a 2 next to it (we think this means that it takes 2 seconds to change modes. We also do not know how the Psi cost works because we do not see a change in Psi in the UI when changing modes).
Deploy's a Phase Prisim into Phasing Mode and generates power radius similar to that of a Pylon.

The Phase Prisim can change modes and act as a pylon anywhere on the map. In this mode it can supply power to any units or buildings and allow a remote site to warp-in units without building a fixed pylon. We also believe this will replace the transport unit but this is unconfirmed.

Phoenix

Builds From: Stargate
Shield: 80
Health: 120
Armament: Air superiority fighter. One special ability:

Power Overload
Rapidly attack all nearby air enemies. The Phoenix is offline for a short duration after.

The Phoenix is set to replace the Corsair and Scout units taking on features of both. It also will be able to attack ground and air units. The description on the Starcraft2.com site suggests that their air attack is much stronger than their ground attack (akin to Scouts), and the overload ability appears to only attack air targets (un-confirmed).

Warp Ray

Shield: 75
Health: 125
Armament: Fires a beam that does more damage the longer its fired.

The Warp Ray is a specialist Protoss flyer. Its attack does more damage the longer it fires. Making it extremely effective against high armor/health units and even more so against buildings. But against smaller more numerous units its very weak taking far to long to kill one small unit.

Tempest

Shield: Unknown
Health: Unknown
Armament: Sends out small flyers to attack the enemy

The Tempest looks to be the replacement for the Carrier. It has a ground to air shield making it very tuff against ground units. It also fires out small flyers to attack with.

Star Relic

Builds From: Unknown
Shield: Unknown
Health: Unknown
Armament: Spell caster / Fires Fusion beam that slowly damages unit until it dies, then explodes unit dealing AoE damage, AoE stealth will hide units and buildings in a range around the Star Relic

This looks like a replacement for the Arbiter. Giving it a new list of skills and a much more useful attack.

Mothership

Builds From: Unknown
Shield: 350
Health: 950
Energy: 300
Armament: Attacks with multiple rays dealing what looks like medium damage (counted 4 rays at one time). The Mothership also has 3 special abilities:

Time Bomb
Energy Cost: 75
This is a special ability that slows down all enemy movement inside the field, then stopping attacks just before they reach the Mothership.
Planet Cracker
Energy Cost: 100
Deals heavy damage in what looks like an aoe radius beneath the Mothership to all ground targets in range.
Black Hole
Energy Cost: 150
The Black Hole allows the Mothership to create a hole in space. The hole is a target area skill and will suck in flyers in a radius around it.

As per the game play trailer: The Mothership is the ultimate Protoss unit and requires significant resources to create. You also can only have one Mothership per Protoss player on the map at any given time (meaning if you loose your Mothership you can build another but you cannot have two out at one time). The Mothership is extremely powerful and very tuff to kill. Combined with its special abilities allows the Mothership to take on entire armies by itself.

851 Views

Protoss - Page 3

Jun 26, 2007 - 2:47 PM - by Cotton

Buildings:

Nexus

Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Builds Probes which build everything else.

We know very little about the Nexus in SC2 other than we've seen it in the game-play demo. We assume it will act just like the nexus in Brood War. Acting as a probe dispenser, with no add-ons or upgrades. If you set the rally point to a resource the Pobes you build will start auto-gathering it.

Pylon

Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Unkown

I counted 11 pylons in the Protoss base of the game play trailer. The Psi in the UI said 141. So assuming the Nexus still provides 9 Psi, each pylon gives 12 Psi instead of 8.

Photon Cannon

Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Unkown

We've seen these in action during the game play video, and as far as we can tell they remain unchanged from Brood War.

Phase Cannon

Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Unkown

The Phase Cannon looks to be another feat of Protoss technology. They have created a turret of some kind that can literally move it self. This will give the Protoss far more flexibility in the defense of there base.

Assimilator

Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Unkown

In the game play trailer you can clearly see probes go in and out of this building carrying green balls. So its safe to say this is the Protoss Assimilator.

Gateway / Warp Gate

Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Builds Zealots, Stalkers, and Immortals

The Gateway will warp in units from the Protoss homeworld. As a Gateway it seems to work just like it does in Brood War. But it has gained a new upgrade to turn it into a Warp Gate. Once a Warp Gate the building can teleport units to anywhere there is a power source you control.

Forge

Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Unkown

We think this is the SC2 version of the Forge. It is seen at the begining of the game play trailer during the fly over of the Protoss base.

Robotics Facility

Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Unkown

We really don't know what this building is. But if I had to take a shot in the dark I'd say it is the Robotics Facility. It is seen at the begining of the game play trailer during the fly over of the Protoss base.

Observatory

Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Unkown

This one is truly a shot in the dark, but we think this one might be the Observatory. It is seen at the begining of the game play trailer during the fly over of the Protoss base.

Templar Archives

Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Unkown

We think this is the SC2 version of the Templar Archives. It is seen at the begining of the game play trailer during the fly over of the Protoss base.

Stargate

Shield: Unkown
Health: Unkown
Armament: Unkown

The Stargate has been announced by Blizzard at SC2.com. No new information on the building has been given. But we assume it will still build all of the Protoss attacking flying vehicles.

800 Views