Dave J McWeasely
United States
Louisville
Kentucky
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In a previous article I covered the 1-cost fighters.
Firebat - Vulture - Zealot - Hydralisk
These are the 2-cost fighters. You are likely to see a lot of them. Understanding their values is a key to playing StarCraft well.
Ghosts didn't make the cut because they're fighters in name only - really there more spellcasters than fighters.
The Firebat
Unit Cost: 1+1
Dev Cost: 1+0
5 Cards: with Marine: 5/5, 6/4, 6/6 MZZ-Splash; with Vulture: 6/6, 6/5 MZZ-Splash
Notable Techs: Stim Pack, Bunker, Yamato Cannon
The Firebat has two good cards for mopping up tier-1 infantry, the MZZ-splash cards. Though it should be noted that the best of these, the 6/6 MZZ, is already available to Marines, which a terran player should already have plenty of. So researching Firebats really only adds one new splash to the pool.
If you have lots of workers and lots of gas, but not much minerals, Firebats are a decent choice against a MZZ-based foe.
Stim Pack is unexciting for the Firebat. Sure you can use it, but it's a suicide pill. Better to have your marines swallow that pill instead. Still, it's the more unexpected.
The Hydralisk
Unit Cost: 1+1
Dev Cost: 1+0
4 Cards: 6/6 +1-vs-fly; with 'ling: 5/5, 5/6; with Muta: 7/6
Notable Techs: Burrow(?)
The Hydralisk shares some similarities with the Firebat. Their costs are the same. Thanks to it's 7/6 card, it can aspire to killing Reavers and Tanks. That goes double for air targets, since there's another such card against air, and the orbital defense lasers definately make the Hydralisk a threat on defense.
I have not been able to make Burrow work very effectively yet, so I'll say nothing on it.
The Hydralisk is a simpler unit than the firebat. It has fewer cards, and when the shockingly weak zergling cards are culled, fewer still. You are not going to win games by massing hydralisks. It is, however, a minor threat.
Sneaky Trick: On defense, pairing with a queen and then playing the Zerg Cheerleader card can get you 8 attack. That can sometimes upset an agressor's plans....
The Zealot
Unit Cost: 2+0
Dev Cost: 0+0
5 Cards: 5/6, 6/7, 7/5; with 'goon: 6/6, 5/7
Notable Techs: two-count +1 Health Cards (free!), Increased Reaver Damage, Improved Carrier Capacity
The Zealot is the basic ground unit of the Protoss, as such it's dev cost is zero. It also has zero researchable techs. It has five combat cards, three of which are zealot-only. Three of them are outstanding: 7/5, 6/7, and 5/7. The +1 Health Cards stack well, giving two instances of Zealots fielding 8 health per deck cycle. There is no problem to have half to two-thirds of one's combat units be Zealots.
Zealots are overall remarkably better than the Firebat or Hydralisk. In some sense they are more expensive, too, since minerals are in high demand, especially early.
In a pinch they use the minor values of Reaver or Carrier tech cards - they're not much worse than the Zealot cards. However, this is only really worth it if you're going for those units eventually anyway. This is unlike Yamato Cannon, which is a good investment for an all-marine force.
The Zealot does have one other major weakness, and that is its susceptibility to MZZ-splash. It is a major bummer, to put it mildly, that this splash destroys a 2-cost Protoss unit and only 1-cost units in the other races. On the other hand, the other races can have some unexpected difficulties getting this MZZ-splash to trigger - every front line unit in the Protoss arsenal is capable of at least Health 8.
The Vulture
Unit Cost: 2+0
Dev Cost: 2+0
4 Cards: 5/6; with goliath and siege: 7/7; with Firebat: 6/5 MZZ-splash, 6/6
Notable Techs: Spider Mines, Repair Cards
At first blush the Vulture is unremarkable. It has the highest dev cost, has only four combat cards, and two of them are middling at best. The other two cards are fairly special: the 7/7 card has good offensive or defensive application, and the 6/5 MZZ-splash, though suicidal, can win you critical battles as the attacker.
Of course this is not the reason anyone buys Vultures. They buy for the Spider Mine tech. These cost 0+1 and give 7/7 or 8/7. If the opponent doesn't have detector they also get full-fledged Ground Splash. Thus Vultures are the only 2-cost unit with the ability to ground-splash arbitrary, non-MZZ units. This catapults the vulture really out of the Middleweight class and makes it a scrappy contender in the Heavyweights, alongside the more expensive Reavers and Ultralisks.
Another advantage of the Vulture is that it has zero card overlap with the Marine. Come to think of it, it also has zero overlap with the other Terran Tier-1 unit, the Wraith. And a mix of those three unit types together can take out anything, and makes 15 of the initial 18 Terran combat cards worthwhile. Hmmm...
Note that the Terran "Repair" +1 health cards work just fine on the Vulture. They don't cost minerals, just worker time, and sometimes you don't even have to pay that. They're not the Protoss "Shields" cards, but they're not nuthin' either.
Finally, a caveat: The Vulture relies heavily on a few star cards. Like the Hydralisk, it does not have the depth necessary to take over full-time combat duties from 1-cost units; rather, it makes a powerful supplement to them.
Conclusions
The two-mineral units are markedly superior to the 1+1 units. If you have a decent supply of Minerals, say 3 or more, you should definately favor the Vulture over the Firebat. The 1+1 units have a more narrowly defined role, but can still see play.
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Scott Lewis
United States
Castle Rock
Colorado
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Interesting analysis. I think it's interesting to see how these units stack up.
One thing worth noting about the Hydralisk, though, is of the 2-cost figthers, it's the only one that can attack air. (True, the Ghost can too, but as you mentioned, it's less a fighter than it is a caster).
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Justin Ziegler
United States
Connecticut
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wow, nice review. i like that you went through all the units and their pros and cons. i disagree about the vulture, however, spider mines don't make them "heavy class" material. relying on 2 cards makes them less than desireable for me, while heavy class can rely on more. and their normal cards are so-so. they take 2 minerals which i would rather spend on 2 rines or a tank min price. although all of this is just me
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good job 
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Posted Sun Aug 31, 2008 8:41 pm
