It's Nerfing Time | |
---|---|
Season 2, Episode 21.5 | |
Air date | November 11, 2013 |
Episode guide | |
Previous Halloween Special 2013 |
Next Crude Brood |
It's Nerfing Time is the special episode in the second season of StarCrafts. It stars Dustin Browder and David Kim as animated version of themselves.
Plot[]
David Kim reads "Possible Balance Changes" on the Blizzard Entertainment's official StarCraft II forum page. He asks his partner Dustin Browder what he thinks what he is thinking: grab their weapons and start updating the game "Balance Patch 1.2.NURF ALL DAT" on the screen.
Three marines march to attack the protoss expansion base, and the high templar with Khaydarin Amulet warps in at the pylon, frightening the marines away. The templar casts energy from the amulet to prepare for the psionic storm, until a plastic bullet hits his garment, breaking it into pieces. The shooter reveals to be both David and Dustin preparing nerf guns. "It's Nerfing Time!" said David. The high templar cries at his broken amulet. Two nerf gunners shoot at the mothership, descending it upon the high templar violently.
David somersaults and uses double nerf guns at marine, reaper and siege tank. The marine dodges the yellow darts safely, the reaper tries to throw a grenade but gets shot, causing his grenade to land on him and explode, and the siege tank has its cannon blocked by a nerf bullet, blasting itself from inside.
Dustin fires his larger nerf gun at the battlecruiser, making it crash-landed downwards with a burst. An ultralisk clutches the nexus and hammers it against the ground, but the nerf guns are triggered at it, causing him to accidentally release the structure and swoop onto it.
David locates Derpfestor with an infested terran riding him. They force the rider off him and shoot multiple nerf bullets at him like a machine gun. Derpfestor makes a roll for it from numerous shots but he collides at the boulder pile. A last dart sticks at the boulder, letting a huge, higher rock crush him.
After David felicitates Dustin for a weak point, he checks his nerfing to-do list, and marks all points accomplished. They have finished patching the game, but unknowingly two MULEs carrying huge load of minerals scram from the scene.
Characters[]
- David Kim
- Dustin Browder
- High templar
- Marines
- Mothership
- Siege tank
- Reaper
- Battlecruiser
- Ultralisk
- Derpfestor
- Infested terran
- MULEs
- Hydralisk (cameo)
- Zergling (cameo)
- Dark archon (debut, cameo)
Trivia[]
- Both Dustin Browder and David Kim made their guest appearance as voice actors of themselves on this episode.
- This is the first episode to have different voice actors rather than Jonathan Burton himself.
- This is the second episode to have voice acting since "The True Meaning of StarCraft."
- This episode was created after BlizzCon 2013 held on November 8 and 9, 2013, when Dustin Browder and David Kim provided voice acting for CarBot Animations.
- This episode received a new title card, written as "NERFS UP!"
- Inside the Blizzard Entertainment facility, the dark archon made his cameo appearance as excluded unit from StarCraft: Brood War.
- However, dark archon is made available in the campaign of StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void.
- The scene takes place on grasslands which was used in the first season.
- Here is the list of players' complaints on the forum page:
- "HIGHTEMPLAR AMULET RESEARCH OP!!! must nurf"
- "MOTHERSHIP vortex GG too much OP"
- "REAPER NADES MAKE ME ANGRY >:(
- "TANKS too stronk vs light units must nurf"
- "CATTLE BRUISER DAMAGE TOO GOOD, tier 3 should be weaker than tier 1 OBVIOUSLY"
- "DAT ULTRALISK RAM vs BUILDINGS SO OP GG"
- "DERPFESTOR too much op trolol too stronk = nurf"
- Explanations:
- High templar's Khaydarin Amulet research which adds +25 to the starting energy is deemed too much to cast more psionic storm and feedback when battling other races (worse on ZvP battles when warping at pylons to defend the expansion base against run by's) even a ghost who uses EMP against him but results less.
- Mothership's vortex ability used in Wings of Liberty has been removed in Heart of the Swarm due to trapping of all units in the same area and reappearing only to be detonated by ghost's nuclear strike in team play, also the "Toilet Archon" tactic to include friendly archons as a surprise attack, and even friendly banelings. These strategies were shown in "The BWC 2012."
- Reaper's grenade, D-8 Charge, has been removed due to being too effective against units and buildings.
- However, the grenades have been returned in Legacy of the Void Beta on April 28, 2015. However, it only deals 10 damage and knocks units back within the explosion in the initial release of the completed expansion.
- Siege tanks' splash damage and attack range are too strong and too wide against weaker units, even worse if two or more tanks are grouped togehter. They give them higher chance to eradicate their enemies in a rush.
- Battlecruisers as tier 3 units are too strong against tier 1 units (or basic units). Tier 3 units like thor, carrier, ultralisk, brood lord, colossus, templars, and mothership, are meant to be easily damaged by numerous tier 1 units to be even (only for StarCraft II starters.)
- Ultralisk's ram against buildings instead of its normal attack is considered to be overpowered by players when damaging them through the base too quickly.
- Infestors are considerably overpowered units of zerg race due to instant fungal growth cast which is hard to dodge, and lots of infested marines are spawned if more infestors with full energy are present. It is even worse with brood lords as defense.
- MULEs are believed to be overpowered support temporary units in terran, but they are not nerfed since terran has the slowest unit production in the game (due to fast larvae production on zerg and chrono boost on protoss).
- However, MULEs have been nerfed in Legacy of the Void's update in October 9, 2015.
- Marine dodging the nerf darts is a reference to what the marines' attributes weren't forcibly changed by some players' requests at Blizzard's decision.
- Battlecruiser appears on this episode again since "Heart of the Swarm Opening".
- Rocks are also nerfed since they were used to crush trapped units at the time of collapse.
- Although this episode pertains about "Balance patch 1.2", only motherships, khaydarin amulets and infestors are nerfed in patch 1.3 of StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty.
- For ultralisk's ram against building, it was removed in patch 1.1 of WoL.
- In the facility, there are posters drawn on walls: Blizzard Entertainment's logo, StarCrafts poster, "WoWcraft soon!" teaser, and Blizz Con advertisement.
- The video has been removed from YouTube for unknown reasons.
- Unit quotations from StarCraft II used:
- High templar - "Saraht tuun!", "For Aiur."
- Reaper - "This ain't good..." (Actually, this line belongs to Wraith)
- Battlecruiser - "We're going down!" (the rest of quote is cut, which is a reference to film "Spaceballs")
- Background music used: To be updated
Cultural References[]
- "Nerfing" in gaming means lowering down attributes, properties and abilities. This episode reveals a pun on its word as a toy weapon called "nerf gun", hilariously.
- A name written on forum page, large nerf gun, and the checklist is spelled as "NURF."
Video[]
StarCrafts Episode Special ITS NERFING TIME! BlizzCon