Blizzard unveils revamped Mothership

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Blizzard has added the profile of the Protoss Mothership to Starcraft II website, making the version revealed at Blizzcon 2007 official.

For those who have not been keeping track, the [url=http://www.starcraft2.com/features/protoss/mothership.xml]Mothership[/url] was first previewed in a video at the Blizzard Worldwide Invitational in Korea. It had three abilities: Black Hole, Planet Cracker and Time Bomb. Also, due to the extremely high-powered nature of these abilities, you could only build one Mothership.

At the recent Blizzcon 2007, Blizzard unveiled reworked the Mothership, and has since posted the profile of the updated Mothership on [url]starcraft2.com[/url].

The Black Hole ability has been now removed. In it’s place instead is a Cloak Field ability. In a video clip, a cluster of Proton Cannons are under attack from some Dragoons and Zealots. The Mothership activates the Cloak Field to Cloak the Cannons, rendering them invisible to the enemy units while still being able to counter-attack, thus forcing a retreat.

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[color=grey][size=1]Motherships using the Time Bomb ability. — Video still: Blizzard[/size][/color][/center]

Another significant change is that the Time Bomb ability can now be used offensively. Before, the Time Bomb appeared to be an defensive ability that was generated around the Mothership to stop incoming attacks. In the profile, two Motherships can be seen generating Time Bombs around some Terran units. The attacks from the Terran units were stuck within the Time Bomb until the effect was over. This is effectively a form of disabler.

The Planet Cracker ability’s offensive power has also been toned down. While previously it was an area of effect ability, it has now been refactored to become a single, focused beam. Also, while the Planet Cracker originally could destroy masses of Marines and structures with great speed, the version of the Planet Cracker shown on the website had problems destroying even SCVs. Another minor change appears to be that the Mothership now cannot use it’s normal attack while using the Planet Cracker ability.