Vorazun (Co-op Missions)

"Vorazun leverages the advanced technology of the Protoss with the cunning and adaptable aspects of the Dark Templar to devastating effect. Gain access to some of the most mysterious powers of the Protoss, such as Dark Archons, and use ancient technologies to perform powerful feats—like stopping time itself. With Vorazun, you’ll have some of the most versatile tools in the StarCraft universe available to you. . . the question is, will you be crafty enough to claim victory?"

- Commander blurb

Vorazun is a playable commander in Co-op Missions. She has access to dark archons and cloaked units with high damage, and time-stopping abilities. Her abilities overall focus on stealth and subterfuge, utilizing cloaked units and abilities that incapacitate enemies for a short time. As part of this, she is able to summon dark pylons that can cloak nearby allied units and structures, and has several upgrades to variably improve the combat proficiency of her cloaked units, or to allow her to warp in dark templar easier.

Info

 * Recommended for experienced players
 * Manipulate the battlefield from the Spear of Adun with stealthy abilities
 * Command an army of cloaked and high damage Nerazim units

Mastery

 * Power Set 1
 * Dark Pylon Range: +2% – 60%
 * Black Hole Duration: +2% – 60%


 * Power Set 2
 * Shadow Guard Duration: +0.5s – 15s
 * Time Stop Unit Speed Increase: +1% – 30%


 * Power Set 3
 * Chrono Boost efficiency: +1% – 30%
 * Spear of Adun starting and maximum energy: +3 – 90

Units and Structures
Vorazun has access to the following units and structures:

Talent Progression
Vorazun acquires the following talents as she levels up.

Strategies
Vorazun is widely considered the most powerful commander, with an array of useful talents to boost her offensive potential, powerful units, and versatile calldown abilities. Even after patches have repeatedly nerfed her, Vorazun remains very capable as a commander. Her Dark Templars can vaporize entire waves with a single casting of Shadow Fury, even the toughest ones. Dark Archon is great for redirecting enemy fire, regardless of numbers. Mass Void Ray allows Vorazun to solo most offense maps at any level. Cloaked Corsairs make for some very fun "entirely invisible and invincible" army when coupled with Dark Templar at level 13. Also the Void Rays can attack while moving provided that they're facing directly towards the enemy.

Power Set 1: Both options are equally viable.
 * Recommended masteries:
 * ☀Dark Pylon Range (+2% - +60%)
 * ☀Black Hole Duration (+2% - +60%)
 * Dark Pylon Range covers an entire expansion and helps offsets Vorazuns' primary weakness (enemies destroying the Dark Pylon). It is best used in combination with a non-cloaked army or defenses, such as with mass Void Rays or for cloaking the structures of a defensive ally. It can also be used in certain mutations to cloak the entire base and surrounding the Dark Pylon fully with cannons, leaving melee enemies unable to reach the Dark Pylon.
 * Black Hole Duration can be very useful in the early-game or against tough mutators that buff the enemy units - the extra duration is especially handy against Hybrid Nemeses that Corsairs otherwise have trouble dealing with.

Power Set 2: Time Stop Unit Speed Increase
 * ☀Time Stop Unit Speed Increase (+1% - +30%)
 * The choice is clear: Time Stop Unit Speed Increase benefits to all units every four minutes, and provides a substantial DPS boost for both players’ armies whenever Time Stop is used, which should be early and often. Full points in Shadow Guard Duration effectively amounts to an extra 30 seconds.

Power Set 3: Mastery point split recommended
 * ☀Chrono Boost Efficiency (+1% - +30%)
 * ☀Initial and Maximum Spear of Adun Energy: (+3 - +90)
 * Should be used by more experienced players only, as this necessitates efficient usage of Vorazun’s abilities during the early-game as well as extra attention paid to tight macro play.
 * These are both good masteries. Spear of Adun Energy (8 mastery points) provides sufficient energy for -immediate- expansion at 3 minutes into the game; both an initial Dark Pylon and the first cast of Shadow Guard to defend your base and avoid supply block. Chrono Boost Efficiency (22 mastery points) allows for faster research, which is especially important in the case of the crucial Shadow Fury upgrade for Dark Templar and Stealth Drive upgrade for the Corsair. Chrono Boosting the Starport can allows for production of Corsairs out of one Stargate instead of two.

Must Have Energy
Vorazun is very vespene dependent, so build assimilators as resources permit; depending on the map, possibly even before the first gateway. Once orbital assimilators are available, build them even sooner and at the expansion as well. Teching up to dark templar and researching their Shadow Fury should be highest priority, as even a few upgraded dark templar can rapidly crush the first few enemy attack waves and even the first primary objective. A large army of dark templars with Shadow Fury will simply delete anything you encounter on the ground, be they units or buildings, so your only remaining concern will be detection and anti-air. The Dark Pylon calldown combined with transformed Gateways can also be used for front-line reinforcements, and allow you to put unending pressure on enemy bases on attack maps (or as a quick defense).

Before they become available, however, Vorazun's Shadow Guard calldown can be used to defend the first wave, and can be used afterward to clear out the rocks for her expansion, and given control and timing is perfect, even ally's expansion.

From The Shadows
Vorazun's gameplay is about subversion and subterfuge. Dark templar are her primary units, and are much more effective than in melee gameplay due to their higher shields and lower Vespene cost. Upgraded and in mass numbers, a force of dark templar can rip apart virtually any ground-based units. However, Vorazun's other options should not be neglected, and properly used she has one of the most effective armies. Vorazun has Shadow Guard, which should be used exactly once at the beginning of the game to clear your rocks and solo the first wave. The easy way to use it is to cast it next to your rocks at your natural as soon as the red dot appears on the minimap. Clear the rocks and then go clear the wave using blink as much as possible, then clear ally's expansion rocks if possible.

We Are As One
Support from void rays or corsairs for anti-air will form a powerful attack force. Oracles are necessary and primarily used for detection, but its stasis wards are useful to guard choke points and prepare ambushes for enemies. Her centurions make useful mineral dumps if the player has far more minerals than vespsene, allowing for effective supporters for ally's army. Dark archons are effective support attackers, especially when faced with concentrated high-tier units.

Always Bet On Void
When using Vorazun, keep in mind that even if the enemy has detection, she grants cloaked units several combat buffs with Emergency Recall and Strike From the Shadows. Even in the heat of combat, a dropped dark pylon can turn the tide of what would otherwise be a total loss, especially for the allied commander. When utilizing Corsair and Dark Templar as primary force, lost battle will not result in any loss unless they have already been recalled in the last minute.

The Enemy Has Discovered Us
Due to her heavy emphasis on stealth and special abilities, Vorazun requires a slightly different approach than her fellow commanders. Her dark templar need to be monitored unless they are in overwhelming numbers, as a small number will be left vulnerable to disrupters, banelings, and hybrid when their special abilities are on cool down, this should be taken into careful account during the mid-game when Vorazun's army isn't at full strength.

Oracles possess a unique challenge of their own, as they are Vorazun's only mobile detector. Unlike the other protoss commanders, Vorazun's oracles are both fast and uncloaked. For a player used to fielding observers, it is easy to lose track of oracles in the middle of a battle and have them fly heedlessly into anti-air defenses that shred them, costing the player a fair amount of resources as he or she has to churn out more oracles for detection.

Protoss Commanders
Artanis is an excellent teammate for Vorazun. While Artanis's Pylon Power is useful, Vorazun's dark pylon is functionally identical, and provides more combat benefits. This can be best used by having Artanis's Pylon Power used to summon both commanders' units on battlefield while Vorazun's Dark Pylon for defense and utility using the cloaking buffs and recalling Artanis's painfully slow ground army. Artanis's Guardian Shell and Vorazun's Emergency Recall goes nice together, where the Guardian Shell will keep the unit alive longer, then Emergency Recall making sure no cloaked unit will be lost, including Artanis's units within Dark Pylon field.

Karax is an excellent teammate for Vorazun. Karax's static defenses can be cloaked by Vorazun's dark pylons and hit harder when she is mastered. Vorazun's Black Hole ability clumps units together for his Purifier Beam and Orbital Strike abilities, and his Chrono Wave ability accelerates the production speed of Vorazun's buildings, as she has many upgrades critical to her army's success. Vorazun will perfectly patch up Karax's lack of combat ability using her overpowered army while being supported by his Spear of Adun abilities and possibly Energizers. Karax may even allow Vorazun to take 2 gases at his expansion, since his towers barely use up gases, to allow Vorazun to produce units at non-stop rate accelerated even further by Karax's abilities. If Karax expands fast enough, he may even be able to produce purifier colossi to answer for Vorazun's almost complete lack of splash damage. Upgraded dark archons can either offset the energizer's inability to control enemy biological units or its only-temporary ability to control enemy mechanical units.

Alarak is a questionable teammate for Vorazun. Corsairs and void rays provide powerful anti-air support to supplement Alarak's ground-focused armies. In large offensive battles, Alarak's Death Fleet can retrieve units saved by Emergency Recall, then teleport them back to the front lines. Black Hole can position large numbers of enemy hybrid ground units to be decimated by Alarak's vanguards. Alarak's havocs alleviate Vorazun's reliance on oracles for detection.

Fenix and Vorazun share many weaknesses, but also add a lot to each other's strengths. Fenix's Cybros arbiter can cloak his entire army as well as the army of Vorazun not normally cloaked, granting both forces the base 15% attack bonus from Vorazun as well as emergency recall. This is doubly powerful for Fenix as his forces take a while to build. Vorazun's dark pylons also are great to allow for mobility, and black hole and time stop are invaluable for giving both forces time to wipe out waves. This is especially powerful with Fenix's colossi and area of effect heroes like Mojo or Taldarin. Fenix's early heroes also can help defend against early waves, saving Vorazun's energy for more important targets. The issue the two have is they both have expensive armies that take a while to become powerful, and if destroyed take a relatively long time to rebuild. In addition, both lack powerful early and midgame anti-air.

Terran Commanders
Raynor is a questionable teammate for Vorazun. Medics can heal weakened dark templar that were saved by Emergency Recall, but dark templars' 160 shield and 40 health makes it seem pointless; even more so given how Vorazun skips ground armor due to the same reason. However his scan ability will effectively make up for her ineffective detectors. Also Dark Pylons' slight damage boost will even more empower Raynor's bionic army, letting them quickly burn through enemy forces. However, increased use of detectors due to Vorazun may be troubleing to Raynor due to ravens' Seeker Missiles and vipers' Parasitic Bomb causing massacre in Raynor's highly concentrated infantry. The real strength to a Raynor pairing is taking a pair of gases from your ally as Raynor is generally mineral heavy.

Swann is an excellent teammate for Vorazun. He alleviates Vorazun's reliance on gas with his vespene harvesters and his science vessels and SCVs can repair her recalled Corsairs for free. In return, dark pylons support Swann's static defences and Emergency Recall can save his more expensive units so that they can be repaired later to full health. While also being able to recall onto tougher enemy attack.

Nova is a perfect match for Vorazun, with her Strike from the Shadows passive boosting Nova's damage and that of her ghosts, banshees, and any units cloaked by her healing drones. Black Hole can set up Nova's airstrikes, nukes, banshees and ravens for area damage, and Emergency Recall will save any of her costly cloaked units from death. In return, Nova can heal Vorazun's units with her ravens and provide better ground-to-air damage than Vorazun's stalkers are capable of doing.

Zerg Commanders
Kerrigan is a questionable teammate for Vorazun. It is best for Kerrigan to focus on dedicated anti-air with hydralisks, while Vorazun dedicates an air force composed of void rays. Lurkers benefit from Vorazun's 'stealth buffs' to burrowed units. The increased usage of hostile detectors renders Kerrigan's lurkers useless and her creep spreading much harder. The healing benefit from her creep is redundant for the same reason as Raynor's medics. Vorazun's Dark Pylons makes Kerrigan's Nydus Channel redundant.

Zagara is an excellent teammate for Vorazun. It is best for Zagara to focus on dedicated anti-air with corrupters and scourges, while Vorazun dedicates ground forces composed of dark templar and centurions. This allows them to focus only on one tech tree and gives them advantage of increased numbers, which coupled with their extreme efficiency on those units allows for quick and effective destruction of the enemies.

Abathur is an excellent teammate for Vorazun. His lack of fast and effective killing can be replaced by Vorazun's strong army while Abathur's army will take the heat with their increased health and size. As for anti-air units, Vorazun's corsairs may not do well against highly armored units like battlecruisers, but Abathur's devourers are perfect counter for multiple high armored enemies due to their strong one-hit damage. While Abathur's big-sized roaches may be very disturbing for other commanders, Vorazun's dark templar can blink to the front line easily to deal high damage while enemies are busy attacking the roaches. Vorazun's spare minerals can be used on centurions for Abathur's vipers to consume, while Abathur's healing can repair Vorazun's corsairs as well.

Stukov and Vorazun both suffer from similar weaknesses, their slow ability to start and lack of powerful early anti-air, but both become powerhouses in the late game. Stukov players going for more mineral heavy infested marine builds may want to consider giving their expansion vespene geysers to their Vorazun ally, as it will allow them to produce their forces faster while Stukov will rely heavier on minerals. Both forces have very powerful cooldowns, Black Hole and Time Stop can break defenses while Stukov pushes through, while Stukov's cooldowns can provide fire support for Vorazun's forces. Stukov also has greater defensive options, with his mobile infested bunkers and Infest Structure ability. In addition, their air superiority fighters, Infested liberators and corsairs complement each other by specializing against heavy air units and swarms of light air units respectively.

Dehaka and Vorazun cover for eachother’s weaknesses well, and make for a powerful late game army. Vorazun struggles against some early attack waves, while Dehaka benefits from having to deal with them as it will give him early essence. If Dehaka takes care of the early attack waves, Vorazun can save her energy for a push or emergency situation. In the late game, Dehaka’s ability to tie up and slow enemies works well with Vorazun’s disruption web, preventing enemies from moving out of them. Dehaka’s ability to snipe big targets with devour mixed with the shadow strike of dark templar means large attack waves can be destroyed easily. Dehaka’s calldowns and worms can provide damage and detection to areas where Vorazun can’t cover. Time stop also allows Dehaka to deep tunnel into entrenched positions and cause havoc before the enemy unfreezes. Also worth noting is the level 15 damage boost granted to impalers.

Development
Dark Archons' Mind Control ability initially took 100 energy, which was nerfed to 150 energy on 3.1 patch, then was reverted to 100 energy on 3.2 Patch, then back again to 150 on 3.3 Patch.

Prior to Patch 3.2, Vorazun's "Strike from the Shadows" talent raised damage by 25%, and also affected any damaging abilities in addition to normal attacks. Also the Dark Templars' Shadow Fury also dealt 35 damage to any targets rather than 20(+15 light) damage.