Dead of Night

"Sometimes the dead don't stay dead."

- Tagline

Dead of Night is a Co-op Missions scenario based off of the mission "Outbreak" and the arcade map "Left 2 Die." The map released with Patch 3.11.

Background
On a fringe Terran Dominion world, Lieutenant Rosa Morales of the Dominion Navy Medical Corps was assigned to stem a powerful zerg infestation. However, the infestation began to spread too quickly for an evacuation to take place, so Morales enlisted the aid of allied commanders to stem the outbreak. This infestation was supported by Amon's Forces along with hybrid. During the battle, a virophage appeared on the field, but would only surface at night. Morales requested commanders destroy it to prevent future outbreaks.

The commanders were successful in purging the infestation from the planet.

Gameplay
Dead of Night is heavily modified from the campaign and arcade versions, but includes the special "Left 2 Die" zerg strains such as spotters, hunterlings, kaboomers, and chokers. Stanks and nydus worms appear as bosses. The goal of the map is to clear the map of infested structures, but the structures spawn waves of infested during the night cycle. As such, it is advisable to attack at day and defend at night. Infested marines, infested colonists, aberrations and volatile infested will spawn in waves against the base of the two players.

The two players spawn in the center of the map, with a single base, and have a neutral invincible sensor tower. However, they will be given three extra mineral patches (two in brutal) and one extra vespene geyser for their base. There are four avenues of attack into the player's base, but three are blocked with rocks, and for the first night only the southwestern approach will be attacked. On night 2, the northeastern barricade will be attacked, and on night 3, infested will attack from all directions. Enemy infested structures can be attacked in any order, though attacking the recommended bases will lead to the least defenses.

Static defensive units and structures will be key, especially near the chokes, on the tops of the cliffs, and near the mineral line. Hunterlings will attack workers if left unprotected, and can lead to an early defeat. Defenses should be watched as spotters can deactivate static defense and pylons powering them. Only one regular special infested will spawn per night, though boss special infested can spawn any night past 3. Static defense and area of effect units such as firebats, hellbats and perdition turrets will be very helpful, as they can brush aside heavy waves of infested, but do not forsake anti-armor to deal with the high health aberrations that will also spawn.

Two boss infested can spawn, the Stank and the special nydus worm. The Stank is a high health engine of destruction, and will not die during the day if left unchecked. Taking a heavy force to deal with it, or using a calldown on it should take care of it. The nydus worm will spawn at some point of the map, and generate units towards the player's base at regular intervals. These have high health, and likely the player must push out of their base to deal with them.

Many of the infested structure clusters are defended by Amon's Forces and hybrid during the day, though most of them are lightly defended. Amon's Forces will also send attack waves in the form of drops in the player's base during the night, so anti-air or a force in the main base is advised to deal with these. Commanders with the ability to repair are also helpful during night time sections.

Push out during the day to clear out sections of the map. Both players should move in opposite directions to ensure the optimal number of structures destroyed, defenses are usually enough for one player to deal with. It is easy to clear out weakened clusters of structures even during the night, but be careful not to leave the main base too undefended.

The bonus objective is the virophage, which will spawn away from the player's base but only appear during the night. The virophage has a very high amount of health (10,000) and will surface only during the night. It will generate volatile infested to defend itself, which can clear out large numbers of light units. Beware as its high health requires a high investment of forces to destroy, and contributing too many forces to destroying it may leave the main base undefended.

The nature of this map allows for ease grinding of achievements. If desired, single infested structure can be left alive, allowing for continued waves to be sent against the players. The amount of infested that spawn also allow for achievements with high kill counters to be gained easily.

Mutators
The following mutators have been applied to Dead of Night:


 * The Quick and the Dead

Trivia

 * Unused quotes in the Galaxy Map Editor indicate that there was initially a limit to the number of nights before the mission fails, as well as the ability for the virophage to attack air units. These are not present in the final version of the map.


 * A rooster 'doodle-doos' when the day cycle begins, and a wolf howls when the night cycle begins. These sound cues were previously used in Warcraft III.


 * It has been highlighted that hypothetically, as Stukov commands infested forces, he should be able to control the enemy infested on the map.