Guardian

	This article is about the StarCraft unit. You may be looking for:
	The brood lord from StarCraft II other uses of the term guardian

A guardian

The guardian is a zerg long-range bomber.

Overview

A guardian

The guardian is evolved from the mutalisk and thought to be based on the nesting form of the mantis screamer. It possesses a thicker carapace than its counterpart and attacks by lobbing explosive globs of acid. The guardian is much slower than the mutalisk however, and is often designated to guard larvae.

Despite being devastating in terrestrial combat, guardians are next to useless in space combat.

Game Unit

StarCraft

Guardian
Unit
Race	Zerg
Role	Heavy Siege Flyer
Armament	Acid spores
Properties
Size	Large
Sight	11
Production
Minerals	50
Gas	100
Control	2
Build time	40
Evolves from	Mutalisk
Requires	Greater spire
Hotkey	G
Protection
Hit points	150
Armor	2
Combat
Ground attack	20
Cooldown	30
Attack range	8

Unit profile

The guardian is converted from an existing mutalisk. It has an anti-ground attack that out-ranges almost all ground-to-air weapons, and in large groups can be particularly devastating as a bomber unit. While the guardian has a respectable attack of 20 (26 when fully upgraded), it has no defense against enemy air units and is vulnerable to ground-to-air units when on the run. The slow speed of the guardian also renders it vulnerable to area-of-effect spells such as psionic storm and irradiate.

Production

Guardian Morph

Causes mutalisk to morph into a guardian.

Usage
Hotkey G Cost 50 100 1 mutalisk

Acquisition
Required Greater Spire

Upgrades

Flyer Attacks

• +1 bonus to attack per level for mutalisks
• +2 bonus to attack per level for guardians and devourers.

Acquisition
Purchased from Spire Greater spire Hotkey A Level 1 Cost 100 100 267 Level 2 Cost 175 175 300 Required Lair Level 3 Cost 250 250 333 Required Hive

Flyer Carapace

+1 bonus to armor per level for overlords, mutalisks, guardians, devourers, scourge and queen.

Acquisition
Purchased from Spire Greater spire Hotkey C Level 1 Cost 150 150 267 Level 2 Cost 225 225 300 Required Lair Level 3 Cost 300 300 333 Required Hive

Development

During development, scourges (or "avengers" as they were then known) emerged from destroyed guardians.

StarCraft II

In StarCraft II, the guardian has been replaced by the swarm guardian and later the brood lord. In Heart of the Swarm, guardians appear as a strain of primal zerg duplicated from the Swarm.^{[citation needed]}

Special Guardian Strains

• Feral Guardian
• Kukulza
• Zergrinch Gargoyle

Notes

Guardian stat profile

Most sources list the guardian's attack as being one of acid. However, its battle.net page lists its attack as being one of plasma.

References

Zerg Units and Structures of StarCraft/Brood War v • e

Ground units Larva Drone Zergling Hydralisk Lurker (BW) Defiler Ultralisk Air units Overlord Mutalisk Guardian Scourge Queen Devourer (BW) Infestation units Broodling Infested terran Transition units Egg Lurker egg Cocoon Basic buildings Hatchery Extractor Evolution chamber Spawning pool Hydralisk den Advanced buildings Lair Hive Spire Greater spire Queen's nest Nydus canal Defiler mound Ultralisk cavern Infested command center Defenses Creep Creep colony Spore colony Sunken colony Scrapped Fungal colony Mutation chamber Mutation pit Nydus pit Scoria