Hatcheries perform three vital functions that no colony can survive without: producing the creep, which most zerg structures require in order to be built, giving birth to larvae that can mutate into the various zerg breeds and digesting minerals and vespene gas to change into a nutrient form that zerg can use to feed their mutations. In addition, the hatchery is one of the only structures that can be built without pre-existing creep (the other being the extractor) and is therefore essential for any expansion attempt.[1]
Hatcheries also serve as the central point from which genetic information is distributed from the hive cluster to drones and larvae. The zerg have been known to defend their hatcheries with fanatical zeal, given that they are the key to production of new strains.
With the aid of a spawning pool, queens can be spawned directly from the hatchery itself without the need for larva.[2]
Many zerg ground units may burrow, rendering themselves invisible but incapable of moving or attacking.
Allows most zerg land units--all but the massive ultralisk and primitive broodling--to burrow into the ground, rendering them immobile and unable to attack, but also safe from enemy fire unless the enemy has a detector nearby. Applies to: Drone, zergling, hydralisk, defiler, and infested terran
The zerg continue to use hatcheries in StarCraft II. Hatcheries continue to be able to create creep. Upgrades for overlords and overseers are researched at the hatchery and its evolved forms, but at least a lair is required first. This change allows the player to research the upgrades at any hatchery they control as long as they have a lair, rather than being limited to researching them at the lair itself.
If multiple hatcheries are selected, pressing the "S" hotkey will select all of the available larvae at all the selected hatcheries. The player must press a hotkey (or select a morph icon) once for each unit they wish to build.
Two rally points are able to be set on a hatchery; one ("G") for drones and another ("Y") for warrior units. The queen doesn't get a rally point.
Each individual egg can be separately rallied; this overrides rally points set for the hatchery.[3]
A hatchery spawns a new larva every 15 seconds if there are less than 3.
Queens can target a hatchery/lair/hive, causing it to eventually spawn four larvae. These join any already-present larvae. The larva-producing structure will not naturally produce any more larvae until the total falls below three. The larva count for any given hatchery/lair/hive cannot exceed nineteen, no matter how many times spawn larva is cast.
Kerrigan, Zagara and Abathur use hatchery as tier 1 primary structure which can create larvae and generate creep. Kerrigan and Zagara can create queens after morphing a Spawning pool. Abathur can initially create swarm queens instead of standard queens, and can get an upgrade to create two swarm queens simultaneously. Kerrigan and Zagara hatcheries can automatically generating up to 6 larvae and can additionally increase generation through a queen Inject Larva ability. Abathur lacks access to inject larvae, he has an increased larva cap, and his hatcheries can automatically generate up to 9 larvae. Kerrigan and Zagara also requires a spawning pool to mutate the hatchery into a lair, like in Versus. Unlike the other two commanders, Abathur requires a roach warren to mutate the hatchery into a lair.
Stetmann use the mecha hatchery variant as a tier 1 primary structure which can build mecha larvae and generate an Egonergy field. It has a larvae limit of 9. After morphing a mecha spawning pool, he can mutate the mecha hatchery into a mecha lair.
Kerrigan Upgrades[]
Pneumatized Carapace
Increase speed of the overlord from 0.59 to 3.38 and the overseer from 1.88 to 3.38.
The following section contains information from a previous version of StarCraft II which is no longer valid.
As of February 2010, the hatchery could no longer research burrow.[6]
This change has since been reverted.
Trivia[]
According to Bob Fitch, the role of the hatchery was initially going to be the taken by the queen, who would lay eggs like the Queen from the film Aliens. However, it was deemed too hard to get the look and feel of the unit in its role. Larvae were added as a "temp state" for eggs in order to not have it look off when eggs were spawned from the hatchery.[7]
A "hatchery petting zoo" is featured as an attraction in the Blizzard World map in Overwatch.
↑"for zerg is it the same that the hatchery sets the rally, or can you rally for each individual egg?" You can do both. You can set a rally for your hatchery, but can then override it with manual orders per egg as well. Also don't forget, you can set a worker rally point for your hatchery, as well as a unit rally point. Karune, Rancid_death75. Another rally question for Kaurne!Battle.net StarCraft II General Discussion Forum. Accessed 2009-02-18.
↑At this point you can research Burrow once you get Lair. Kapeselus. 2010-02-15. Is Zerg burrowing innate?Battle.net StarCraft II General Discussion Forum. Accessed 2010-02-15.
Carnage Hall
Denied
