Nuclear Missile
Nuclear Missiles are the Terrans' most dangerous weapon in StarCraft. Nuclear Missiles are constructed at Nuclear Silos, and launched by Ghosts. They do a huge amount of damage to a large area.
Nuclear Missile damage is calculated individually for each unit in the missile's blast radius. Large units lose either 500/250/125 hit points, or two thirds/one third/one sixth of their maximum HP depending on their distance to the center of the explosion -- whichever is greater. Missile damage is explosive, so the damage inflicted on small units is halved, and medium-sized units take only 75% damage.
Contents
Unit quirks
- Nuclear Missiles do not register as "[men]" or "[any unit]" in trigger conditions. They can be detected if the condition specifically checks for "Nuclear Missile", though.
- Prior to being launched, Nuclear Missiles exist inside of their Nuclear Silos, and can be detected there using the Bring condition. This makes it possible to check if a specific Silo is armed.
Techniques
Tracking a Nuclear Missile launch
It is possible to track the individual stages of a Nuclear Missile launch using the Bring condition and death counters. However, multiple concurrent launches by the same player cannot be tracked, and "lost" nukes (launches that have been canceled, or prevented by killing the Ghost) cannot be accounted for.
Reserve a death counter for this method; for the purposes of our example, Alan Turret will be used. For simplicity's sake, the triggers below assume that we are only tracking Player 1 nukes, that Player 1 has only one Nuclear Silo, and that we have a location ("NUKE SILO") centered on that Silo.
- Player 1
- Player 1 has suffered exactly 0 deaths of Alan Turret.
- Player 1 brings at least 1 Nuclear Missile to NUKE SILO.
- Modify death counts for Player 1: set to 1 for Alan Turret.
- Preserve trigger.
- Player 1
- Player 1 has suffered exactly 1 deaths of Alan Turret.
- Player 1 brings at least 1 Nuclear Missile to Anywhere.
- Player 1 brings exactly 0 Nuclear Missile to NUKE SILO.
- Modify death counts for Player 1: set to 2 for Alan Turret.
- Preserve trigger.
- Player 1
- Player 1 has suffered exactly 2 deaths of Alan Turret.
- Player 1 brings exactly 0 Nuclear Missile to Anywhere.
- Modify death counts for Player 1: set to 3 for Alan Turret.
- Preserve trigger.
- Player 1
- Player 1 has suffered exactly 3 deaths of Alan Turret.
- Player 1 brings at least 1 Nuclear Missile to Anywhere.
- Modify death counts for Player 1: set to 4 for Alan Turret.
- Preserve trigger.
- Player 1
- Player 1 has suffered exactly 4 deaths of Alan Turret.
- Player 1 brings exactly 0 Nuclear Missile to Anywhere.
- Modify death counts for Player 1: set to 5 for Alan Turret.
- Preserve trigger.
Automatically training and launching a Nuclear Missile
Start by giving the desired computer player a Command Center with an attached Nuclear Silo, and centering a location (we'll call it "NUKE SILO") on that Silo. Now, run the AI script "Broodwar Teran 2 - Town B" at NUKE SILO. (Remember that this is a campaign AI script. It may have other actions tied to it, such as creating Ghosts.)
You can detect the missile's completion by detecting when the computer player brings at least 1 Nuclear Missile to NUKE SILO. If you so desire, you can then give the Command Center to another player; however, the Nuclear Missile inside the silo will remain under the ownership of the computer that ran the AI script. You can remedy this by explicitly specifying the Nuclear Missile in a Give Unit action. (Note that missiles acquired in this manner do not automatically play the "Nuclear missile ready" sound clip.)
Alternatively, you can have a computer launch it using the "AI Nuke Here" script, if the computer has a Ghost ready.
This appears to be the only way to automatically train and launch Nuclear Missiles; the Modify Unit Hangar Count does not work on Nuclear Silos, and using Create Unit to produce a Nuclear Missile does not allow it to be launched.
