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Campaign/Belly of the Beast

From Liquipedia StarCraft 2 Wiki
[e][h]Wings of Liberty
Belly of the Beast
Mission Information
Mission Objective
Main:
  • Plant Seismic Charges at each Fissure (3)
  • Run to The Extraction Point
Credits Earned:
None
Research Points:
None
Available Heroes:

Belly of the Beast is the second to last mission, and can be played after Gates of Hell. Having the option to go for Shatter the Sky, Raynor has chosen to take out the Nydus Worm network to prevent the Zerg from using them when Raynor and the Dominion launch their final attack on the Zerg primary Hive cluster.

Primary Objectives[edit]

  • Plant Seismic Charges at each of the 3 Fissures.
  • Kill the Queen.
  • Escape the cave.

Guide[edit]

This mission is another dungeon crawler type mission, where you control four heroes - Jim Raynor, Findlay, Swann, and Stetmann. All four of them are powerful units, and as you explore the caverns, each of them will attain a special ability. Also when one of them completely loses HP, he'll fall incapacitated. He'll remain this way for a while, and will be revived as long as you have another hero around. Be careful though, as he'll revive with low health. Keep Stetmann behind the rest as he can heal quicker than a Medic. You'll want to use these special abilities whenever you have a good opportunity, as you don't want to be overwhelmed by Zerg units or take any unnecessary damage.

The first cavern that you enter is more or less an introductory cavern for the special abilities of all the heroes, so you shouldn't need to worry about dying in this section at all. Be careful though, as there will be a point when you reach the bottom right corner of the map where you will be ambushed by Zerg units on both sides. React quickly and use those special abilities to avoid taking heavy casualties.

Continue forward, and when 4 Nydus Worms pop out of the ground, take out the left two with Tychus's Grenade, take out the right two with Raynor's Penetrator Round, and plant Flaming Betty. An Aberration will unburrow soon, and you'll want Flaming Betty to take hits for you. Once that's done, move on to the fissure.

Once you reach the objective, you'll be tasked with protecting the Seismic Charge until it's ready to go. Don't worry about letting it take a few hits, as it does have 1000 health, but you still want to be careful. Continuously plant Flaming Betty, and make sure that you take out every Nydus Worm with either the Penetrator Round or the Grenade.

In the second cavern, you won't encounter any serious resistance at first. It's all just those 25 health Infested Terrans. Any of those special abilities will just tear through them easily. There is a point where you'll meet 3 Spine Crawlers in a group, but just use Raynor's Penetrator Round to get through them. At the lower left hand corner of the map, an Aberration will pop out of the ground, and Banelings will come to reinforce it. Take out all the Banelings as they'll destroy your army if you're not careful. When a group of 4 Banelings comes at the end, use Tychus's Grenade to kill them all.

When you advance a bit further, you'll be tasked to save the Dominion troops. Even though there are Nydus Worms spitting out Broodlings at them, don't worry, as they can handle themselves. Be careful as you move to take out the Nydus Worms, as there's an army that has 4 Banelings in it waiting for you. Plant Flaming Betty before advancing and let it take those Baneling hits. A group of Zerg will also come from behind, but just let Flaming Betty take the hits again and you should be fine.

Up ahead, you'll encounter a bunch of Infested Terrans coming at you, with Nydus Worms spitting them out. You actually don't need to rush, because if you got the two Firebats, this section shouldn't be a problem. However, when you reach the area where the second Nydus Worm resides, be prepared, as an Ultralisk and some Banelings will come at you from the front and an Aberration will attack you from behind. Retreat a little bit and plant Flaming Betty to take the Ultralisk and Baneling hits. Destroy it with your special abilities, then focus fire the Aberration down. There will be no more resistance after this section, so just advance to the Fissure.

Defending this charge shouldn't be too difficult either, as long as you continuously plant down Flaming Betty. Banelings will be coming at various points in the mission, but with Flaming Betty to take the hits, you should be fine. When the countdown timer nears 0, however, two Ultralisks will pop up. Ensure that Flaming Betty is taking the hits, and use your special abilities to take them down.

The third Cavern is rather short. Advance forward a bit, and you'll encounter a bunch of eggs. You shouldn't really have any trouble with the first two groups, but as you approach the third group, you'll be tasked with saving the final Dominion force... and an Omegalisk unburrows to break through the rocks guarding them. The Omegalisk is a larger version of an Ultralisk, with more HP and damage. You want to plant Flaming Betty right by the Omegalisk, to take the hits in case it destroys the two Rocks. It won't attack you until it breaks through the rocks, so you should be fine. Use your Firebats and a Medic to take care of the units that pop from the eggs, and use the rest of your units to focus fire the Omegalisk. Be careful using the special abilities, as they will damage the rocks if they're in the splash radius. You'll also need to be quick if you want to save those troops from the Omegalisk.

Once you advance further, you'll appear in a big cavern... and a Queen will pop out of the ground. This Queen has 4000 HP, and will rip through your forces extremely quickly if you're not careful. Focus fire the Queen, and plant Flaming Betty to take out the units that pop from the eggs. The Queen will burrow after a certain amount of damage is done to her, and will reappear in the left egg section. Again, focus fire the Queen, and use the special abilities to quickly deal damage to her. The Queen will burrow again, and appear in the final egg group. Attack her, and just do the same thing again. If you have Flaming Betty, don't plant it just yet. The Queen will burrow again when it gets low on health. Now you'll want to use your special abilities aside from Flaming Betty to clear out all the eggs in the final egg group, and stay in the back of that chamber. Once the Queen unburrows again, it will use a Mind Blast that will stun all your heroes, deal damage on them, and pop a certain number of eggs. If you're in the back of the chamber that houses the third egg group, you shouldn't have to deal with the vast majority of the Zerg that hatch from the eggs. Focus fire the Queen down quickly, as it will continuously use Mind Blast from this point on.

You'll now start the escape portion of the mission, where you'll have to quickly dart through the Cavern as the lava slowly rises. Don't engage units that you don't have to, just run for it. When you encounter units that can seriously hurt yours though, like Roaches or Hydralisks, kill them. At the end of the Cavern, you'll encounter an Ultralisk. Plant Flaming Betty to take the hits, and run past it to the beacon. Be careful with your heroes during this part of the mission though, as they won't fall incapacitated if they lose all their HP. They'll just die, and you'll fail the mission.

Special Abilities[edit]

  • Raynor - Penetrator Round
Raynor has a sniper like round, which deals 300 damage to all units in a straight line. It's extremely powerful, and considering the linear layout of the caverns, it'll prove to be useful. Do note that it will not deal any damage to units that aren't within your line of sight.
  • Tychus - Grenade
Tychus has access to Grenades, which deal 200 damage on impact in the target area. Use it only on clumps of units.
  • Swann - Flaming Betty
Swann can place a rather strong Flame Turret named "Flaming Betty". It can serve well as both a tank for damage and as a great damage dealer against weak units in a line.
  • Stettman - Regeneration
Stettman has the ability to quickly regenerate all his life and energy if he doesn't do anything for a while. You should therefore stop periodically to ensure that he's full on energy and health.

Achievements[edit]

Belly of the Beast
Complete all mission objectives in the "Belly of the Beast" mission. 15
Unbreakable
Complete the "Belly of the Beast" mission without letting a hero fall Incapacitated on Normal difficulty. 10
This shouldn't be difficult, just be careful when the Banelings come and also during the Queen section.
One Shot, Fifty Kills!
Kill 50 units with a single Penetrator Round in the "Belly of the Beast" mission on Hard difficulty. 10

Strategy: You want to send Egon to pull the Infested Terrans out of the second grouping and have Egon block them for a bit so that all of the Infested Terrans clump together. Otherwise, a natural clump of 50 targets will not occur, because many of the Infested Terrans will be too far out of range from the Penetrator Round. By sacrificing Egon, you give the Infested Terrans in the back time to "catch up," thus giving Raynor more targets to shoot at, thus making this achievement a lot easier.

When you use the Penetrator Round ability with Raynor, make sure you target the closest Infested Terran. Do NOT "draw your line" and target one of the Infested Terrans at the back. If you do this, Raynor will move forward before firing, and he will either die or he will use the Penetrator Round 1-3 seconds too late.

Bam-Ba-Lam
Kill 100 enemy units with Flaming Bettys in the "Belly of the Beast" mission on Normal difficulty. 10
Brutal Guide