God damn the Zerg brood... How many deaths, how much blood do the Zerg need to waste. Everywhere I look horror thrills my soul, and the very silence is fraught with terror. How many times have I crushed them, I don't remember. And how many times have I lost my men,  that were putting their life on the hazard so bravely. Alas, it was always in vain - no matter how much of that evil creatures I wipe off world's face there are always more and more coming, killing and destroying everything in sight.

I had to face them once more, and anger filled my heart... Another colony had been attacked by the Zerg, and my legion was assigned to eradicate the threat. I knew I was only called upon in severe crisis situations, and I was prepared for a fierce battle.

My Command Center landed in the north-eastern part of the colony, and my SCV's started gathering the so important crystals, the key to building up a deadly Terran army. Soon a Barracks was started, and before starting another one I commanded my most trusted SCV to explore the surrounding darkness.

The brave SCV started exploring the colony counter-clockwise. It reported no Zerg presence at the 12 spot, nor at the next two areas it visited. This is not good, I thought to myself, I don't know what to expect of the enemy. What kind of units do they have, what would be the most effective way to lay waste upon them? Aargh...

Fearless Marines were being trained all the time from my two Barracks. Once criminals, my men were now ready to selflessly give their lives in service to the society they had once threatened. Soon first contact was made, with a Zerg Gargantis flyer being caught in the southern part of my encampment.

The orange behemoth tried escaping after having discovered us, but he had no chance. Some Marines quickly ran towards the helplessly floating creature and shot it to pieces with their 8mm gauss rifles. No wonder my legion is known for it's unrelenting savagery in battle.

While passing through the south-eastern part of the colony, the reconnaissance SCV reported a group of Zerglings was speeding across the open plain, chasing him. The small dune-runners spelled fatal doom for my brave scout, but he didn't even sound scared - he managed reaching the Zerg base at 6 before dying in great pain to their razor limbs sickles and fangs!!! 

Then, in truth, I stood aghast, my hesitant soul laden with dread... my hair rose, and my voice clove to my throat. Anger possessed me and when I had a Medic and Stim Pack researching I commanded all my troops to attack rightaway. It seemed the Zerg were preparing a Lurker attack so I knew my marines had to kill or delay the lurkers from getting to the Command Center before I had mobile detection at hand. And then my warriors collided with a swarm of voracious Zerglings...

 Using advanced tactics just one or two Marines lost their lives before all the Zerglings were dead. After that epic victory my glorious marines proceeded southwards. Wisely using my comsat before rushing into the enemy base, I discovered some Lurker eggs. Having no fear, the Marines opened fire at the defending Hydra and Zerglings, but a disaster so deep happened when the Lurkers hatched and burrowed...

I lost all but three of my attacking marines, and I had killed only one of the four Lurkers. Too deep for words lies the sorrow I am still feeling after foolishly losing those men that trusted me as their commander. And  after a while the survivors, now waiting for reinforcements at 6's choke got overrun by a new Zergling army that was rushing towards my base with the Lurkers running behind.

At my base, a Factory had been completed, and an Engineering bay and Starport were in construction. My first Tank was rolling out of my factory, and right into action did it roll, as the Zerg assault party hit my base. It was actually just the Zerglings...

The three precious Lurkers were used to seal my base, with more Lurkers joining them later. I was not idle, however, I knew this would happen and I was prepared.

Soon my first Science Vessel spotted the Lurkers for my tanks. What a beautiful site this was, the hated beasts exploded and their blood flew out of the ground where they had burrowed.

After sieging and unsieging a few times, the Lurker threat was finally removed and I could plan offensive actions.

With Science Vessels providing detection, my heavy troops started rolling towards the Zerg. At home Irradiate was researched, since I knew how powerful a weapon this is against clustered troops. More powerful weapons and armor where being researched at now two Engineering bays. Once again I was caught on the move... A large group of Lurkers met my army before I could reach the Zerg base. Marines stimmed, tanks fired, and two of the Lurkers were blown to pieces before managing to burrow, then my army had to retreat a bit.

Two marines and a Medic were too slow. It was such a sad sight, the lovely woman was cut to pieces in an instant... Before I could revenge for those lost lives, I had to deal with a small surprise attack at my main base of operations. Six Mutalisk were annoying my SCV's before some Marines chased them away, killing most of them in the process. I decided to assure I would survive a long battle by seizing troop production for a while and using the extra cash to expand twice, to the 12 and 9 spots. I also built some new barracks and two more starports at home. I never seized Science Vessel production, as I knew their speed and Irradiate capabilities would be the only way to have control over a larger area of the colony without having to split my Marine forces too much.

Now I had the ability to attack southwards with the large army I had in the center, but the Zerg started pressuring my main base with fast Mutalisk attacks... They were easy to deal with, using my growing squadron of Science Vessels, but still they were a distraction that was delaying my attack.

After repelling some Mutas that were attacking my main base and expands, I thought I would finally be able to concentrate on wiping out all the Lurkers that were blocking my way towards the Zerg main, but... oh well it seemed I had underestimated the situation! Nine Guardians with Mutalisk support were now destroying buildings in my base.

As ever, Science Vessels saved the day - now the time for a counter had come! My reconnaissance had discovered Zerg expands at all three bottom spots. I decided to methodically destroy them starting from West towards East. Still I wanted to control the center, that's why I left my Tanks there with some Marines and rushed the first expand with the majority of my Army.

The Zerg wouldn't give up that easy - as I returned my troops to the center, I saw a large group of Guardians, Mutalisk and Scourge approaching my base. They started destroying buildings and my Science Vessels were so far away... For me, then, as never before, a grim horror beset me - what if my Science Vessels get intercepted by Scourge while travelling the big distance across the entire colony?

As anticipated, there was an ambush, with some Mutalisk and Scourge destroying a number of my precious Science Vessels, but the rest dealt with the Guardians, irradiating every one of them. Now I had to rebuild my supply depots, because the Guardians had destroyed a great number of them and I was unable to train new warriors. The Zerg used that and launched an all out Zergling assault, first at my northern expand, forcing me to lift my Command Center there after all my SCV's died while bravely trying to defend the outpost with the help of a Science Vessel.

Then, the ever growing Zergling force attacked my main base of operations, and remember my Marine production was stalled due to lack of supply, so I had just a few defenders there... But they fought bravely until finally newly trained Marines helped save my base.

As seen meanwhile my troops that were in the center of the map attacked the Zerg main and leveled it to the ground. At 9, another Zergling and Hydra attack tried to halt my operations there, but Marines with upgraded weapons and armor dealt easily with the threat. Where were those Zerg forces coming from? In the heat of the battle I had totally neglected reconnaissance, so now I scanned the possible expansion areas and found out the Zerg were rebuilding their important buildings at north-west and they had an expand below my main as well. I didn't care much what was happening elsewhere, I just commanded my army to attack to the north-west and the rest is history...

This, my children, is the story of the glorious battle at The Hunters. At the end we had lost 76 men, and the Zerg had lost over 300 of their evil creatures. It turned out the Zerg had used about twice the resources we had gathered, but the bravery and skill of our warriors made up for that. I see you are playing war games, and laughing a lot while doing it.

That is fine, but remember, in reality...