Forty Reasons why Total Annihilation is better than Starcraft

1) Starcraft only has 84 units, over half of which are buildings and their add-ons! Total Annihilation has over 250.

2) In Starcraft, only 12 units can be in a group at once. Note that this was claimed to help "prevent rushing", not that it really does because you can just hotkey groups of units. Of course, Total Annihilation has no limit.

3) In Starcraft, a maximum of five units can be built at once by each building except Zerg, who can only build three and only at certain times. Total Annihilation has no limit.

4) In Starcraft, only nine commands can be given to one unit at once and you can't see what has been queued or in what order, nor can you undo any queued commands and the commands can only be spells or movement orders. In Total Annihilation there is no limit, and you are shown exactly what each unit will do and in what order and you can undo and redo any of the commands in any order.

5) In Starcraft, when a construction unit builds a structure, or a unit plant builds a unit, no other units can help construct, hence the build speed cannot be augmented in any way. In Total Annihilation, you can have as many units as you want help construct buildings and units to speed it up. (Note that even in WarCraft II, you could make an extra peon help build a structure.)

6) There are a limited number of resources on any given Starcraft map. Total Annihilation has no limit. However, when making a map, you can simulate the 'limited resources' concept by restricting all resource units (Solar Collectors, Metal Extractors etc.), and place lots of debris, rocks, and trees. That way you will have to reclaim them, much like in gathering your resources in Starcraft.

7) In Starcraft, you can select all units of the same type, but only on the screen, and only 12 of them. CTRL-Z in Total Annihilation selects all units of that type on the map.

8) Starcraft has no water units whatsoever. In Total Annihilation, you can build entire bases on or under the water!

9) In Starcraft, there is no way to reclaim the minerals of dead units, buildings, and incomplete buildings (not that there is any debris from buildings, of course, as it "magically disappears"). In Total Annihilation, all destroyed units and buildings leave behind scrap metal which can be extracted and reused. You can even extract the metal from operational units and buildings, friend or foe.

10) In Starcraft, all units see in a circular radius, with small line of sight restrictions from large mountains. In Total Annihilation, you can choose between circular line of sight as in Starcraft, permanent line of sight as in Command & Conquer or true line of sight, where units cannot see through walls or over cliffs.

11) In Starcraft, all units shoot in a circular radius, including through wall and over cliffs. The projectiles are not effected by elevation, wind, or gravity. Total Annihilation uses true physics to determine the path of projectiles.

12) In Starcraft, the only change in elevation is onto plateaus and bridges and such, but you're not really "above" anyone as far as the game is concerned. Total Annihilation has everything from small hills to huge mountains that affect the game dramatically.

13) You can not see the energy of a unit unless it is selected in Starcraft. In Total Annihilation, you can see the remaining armour of all units on the screen at once, or turn that off if you prefer more atmosphere.

14) In Starcraft, aircraft can not land. In Total Annihilation, not only do aircraft land, but some can do so underwater.

15) The music in Starcraft is all played on a synthesizer. The music in Total Annihilation is played by a real orchestra and if you prefer, you can put in different CDs and play anything you want.

16) In Starcraft, you can't deselect your selected unit ever, unless they die or go into a assimilator/extractor! In Total Annihilation, you can always deselect everything by right clicking.

17) Right clicking in Starcraft uses "smart commands," but left clicking only uses commands that have been selected. In Total Annihilation, left clicking uses "smart commands," unless you have a command selected. Then it uses that command. Right clicking deselects. Note that you can change the mouse settings in the options window in TA to mimic that of StarCraft.

18) In Starcraft, the only way to have a unit hold fire is to move him around or to ally with the enemy. In Total Annihilation, you can set units to hold fire, to return fire only, or to fire at will.

19) At a Starcraft unit constructing building, the only command you can give units built there is a rally point. In Total Annihilation, you can tell units where to go and set waypoints; you can have them hold fire, return fire, or fire at will; and you can have them hold position, maneuver, or roam at their destination. You can even set them to a patrol route before they exit the building!

20) StarCraft only has one construction unit. Total Annihilation has nine different construction units. Each of them can build different types of structures at varying speeds.

21) With the spawned version of Starcraft, you can only play a game hosted by the person with the CD that you used to install StarCraft. In Total Annihilation, with the spawn, you can play any multiplayer game, so long as the CD:player ratio is at least 1:3.

22) With Starcraft online games, you have to play IPX simulated games on the internet, so you cannot use IP addresses. In Total Annihilation, you can be the server which cuts out the middle man and speeds up games, but if you want, you can always choose to play with simulated IPX.

23) In Starcraft, flying units do not fly; they hover. They are more like flying vehicles. All air units in Total Annihilation use a physics engine to determine the flight path, really bank, and do not stop in mid air like all flying units in Starcraft.

24) Projectiles in Starcraft always hit their target and do damage, whether it appears so or not. Projectiles in Total Annihilation use a physics engine to determine whether they hit or miss their targets and the damage is determined by how close the explosion was to the target.

25) Units in Starcraft cannot fire while moving. If you set them to, every unit in Total Annihilation will automatically aim and fire at enemy units in range, moving or not. This is great for hit and run missions or 'driveby shootings'.

26) Many weapons in Starcraft do not have projectiles. For example, there is a siege tank with its massive artillery shells and marines' gauss rifles that travel at infinite velocity, and then the explosion just appears on the target. Every weapon in Total Annihilation fires a projectile using a physics engine that determines how to hit the target.

27) In Starcraft the largest maps are 256x256. Total Annihilation has maps at least four times that size, for longer and more thought out strategies.

28) In Starcraft there are only two ways to get resources - mining minerals and vespene gas. In Total Annihilation there are several ways to get resources. You can reclaim plants and rocks, you can use metal extractors, metal makers, many different energy producers, and most units produce a bit of energy themselves.

29) In Starcraft if your hatchery/command center/nexus is destroyed, you keep your resources somehow, so that marine had better have deep pockets. In Total Annihilation your Commander stores all your metal and energy, so if he dies you lose most of your resources. You can also build metal and energy storage facilities so you can have a higher maximum resources capacity. Construction plants and several units also store resources.

30) Starcraft has crystals and vespene geysers growing out of the surface of space stations. Total Annihilation drills the metal out of the space station.

31) The Starcraft storyline in the manual states that the Protoss race teleport all their prebuilt buildings and warriors from the Aiur (The Protoss homeworld). However, when fighting a battle on Aiur, the Protoss gain no advantage whatsoever. In non-campaign maps TA does not include the homeworlds and therefore does not have to deal with this problem.

32) In Starcraft a marine can shoot a burrowed Zergling on the other side of a mountain wall past a barracks behind a tree underneath a Siege tank with pinpoint accuracy! In Total Annihilation you cannot.

33) In Starcraft, you cannot choose your colour. It is selected for you randomly. You are just as likely to get purple or yellow as something you want. In TA, you have a choice of ten different colours, including black.

34) Starcraft has no way at all to get new units/structures into the game, other than expansion sets, because the units are hard coded into the StarCraft engine. Total Annihilation's game engine was built specifically to load units found in the directory. When booting up the game it searches the directory and says "Oh a new unit, I'll just add him in here!" and you can then play with it normally. You can also download new units online that were posted at Cavedog's website weekly, and from many others.

35) Multiplayer lag in Starcraft is presented by the game momentarily pausing and commands being delayed by up to five seconds. Lag in Total Annihilation multiplayer simply slows the game down.

36) In Starcraft it's harder to control your units because of the unsatisfactory unit AI. For example, when trying to move a dragoon up stairs he will move jerkily up the stairs, and then decide to go back down and try to go onto the higher platform in a different way. You have to manually click for each step you want him to take. In Total Annihilation units go where you want, when you want, in the most efficient way possible most of the time.

37) In Starcraft when you initially set up the game to host, you can not change the settings when the game has been hosted. If you decide you want to play a different map, you have to completely rehost the game. IIn Total Annihilation you can change all of the settings (except for game name) while the game is being hosted, and then view the settings even while in the middle of the game.

38) In Starcraft if you want to restrict units from play, must build a custom scenario and disable the desired units for each player. In Total Annihilation, when hosting the game, meaning you can edit the unit restrictions with a few clicks you can limit the number of that unit available in the game at any time by one player, or completely prevent them from being used altogether. Other players in the game can also view the unit limits/restrictions.

39) In Starcraft all of the super weapons (nuclear missiles, psionic storms) are impossible to stop after they are casted/lauched. In Total Annihilation, you can build missile defense systems which fire anti-nukes and takes out the missile in mid air before it reaches your base. Note that the antinukes also take out other ICBMs and you can build mobile versions.

40) In Total Annihilation, most weapons as well as units are an object in the game, meaning that a Big Bertha could very well hit a bomber flying past or a nuke could hit a fighter flying overhead. In Starcraft, all weapons are mere graphical effects, and nothing like this can ever happen.


The article was taken from this thread.