Starcraft 2 Oracle Info, Abilities & Gameplay

Starcraft 2 Strategy Guide --> Heart of the Swarm Guide --> New HotS Units --> Oracle (you are here)

The Oracle is a Protoss unit introduced in Heart of the Swarm. This flying caster unit provides the Protoss fleet with an alternative reconnaissance tool aside from the Observer.

Additionally, the Oracle has a powerful, ground-only, energy-based attack that is particularly effective at destroying enemy workers.

Oracle Production

Cost: 150 minerals, 150 vespene gas, and 3 supplies.

Production Time: 50 seconds

Produced at: Stargate

Requirements: Stargate

Class: Light - Mechanical - Psionic

Oracle Stats & Info

Health: 60 shields, 100 health, 200 max energy (spawns with 50)

Weapon Damage: 15 (+10 versus Light). Note: Pulsar Beam must be activated for this attack to be present. This attack is not affected by any weapon upgrades.

Hits Ground Only

Attack Speed: .85 (fast)

Range: 4

Movement Speed: 3.38

Armor: 0

The Oracle's attack is only active when using Pulsar beam. This drains the Oracle's energy pool fairly quickly, especially if you are using a newly-spawned Oracle. With that said, the damage output of Pulsar Beam is very high given its .85 attack speed.

The other notable stat of the Oracle is its high resource and supply cost for its low amount of health and shields. It is very fragile, and as a result, has limited applications in direct combat.

SC2 Oracle Gameplay Video

The video below shows Heart of the Swarm Oracle gameplay and reveals exactly how all of its abilities work:

Oracle Abilities Guide

The Oracle has 3 abilities:

Revelation: Costs 75 energy. Causes enemy units and structures within the target area to grant vision for 60 seconds. This means that the Oracle's owner gets to see exactly what the affected enemy units and buildings see for its duration. Works really well if you are using your Oracle for harass - you can use it before fleeing on the units that come to chase off your attack.

Envision: Costs 50 energy. Allows the Oracle to become a detector for 60 seconds.

Activate Pulsar Beam: Costs 25 energy and drains 1.4 energy per second while active. This grants the Oracle a ground attack that deals 15 damage per tick (25 to light units) with an attack speed of .85. This very fast attack speed and bonus damage to light units makes the Oracle shred through enemy worker lines very quickly. An Oracle can kill a Probe or Drone in under 2 seconds.

Starcraft 2 Oracle Strategies

The Oracle is a bit limited in its functionality, but it is still a useful unit. It does not necessarily play well with all Protoss builds, but there are viable ways to use this unit.

The primary use Protoss players have found with the Oracle is as a harassing unit used to kill off enemy workers early in the game. Just 3 Oracles can take out 20 Probes in under 10 seconds, dealing a crippling blow to the enemy's economy.

There are two good ways to use the Oracle to kill enemy workers. One good strategy is to rush for a very early Oracle and try to take out your enemy's workers before they have enough units to defend themselves. This works great in the lower leagues and many players will struggle to stop a fast Oracle.

In the higher leagues, most people have seen this Oracle rush enough times that they are able to fend it off comfortably. However, this does not mean the Oracle is completely useless - it just means you need to distract your enemy in some manner before moving in to attack.

The simplest way to distract your opponent is to just use two Oracles at once at two different bases at the same time. Send one in to attack the main base and another to attack the natural. If done at the same time, it can be quite effective.

To make this strategy even more effective, particularly in the mid to late game, you can combine this with movements of your main army to really distract the opponent. What you can do is keep 1 Oracle floating outside each of the opponent's bases. Whenever your main army is about to engage the opponent's main army, you can turn on Pulsar Beam and send in your Oracles to attack the mineral line while the opponent is distracted with your main army.

Sometimes you can kill 40+ workers with the multi-pronged strategy, particularly if the Oracles have built up energy and your opponent fails to respond. It can be a true game ender!

Oracles are most effective against Terran. SCVs are harder for the Terran player to replace than Probes or Drones (slowest production due to no Chrono Boost). Oracles are also good versus small numbers of Marines.

Oracles are least effective against Zerg players. Queens can counter the Oracle and Zerg players have an easier time rebuilding Drones. Most players stick to Phoenix for their air harass against Zerg for this reason.

Also, players should realize that Envision offers them access to a Detector without getting up a Robotics Facility. This means Protoss players can go entirely air and are not forced to build a Robotics Facility in every game that goes beyond the 10 minute mark.

Outside of their ability to provide vision, Oracles do not belong in your main army as your primary attacking unit. Their short range puts them right on the front lines, resulting in the Oracle's quick death due to its low HP and Shields. It also has a high supply and resource cost, so you cannot afford to throw these away.

If you want to use the Oracle in the late-game aside from a detector, it is best to just use a couple Oracles to attack an enemy's expansion on their own as part of a multi-pronged attack.

Starcraft 2 Oracle Guide Conclusion

The Oracle is an interesting caster unit that offers the Protoss player access to more aggressive openings. This Heart of the Swarm unit also doubles as a detector, allowing the Protoss player to skip Robotics Bay tech if they so desire.