Groups of animals get special collective nouns1, some of which are familiar (e.g., a pride of lions, a gaggle of geese) and others that are less known but equally evocative: a crash of rhinos, a charm of hummingbirds, a prickle of porcupines, a loveliness of ladybugs, a cackle of hyenas, a glint of goldfish, a parliament of owls.
Starcraft units aren’t too far off from animals — Zerglings are reminiscent of dogs, ultralisks elephants, and archons big, white fluffy bunnies — so what collective nouns would capture the spirit of each? Searching the web, I found that the question had been posed before, with lots of ideas but no consensus.
I conducted a survey to settle the matter2. Each SC2 unit was given five options (plus “other”) that were culled from various sources. In all, 764 people (40% Zerg, 27% Protoss, 19% Terran, and 14% Random) took the survey over the span of three days.
Results
The top vote-getters for each unit are summarized below.
| Terran | Zerg | Protoss |
| crew of SCVs | swarm of drones | cluster of probes |
| pack of MULEs | batch of larvae | legion of zealots |
| squad of marines | brood of broodlings | league of stalkers |
| band of marauders | cluster of overlords | force of sentries |
| pack of reapers | swarm of zerglings | watch of observers |
| company of ghosts | harem of queens | assembly of immortals |
| gang of hellions | horde of hydralisks | spectrum of warp prisms |
| battery of siege tanks | brood of banelings | sweep of colossi |
| battalion of thors | congress of overseers | plume of phoenix |
| squadron of vikings | infestation of roaches | cloud of void rays |
| convoy of medivacs | host of infestors | conclave of high templar |
| congress of ravens | outbreak of infested terrans | brotherhood of dark templar |
| brigade of banshees | flock of mutalisks | ball of archons |
| fleet of battlecruisers | cluster of corruptors | armada of carriers |
| network of nydus worms | cloud of interceptors | |
| stampede of ultralisks | fleet of motherships | |
| eclipse of brood lords |
Some Notes
The most consensus was for “pack” of MULEs. Ravens were the other unit named for an animal; its official collective (unkindness) actually came in last place, while it received the most write-ins with “murder” and “flock.”
The most contentious units were banelings (#1 and #4 separated by 6%), immortals (#1 and #2 by 2.4%), phoenix (#1 and #3 by 2.0%), and colossi (#1 and #3 by 1.4%). Protoss units in particular seem far from settled.
For Zerg units, “swarm” fared well both as an option and as a write-in. Should all Zerg units simply be considered “the swarm”?
Generally one can’t have more than one mothership in-game, which led to some interesting write-ins: paradox, singularity, singleton, FOREVER ALONE.
“Other” honorable mentions: a flower of vikings, a nevermore of ravens, a clutch of larva, a grack of zerglings, a useless of hydralisks, a gaggle of mutalisks, a bronze league of observers, a gathering of immortals, an imbalance of colossi, a wing of phoenix.
Finally, a creative exercise for the reader: given the units of your domain, can you come up with collectives that capture their spirit?
I didn’t know you were into StarCraft! That’s awesome. If you’re interested, we have a StarCraft 2 community/team that plays in the Collegiate StarLeague, which is open to US/Canadian colleges and universities.
Here’s our Facebook page, if you’d like to follow things :) Our Facebook posts are mirrored on Twitter if you’d prefer that.
https://www.facebook.com/drexeldragoons
Props on your team name! I’ll check it out.