Temple of the Past Co-op Guide: Holding the Xel'naga Temple

Temple of the Past is the StarCraft II Co-op mission that asks one question over and over: can you hold? An ancient Xel'naga temple sits on the map and Amon's forces want it destroyed. You do not get to win by out-expanding them somewhere quiet — you win by making sure nothing reaches the temple, wave after escalating wave.

The defining feature is lanes. The temple is approached from multiple directions, which means your attention, not your minerals, is the scarce resource. Splitting evenly across every path is the classic trap: you end up with two half-armies that each lose their fight. Strong runs commit to holding chokes with real firepower and keep a mobile reaction force that can arrive somewhere fast.

Wave triage matters more than raw army size. Every incoming push has a piece that must die first — the heavy that soaks your damage, the caster that disables your line, the ranged unit that outranges your static defense. Deleting priority targets early is what stops a wave from snowballing into a leak. Players who just right-click the nearest enemy tend to hold four waves comfortably and then lose the fifth.

Because it is a hold-out map, static defense earns its keep here in a way it does not on aggressive missions. Cannons, spines, bunkers and turret lines free your army to fight rather than tank, and they never walk to the wrong lane. The catch is that anything outranging or bursting your structures will pick them apart, so buildings should support your army, not replace it.

Commander roles fall out naturally. Fortification specialists like Karax and Swann turn lanes into meat grinders with defenses and support. Swarm commanders like Zagara and Stukov flood chokes with bodies that absorb pressure for free. Burst and elite damage — Nova, Tychus, Alarak, Zeratul — erases the priority threats. Roamers like Dehaka or a mobile Kerrigan cover whichever lane is currently in trouble. The best pairs mix an anchor with a reaction piece instead of doubling up on the same job.

Save your global abilities and calldowns for the late waves, when the spawn sizes stop being polite. Spending them to make an early push comfortable is how otherwise clean Brutal runs collapse at the end.

The channel has a long run of Brutal Temple of the Past clears — Karax and Vorazun, Raynor and Alarak, Artanis and Dehaka, Zagara and Nova — each showing a different way to lock the lanes down. Browse the StarCraft 2 archive on this site, and read the Dead of Night and Oblivion Express guides for the other two flavours of co-op pressure.