Starcraft 2 HotS Lab Rat Brutal Mode & Achievements Guide

Starcraft 2 Campaign Guide --> Heart of the Swarm Campaign Guide --> Lab Rat (you are here)

Lab Rat is the first mission of the Heart of the Swarm campaign. In this guide, you will find strategies and tips for beating this mission on Brutal Mode as well as information on all the achievements and bonus levels.

Achievements and Bonus Levels

There are no bonus objectives or levels available to Kerrigan in this mission. There are however 4 achievements:

Lab Rat: Unlocked by completing all mission objectives in the Lab Rat mission (any difficulty).

Mighty Mouse: Unlocked by destroying 35 Sentry Bots (any difficulty). This is actually easier to do on Brutal mode, as you have to fight against more Sentry Bots in higher difficulty levels.

Rat Race: Unlocked by completing this mission in 10 minutes or less (at least Normal mode). This is actually unlocked as part of the Mad Dash achievement.

Mad Dash: Unlocked by destroying 3 Factories and completing Lab Rat in under 10 minutes. This does require some strategy, but it can be done as part of the Brutal Mode guide.

Lab Rat Brutal Mode & Mad Dash Achievement Guide

The Mad Dash achievement can be unlocked on Brutal mode with ease. The key here is to make 10 total Drones in the mission before you start making your Spawning Pool. These extra Drones will give you the resources you need to train extra Zerglings and morph more Overlords, two things you need to do in order to beat this mission with time to spare.

To unlock Mad Dash, you need to destroy 3 Factories. One factory is in the mid-right portion of the map, whereas the final two are near the Eradicator at the end of the mission. Destroying the Eradicator ends the mission, so you need to use your Zerglings to specifically focus down the final two Factories while ignoring the Eradicator. I like to select about 10 Zerglings to focus down each factory, while the free Zerglings focus the Sentry Bots that spawn from the Factories. If too many Sentry Bots build up you can lose all your Zerglings so be careful.

I do recommend rescuing all the Zergling packs as well as constantly reinforcing your army with more Zerglings from the Hatchery. The video guide below demonstrates this well:

Lab Rat Brutal Mode & Achievements Video Guide

By following the strategies outlined in this video above, you should have no problem beating Lab Rat on Brutal mode and unlocking the Mad Dash achievement. If you find yourself just a little behind on the Mad Dash achievement, try replaying the mission on Hard mode, as meeting the 10 minute timer on this difficulty level will still unlock the achievement.