Birth of a Swarm (campaign)
Birth of a Swarm (campaign)
This is a small WIP campaign that I made. I saw the campaign initiative thread/map collection and thought I'd upload an early version.
This map is kind of an experiment. It is designed mainly to teach players how to play zerg in general. In these maps you will need to expand and/or harras the enemy if you want to survive (at least on brutal). One major difference between this and the normal liberty campaign is that the AI never cheats. Their economy can be hurt just like yours. This is done by an AI system unlike what the normal campaign system uses.
Story
Asgaard was a colonist planet formed at the start of the first great war. It was invaded by an unnamed cerebrate which was designated only to consume the planet providing resources for the assault on Auir. With help from the Dominion the colonists were able to survive till the destruction of the second overmind. The cerebrate lost control over its brood and the zerg are roaming the planet as if they were wildlife. The zerg destruction is now slowly being cleaned up and the planet is once again at peace. The unnamed cerebrate makes a last attempt to for fill his purpose by making a self thinking entity, you.
(This next part is going to be a prologue map) You are planted on a transport ship coupled with a group of zerglings. Destroying the ship from the inside allowed you to crashland on the western part of Asgaard and start your new swarm.
Features
The map currently features an ingame map selection which includes a user friendly way of changing difficulty as well as providing information on the planets current state.
Maps
There are currently 2 maps.
Seed of Life
In the first mission you will establish your first hive cluster. Learning basic building mechanics of the zerg. You will need to fully saturate your main and destroy your opponent to win.
Assimilation
The second mission you will need to infiltrate a zerg research facility in order to get more advanced zerg strains within your army.
Last note, English is not my native language so expect a lot of spelling errors ^^
Comments
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_ForgeUser6146284 Owner
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Posted Dec 4, 2011Can u do a briefing map "where you choose missions" more detailed?With some eggs,zerg claws,bone another zerg units for example. You will continue this excellent work?:D
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Posted Sep 16, 2011Are you still working on this? Really like what you've done. Balance is good, terrain is interesting and the map choosing screen is pretty cool too. Aside from some minor spelling errors I really like the whole thing overall.
Only point really worth noting would be perhaps implementing some kind of victory screen. Going straight back to the map chooser seems a bit bland. Good job!
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Posted Aug 4, 2011I think I've fixed most of the issues that you've listed, but the imbalance in hints between the first and the second lvl.
First Map:
Fixed Agria to Asgaard
Changed the dialog "out of resources" to "starving for resources" as well as making them completely passive after the event.
Second Map:
Removed AI timer.
Reduced expansion timings of AI
Longer time in between attacks
Made the AI recieve their upgrade over time instead of starting with full 2/2 upgrades
You now need to destroy both lairs. Destroying the first will make you gain control of AI's units as well as gaining a large force.
Map Selection:
Saves "highest difficulty completed" (as in the normal campaign)
Saves your last chosen difficulty
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Posted Jul 30, 2011I hope Tyneara accepts you to part of "Custom Campaign Initiative" project soon.
I played mission1.
Really good job! =)
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Posted Jul 30, 2011General Gameplay
- An extremely nice UI, it is just amazing
- Terrain is nice throughout the game
- No Major A bugs.
Mission 1
- The Difficulty was ok on Hard, the Terran Army came no-stop during the 15 minutes but it could be handled.
- Tips are not coloured, this makes the tips look awkward with no colour, nothing really serious but I really suggest colouring it.
- Player 2 is displayed when I hovered over a colonist unit, a small bug that needs fixing
- Cinematic is not that great, need improving (Deselect the units when the player goes into Cinematic modes).
- Resource pickups in the colonist's base in the cliffs are kind of redundant but I will leave to the other testers to comment on this as I found them when I was about to destroy the command center
- Yes the burrow research was available but couldn't be researched because Lair was disabled. Again nothing serious.
Mission 2
- Now the difficulty, I think needs improving. Judging from what Tyneara has said about the Zerg going crazy in Hard. The Zerg on normal were like pussy cats (once the timer finished, I send in about 10 roaches and destroyed the right hatchery with no resistance ... wtf).
- Cinematic, again, needs improving.
- Lack of tips. Mission 1 had like 15 tips when mission 2 had like 2 ... I mean I know that the first mission should be able to explain all of the mechanics but really a learning player should get at less more than 2 tips for the second mission (remind the player to use hotkeys, tell the player what is a gold mineral, etc).
- When you have to wait for the timer to end, there are no mission objectives so you would have to make assumptions. I don't think a beginner player will make those assumptions and will expand too early and get their base kicked.
Overall
Fantastic job with the UI BUT the two maps needs polishing to make it more professional and extensive re balancing with the difficulty with some other minor details that needs to be filled in.
Rating
A 7 out of 10 - Again just some polishing and re balancing but anyway the missions are well done.
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Posted Jul 29, 2011Difficulty note: Played both on Hard
First mission notes
-Drone counter doesn't take into account that drones are used for buildings, so in reality... its not 100% accurate (minor detail)
-Burrow is available for research at the hatchery, but requires the Lair
-When the transmission came that the enemy was "out of resources" I was still getting attacked (in fact a fairly large group of tanks/marines/marauders hit a short while later
-Exit cutscene features an empty view of the terrain, I'd consider possibly creating units to make this look more like the Zerg are overrunning the area.
Second mission notes
-AI attack waves on hard are nuts... pretty much near constant... I think you should consider re balancing this, especially for mission 2 of a "teach how to play Zerg campaign" I consider myself to be a pretty good Zerg player (not particularly great when it comes to melee, but I have played and beaten WOL on Brutual.
-Several tech upgrades require the Hive (2nd zergling upgrade)
-Your AI expands to all three mineral nodes in about 2 minutes, meanwhile you've just barely got your base up and running and you're facing down swarms of hydras, banlings, zerglings etc... you're asking the player to do the impossible really when it comes to shutting down those expansions early.
-English not your first language really showed here
-End cutscene was again of nothing really.... probably because I killed the Lair to the right
Terrain for both missions was solid, no show stopper bugs either.
The launch screen/joining map... bloody fantastic... I'm poking around to try and figure out how it all works. If only Blizzard actually provided support for custom campaigns. As it stands, there's little or no way to save your game and come back to it.
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Posted Jul 28, 2011Hello.
Very intereseting what you did with the selection screen, I realy like it and the maps linked together ;). This looks very promising, although I miss some caracters in your campaign. I will be waiting for the next episode. Great Job!!!