2. True. Same thing here. To isolate hero and the creep he attacks from other camps seems kinda hard to do.
<</quote>>
make a trigger making all camps in some range invoulnerable (but that would bug out when other player tries to attack such camp) or maybe make spells enabled only in some region which you move as your hero attacks.
It is also possible to make a homm3 battle system - ask a guy whos working on pokemon game in here
I'll give your map a try in the near future but Im rooting for ya :)
Managed to get a multiplayer test with 5 of us. Was hilarious chatting to each other, hearing how badly the others are doing, whilst you conquer the world.
One thing we noticed is whatever skill you pick, it doesn't matter it gives you a random one anyways? Some form of bug perhaps?
It's annoying how the skills you have dialog goes over your Hero card, perhaps move it to the side and allow people to open/close it?
The game is really fun in the beginning but starts to lapse towards mid/end game. Everything goes out the window at it just ends up being controlling a huge blob army sweeping across the land.
One of us managed to kill everyone with the most gigantic army, but another guy kept running around stealing castles and mines etc. Forever and ever never fighting. In the end after an hour and half they just called it a stalemate and left.
Please add a way to split armies and purchase more Heroes. Then the game will really become alot more interesting.
I recommend having an optional time cap. Such as after 1 year the game ends and whoever controls the most lands/units/structures wins the game.
1. One thing we noticed is whatever skill you pick, it doesn't matter it
gives you a random one anyways? Some form of bug perhaps?
2. It's annoying how the skills you have dialog goes over your Hero card,
perhaps move it to the side and allow people to open/close it?
3. The game is really fun in the beginning but starts to lapse towards
mid/end game. Everything goes out the window at it just ends up being
controlling a huge blob army sweeping across the land.
4. One of us managed to kill everyone with the most gigantic army, but
another guy kept running around stealing castles and mines etc. Forever
and ever never fighting. In the end after an hour and half they just
called it a stalemate and left.
5. Please add a way to split armies and purchase more Heroes. Then the game
will really become alot more interesting.
6. I recommend having an optional time cap. Such as after 1 year the game
ends and whoever controls the most lands/units/structures wins the game.
1. Are you sure? There are 4 buttons. You make 2 choices, between 2 upper and between 2 lower. Upper ones are characteristics. Lower are skills. If you choose both, it gives you them. It was working well, like one of things that never bugged :)
2. Hero tab must cover usual hero info, because there is nothing to see, hero tab contains all info you need about hero.
3. I'm starting to think about to unite multiple units in a single unit with number, how it was in original homm.
4. There are some ways to counter this. First, heroes can learn a spell which places walls, so you can block ways and close mines against recapturing. Second, there is some spells to slow down and stun enemy hero. Third, you can keep guards in your castles, which will protect it while you far away. 4th, you can have logistics skill, which will allow you to chase that kind of heroes. And finally, I'm gonna make a condition like it was in homm: player loses if he has no castle during a week.
5. Probably I will make it. Maybe not so soon. THere is alot of bugs still, without such new changes.
If you get a chance, maybe include a change log in the map/game so we can see what's in progress. I noticed for example you updated it today.
1) I didn't realize you pick 2 skills, I only picked one each time lol :)
3) YES! I think that's the best way. 1 unit should represent 1-5 of that unit. Obviously scaling in strength depending on how many units are part of it.
A few extra things:
- The terrain I think would be better, if slightly smaller and more 'entwined' if you understand what I mean? So rather than square boxes for each players sections, rectangular which shape into other players terrains, so you're 'closer together' yet still have same size territory. I could show a picture if you don't follow what I mean.
- Try randomly placing creeps on the map to make it more interesting? Could also randomize which buildings like mines are placed.
- Maybe place all creeps inside their structures, ones that don't have one you could just make it a small cave or something. Then if a player chooses to attack them the creeps jumps out.
- Considered a global scoreboard? How each players is doing.
- Considered a weekly 'review/update' which notifies a person how he's done? How much captured, resources gained, troops trained, units killed etc. etc.
Yeah, show a picture about your terrain suggestion.
I will make monsters/resources/artefacts/mines to be placed randomly, just a bit later, when I finsh to balance player locations, players and units. Because I need to feel how many of random monsters to place.
I don't want to place creeps into structures, because they mest block mines against capture and resourse against picking. Or players will not attack, they will just run all around map and pick/capture stuff. And I just made a change to prevent multicamp attacks. Hope It'll work.
Yeah, global statistics is in my list of things to add. This list is long, but one day i'll make it.
I was actually thinking about to accentuate day/week ands, so probably i'll add some weekly reviews too.
Ok here's an example of what I mean, note it was done in a couple of minutes so looks pretty terrible, but you get the idea.
On the left is how you currently have it, on the right is how I think you should redesign/move towards.
You might also want to consider distributing more terrain to players with less people. So dividing each 'country' into provinces and then once game starts, giving an equal amount to each player.
6 Resources, almost everyone was complaining about this, trying to get a specific resource was very frustrating whilst having a whole stack of another one you're simply not using. Can't you combine Sulphur, Mercury and Gems into 1?.Can't see any reason to have so many.
I never actually got to see any other players, terrain really needs to be shrunk a bit.
Creeps often don't return to their position when provoked, so if you loose a battle retreat to your castle. Its very possible for them to follow and end up camped outside your base. Meaning any units you by automatically jump into combat.
As Wizard, I upgrade the Mage tower all the way up level 5, yet just remained on 2 spells? Only by leveling up a stat was I able to get the 3rd spell weaken - lower damage.
That's all for now, but I think by reducing resources, shrinking map and lastly combining a number of units to be represented by 1. The map would be so much better if you could do that.
1. 6 Resources, almost everyone was complaining about this, trying to get a
specific resource was very frustrating whilst having a whole stack of
another one you're simply not using. Can't you combine Sulphur, Mercury
and Gems into 1?.Can't see any reason to have so many.
2. I never actually got to see any other players, terrain really needs to
be shrunk a bit.
3. Creeps often don't return to their position when provoked, so if you
loose a battle retreat to your castle. Its very possible for them to
follow and end up camped outside your base. Meaning any units you by
automatically jump into combat.
4. As Wizard, I upgrade the Mage tower all the way up level 5, yet just
remained on 2 spells? Only by leveling up a stat was I able to get the
3rd spell weaken - lower damage.
5. That's all for now, but I think by reducing resources, shrinking map and
lastly combining a number of units to be represented by 1. The map would
be so much better if you could do that.
1. There is a marketplace present now. It's not singleplayer merketplace like it was in homm. Youcan only trade between players. It's real market.
2. When we play with kinda 10-12 players, we meet bloody and frequently. 8 players is ok too. Just be more expensive and agressive.
3. Working on it.
4. Yeah, you need a skill "magic" to learn spells of lvl 3+.
5. There is no chance I reduce amount of resources. Just trade. Map won't be shrinked too. I'll try to make game fine without combining units, but when all other attempts will fail, i'll combine units.
I just tried it and... it's blasphemy. This is not Heroes of Might and
Magic.
Why? Because:
it's in real time (in both world and battle)
there's no battle screen, you just spawn units and they fight right
there on the world map
you can't even command those units of yours
no view of the castle/town, just a command card
This I got from playing less then a minute and then quitting in utter
disgust. Call it whatever you want, It's not Heroes.
Yeah, you right, it's not clear homm, because it's not turn based, and because no battle screen etc. Yeah, alot of differences. As well as huge similarities, including the core mechanics. Maybe it's homm for 70-80%. Alot of players agree, that this game feels like homm. And I was actually initially trying to make to feel like turnbased, being realtime. It's just experiment of projecting discrete time game to realtime engine. Yeah, it's not perfect, but there are alot of ways to improve it.
And the name reflects the substance of the mod, I believe. But if anyone will create a homm mod which will be more hommier, i'll change the name.
Reading this thread amuses me. All Fulla's feedback is basically feedback on things that were 100% recreated from the original game, because Zolden is trying to get close to that. Then Tolkfan comes in and rages about it not being close to HOMM because of the map not being turn-based.
To Fulla I would like to say; I'm sure your feedback is helping, but you really need to keep in mind that HOMM is a completely different game from Starcraft. Even though they share somewhat of a same genre title. It's fairly normal for HOMM players to spend the first hour leveling their heroes and upgrading their town before they even start thinking about attacking eachother. Because the game is normally turn-based, it has a really slow buildup and a *really* long playtime.
A pall of mine plays HOMM5 fairly avidly and we discuss the game every now and then - he's told me that online matches of the game (I only played single player) can literally last up to 5-6 hours with ease because of the immense worlds and set-ups the game throws at you. Of course, there it's actually possible to save the game in between and continue it later. This whole set-up does make the whole thing feel more rewarding though, because you literally raised your army from scratch in most cases.
To Tolkfan; If you don't like it I recommend you don't play it anymore first and foremost, but I would say... give it more of a chance? It's a beta - I can't speak for turn-based play, but I can imagine that views of the castle/town will come into play once more stuff is fleshed out - it's the basics that need to work first.
Yesterday during map night I noticed that this map was actually on page 3 of the pop list, which I thought was pretty interesting. I might give it a whirl soon :)
I played that game as well back in the day, along with quite a few others. I do understand that they require alot of patience and can be really fun playing whole day! But try to see going out and buying a Single Player game you intend to play for weeks/months on end, is completely different than joining and playing a 14 slots multiplayer map on the bnet :)
You can keep the same rewarding experience whilst also cutting a few corners here and there, whilst I dare use the word 'dumb down' to fit more for multiplayer such as combining resources as I suggested.
To Zolden:
Was nice playing a full house today, shame I lagged out towards the end. Hope you can solve that. My comp isn't the greatest, but usually can handle most maps.
Definitely consider adding the ability to buy more Heroes. I think that alone would add alot more dimensions to the game.
Well it was cool but it did not have the heroes battle and the turn based elements so It's not Heroes... I played it ones and got to say well done but I won't play it again!
The game I played was over 2 sc hours but I think all players had left around 1h and there was no way to tell :/ SO please
1 Make a city with building selection instead of the buttons
2 Show a Victory window
3 Do as it is in Heroes make army units one unit that is strong and loses amount number of units in that one stack(cuz It gets way laggy when your 500-1000 units spawn and fight at the same time!) :(
If these things gets fixed I think it could be a fun to play game even if it's not like THE Heroes of might and magic...
We played this yesterday during map night with about 9-10 players.
Three or four players had no clue what to do and either left at the start, or lost their hero+army two-three times figuring out what the hell they were supposed to do, causing them to get so far behind that they got completely smashed whenever they met an enemy hero - after which they left.
As a veteran HOMM player, I personally knew what to do and got off to a good start.
All other players found out what the map was about relatively quickly (with some guidance by me I s'pose) and played it for a good 45 mins before they all ended up leaving (Eiviyn got stuck in a tree or something).
Overall I quite liked the map. It does play a lot like the original HOMM in real-time and the way you set up the battles does have a chance to work. To summarize all the criticism I have (including previously named points so you can use this as a checklist if you want):
Army size. Once your army gets too big you start randomly attacking other packs, plus the map starts to lag. 'Instancing' battles in some way to prevent one army from engaging three neutral armies in a big battle would really help.
Multiple heroes. 'Nuff said.
Map balance. Most units seem balanced fairly well, but the map balance is kind of weird. In the original HOMMs, capturing a sawmill and an ore pit protected by level 1-2 mobs at the start was always fairly easy. Here, I started near a crystal mine protected by a small pack of T3 units and didn't get my sawmill until I could beat a large group of T4 units. I didn't get ore until I ventured out relatively far.
Overall terrain. I s'pose this is fairly low priority, but the terrain on your map is just really really bland and boring. In a game of this, good terrain is kind of a must. Stuff like improving the location and looks of buildings like mines ties into this.
The cities as a whole are bland. Obviously they are WIP, but just to point it out; you need more than a dialog screen with some buttons.
Some of the spelling as a bit off or odd; you might want to get someone with a good grasp of the English language to go over it. Generally it's not terrible, but it confused me in a couple of cases.
To tie into that - clarity. If it weren't for me, I doubt half the people in the map would've figured out what the game was about. I had several people asking what mines were for, for example. You might want to add some tooltips or any other kind of clarification as to how stuff works once you get closer to finishing the maps.
Also something you're probably already working on, but... more diversity. HOMM had arenas, morale flags, sancutaries where you couldn't be attacked, temples... your map has cities, mines, and recource/chest pick-ups - that's it.
Last but not least; the magic system needs a bit of improvement. The spells worked fairly well as is, but my hero had so much mana regeneration from the get-go that I could simply chain-cast spells and never run out of mana. And that was without ever even grabbing skill points in increased mana regen.
wow, okay. so a week ago i saw this thread, and thought:
cool idea, i love homm played every game of it and it would be just awesome to see a sc2 map with it - then i saw the screenshots and thought: what is this?
it lookes weird, the battle scenes also made no sense for me.. i closed the thread and never thought about it again - until 1 hour ago.
i tried it and really, i like it!
the idea is great - everything is "real time", that market is really cool (even if noone uses it after some time) and the battles make sense in that way.
i have to say good work and i hope you keep working on it! because even if the idea is really awesome, the game "looks" like shit - sorry.
hope you find some talented ui and terrain designer or even can make them urself and then it will be very awesome!
@Fullachain: Go
2. True. Same thing here. To isolate hero and the creep he attacks from other camps seems kinda hard to do. <</quote>>
make a trigger making all camps in some range invoulnerable (but that would bug out when other player tries to attack such camp) or maybe make spells enabled only in some region which you move as your hero attacks.
It is also possible to make a homm3 battle system - ask a guy whos working on pokemon game in here
I'll give your map a try in the near future but Im rooting for ya :)
Managed to get a multiplayer test with 5 of us. Was hilarious chatting to each other, hearing how badly the others are doing, whilst you conquer the world.
I recommend having an optional time cap. Such as after 1 year the game ends and whoever controls the most lands/units/structures wins the game.
@sigmapl: Go I have an idea how to handle it. Trying to implement it.
1. Are you sure? There are 4 buttons. You make 2 choices, between 2 upper and between 2 lower. Upper ones are characteristics. Lower are skills. If you choose both, it gives you them. It was working well, like one of things that never bugged :)
2. Hero tab must cover usual hero info, because there is nothing to see, hero tab contains all info you need about hero.
3. I'm starting to think about to unite multiple units in a single unit with number, how it was in original homm.
4. There are some ways to counter this. First, heroes can learn a spell which places walls, so you can block ways and close mines against recapturing. Second, there is some spells to slow down and stun enemy hero. Third, you can keep guards in your castles, which will protect it while you far away. 4th, you can have logistics skill, which will allow you to chase that kind of heroes. And finally, I'm gonna make a condition like it was in homm: player loses if he has no castle during a week.
5. Probably I will make it. Maybe not so soon. THere is alot of bugs still, without such new changes.
6. Interesting idea. Probably I'll implement it.
Ok great :)
If you get a chance, maybe include a change log in the map/game so we can see what's in progress. I noticed for example you updated it today.
1) I didn't realize you pick 2 skills, I only picked one each time lol :)
3) YES! I think that's the best way. 1 unit should represent 1-5 of that unit. Obviously scaling in strength depending on how many units are part of it.
A few extra things:
- The terrain I think would be better, if slightly smaller and more 'entwined' if you understand what I mean? So rather than square boxes for each players sections, rectangular which shape into other players terrains, so you're 'closer together' yet still have same size territory. I could show a picture if you don't follow what I mean.
- Try randomly placing creeps on the map to make it more interesting? Could also randomize which buildings like mines are placed.
- Maybe place all creeps inside their structures, ones that don't have one you could just make it a small cave or something. Then if a player chooses to attack them the creeps jumps out.
- Considered a global scoreboard? How each players is doing.
- Considered a weekly 'review/update' which notifies a person how he's done? How much captured, resources gained, troops trained, units killed etc. etc.
@Fullachain: Go
Yeah, show a picture about your terrain suggestion.
I will make monsters/resources/artefacts/mines to be placed randomly, just a bit later, when I finsh to balance player locations, players and units. Because I need to feel how many of random monsters to place.
I don't want to place creeps into structures, because they mest block mines against capture and resourse against picking. Or players will not attack, they will just run all around map and pick/capture stuff. And I just made a change to prevent multicamp attacks. Hope It'll work.
Yeah, global statistics is in my list of things to add. This list is long, but one day i'll make it.
I was actually thinking about to accentuate day/week ands, so probably i'll add some weekly reviews too.
Thnx again for ideas :)
Ok here's an example of what I mean, note it was done in a couple of minutes so looks pretty terrible, but you get the idea.
On the left is how you currently have it, on the right is how I think you should redesign/move towards.
You might also want to consider distributing more terrain to players with less people. So dividing each 'country' into provinces and then once game starts, giving an equal amount to each player.
Played a 8ppl game was night, was very fun.
Things that kept coming up:
That's all for now, but I think by reducing resources, shrinking map and lastly combining a number of units to be represented by 1. The map would be so much better if you could do that.
I just tried it and... it's blasphemy. This is not Heroes of Might and Magic.
Why? Because:
This I got from playing less then a minute and then quitting in utter disgust. Call it whatever you want, It's not Heroes.
A bit harsh... ? It's obviously been modified to SC2 RTS gameplay, but the core is still there.
1. There is a marketplace present now. It's not singleplayer merketplace like it was in homm. Youcan only trade between players. It's real market.
2. When we play with kinda 10-12 players, we meet bloody and frequently. 8 players is ok too. Just be more expensive and agressive.
3. Working on it.
4. Yeah, you need a skill "magic" to learn spells of lvl 3+.
5. There is no chance I reduce amount of resources. Just trade. Map won't be shrinked too. I'll try to make game fine without combining units, but when all other attempts will fail, i'll combine units.
Yeah, you right, it's not clear homm, because it's not turn based, and because no battle screen etc. Yeah, alot of differences. As well as huge similarities, including the core mechanics. Maybe it's homm for 70-80%. Alot of players agree, that this game feels like homm. And I was actually initially trying to make to feel like turnbased, being realtime. It's just experiment of projecting discrete time game to realtime engine. Yeah, it's not perfect, but there are alot of ways to improve it.
And the name reflects the substance of the mod, I believe. But if anyone will create a homm mod which will be more hommier, i'll change the name.
Reading this thread amuses me. All Fulla's feedback is basically feedback on things that were 100% recreated from the original game, because Zolden is trying to get close to that. Then Tolkfan comes in and rages about it not being close to HOMM because of the map not being turn-based.
To Fulla I would like to say; I'm sure your feedback is helping, but you really need to keep in mind that HOMM is a completely different game from Starcraft. Even though they share somewhat of a same genre title. It's fairly normal for HOMM players to spend the first hour leveling their heroes and upgrading their town before they even start thinking about attacking eachother. Because the game is normally turn-based, it has a really slow buildup and a *really* long playtime.
A pall of mine plays HOMM5 fairly avidly and we discuss the game every now and then - he's told me that online matches of the game (I only played single player) can literally last up to 5-6 hours with ease because of the immense worlds and set-ups the game throws at you. Of course, there it's actually possible to save the game in between and continue it later. This whole set-up does make the whole thing feel more rewarding though, because you literally raised your army from scratch in most cases.
To Tolkfan; If you don't like it I recommend you don't play it anymore first and foremost, but I would say... give it more of a chance? It's a beta - I can't speak for turn-based play, but I can imagine that views of the castle/town will come into play once more stuff is fleshed out - it's the basics that need to work first.
Yesterday during map night I noticed that this map was actually on page 3 of the pop list, which I thought was pretty interesting. I might give it a whirl soon :)
To Moz:
I played that game as well back in the day, along with quite a few others. I do understand that they require alot of patience and can be really fun playing whole day! But try to see going out and buying a Single Player game you intend to play for weeks/months on end, is completely different than joining and playing a 14 slots multiplayer map on the bnet :)
You can keep the same rewarding experience whilst also cutting a few corners here and there, whilst I dare use the word 'dumb down' to fit more for multiplayer such as combining resources as I suggested.
To Zolden:
Was nice playing a full house today, shame I lagged out towards the end. Hope you can solve that. My comp isn't the greatest, but usually can handle most maps.
Definitely consider adding the ability to buy more Heroes. I think that alone would add alot more dimensions to the game.
@Fullachain: Go Yeah, there were some perfomance leaks, but I solved it.
And it's not easy to integrate 2nd hero to the system of triggers, but maybe I'll do it one day, it will improve the game for sure.
Should check out the H&M 6 Beta:
Specifically note they cut down resources ! But apart from that alot of cool features. Some heroes can also attack in combat by the way?
@Fullachain: Go
Wauw, a little off topic but many thanks for that link!
Well it was cool but it did not have the heroes battle and the turn based elements so It's not Heroes... I played it ones and got to say well done but I won't play it again!
The game I played was over 2 sc hours but I think all players had left around 1h and there was no way to tell :/ SO please
1 Make a city with building selection instead of the buttons
2 Show a Victory window
3 Do as it is in Heroes make army units one unit that is strong and loses amount number of units in that one stack(cuz It gets way laggy when your 500-1000 units spawn and fight at the same time!) :(
If these things gets fixed I think it could be a fun to play game even if it's not like THE Heroes of might and magic...
We played this yesterday during map night with about 9-10 players.
Three or four players had no clue what to do and either left at the start, or lost their hero+army two-three times figuring out what the hell they were supposed to do, causing them to get so far behind that they got completely smashed whenever they met an enemy hero - after which they left.
As a veteran HOMM player, I personally knew what to do and got off to a good start.
All other players found out what the map was about relatively quickly (with some guidance by me I s'pose) and played it for a good 45 mins before they all ended up leaving (Eiviyn got stuck in a tree or something).
Overall I quite liked the map. It does play a lot like the original HOMM in real-time and the way you set up the battles does have a chance to work. To summarize all the criticism I have (including previously named points so you can use this as a checklist if you want):
wow, okay. so a week ago i saw this thread, and thought:
cool idea, i love homm played every game of it and it would be just awesome to see a sc2 map with it - then i saw the screenshots and thought: what is this?
it lookes weird, the battle scenes also made no sense for me.. i closed the thread and never thought about it again - until 1 hour ago.
i tried it and really, i like it!
the idea is great - everything is "real time", that market is really cool (even if noone uses it after some time) and the battles make sense in that way.
i have to say good work and i hope you keep working on it! because even if the idea is really awesome, the game "looks" like shit - sorry.
hope you find some talented ui and terrain designer or even can make them urself and then it will be very awesome!
Ok, I've just started to work on the map again, so thanks for feedback, guys.
I've created a new video to reflect the new things I've implemented in the mod. There are 3 parts: