Crater of Carnage is a 5v5 map based loosely on DotA, in that you are fighting the other team to destroy their home base. The similarities end there, however, as there are no heroes here, only hardened criminals, Protoss prisoners, and captured Zerg creatures all fighting for the pleasure of Emperor Mengsk and trillions of television and holo viewers at home. Choose your class and fight to take over forward bases as you push towards the destruction of your enemies.
Health as a player upgradable attribute influences the following:
Maximum Hit Points - A bonus amount of Max HP added to your Archetype's base
Hit Point Regeneration - The rate at which you recover HP from passive regeneration
Crowd Control Reduction - Your resistance to stuns, slows, roots, and other disables
I feel it is very important to include CC Reduction as a statistic associated with Health, or it would immediately become a worthless stat when compared with Damage. Think of how easy it would be to just stun a high HP target until you killed them with your crazy damage output. Raising your resistance to that strategy is what will keep this attribute (and Brawlers) competitive. An important thing to keep in mind is that there is NO damage mitigation statistic such as armor or magic resistance in Crater of Carnage. The only things that can mitigate damage are class abilities themselves. The main thing that will keep you from dying is not getting hit, and investing in Health.
Power
The Power attribute is very straightforward, it influences your basic attack AND ability damage. There are no designated carries in Crater of Carnage, so this attribute is valuable to everyone in every class. Every class shares the same Base Damage statistic which grows with level up. Putting resources into Power will raise your Base Damage number further. Damage output will be determined per ability, usually as a percentage of your Base Damage. For example, very fast animating attacks with low cooldowns would do 100% of Base Damage, while slower attacks would do 150%, and AoEs would do 50% of your Base Damage.
Expertise
This effect will change based on the class, for example, a low cooldown melee Brawler with an energy bar to manage may use this attribute to gain increased energy regeneration. It may have multiple effects on the same class, there really are not any limits to what I can design this stat to do.
Attribute Builds
Blizzard DotA has decided to work an item system much like what I am interested in doing, involving minimal directly modified statistics. I am considering ripping items out of the game entirely, and if I did this is the system I would replace them with. The current design allows each player to upgrade their class a maximum of 4 times in each of the following 3 attributes. Each new level of upgrade will cost more than the last, and there will be a logical rule in place that says "If one attribute has reached rank 4, none others may. If two attributes have reached rank 3, the final cannot." This leaves you with 6 actual character builds, as illustrated below:
Build 1
Damage 4
Health 3
Expertise 2
Build 2
Damage 2
Health 3
Expertise 4
Build 3
Damage 4
Health 2
Expertise 3
Build 4
Damage 2
Health 4
Expertise 3
Build 5
Damage 3
Health 2
Expertise 4
Build 6
Damage 3
Health 4
Expertise 3
On any given class you get 6 ways to build them. This demonstrates what I meant by a Safety Net in the first post beautifully, because it is impossible to purchase attributes you absolutely cannot use. At the same time, in most DotA-likes, despite having access to dozens of items, most Heroes only have 1-2 truly competitive builds anyway. While it looks like this system is restricting player choice, it really isn't, it is just removing fake choices that trick new players into making bad decisions. This system allows for individuals to build their characters differently based on the flow of the game and the class they have picked, and it is my hope that in the finished game people have a hard time pinning down what the "best" build really is, and are surprised by opponents using unexpected builds.
Classes are my attempt to help organize player characters into distinct but flexible play styles.
Warriors
Protoss prisoners that fight to survive make up the Warrior class. They are ruthless killers who despise humanity, fighting only because of the hope that they will be rescued.
Scouts
The Terran Scouts fill a variety of roles on the team, and are usually picked from the ranks of those deemed unfit for military service due to extreme paranoia and aggressive behavior.
Psions
Protoss Templar prisoners who wield psionic powers to devastate their foes through careful application of misdirection and raw power.
Pirates
Terran Pirates who have been captured and were placed in the Crater instead of being executed.
@LoneVandal: Your map's "lore" suggests a strong relation with Starcraft lore, so I think this "plagued one" hero may be am "one-of-a-kind" Infested Terran. I don't know how much you plan to work on their backstories but I could imagine a good one for this hero.
@LoneVandal: Your map's "lore" suggests a strong relation with Starcraft lore, so I think this "plagued one" hero may be am "one-of-a-kind" Infested Terran. I don't know how much you plan to work on their backstories but I could imagine a good one for this hero.
At first I was stuck on the idea that a melee character would pretty much have to be a Zealot, but then I thought maybe a Firebat that spews filth instead of fire, or Kerrigan, would be a good fit for this. Zergy Kerri looks somewhat like a zombie with weird mutations :)
@LoneVandal: Go If the whole thing is a TV show for Dominion people, maybe this infested terran was created by a Dominion bio-lab? Like the Dominion is actually using the show to test their own weapons. This idea made me remember that Killer Instinct game, where about half of those freaks were in the tournament only to be tested as weapons by the company running the show.
@LoneVandal: Go If the whole thing is a TV show for Dominion people, maybe this infested terran was created by a Dominion bio-lab? Like the Dominion is actually using the show to test their own weapons. This idea made me remember that Killer Instinct game, where about half of those freaks were in the tournament only to be tested as weapons by the company running the show.
An infested terran with that background works, but I have a tight budget which unfortunately doesn't include new models. Since this is designed as a melee hero my options are very limited.
So basically, you're taking Blizzard DotA, substituting/adding in a bunch of awful ideas, making it more confusing, and changing a few names around. Sounds like fun.
So basically, you're taking Blizzard DotA, substituting/adding in a bunch of awful ideas, making it more confusing, and changing a few names around. Sounds like fun.
Not.
As antagonistic as your post was, after a few days I realized you were right when you said "more confusing" which is completely counter to the majority of my effort. I'm tearing the passives out of Archetypes and working on some other methods to continue simplifying things. You should work on not sounding like an asshole. Maybe then people would have an easier time agreeing with what you have to say.
Thinking about it more, the project is taking a new direction. No more trying to be like DotA but easier. A different game, still using 5v5 teams perhaps, but a different game is what I think this needs to become.
As antagonistic as your post was, after a few days I realized you were right when you said "more confusing" which is completely counter to the majority of my effort. I'm tearing the passives out of Archetypes and working on some other methods to continue simplifying things. You should work on not sounding like an asshole. Maybe then people would have an easier time agreeing with what you have to say.
I don't care if people agree with what I have to say, because I already know I'm right. Whether other people agree with that or not is up to them.
You're paying people tons of money to create a map that Blizzard is already creating. Congratulations. Your map will become a gigantic waste of money when Blizzard's (or someone else's better idea) is released.
DotA maps need variance in the gameplay elements for both casual and competitive players to set them apart from each other. Nothing you described in your posts sets your map apart from Allstars/Sotis or Blizzard's DOTA. You essentially took Blizzard DOTA, removed good ideas from it, and replaced them with bad, generic ones. I could go more in depth, but I'd rather not because it's really not worth my time. But from what I've read, nothing here is worth playing or spending time or money on.
Lastly, this is coming from an AoS player who has played Allstars at a high competitive level and a Map editor who edited the original DOTA on Reign of Chaos for 3 years at the near peak of its popularity. I know a lot more than you do, and I can tell you that you have a lot of work to do.
Sorry for the tone in my posts, but it annoys the hell out of me when people borrow other ideas to use as their own and just make them worse as opposed to improving on them, while presenting themselves as people who know a lot about game design (I can tell that you don't know much or you wouldn't be presenting awful ideas and paying people to make your map).
Stop trying to create Blizzard DOTA before it comes out. No one wants to play that.
@LoneVandal: Go
Stop trying to create Blizzard DOTA before it comes out. No one wants to play that.
Well the project didn't start out that way. The more I worked on it though, the more I came to same conclusions B DotA did. I don't care if you believe me, but most of the work I did was before I knew B DotA was only going to have 3 statistics, was going to change how jungle camps worked, was going to have attacks that outranged towers, was not going to use last hits, etc... And you know what, it all made sense. Everything they're doing makes perfect sense and I think I need to take the map in a new direction entirely. You're right that I shouldn't create Blizzard DotA, I will enjoy playing that when it comes out much more than I would enjoy a half baked attempt at making it myself.
Crater of Carnage Overview
Crater of Carnage is a 5v5 map based loosely on DotA, in that you are fighting the other team to destroy their home base. The similarities end there, however, as there are no heroes here, only hardened criminals, Protoss prisoners, and captured Zerg creatures all fighting for the pleasure of Emperor Mengsk and trillions of television and holo viewers at home. Choose your class and fight to take over forward bases as you push towards the destruction of your enemies.
Attributes and Hero Growth
Health
Health as a player upgradable attribute influences the following:
I feel it is very important to include CC Reduction as a statistic associated with Health, or it would immediately become a worthless stat when compared with Damage. Think of how easy it would be to just stun a high HP target until you killed them with your crazy damage output. Raising your resistance to that strategy is what will keep this attribute (and Brawlers) competitive. An important thing to keep in mind is that there is NO damage mitigation statistic such as armor or magic resistance in Crater of Carnage. The only things that can mitigate damage are class abilities themselves. The main thing that will keep you from dying is not getting hit, and investing in Health.
Power
The Power attribute is very straightforward, it influences your basic attack AND ability damage. There are no designated carries in Crater of Carnage, so this attribute is valuable to everyone in every class. Every class shares the same Base Damage statistic which grows with level up. Putting resources into Power will raise your Base Damage number further. Damage output will be determined per ability, usually as a percentage of your Base Damage. For example, very fast animating attacks with low cooldowns would do 100% of Base Damage, while slower attacks would do 150%, and AoEs would do 50% of your Base Damage.
Expertise
This effect will change based on the class, for example, a low cooldown melee Brawler with an energy bar to manage may use this attribute to gain increased energy regeneration. It may have multiple effects on the same class, there really are not any limits to what I can design this stat to do.
Attribute Builds
Blizzard DotA has decided to work an item system much like what I am interested in doing, involving minimal directly modified statistics. I am considering ripping items out of the game entirely, and if I did this is the system I would replace them with. The current design allows each player to upgrade their class a maximum of 4 times in each of the following 3 attributes. Each new level of upgrade will cost more than the last, and there will be a logical rule in place that says "If one attribute has reached rank 4, none others may. If two attributes have reached rank 3, the final cannot." This leaves you with 6 actual character builds, as illustrated below:
On any given class you get 6 ways to build them. This demonstrates what I meant by a Safety Net in the first post beautifully, because it is impossible to purchase attributes you absolutely cannot use. At the same time, in most DotA-likes, despite having access to dozens of items, most Heroes only have 1-2 truly competitive builds anyway. While it looks like this system is restricting player choice, it really isn't, it is just removing fake choices that trick new players into making bad decisions. This system allows for individuals to build their characters differently based on the flow of the game and the class they have picked, and it is my hope that in the finished game people have a hard time pinning down what the "best" build really is, and are surprised by opponents using unexpected builds.
Classes
Classes are my attempt to help organize player characters into distinct but flexible play styles.
Warriors
Protoss prisoners that fight to survive make up the Warrior class. They are ruthless killers who despise humanity, fighting only because of the hope that they will be rescued.
Scouts
The Terran Scouts fill a variety of roles on the team, and are usually picked from the ranks of those deemed unfit for military service due to extreme paranoia and aggressive behavior.
Psions
Protoss Templar prisoners who wield psionic powers to devastate their foes through careful application of misdirection and raw power.
Pirates
Terran Pirates who have been captured and were placed in the Crater instead of being executed.
Reserved Post
Talk about spamming. You do know you can edit older posts. Also moved to correct forum.
Contribute to the wiki (Wiki button at top of page) Considered easy altering of the unit textures?
https://www.sc2mapster.com/forums/resources/tutorials/179654-data-actor-events-message-texture-select-by-id
https://media.forgecdn.net/attachments/187/40/Screenshot2011-04-17_09_16_21.jpg
I do know I can edit older posts, but this helps organize them better for people trying to read the various subjects.
@LoneVandal: Your map's "lore" suggests a strong relation with Starcraft lore, so I think this "plagued one" hero may be am "one-of-a-kind" Infested Terran. I don't know how much you plan to work on their backstories but I could imagine a good one for this hero.
At first I was stuck on the idea that a melee character would pretty much have to be a Zealot, but then I thought maybe a Firebat that spews filth instead of fire, or Kerrigan, would be a good fit for this. Zergy Kerri looks somewhat like a zombie with weird mutations :)
@LoneVandal: Go If the whole thing is a TV show for Dominion people, maybe this infested terran was created by a Dominion bio-lab? Like the Dominion is actually using the show to test their own weapons. This idea made me remember that Killer Instinct game, where about half of those freaks were in the tournament only to be tested as weapons by the company running the show.
An infested terran with that background works, but I have a tight budget which unfortunately doesn't include new models. Since this is designed as a melee hero my options are very limited.
@LoneVandal: Go Well, let's hope HoTS will give us all lots of useful models then.
@SoulFilcher: Go theres a good infested zelot model on hive
http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/sc2-resources-675/infested-zerg-controlled-zealot-198407/
theres also wow models......
@SouLCarveRR: Go
Wow that model is great :D Is it available for public use?
@LoneVandal: Go Yeah, its public, I use it in my mod.
So basically, you're taking Blizzard DotA, substituting/adding in a bunch of awful ideas, making it more confusing, and changing a few names around. Sounds like fun.
Not.
As antagonistic as your post was, after a few days I realized you were right when you said "more confusing" which is completely counter to the majority of my effort. I'm tearing the passives out of Archetypes and working on some other methods to continue simplifying things. You should work on not sounding like an asshole. Maybe then people would have an easier time agreeing with what you have to say.
USELESS COMMENT (just so people know i'm still here)
gl on your map. whether a good idea or not, it's worth a try
Thinking about it more, the project is taking a new direction. No more trying to be like DotA but easier. A different game, still using 5v5 teams perhaps, but a different game is what I think this needs to become.
I don't care if people agree with what I have to say, because I already know I'm right. Whether other people agree with that or not is up to them.
You're paying people tons of money to create a map that Blizzard is already creating. Congratulations. Your map will become a gigantic waste of money when Blizzard's (or someone else's better idea) is released.
DotA maps need variance in the gameplay elements for both casual and competitive players to set them apart from each other. Nothing you described in your posts sets your map apart from Allstars/Sotis or Blizzard's DOTA. You essentially took Blizzard DOTA, removed good ideas from it, and replaced them with bad, generic ones. I could go more in depth, but I'd rather not because it's really not worth my time. But from what I've read, nothing here is worth playing or spending time or money on.
Lastly, this is coming from an AoS player who has played Allstars at a high competitive level and a Map editor who edited the original DOTA on Reign of Chaos for 3 years at the near peak of its popularity. I know a lot more than you do, and I can tell you that you have a lot of work to do.
Sorry for the tone in my posts, but it annoys the hell out of me when people borrow other ideas to use as their own and just make them worse as opposed to improving on them, while presenting themselves as people who know a lot about game design (I can tell that you don't know much or you wouldn't be presenting awful ideas and paying people to make your map).
Stop trying to create Blizzard DOTA before it comes out. No one wants to play that.
Well the project didn't start out that way. The more I worked on it though, the more I came to same conclusions B DotA did. I don't care if you believe me, but most of the work I did was before I knew B DotA was only going to have 3 statistics, was going to change how jungle camps worked, was going to have attacks that outranged towers, was not going to use last hits, etc... And you know what, it all made sense. Everything they're doing makes perfect sense and I think I need to take the map in a new direction entirely. You're right that I shouldn't create Blizzard DotA, I will enjoy playing that when it comes out much more than I would enjoy a half baked attempt at making it myself.