Ya i found a bug, or more like a cheat. That if you get the max admin building for 8 planets you just destroy all admin building and keep all the 8 planets. So you can have an extra # more buildings to build. I think you might know this but just wanted to be sure.
This map has obviously been a big project and is impressive in scope and vision. However the game-play is extremely slow and the user interface is quite honestly painful to use. Command Card buttons would have been a better choice for a lot of the menus, since you gain hotkeys and icons.
Also there was one minor bug that I do not know how to recreate, but a transport ship was sitting next to its source planet and instantly funneling the resources it picked up to the target planet. Basically it was teleporting resources over instead of flying between the planets.
I wouldn't call that a cheat, though perhaps a bug, because it requires you to have both built those admin buildings for the planets you want, and captured them, then destroyed the admin buildings for no refund (and they aren't cheap)
A bigger bug would however be that when you build a structure on a planet, and then overwrite it when researching, it keeps the old stats, and demolishing it may cause stats to go negative, or with no buildings, positive.
One thing that wasn't clear to me, was exactly how research stats and the mineral budget determines what stats the thing you research ends up with. I assume that the (stats * coef) are added up, and used somehow, the coef for that tech type, and that stat, and that value, along with crystal budget, are used to determine tech stats, (with randomization) and research time.
Ya i found a bug, or more like a cheat. That if you get the max admin building for 8 planets you just destroy all admin building and keep all the 8 planets. So you can have an extra # more buildings to build. I think you might know this but just wanted to be sure.
This map has obviously been a big project and is impressive in scope and vision. However the game-play is extremely slow and the user interface is quite honestly painful to use. Command Card buttons would have been a better choice for a lot of the menus, since you gain hotkeys and icons.
Also there was one minor bug that I do not know how to recreate, but a transport ship was sitting next to its source planet and instantly funneling the resources it picked up to the target planet. Basically it was teleporting resources over instead of flying between the planets.
There isnt enough command card place to make a map like this with only command card, but you are right.
Interface is in very early phase, I am waiting for 1.2 patch to make it much better.
@Hasup: Go
A bigger bug would however be that when you build a structure on a planet, and then overwrite it when researching, it keeps the old stats, and demolishing it may cause stats to go negative, or with no buildings, positive.
One thing that wasn't clear to me, was exactly how research stats and the mineral budget determines what stats the thing you research ends up with. I assume that the (stats * coef) are added up, and used somehow, the coef for that tech type, and that stat, and that value, along with crystal budget, are used to determine tech stats, (with randomization) and research time.
Demolishing that way is no longer possible.
yeah its something like this: (stats * coef) with lots square root and with other stuffs... but basically there is * between them, research time is based on this, and after this comes 0-10% bonus on the stats of the thing you research.
I just started a new game of this, solo, vs aliens, and at the start, the aliens built a troop transport, with the ability to conquer 64000 population, and took my home planet 60 seconds after the game started. I didn't even have time to build fighters to defend my planet.
I just started a new game of this, solo, vs aliens, and at the start, the aliens built a troop transport, with the ability to conquer 64000 population, and took my home planet 60 seconds after the game started. I didn't even have time to build fighters to defend my planet.
You shouldnt colonize that close to ai:D anyway I changed a bit the ai and it wont make troop transport that early.
I am glad to say that I have created this account mainly for responding to the quality of your game and to leave my review of it here. After this, though, I will probably be able to use this account for searching other high-quality maps.
Anyway, enough of the sweet talk. TFF is definitely among one of my most recommended on the list of Custom SC2 maps I enjoy playing during any downtime I can get. The gameplay provides the realistic abilities of most internet space browser games (which is where you took the idea of making the map from), and translating it into Starcraft's Galaxy Editor and creating a truely entertaining and intensive skill-practicing game. The research system is unique in Starcraft, as not very many other games have utilized this feature yet. Also, the constant differing maps keeps the strategies and planet choosing fresh and new.
I hope you're continuing on working on the map, because it'd be great to see how far and how creative it can become.
Like everyone else, I have a few suggestions, or possible add-ons that could be introduced to the game:
Possible stationary base defenses - As I've found, it can be somewhat difficult to return quickly to your base if your fleet is out attacking the main base planets of another player. Being futuristic, it would add more skill and strategic placement to construct planetary or solar-system defenses to relax this fear.
Semi-larger capital ships - For storing smaller ships within the space fleet, and could transport them to the destination you want them sent to at a faster pace. Basically operates like a Medivac, only has a basic laser to defend itself. Ships inside it cannot shoot, and if it is destroyed, then all ships it was carrying are also destroyed.
Ships with warp capabilities - I think there could be either two ways this could work... 1) there could be a ship that can warp ships with a cooldown, or 2) a research upgrade that allows ships to warp to another area after researching the attachment (would cost severe energy draining and weight, as well as a weapons cooldown before it can start shooting again).
Aside from the possible suggestions, I've noticed a bug that occurred when I was once playing; after adding 9 research quality points and 1 point to another skill (cannot recall at the moment), any attempts at researching Military hull upgrades failed, and would remain stuck on my research list.
Also, the administration upgrades may be a bit difficult, or slightly imbalanced, as it gives the player a considerate advantage over other players in expansion, research capabilities, resources, production, etc.
Anyway, that's all I've got for now. Thanks for reading.
Also I encountered almost the same bug. I do not know if it is related to the talent points, but I had put all 10 into research quality, and Bomber Hull is the upgrade that was permanently failing for me. It produced some sort of trigger error and would not leave my research list.
Also, to the author, there is a WC3 map called "Solar Conquest" which had some amazing gameplay, and your map is reminiscent of it.
You could zoom in on any planet and each one had its own unique battlefield map. The space map had starships to fight with, orbiting defense satellites, all sorts of cool stuff. Non-capital starships could enter the atmosphere of planets, ground forces battled on the planet surface like a standard RTS.
In addition to orbiting defenses you could build ground-based defenses that would attack space-based targets, like the Ion Cannon in The Empire Strikes Back.
Anyway yeah, there is a lot you can do with this map.
You have improved the interface, even something as simple as the "cancel" buttons helped a lot, but I still think the map could use more interface tweaks.
Finally, I needed more Command Card space for my map, and some people recommended a solution: use the Morph ability to switch to a new unit type instantly, like the way that Burrow works. I did not end up implementing this so I can't provide details, instead I just simplified my menus and combined some.
Ah, I think there was another game developer trying to work on that ability. I assume that he is still working on the project, if not, then perhaps he will be able to work with Hookah on that planetary feature.
Also, after reading my above post, I realized that I was very repetitive with certain words >.< .
I do have another question, and it is about whether a more sufficient and detailed guide on the help section could guide newcomers, so as to decrease the drop-out rates and increase games played :D.
I dont have much time to post now, but look at the map's page here in sc2mapster I check that daily and usually update it too.
I will remake all the dialogs in the next weeks, I already started working on it. Also adding more stuff to it (like ships, weapons).
It will look really awesome, But it will take 1-2 week before I will have workable version again:D
I dont understand what are you suggesting with morph.
The problem with zooming into a planet that it would require more space from map size (256x256) and it would be also hard to implement for now. (I expecting that some day the max map size will be increased.)
The stucked research bug was reported several times and I still couldnt find out what is causing it, but I made some changes that may fix it. However I wont be making new updates in the next week, I have to rewrite lots of stuff cause the new dialogs.
I am not sure that any change that would make ships faster would improve the game play. As its very important that people should have time to prepare for any attack.
I am open for any ship recommendation. I will add atleast 2 new ship when the new version finishes, one war ship and a defense platform, which could only move once for limited distance, from your planet where you built it.
I also plan to add new weapons and making them into 2 type, heavy and light and for example on cruiser you could change the torpedo to any heavy weapon or the laser to any light, but heavy laser would be so heavy that similar quality heavy laser as cruiser couldnt be fitted on the cruiser cause it would have to much mass.
Colony development will be changed that the chosen development slowly improves on the colony.
I am adding 3 new weapon to the ships to choose from and I dont have much idea how they should like or behave. (Also in 2.0 you will able to choose weapon type for your shipdesign....)
Any idea is welcomed!
This reminds me of that Sins of a Solar Empire game.
I had the exact same thought. :)
The main difference here being that you can travel freely between each solar system (or so I guess, from what I've seen in the videos). This is something I disliked in Solar Empire, I'm glad it doesn't happen here. Even quick matches in Solar Empire are very (and I mean VEEEEEEEERY) long, I remember a few random maps which took several days to finish (against only one AI!). I don't even want to know how it was in multiplayer...
Hookah, do you plan on adding a hostile faction, like pirates? There was a faction in Solar Empire which was a group of pirates, owning only one planet but with a very strong army and a very high production rate. The more you paid them, the least they wanted to attack you. If you had enough income, you could bribe them and they would eventually go with their entire fleet against the player(s) who didn't pay them enough. You should check for that game, there are really interesting features you can get inspiration from if you're looking for ideas of improvements.
I know solar empire. (it was kind of disappoint for me that game, I was expecting more from it, I know better 4x games than solar empire)
The current version last about 1-3 hour, if only 1v1 than it might last less than a hour. The new version will support however very long games too (currently the biggest research budget is 50mill and it will be 2billion in 2.0), however It will be faster than the current version if you want to kill your enemies.D
Bride able pirates are implemented in many other 4x games. So I might add it if I will have trigger space for it, but currently I am full with many other ideas which I will add. (I am rewriting most of the triggers for 2.0 and they take about half the space than it took before.D)
I am just not sure what kind of weapons would look spacey in sc2. I dont want similar weapons, currently my plan is to add 2 laser weapon (one very fast and one big), 3 torpedo (2 the usual kind of rocket based and one Start Treky photon torpedo) and 1 shockwave kind like archon's attack.
@Hookah604: Go
Play around with the Armored/Light/Massive etc attributes to balance weapons, and/or perhaps buffs with Damage Response things like fighters get 90% chance to dodge a beam weapon attack.
Beam weapons for example should have a hard time hitting fighters (low tracking/targetting rating) but tear up other capital ships.
Dumbfire bombs/torpedoes that go in a ballistic line, non-homing, *do massive damage but can be shot down* (bomber based anti-capital / anti-battleship)
Swarm missiles, 8 per shot, homing (fighter to fighter, try basing it on the banshee missile scaled down, should look cool)
Beam weapons, (capital ship vs capital ship, cruisers)
Flak weapons, short range splash damage, inaccurate but high rate of fire (cruiser/battleship/capital ship vs fighters)
Standard lasers (fighter based)
Heavy lasers (cruiser+ based)
Standard missiles (fighter to fighter, cruisers, etc), homing
EMP lasers that do high shield damage, and if target is out of shields they disable electronics, but do no hull damage
EMP torpedoes that detonate and disable electronics (weapons/movement systems) for a short period
Magnetic mines
Projectile-based railguns, high hull damage, low shield damage
Basically look at EVE, Homeworld, Starlancer, Freespace 2, Freelancer, X3, etc and steal their weapon ideas.
yeah I am using attributes to balance ships and with the new weapons and ships I have the perfect idea how to balance it.
I want ideas how should weapons look like, what model should I use, how should projectile move and what impact should it have, I just dont know how to make weapon that would look like really cool, without having imbalanced effects:D
I think there will be 2 with small splash damage and all the other ones will be single shoot weapon, I dont want multi shoot cause I want to make it lag less:D
There are 6 weapons and 6 ships, each weapon will have ship pair which will take extra damage from it and a secondary pair which will take extra damage too but bit less.
I made a almost completely data driven wormhole effect. (uses triggers for setting up the locations and creating the dummy units.) It looks rather better than your current wormhole in my opinion, I would request that you use it, since I imagine that yours uses more in the way of triggers.
Ya i found a bug, or more like a cheat. That if you get the max admin building for 8 planets you just destroy all admin building and keep all the 8 planets. So you can have an extra # more buildings to build. I think you might know this but just wanted to be sure.
Looks very nice, thumbs up for you good sir.
This map has obviously been a big project and is impressive in scope and vision. However the game-play is extremely slow and the user interface is quite honestly painful to use. Command Card buttons would have been a better choice for a lot of the menus, since you gain hotkeys and icons.
Also there was one minor bug that I do not know how to recreate, but a transport ship was sitting next to its source planet and instantly funneling the resources it picked up to the target planet. Basically it was teleporting resources over instead of flying between the planets.
@Hasup: Go
I wouldn't call that a cheat, though perhaps a bug, because it requires you to have both built those admin buildings for the planets you want, and captured them, then destroyed the admin buildings for no refund (and they aren't cheap)
A bigger bug would however be that when you build a structure on a planet, and then overwrite it when researching, it keeps the old stats, and demolishing it may cause stats to go negative, or with no buildings, positive.
One thing that wasn't clear to me, was exactly how research stats and the mineral budget determines what stats the thing you research ends up with. I assume that the (stats * coef) are added up, and used somehow, the coef for that tech type, and that stat, and that value, along with crystal budget, are used to determine tech stats, (with randomization) and research time.
Its not bug, its intended that way.
There isnt enough command card place to make a map like this with only command card, but you are right. Interface is in very early phase, I am waiting for 1.2 patch to make it much better.
All transport related bug is now fixed.
Demolishing that way is no longer possible.
yeah its something like this: (stats * coef) with lots square root and with other stuffs... but basically there is * between them, research time is based on this, and after this comes 0-10% bonus on the stats of the thing you research.
In the last 2-3 days I added 1v1 mode to the map.
My newest stuff to the map: (its so cool)
I just started a new game of this, solo, vs aliens, and at the start, the aliens built a troop transport, with the ability to conquer 64000 population, and took my home planet 60 seconds after the game started. I didn't even have time to build fighters to defend my planet.
You shouldnt colonize that close to ai:D anyway I changed a bit the ai and it wont make troop transport that early.
I am glad to say that I have created this account mainly for responding to the quality of your game and to leave my review of it here. After this, though, I will probably be able to use this account for searching other high-quality maps.
Anyway, enough of the sweet talk. TFF is definitely among one of my most recommended on the list of Custom SC2 maps I enjoy playing during any downtime I can get. The gameplay provides the realistic abilities of most internet space browser games (which is where you took the idea of making the map from), and translating it into Starcraft's Galaxy Editor and creating a truely entertaining and intensive skill-practicing game. The research system is unique in Starcraft, as not very many other games have utilized this feature yet. Also, the constant differing maps keeps the strategies and planet choosing fresh and new.
I hope you're continuing on working on the map, because it'd be great to see how far and how creative it can become.
Like everyone else, I have a few suggestions, or possible add-ons that could be introduced to the game:
Aside from the possible suggestions, I've noticed a bug that occurred when I was once playing; after adding 9 research quality points and 1 point to another skill (cannot recall at the moment), any attempts at researching Military hull upgrades failed, and would remain stuck on my research list.
Also, the administration upgrades may be a bit difficult, or slightly imbalanced, as it gives the player a considerate advantage over other players in expansion, research capabilities, resources, production, etc.
Anyway, that's all I've got for now. Thanks for reading.
@Wuatduhf: Go
I like those recommendations.
Also I encountered almost the same bug. I do not know if it is related to the talent points, but I had put all 10 into research quality, and Bomber Hull is the upgrade that was permanently failing for me. It produced some sort of trigger error and would not leave my research list.
Also, to the author, there is a WC3 map called "Solar Conquest" which had some amazing gameplay, and your map is reminiscent of it.
You could zoom in on any planet and each one had its own unique battlefield map. The space map had starships to fight with, orbiting defense satellites, all sorts of cool stuff. Non-capital starships could enter the atmosphere of planets, ground forces battled on the planet surface like a standard RTS.
In addition to orbiting defenses you could build ground-based defenses that would attack space-based targets, like the Ion Cannon in The Empire Strikes Back.
Anyway yeah, there is a lot you can do with this map.
You have improved the interface, even something as simple as the "cancel" buttons helped a lot, but I still think the map could use more interface tweaks.
Finally, I needed more Command Card space for my map, and some people recommended a solution: use the Morph ability to switch to a new unit type instantly, like the way that Burrow works. I did not end up implementing this so I can't provide details, instead I just simplified my menus and combined some.
@scmapcritic
Ah, I think there was another game developer trying to work on that ability. I assume that he is still working on the project, if not, then perhaps he will be able to work with Hookah on that planetary feature.
Also, after reading my above post, I realized that I was very repetitive with certain words >.< .
I do have another question, and it is about whether a more sufficient and detailed guide on the help section could guide newcomers, so as to decrease the drop-out rates and increase games played :D.
I dont have much time to post now, but look at the map's page here in sc2mapster I check that daily and usually update it too.
I will remake all the dialogs in the next weeks, I already started working on it. Also adding more stuff to it (like ships, weapons).
It will look really awesome, But it will take 1-2 week before I will have workable version again:D
ok, here is a more detailed reply:
I dont understand what are you suggesting with morph.
The problem with zooming into a planet that it would require more space from map size (256x256) and it would be also hard to implement for now. (I expecting that some day the max map size will be increased.)
The stucked research bug was reported several times and I still couldnt find out what is causing it, but I made some changes that may fix it. However I wont be making new updates in the next week, I have to rewrite lots of stuff cause the new dialogs.
I am not sure that any change that would make ships faster would improve the game play. As its very important that people should have time to prepare for any attack.
I am open for any ship recommendation. I will add atleast 2 new ship when the new version finishes, one war ship and a defense platform, which could only move once for limited distance, from your planet where you built it.
I also plan to add new weapons and making them into 2 type, heavy and light and for example on cruiser you could change the torpedo to any heavy weapon or the laser to any light, but heavy laser would be so heavy that similar quality heavy laser as cruiser couldnt be fitted on the cruiser cause it would have to much mass.
Colony development will be changed that the chosen development slowly improves on the colony.
I am about at the 1/3 of the version 2.0 of the map. (this is how the new production window looks like: http://www.sc2mapster.com/maps/warring-factions/images/30-ff-2-0-colony-production/)
I am adding 3 new weapon to the ships to choose from and I dont have much idea how they should like or behave. (Also in 2.0 you will able to choose weapon type for your shipdesign....)
Any idea is welcomed!
I had the exact same thought. :)
The main difference here being that you can travel freely between each solar system (or so I guess, from what I've seen in the videos). This is something I disliked in Solar Empire, I'm glad it doesn't happen here. Even quick matches in Solar Empire are very (and I mean VEEEEEEEERY) long, I remember a few random maps which took several days to finish (against only one AI!). I don't even want to know how it was in multiplayer...
Hookah, do you plan on adding a hostile faction, like pirates? There was a faction in Solar Empire which was a group of pirates, owning only one planet but with a very strong army and a very high production rate. The more you paid them, the least they wanted to attack you. If you had enough income, you could bribe them and they would eventually go with their entire fleet against the player(s) who didn't pay them enough. You should check for that game, there are really interesting features you can get inspiration from if you're looking for ideas of improvements.
I know solar empire. (it was kind of disappoint for me that game, I was expecting more from it, I know better 4x games than solar empire)
The current version last about 1-3 hour, if only 1v1 than it might last less than a hour. The new version will support however very long games too (currently the biggest research budget is 50mill and it will be 2billion in 2.0), however It will be faster than the current version if you want to kill your enemies.D
Bride able pirates are implemented in many other 4x games. So I might add it if I will have trigger space for it, but currently I am full with many other ideas which I will add. (I am rewriting most of the triggers for 2.0 and they take about half the space than it took before.D)
I am just not sure what kind of weapons would look spacey in sc2. I dont want similar weapons, currently my plan is to add 2 laser weapon (one very fast and one big), 3 torpedo (2 the usual kind of rocket based and one Start Treky photon torpedo) and 1 shockwave kind like archon's attack.
@Hookah604: Go Play around with the Armored/Light/Massive etc attributes to balance weapons, and/or perhaps buffs with Damage Response things like fighters get 90% chance to dodge a beam weapon attack.
Beam weapons for example should have a hard time hitting fighters (low tracking/targetting rating) but tear up other capital ships.
Basically look at EVE, Homeworld, Starlancer, Freespace 2, Freelancer, X3, etc and steal their weapon ideas.
P.S. New menu is looking great!
yeah I am using attributes to balance ships and with the new weapons and ships I have the perfect idea how to balance it.
I want ideas how should weapons look like, what model should I use, how should projectile move and what impact should it have, I just dont know how to make weapon that would look like really cool, without having imbalanced effects:D
I think there will be 2 with small splash damage and all the other ones will be single shoot weapon, I dont want multi shoot cause I want to make it lag less:D
There are 6 weapons and 6 ships, each weapon will have ship pair which will take extra damage from it and a secondary pair which will take extra damage too but bit less.
@Hookah604: Go
I made a almost completely data driven wormhole effect. (uses triggers for setting up the locations and creating the dummy units.) It looks rather better than your current wormhole in my opinion, I would request that you use it, since I imagine that yours uses more in the way of triggers.
I will look into it.