I have little modified Blizzard content, thank gods. Of course, what little I have is because it was too annoying to recreate like the broodling weapon. It's still too annoying so I guess I'll remove it.
It's a good lesson, though: it's better that it happens now than a year down the road when HotS comes out...
If it's just default data changing, that's not too bad since you should have duplicated everything (ok, everyone got lazy at some point). But triggers disappearing may indicate a real problem.
Question: I have a beam that is created by event: unit birth and is supposed to connect two attachment points on _Unit, so I put the two attachment points into host launch ops and host impact ops. However, while this works, the beam doesn't move with the attachment points (which bob up and down) if the unit is stationary. It works fine when the unit is moving! What gives?
But honestly... what does our real name have to do with this? Nothing!
Whether Blizzard bans me under "s3rius" or under my real name doesn't
change anything as they'd just ban my account in both cases.
It does: if you troll or get banned under your real name, people might see it. Like your future employer or (for the younger generation) your parents and friends. This keeps people in line even when they no longer really care about getting banned, like if they're going to quit the game anyway.
Even though I don't approve of 7's term 'ego boost', it's true that I believe spending x months making something for no benefit is a waste of time:
Quote:
I think that INITIALLY you might have had the right mindset and knew how to approach making mods. Intellectually you appreciate the logic behind gems being created through love and unspoiled intention; but the moment you began to appreciate the praise more than the creating you started to burn out.
And this happened when it became clear that most players of my D2 mod cared less about challenge and adventure than about three questions: what's the best class, what are the best items, what kind of cheese can I use to avoid any semblance of challenge and content and obtain those items with no effort?
There's no satisfaction in making a game for people to enjoy if they don't actually want to enjoy it and instead care only about how to efficiently skip most of the game and proceed to grind for items in one area using exclusively the best character build. So might as well get satisfaction from the number of players then.
Quote:
You aren't gonna succeed if you value the extrinsic rewards more than the intrinsic rewards. Not only are you going to burn yourself out, but the quality of your mods and experience will be far worse.
I wanted to make a hero-based point capture 6v6 with keyboard controls. I can't because neither keyboard controls nor 6v6 are viable. So, since I have to make whatever wasn't my first choice, it had better be popular instead. I'll let the intrinsic reward people happily sit in the back of the list with 0 games per hour.
This doesn't mean I don't care about the quality of the product. The best way to retain players is by making a product that meets customer demand better than the competition, driven by the desire to become bigger than the competition. Isn't that the foundation of our economic system? Just the luck factor, of course, sucks.
A good way to remain motivated is to keep your map 'foldable'. I don't know how you'd really call it in English but it's a term in written communication where you make sure a text is complete and correct regardless of when the recipient stops reading. You do this by putting the basics in the first paragraph and then elaborating in increasing detail in the subsequent paragraphs.
So if you're making a TD, instead of first implementing 36 towers and then implementing 50 creeps, make a minimum baseline of towers and creeps and alternate both. This ensures that should you get bored or RL intervene you can easily wrap up the map and have something playable with minimum effort even if it may not be feature complete.
Having a way out, so to speak, means the work ahead is 'optional' rather than a wall of stuff you absolutely 100% have to get through.
......
Also, if there's something you're not sure how or whether to implement, figure it out first, especially if it may influence other content. If you decide to go from a 3rd person view to an isometric view, your map is probably way too big. Redoing work is a motivation killer.
Keep a to-do list and keep it as short as possible before you implement more content. If your map is foldable, more content isn't critical. But if you don't fix outstanding issues they'll just pile up until you think the map is done and you realise you have 20 days worth of fixing ahead of you. I made this mistake with Diablo 2 a number of times.
I believe there's a pretty big difference between the popularity of this fangled thing called "Trackmania" and Starcraft 2.
Trackmania has only been the biggest PC racing game for the last few years. :P Also, number of players and number of builders should both scale up equally.
Quote:
And having an editor that makes it easy to make maps isn't necessarily a good thing. Starcraft 2's editor takes a lot of patience from my experience, (Yet it can create some pretty amazing things) and this will weed out those who are weak in their determination.
I like this attitude. :) It was almost impossible to make a Diablo 2 mod unless you were determined, so there were few mods but they all had a lot of work put into them. People who qq on the b.net forum that 'the editor is too hard to use' would never have produced anything worth playing anyway.
......
Quote:
Failure is only random if you do not understand the variables at play. It's easy to bury your head in the sand, to simply make the mod you want to make and ignore the world around you that you ultimately want to play your mod. (...) Is your game easily accessible? (...) Does it hit you in the face with production value right off the bat? Well made custom load screen, high quality voice acting, music? Do these all fit together to create a coherent product? (...) it's the small touches modders often neglect that often make the difference of getting on the front page.
+1.
This is exactly what I've been saying about Diablo 2 mods for years. <3 My mod, Median XL is the biggest because I care about these things: many people have attempted to install Eastern Sun and blew it, others tried Zy-El and got stomped in the first area. Several people were turned off Blackened because the UI is so ugly. Even the item names: I made sure every item name actually fits in the lore.
It worked, but then D2 was so hard to mod that there was very little supply in terms of mods and therefore a large demand to get things started. With the glut of maps for SC2 nowadays it seems likely that some will just get completely overlooked for no reason at all.
Also, it's incredibly unlikely that Blizzard takes aim at your map. I think most of those fears stem from the delusion that people at Blizzard care about you and your map in particular among the sea of custom maps that only signify one thing to them: +X boxes sold to people looking to play UMS/Dota = €60X profit. What those maps actually look like is irrelevant to them, unless it has a swear word in it and someone might commit suicide because of that and sue Blizzard.
0
So, did you make new doodads too? :D
0
I have little modified Blizzard content, thank gods. Of course, what little I have is because it was too annoying to recreate like the broodling weapon. It's still too annoying so I guess I'll remove it.
It's a good lesson, though: it's better that it happens now than a year down the road when HotS comes out...
0
If it's just default data changing, that's not too bad since you should have duplicated everything (ok, everyone got lazy at some point). But triggers disappearing may indicate a real problem.
0
So when they said beta maps would be release compatible, they lied?
0
I look at that image and wonder: of all possible items that could serve a mapmaker, why... fruit? :)
0
Are you sure?
Did you test it?...
0
Keep a backup copy of your old SC2 install (the folder + the one in documents + registry keys).
Unless the editor is a revolution, it's not worth being locked out of until release.
0
I read the OP and I thought 'man, how old is an Evo IV? What did a '80s Lancer look like again?'. :)
0
Question: I have a beam that is created by event: unit birth and is supposed to connect two attachment points on _Unit, so I put the two attachment points into host launch ops and host impact ops. However, while this works, the beam doesn't move with the attachment points (which bob up and down) if the unit is stationary. It works fine when the unit is moving! What gives?
0
It does: if you troll or get banned under your real name, people might see it. Like your future employer or (for the younger generation) your parents and friends. This keeps people in line even when they no longer really care about getting banned, like if they're going to quit the game anyway.
0
Even though I don't approve of 7's term 'ego boost', it's true that I believe spending x months making something for no benefit is a waste of time:
And this happened when it became clear that most players of my D2 mod cared less about challenge and adventure than about three questions: what's the best class, what are the best items, what kind of cheese can I use to avoid any semblance of challenge and content and obtain those items with no effort?
There's no satisfaction in making a game for people to enjoy if they don't actually want to enjoy it and instead care only about how to efficiently skip most of the game and proceed to grind for items in one area using exclusively the best character build. So might as well get satisfaction from the number of players then.
I wanted to make a hero-based point capture 6v6 with keyboard controls. I can't because neither keyboard controls nor 6v6 are viable. So, since I have to make whatever wasn't my first choice, it had better be popular instead. I'll let the intrinsic reward people happily sit in the back of the list with 0 games per hour.
This doesn't mean I don't care about the quality of the product. The best way to retain players is by making a product that meets customer demand better than the competition, driven by the desire to become bigger than the competition. Isn't that the foundation of our economic system? Just the luck factor, of course, sucks.
0
You don't HAVE to specify your real name, you know.
Make a new b.net account. Enter your real name: 'Donald Duck'.
Problem solved.
0
A good way to remain motivated is to keep your map 'foldable'. I don't know how you'd really call it in English but it's a term in written communication where you make sure a text is complete and correct regardless of when the recipient stops reading. You do this by putting the basics in the first paragraph and then elaborating in increasing detail in the subsequent paragraphs.
So if you're making a TD, instead of first implementing 36 towers and then implementing 50 creeps, make a minimum baseline of towers and creeps and alternate both. This ensures that should you get bored or RL intervene you can easily wrap up the map and have something playable with minimum effort even if it may not be feature complete.
Having a way out, so to speak, means the work ahead is 'optional' rather than a wall of stuff you absolutely 100% have to get through.
......
Also, if there's something you're not sure how or whether to implement, figure it out first, especially if it may influence other content. If you decide to go from a 3rd person view to an isometric view, your map is probably way too big. Redoing work is a motivation killer.
Keep a to-do list and keep it as short as possible before you implement more content. If your map is foldable, more content isn't critical. But if you don't fix outstanding issues they'll just pile up until you think the map is done and you realise you have 20 days worth of fixing ahead of you. I made this mistake with Diablo 2 a number of times.
0
Several posts here I can only '+1' with.
......
Trackmania has only been the biggest PC racing game for the last few years. :P Also, number of players and number of builders should both scale up equally.
I like this attitude. :) It was almost impossible to make a Diablo 2 mod unless you were determined, so there were few mods but they all had a lot of work put into them. People who qq on the b.net forum that 'the editor is too hard to use' would never have produced anything worth playing anyway.
......
+1.
This is exactly what I've been saying about Diablo 2 mods for years. <3 My mod, Median XL is the biggest because I care about these things: many people have attempted to install Eastern Sun and blew it, others tried Zy-El and got stomped in the first area. Several people were turned off Blackened because the UI is so ugly. Even the item names: I made sure every item name actually fits in the lore.
It worked, but then D2 was so hard to mod that there was very little supply in terms of mods and therefore a large demand to get things started. With the glut of maps for SC2 nowadays it seems likely that some will just get completely overlooked for no reason at all.
0
Also, it's incredibly unlikely that Blizzard takes aim at your map. I think most of those fears stem from the delusion that people at Blizzard care about you and your map in particular among the sea of custom maps that only signify one thing to them: +X boxes sold to people looking to play UMS/Dota = €60X profit. What those maps actually look like is irrelevant to them, unless it has a swear word in it and someone might commit suicide because of that and sue Blizzard.