ahhh, thanks, worked like a charm. The "at effect" part was messing with me; I didnt know you could add terms to events like that (which I quickly learned, after being unable to find "at effect" in the default action list)
I have an ability that targets a point, with an offset periodic effect, causing a search area, which deals damage.
In a picture: ( ) is boomie, ... is travel time X is caster.
X...( )...( )...( )...( )...( )
The caster targets a point, and damage is dealt every distance up until that point. I have the damage and everything working; and the cast animation at target... I cannot for the life of me get an actor animation to play at the ( ) points; where a search effect goes off, causing damage to units in range.
Closest thing in game I can find, is Penetrating rounds; to the type of ability it is. I know this is kind of broad, but, I cannot think of a better way to explain it.
not to push my own project; but I added a capture the flag (also king of the hill, plant the bomb, gladiator, and team gladiator) to my WC3 map; and will be adding both CTF and KOTH to my SC2 map, Custom Hero Arena. The game is not based on that style of game though; and is just an added mode; for funzies.
I think CTF could hold steady on page 2 or 3 for a long time on SC2. I doubt it would spend much time on page 1, simply because it doesn't call the popularity of a lot of games. It is and always will be a fun game style for people who are bored though.
The amount of text in a map does increase load times, but by a very small amount. Triggers are just text loaded in. How fast do you think your computer could open a 100 page document in word pad? Say, 3 seconds? Add in the small amount of time it takes for that program to actually run.... Not long.
Things loaded on "map init" add considerably to load times though. If you have any reference to a player (picked player) player(1) ect, that will add to your load time by a good deal. Players don't load as the same time as your triggers, so a trigger might be left wonder "What players?.... What players? ... What players?...." Until the players are loaded. <<This was completely true for WC3, and while helping a friend lower their load times, i removed an action like this from their init, and it took about 7 seconds off their load.
If you have a lot of units pre-set on your map, you can load them in with triggers, to limit load time. At the .5 second mark or something, you can load in units through a trigger; so they are not spawned on the map while the map loads.
Mods, custom models, ect, can add a good bit to your load time as well. Most people dont want to part with them though.
Haha, now you're stuck with me! Is it bad that as a group leader, you can add anyone to a group without asking their permission? Someone should fix that. I just gave a lot of terrible people, good ideas.
The only way out of the group is to ragequit. No rage? no quit.
Anyone who wants in, send me a PM, or post here. You need to rage-join, if you would like to join. Only serious rage-joins will be allowed. No rage? no join. (seriously, rage-join, no joke)
You want to join because of the name, enough said. (Copied straight from the team page)
leave me alone and let me work
What we Are:
A separate but equal group of editors who know what they are doing, but may occasionally need feedback from someone who isn't an idiot, or can offer more efficient ways to do something. This is not a group for noobs to ask "How does I make my Zealot fly?" No, go away. Not everyone has a complete comprehension of every aspect of the editor, this is understood. If you do not know what a loop is, you do not know enough. If you do not know what a dialog box is, you do not know enough. If you do not know how to make the units for your own map, you do not know enough. No one wants to spend their time making a map for someone incapable of doing it themselves.
Well, wow... you really don't like people, do you?
Good point! I/we/us want to spend our time editing, and have a moderately dedicated group of people to occasionally lend aid. The kind of people who know what is going on, and aren't jumping in with terrible suggestions; or troubleshooting, "Is the power turned on? Check for me, make sure the power cable in the back is plugged into a working outlet. Do you see a green light? is the monitor powered on, and plugged in?"
What is Required of Members:
You must have an active project. You do not need to have your own "author" page or anything. Anyone with a blank map can have a green boarder. Show proof that you are not illiterate with the editor, and have a plan. I/We only ask that you put in as much group effort as you would like to get from others. It is helpful to have someone who knows your map well, and knows what you are trying to accomplish in the long run. If you want someone to test you map and give constructive feedback on the UI, be prepared to offer an equal value of assistance in return. This is not a charity, do not feel inclined to help others, but also, only expect as much out as you put in.
Anyone interested in joining... well... you can figure out what to do. Otherwise, I will enjoy being all alone in this group. No one wants me to enjoy it as much as I will.
Anyone who wants to discuss the irony of a group of this nature.. have at it. That seems more entertaining than anything else.
Honestly, I think diablo 3 might help SC2 in the long run.
Once it is finally released, blizzard will focus their aim back over here.
Most Diablo 3 players will swap over from Diablo 2 (still has more players than sc2, non ladder) and WoW.
Diablo 3, the way it is currently designed, would fail on the popularity list in SC2. It has limited replayability. Fast character progression, little difference between your character and your neighbors. It is one of those games that will boom, and then die down quickly to a core group of players.
About the time it is dying down, HOTS should be out. Blizzard claims that HOTS should answer the problem every mapper has ever had. Despite my personal belief that that is completely untrue, because blizzard knows nothing of the custom mapping community... I think they will offer some help in some areas, that will allow a larger variety of maps to be playable, in terms of quality, and ability to get a game full of players.
When big games like D3 die down, the players start looking for something with a lot of replayability. If SC2 hasn't completely flopped, it will be a good place for many of them to start.
Speculation of course. Based on.. well.. reality... A lot of players moved to WC3 when TFT came out; a lot of people from Diablo 2. Maybe some short term pain, but a better pay out in the end. (hah, punny sentence)
Another way is to pick what unit you want to appear like a doodad, and enable a bunch of flags on it...
unselectable, uncommandable, unclickable, invulnerable, no tooltips, ect. As you browse down the list, you will see a bunch of things that make sense. Then remove any attacks from the units, and make it so they cannot move. You can also make "wandering villagers" by allowing them to move, and setting patrol points and such.
With this method, you can have units places like normal units, that wont do anything; and no one can interact with. You should set their pathing to whatever you need, along with their plane array. Set their mass really high, so units cannot push them by walking into them, and set their movement radius to whatever works for them.
With that, you can also change out the models on the units to be whatever you want; so you can have a unit that is a tree... A patrolling tree... A waterfall of trees would be fun.
get an accountant to write of projections of how much possible money could be made from a working custom games system, in the arcade. If the final number makes you shit bricks, present it to blizzard. If an annual profit margin is not enough for you to retire healthily on tomorrow, trash the idea, because it will never happen.
" A lot of mapping teams die out or never finish their projects. This is where this organization strives. We work towards a finished project and don't give up. -
Past projects have been halted, as people have become busy with school and work"
Anyone else find that?
Also, your item request,
The "Throw" part is actually an ability. The item editor will be required to make abilities for items as well? That means behaviors, effects, buttons, models, movers, actors, and abilities.
And your extra 10 dollars "when the map is complete, and if it become popular" That is a lot of "if" for 10 dollars.
Honestly, I think you would do much better to recruit someone who knows what they are doing, and giving them some creative control. No one wants to make less than a dollar an hour to have someone standing over their shoulder telling them "IT MUST BE DONE LIKE THIS!" while they do intricate data work. Most people working under those conditions get paid 20-30 dollars an hour.
Also, to get more help, you should post how much you have done. If you just painted a pretty terrain, people might not want to waste their time contributing to a map that will never be complete. If it is 80% done, playable, and just needs these finishing touches, there is a better chance someone might help; to get their name on a completed map. Though judging by the list, it would appear as though the game is still missing large sections.
Just ideas, as to how you might find willing and able workers. your notion of "you should be blessed to do work for me that I an unable to do" will not get you nearly as far as say... not doing that.
I will agree with the what everyone is saying so far. I use a lot of dialogs in my map; they are all pretty basic. All of the information that I need to pass on to the player is easy to understand, the dialogs are well organized and are easy to access and use.
Not saying that I dont plan to eventually make some really great looking dialogs; but as long as they have functionality, I can work on the rest of my map and upgrade the dialog graphics once I have a finished project.
Look through the list of maps that lost momentum, were quit halfway through, or will simply never be finished. I see a lot of great artwork in games that have no playability yet. I couldn't imagine spending all that time to make an amazing dialog system, and then crap out on the map for whatever reason.
Art should always be saved for last; just make sure you are organized.
2 abilities that are a combination of triggers and data. Easy to implement into your own map and with any knowledge of the data editor, can be changed reasonably easily. You can change the size of the walls through the triggers; again, pretty easily.
I have to disagree with this statement. SC2 has been out for more than a year and a half. The anemic custom map scene is not due to inexperience. It is due to the popularity system. Most of the skilled and innovative mappers have left in frustration.
...yup... A bit off topic, but I recently read on the helper that you are moving back to WC3 to continue updating your map. living proof I guess.
For the past year, and right now, and I am sure in the future, WC3 mappers will continue to pump out a lot more maps than SC2 mappers. Quantity is not quality; but with an easier to understand editor, and 6 years worth of tutorials... It is not difficult for an average person with an idea to make it happen.
A lot of people claim that HOTS is going to "fix" the whole custom map system for SC2. It isn't out yet, so I wont comment on whether I believe this to be true or not. What is a fact though, is that right now mappers and players are leaving SC2. Many people plan to skip out on HOTS. The grand problem is that once HOTS comes out, for 60 more dollars, not a lot of people are going to pay 100 dollars to join in playing SC2. WC3 is what, 20 dollars? It has no system requirements, and a better variety of active, custom maps.
Not as many players are going to buy the game, not as many mappers are going to invest in a system with hopes that their money spend, and hundreds of hours invested might ever be noticed.
I am reasonably new to SC2; but spent a long time editing in WC3. One thing that I have heard many times on this topic is, "Look at how long WC3 was out before quality maps were being made." Not that there aren't quality maps, but there aren't a lot of quality maps that are active at once. WC3 also, over the years had many, many community sites; a lot more people were interested in editing, and it was easier to do a lot of the basic stuff. With SC2, if you want to do anything (except make a tug) you need to study the editor for a while beforehand.
I have asked some tug-of-war editors why they insist on using all of the existing game units with default abilities and upgrades; and none of them would admit to laziness. Rather, they used the blizzard reasoning when SC2 came out, "We don't want to confuse people who are used to playing normal starcraft." Which really, holds true. In every hero-types game I have played, everyone moved their hero forwards... then back... then forward... then back... then forward... then back... then forward... then back... always staying close to the combat, but never taking damage. And whoever can do this for the longest without getting distracted, eventually wins.
I mean no offense to this community, but the post that necro'd this, about the fact that people think a shiny terrain, massive spell flashy boom, an ability that can do 16 things at once, but has no practical use, and pictures of ninjas... seem too have entirely too much weight on custom games. It is all about how pretty a screenshot of the game can look, rather than how the game plays.
0
ahhh, thanks, worked like a charm. The "at effect" part was messing with me; I didnt know you could add terms to events like that (which I quickly learned, after being unable to find "at effect" in the default action list)
Thanks again!
0
I have an ability that targets a point, with an offset periodic effect, causing a search area, which deals damage.
In a picture: ( ) is boomie, ... is travel time X is caster.
X...( )...( )...( )...( )...( )
The caster targets a point, and damage is dealt every distance up until that point. I have the damage and everything working; and the cast animation at target... I cannot for the life of me get an actor animation to play at the ( ) points; where a search effect goes off, causing damage to units in range.
Closest thing in game I can find, is Penetrating rounds; to the type of ability it is. I know this is kind of broad, but, I cannot think of a better way to explain it.
0
not to push my own project; but I added a capture the flag (also king of the hill, plant the bomb, gladiator, and team gladiator) to my WC3 map; and will be adding both CTF and KOTH to my SC2 map, Custom Hero Arena. The game is not based on that style of game though; and is just an added mode; for funzies.
I think CTF could hold steady on page 2 or 3 for a long time on SC2. I doubt it would spend much time on page 1, simply because it doesn't call the popularity of a lot of games. It is and always will be a fun game style for people who are bored though.
0
The amount of text in a map does increase load times, but by a very small amount. Triggers are just text loaded in. How fast do you think your computer could open a 100 page document in word pad? Say, 3 seconds? Add in the small amount of time it takes for that program to actually run.... Not long.
Things loaded on "map init" add considerably to load times though. If you have any reference to a player (picked player) player(1) ect, that will add to your load time by a good deal. Players don't load as the same time as your triggers, so a trigger might be left wonder "What players?.... What players? ... What players?...." Until the players are loaded. <<This was completely true for WC3, and while helping a friend lower their load times, i removed an action like this from their init, and it took about 7 seconds off their load.
If you have a lot of units pre-set on your map, you can load them in with triggers, to limit load time. At the .5 second mark or something, you can load in units through a trigger; so they are not spawned on the map while the map loads.
Mods, custom models, ect, can add a good bit to your load time as well. Most people dont want to part with them though.
0
@ScorpSCII: Go
Haha, now you're stuck with me! Is it bad that as a group leader, you can add anyone to a group without asking their permission? Someone should fix that. I just gave a lot of terrible people, good ideas.
The only way out of the group is to ragequit. No rage? no quit.
Anyone who wants in, send me a PM, or post here. You need to rage-join, if you would like to join. Only serious rage-joins will be allowed. No rage? no join. (seriously, rage-join, no joke)
0
You want to join because of the name, enough said. (Copied straight from the team page)
leave me alone and let me work
What we Are:
A separate but equal group of editors who know what they are doing, but may occasionally need feedback from someone who isn't an idiot, or can offer more efficient ways to do something. This is not a group for noobs to ask "How does I make my Zealot fly?" No, go away. Not everyone has a complete comprehension of every aspect of the editor, this is understood. If you do not know what a loop is, you do not know enough. If you do not know what a dialog box is, you do not know enough. If you do not know how to make the units for your own map, you do not know enough. No one wants to spend their time making a map for someone incapable of doing it themselves.
Well, wow... you really don't like people, do you?
Good point! I/we/us want to spend our time editing, and have a moderately dedicated group of people to occasionally lend aid. The kind of people who know what is going on, and aren't jumping in with terrible suggestions; or troubleshooting, "Is the power turned on? Check for me, make sure the power cable in the back is plugged into a working outlet. Do you see a green light? is the monitor powered on, and plugged in?"
What is Required of Members:
You must have an active project. You do not need to have your own "author" page or anything. Anyone with a blank map can have a green boarder. Show proof that you are not illiterate with the editor, and have a plan. I/We only ask that you put in as much group effort as you would like to get from others. It is helpful to have someone who knows your map well, and knows what you are trying to accomplish in the long run. If you want someone to test you map and give constructive feedback on the UI, be prepared to offer an equal value of assistance in return. This is not a charity, do not feel inclined to help others, but also, only expect as much out as you put in.
Anyone interested in joining... well... you can figure out what to do. Otherwise, I will enjoy being all alone in this group. No one wants me to enjoy it as much as I will.
Anyone who wants to discuss the irony of a group of this nature.. have at it. That seems more entertaining than anything else.
0
Honestly, I think diablo 3 might help SC2 in the long run.
Once it is finally released, blizzard will focus their aim back over here.
Most Diablo 3 players will swap over from Diablo 2 (still has more players than sc2, non ladder) and WoW.
Diablo 3, the way it is currently designed, would fail on the popularity list in SC2. It has limited replayability. Fast character progression, little difference between your character and your neighbors. It is one of those games that will boom, and then die down quickly to a core group of players.
About the time it is dying down, HOTS should be out. Blizzard claims that HOTS should answer the problem every mapper has ever had. Despite my personal belief that that is completely untrue, because blizzard knows nothing of the custom mapping community... I think they will offer some help in some areas, that will allow a larger variety of maps to be playable, in terms of quality, and ability to get a game full of players.
When big games like D3 die down, the players start looking for something with a lot of replayability. If SC2 hasn't completely flopped, it will be a good place for many of them to start.
Speculation of course. Based on.. well.. reality... A lot of players moved to WC3 when TFT came out; a lot of people from Diablo 2. Maybe some short term pain, but a better pay out in the end. (hah, punny sentence)
0
^^
Another way is to pick what unit you want to appear like a doodad, and enable a bunch of flags on it...
unselectable, uncommandable, unclickable, invulnerable, no tooltips, ect. As you browse down the list, you will see a bunch of things that make sense. Then remove any attacks from the units, and make it so they cannot move. You can also make "wandering villagers" by allowing them to move, and setting patrol points and such.
With this method, you can have units places like normal units, that wont do anything; and no one can interact with. You should set their pathing to whatever you need, along with their plane array. Set their mass really high, so units cannot push them by walking into them, and set their movement radius to whatever works for them.
With that, you can also change out the models on the units to be whatever you want; so you can have a unit that is a tree... A patrolling tree... A waterfall of trees would be fun.
Just ranting now... Hope this helps.
0
Earth Defense Force -'Nuff Said
0
get an accountant to write of projections of how much possible money could be made from a working custom games system, in the arcade. If the final number makes you shit bricks, present it to blizzard. If an annual profit margin is not enough for you to retire healthily on tomorrow, trash the idea, because it will never happen.
0
" A lot of mapping teams die out or never finish their projects. This is where this organization strives. We work towards a finished project and don't give up. - Past projects have been halted, as people have become busy with school and work"
Anyone else find that?
Also, your item request,
The "Throw" part is actually an ability. The item editor will be required to make abilities for items as well? That means behaviors, effects, buttons, models, movers, actors, and abilities.
And your extra 10 dollars "when the map is complete, and if it become popular" That is a lot of "if" for 10 dollars.
Honestly, I think you would do much better to recruit someone who knows what they are doing, and giving them some creative control. No one wants to make less than a dollar an hour to have someone standing over their shoulder telling them "IT MUST BE DONE LIKE THIS!" while they do intricate data work. Most people working under those conditions get paid 20-30 dollars an hour.
Also, to get more help, you should post how much you have done. If you just painted a pretty terrain, people might not want to waste their time contributing to a map that will never be complete. If it is 80% done, playable, and just needs these finishing touches, there is a better chance someone might help; to get their name on a completed map. Though judging by the list, it would appear as though the game is still missing large sections.
Just ideas, as to how you might find willing and able workers. your notion of "you should be blessed to do work for me that I an unable to do" will not get you nearly as far as say... not doing that.
0
I will agree with the what everyone is saying so far. I use a lot of dialogs in my map; they are all pretty basic. All of the information that I need to pass on to the player is easy to understand, the dialogs are well organized and are easy to access and use.
Not saying that I dont plan to eventually make some really great looking dialogs; but as long as they have functionality, I can work on the rest of my map and upgrade the dialog graphics once I have a finished project.
Look through the list of maps that lost momentum, were quit halfway through, or will simply never be finished. I see a lot of great artwork in games that have no playability yet. I couldn't imagine spending all that time to make an amazing dialog system, and then crap out on the map for whatever reason.
Art should always be saved for last; just make sure you are organized.
0
http://www.sc2mapster.com/maps/wall-firecircle-fire-abilities/ Open source, pictures and more information there.
2 abilities that are a combination of triggers and data. Easy to implement into your own map and with any knowledge of the data editor, can be changed reasonably easily. You can change the size of the walls through the triggers; again, pretty easily.
If anyone has any questions, let me know.
0
...yup... A bit off topic, but I recently read on the helper that you are moving back to WC3 to continue updating your map. living proof I guess.
For the past year, and right now, and I am sure in the future, WC3 mappers will continue to pump out a lot more maps than SC2 mappers. Quantity is not quality; but with an easier to understand editor, and 6 years worth of tutorials... It is not difficult for an average person with an idea to make it happen.
A lot of people claim that HOTS is going to "fix" the whole custom map system for SC2. It isn't out yet, so I wont comment on whether I believe this to be true or not. What is a fact though, is that right now mappers and players are leaving SC2. Many people plan to skip out on HOTS. The grand problem is that once HOTS comes out, for 60 more dollars, not a lot of people are going to pay 100 dollars to join in playing SC2. WC3 is what, 20 dollars? It has no system requirements, and a better variety of active, custom maps.
Not as many players are going to buy the game, not as many mappers are going to invest in a system with hopes that their money spend, and hundreds of hours invested might ever be noticed.
Downward spirals are downward.
0
I am reasonably new to SC2; but spent a long time editing in WC3. One thing that I have heard many times on this topic is, "Look at how long WC3 was out before quality maps were being made." Not that there aren't quality maps, but there aren't a lot of quality maps that are active at once. WC3 also, over the years had many, many community sites; a lot more people were interested in editing, and it was easier to do a lot of the basic stuff. With SC2, if you want to do anything (except make a tug) you need to study the editor for a while beforehand.
I have asked some tug-of-war editors why they insist on using all of the existing game units with default abilities and upgrades; and none of them would admit to laziness. Rather, they used the blizzard reasoning when SC2 came out, "We don't want to confuse people who are used to playing normal starcraft." Which really, holds true. In every hero-types game I have played, everyone moved their hero forwards... then back... then forward... then back... then forward... then back... then forward... then back... always staying close to the combat, but never taking damage. And whoever can do this for the longest without getting distracted, eventually wins.
I mean no offense to this community, but the post that necro'd this, about the fact that people think a shiny terrain, massive spell flashy boom, an ability that can do 16 things at once, but has no practical use, and pictures of ninjas... seem too have entirely too much weight on custom games. It is all about how pretty a screenshot of the game can look, rather than how the game plays.