Progress is going well. Few triggers remain before I begin testing/balancing and start working on the concluding cinematic.
I do expect I will be quite busy in late-December, so I'm either looking at a release in early December if we're lucky, or else early next year. Hoping for this year tho!
Thanks to VastanX, all Annihilation missions have now been supplied with unique models for several of the campaign's main characters. Thanks to you for making these, Vastan!
This does mean that I have updated all missions with these models, as well as several other changes. See the full list of changes below.
All Missions: New, unique models and wireframes have been made for Maxwell Reeves, Morganus Krayen, Jared Malrick, Ivan Crowley and Harris Arrow. A new portrait has also been made for Harris Arrow.
All Missions: Loading screen has been updated to coincide with new Hero models. In addition, a brand new loading screen has been created for Mission 01 "Mindless Creatures".
All Missions: Loading screen text has been moved slightly to the right.
A21, A22, A23: Flashback images for cinematics have been altered to coincide with updated Hero models.
Mate, you don't have to apologize for not testing my maps due to health reasons! There are obviously more important things. I am really sorry to hear you've had to go through a lot. Hope you feel better, and welcome back!
The first mission was released in April 2014. It's crazy to think I've been working on this thing for more than 4 years!!! I've learned so much, and it's been a blast to create. I hope I can end the campaign with a bang!
Almost finished with terraining. I expect it to be done within the next 1-2 days. Once that happens, it's data work (which won't take that long) and then triggers. The final mission shouldn't take too long to fully trigger, but I might need to do quite a bit of testing depending on exactly how things go. So, maybe a release in November or December is doable.
The first major update for Mission 23 "Frontal Push" has been released. Status now changed to "Release". Also, a short bug fix for Mission 19 "Planetary Incursion".
A23: Reduced the change for Nassarin to deliver dialogue lines when using the "Morale Boost" ability.
A23: Reduced the size of the shield effect from Voradin's "Mind Soothe" ability.
A23: Added additional R.S.S.I units during the Voradin's final scene in the ending cinematic.
A23: Fixed an issue causing Warp Gates to wapr in Energizers when the Havoc was selected in the beginning of the mission.
A19: Fixed an issue causing the Swarm Host "Root" ability to be removed upon researching "Burrow".
Hey, I just played your first mission. Overall, I really liked it. Here's my feedback to you!
I like the intro cinematic. It was very simple, yet surprisingly effective. The slow camera pans combined with the atmosphere of the map and the music really drew me in, and I didn't need a long introduction.
I'm a sucker for custom units, and you didn’t just make the custom units, you went all the way, making custom portraits, ability icons, wireframes and everything. Very nice job! I like Volchron as a hero. I'd argue that his Whirlwind ability is a bit too strong. It absolutely destroys every unit that gets thrown at you, and makes quick work of the boss too. Volchron also has energy, but he's entirely cooldown-based. There's really no reason for the energy to be there. I found this quite odd.
One last thing about Volchron, he actually has the lowest subgroup of all the units you have. I think when selecting a group of units, the heroes should ALWAYS appear first.
Some problems I do wanna point out about the custom units, is there tooltips. For example, the tooltip for the Paladin states that it can use blink, but I don’t have the blink ability available. Also, the Hunter tooltip states that it can Charge, but it can’t. It seems you just forgot to edit the tooltips of those units. Also, the Cyber Core’s tooltip says it contains the Warp Gate upgrade, so overall, just make sure the units have the appropriate descriptions.
I found the terraining to be very unique. I quite liked it. I do think, considering that this is a micro mission, the open areas were unnecessarily large. The size of the areas you explore could be reduced just slightly. I'm not asking you to rework the entire terrain just to change this, but I'll just point it out as a reminder for future missions. Also, some of the areas after the midgame cinematic was quite barren compared to what I saw in the first section. I would put a little more tension to detail there. Especially since the lack of it makes the areas seem way bigger than they actually are.
The boss was really fun. I would say maybe making the targeting reticles for the boss more apparent. Black blends in with the terrain a little too well that they’re often hard to see. The Disruptor blasts that appear towards the end also needs to have some sort of indicator, or a warning. Something, at least. Since you’re in melee range to deal with the boss, the blasts kill you almost instantly. Theres no way to know when they will come. Unless I didn't get the boss's patterns.
And lastly, some minor things. Some of these are a bit nitpicky just because I'm basing them off of what I like and what I usually see, but oh well:
When I open the map, the little bug window appears at the top of the screen. This can be removed under the Map > Map Info tab.
Would love to see a difficulty selection to this. I found the difficulty was good, but just to accomodate to other players' skill levels.
This is a minor thing, but I like to hide resources and the supply frame for missions or sections of missions where its not needed, as it’s basically just wasted UI-space. Since you do make use of the resources, just hiding the supply Frame is good enough, I think. Oh, and the resource trading and alliances menu I would remove too. Especially the alliance menu since that can actually give the player spoilers as to which factions etc you’ll be encountering.
Since we already know when someone is speaking, you don’t need the quotation (“”) marks on every dialogue line.
The cinematics start very abruptly. I recommend doing a fade out over 1-2 seconds so it looks smoother. Similar to how it looks when the cinematics end.
Good luck on this project! It looks very interesting so far!
Another short update has been released, this time for past missions, mainly Mission 02, 15 & 16.
Due to extensive feedback, I've decided to change up Mission 15 a bit. The main thing is to change the way the Portal Amplifiers is taken. There is now a beacon in the area that you have to step on. This should prevent players from randomly activating them unintentionally, and having R.S.S.I forces attack you before you're ready. Also made it more easy to let players know that structures can hold Portal Amplifiers, which can lead more players to use defenses instead of combat units.
The final change is a tip in the beginning of the mission that specifically states that in order to complete the objective, the Portal Amplifiers must be controlled while the Protoss Defenders has already been cleared out.
I feel like all of these changes help players have more control over the mission and may result in more people beating it on the harder difficulties.
For mission 02 and 16, there was a couple game-breaking bugs that prevented players from progressing through the maps. These bugs have now been fixed. For mission 16, I have also reworked some of the dialogue lines towards the end of the mission, which better coincides with what happens later in the story. This should help create a better overall experience for player replaying the campaign, but especially newer players trying the campaign for the first time.
Full patch notes:
A02, A16: Fixed an issue causing certain bridges to be impassable.
A15: Added a tip in the beginning of the mission that helps players figure out how to approach the completion of the objectives.
A15: Added a beacon that is required to be stepped on in order to active the Portal Amplifiers. This should help prevent players from randomly activating them unintentionally.
A16: Reworked a couple dialogue lines in the cinematic that occurs after the Pride of Cyrex’s defeat.
0.942302116555523
Progress is going well. Few triggers remain before I begin testing/balancing and start working on the concluding cinematic.
I do expect I will be quite busy in late-December, so I'm either looking at a release in early December if we're lucky, or else early next year. Hoping for this year tho!
Stay tuned ~
0.94233555491162
Sure thing. But you're gonna be the one fighting them.
0
In reply to JayborinoPlays:
0.945745627038245
- New Models Added -
Thanks to VastanX, all Annihilation missions have now been supplied with unique models for several of the campaign's main characters. Thanks to you for making these, Vastan!
This does mean that I have updated all missions with these models, as well as several other changes. See the full list of changes below.
Download the updated missions: https://www.sc2mapster.com/projects/starcraft-ii-annihilation-campaign/files
Currently under review, so they might not be available for a couple hours.
0
In reply to DEFILERRULEZ:
0
In reply to Hultmanable:
0.947078617314163
Mission 24 Update:
Almost finished with terraining. I expect it to be done within the next 1-2 days. Once that happens, it's data work (which won't take that long) and then triggers. The final mission shouldn't take too long to fully trigger, but I might need to do quite a bit of testing depending on exactly how things go. So, maybe a release in November or December is doable.
0
The first major update for Mission 23 "Frontal Push" has been released. Status now changed to "Release". Also, a short bug fix for Mission 19 "Planetary Incursion".
0
In reply to EDHRIANO:
0.950642325895876
In reply to EDHRIANO:
0
Mission 23 Released:
You can find it here, but it is currently under review so might not be visible until an hour or two: https://www.sc2mapster.com/projects/starcraft-ii-annihilation-campaign/file
Hope you enjoy!
Estimated playtime including cutscenes: 1 hour
0.950909715070374
Development of Mission 23 is going well. Working on the final cinematic. Planned release is sometime next week.
0
Someone reported a game-breaking bug for mission 15 that occurred after the release of the new version. My apologies.
A new version of Mission Pack 04 (Containing A13-A16) is currently in the process of uploading.
0
Hey, I just played your first mission. Overall, I really liked it. Here's my feedback to you!
I like the intro cinematic. It was very simple, yet surprisingly effective. The slow camera pans combined with the atmosphere of the map and the music really drew me in, and I didn't need a long introduction.
I'm a sucker for custom units, and you didn’t just make the custom units, you went all the way, making custom portraits, ability icons, wireframes and everything. Very nice job! I like Volchron as a hero. I'd argue that his Whirlwind ability is a bit too strong. It absolutely destroys every unit that gets thrown at you, and makes quick work of the boss too. Volchron also has energy, but he's entirely cooldown-based. There's really no reason for the energy to be there. I found this quite odd.
One last thing about Volchron, he actually has the lowest subgroup of all the units you have. I think when selecting a group of units, the heroes should ALWAYS appear first.
Some problems I do wanna point out about the custom units, is there tooltips. For example, the tooltip for the Paladin states that it can use blink, but I don’t have the blink ability available. Also, the Hunter tooltip states that it can Charge, but it can’t. It seems you just forgot to edit the tooltips of those units. Also, the Cyber Core’s tooltip says it contains the Warp Gate upgrade, so overall, just make sure the units have the appropriate descriptions.
I found the terraining to be very unique. I quite liked it. I do think, considering that this is a micro mission, the open areas were unnecessarily large. The size of the areas you explore could be reduced just slightly. I'm not asking you to rework the entire terrain just to change this, but I'll just point it out as a reminder for future missions. Also, some of the areas after the midgame cinematic was quite barren compared to what I saw in the first section. I would put a little more tension to detail there. Especially since the lack of it makes the areas seem way bigger than they actually are.
The boss was really fun. I would say maybe making the targeting reticles for the boss more apparent. Black blends in with the terrain a little too well that they’re often hard to see.
The Disruptor blasts that appear towards the end also needs to have some sort of indicator, or a warning. Something, at least. Since you’re in melee range to deal with the boss, the blasts kill you almost instantly. Theres no way to know when they will come. Unless I didn't get the boss's patterns.
And lastly, some minor things. Some of these are a bit nitpicky just because I'm basing them off of what I like and what I usually see, but oh well:
Good luck on this project! It looks very interesting so far!
0
Another short update has been released, this time for past missions, mainly Mission 02, 15 & 16.
Due to extensive feedback, I've decided to change up Mission 15 a bit. The main thing is to change the way the Portal Amplifiers is taken. There is now a beacon in the area that you have to step on. This should prevent players from randomly activating them unintentionally, and having R.S.S.I forces attack you before you're ready. Also made it more easy to let players know that structures can hold Portal Amplifiers, which can lead more players to use defenses instead of combat units.
The final change is a tip in the beginning of the mission that specifically states that in order to complete the objective, the Portal Amplifiers must be controlled while the Protoss Defenders has already been cleared out.
I feel like all of these changes help players have more control over the mission and may result in more people beating it on the harder difficulties.
For mission 02 and 16, there was a couple game-breaking bugs that prevented players from progressing through the maps. These bugs have now been fixed. For mission 16, I have also reworked some of the dialogue lines towards the end of the mission, which better coincides with what happens later in the story. This should help create a better overall experience for player replaying the campaign, but especially newer players trying the campaign for the first time.
Full patch notes: