New Campaign ((Name still underway))

Before any of you read this, I will tell you that I have thought about some of this, and decided "Hey, I actually like this idea" so i'm going to do it! Even if no one signs up, i'll work on it alone

It's all 'bout Garithos and Kel'Thuzad, RPG-ish type ((RTS with long cooldowns, or maybe Hero RPG system, but i dunno)) and how they end up like they are... i thought about the first few maps and I am still getting used to the editor... especially with my... situation ((Dunno if it's normal, but lots of strings are missing...://// )) But anyways, I have thoroughly thought out the heroes, and don't plan to change them unless I hear a pretty good idea....

Anyways, as obvious, a prequel ((It's GARITHOS!)) to all this, when poor 'lil Garithos was a captain, seeking vengeance for what those orcs did to his countryside farm! But then a choice is brought upon him, King Terenas is pleased with his combat skills, and has decided to promote him again, this time, he has a choice, to become a Paladin of the Silver Hand... or become a Knight of the Dark Fist.

As most RPG maps, it will use the only use hero system, but with AI controlled towns... considering this is a little bit before RoC, Let's put him in Dalaran, Shall we?

Now, if anyone wants to join, or even feels like contributing, they can just post some models/ideas/plot points i might have forgotten, then feel free... again... if no one joins or contributes, i have alot of work ahead of me

Positions needed: ((I will edit this post when a position gets filled or someone abandons it...))
Triggerist ((Airjp73)) ((Anvilsmith))
Concept Artist
Modeler
Voice actor(s)((Anvil smith))
Terrainist ((Anvilsmith))
Ideaist ((Man i love putting ist at the end of every wordist))

Feel free to criticise, flame, or praise...

Edit: Don't bother to E-mail, My comp is kinda messed right now...

I would be interested in doing the triggers

Well, I'm already working on another fledging RPG, but the project leader hasn't replied in a while, and I assume he's quit. I could work on the triggers, as well as develop some ... I'm *very* good with that, and love desigining technical parts that follow entirely original and very abstract concepts, but are supported by a strong backstory (in this case, minigames and unique mission objectives/principles). My main skill, however, incorporates storytelling, descriptive writing and story design. My only problem is that I don't quite remember the stories of WC I and II, and honestly, they're really worth remembering.

Here's what I propose regarding the campaign structure:
-mutually exclusive optional objectives, which mostly give bonuses
(which sometimes appear to be penalities until late in the mission) to help complete the mission.
-mutually exclusive mission objectives, which might not affect mission order, but do determine what rewards or lack of penalities the player gets on the next mission (s). Long-term bonuses provide equally long-term penalities: For instance, the player might even get another hero to help him, but later get attacked by the hero's enemies. Or the hero himself may turn on the player, and after two successful missions at his side, harass him for two more.
-In terms of rules, all maps are relatively close. That is, you don't get a simple mercenary-style map (see below), then suddenly have to go the completely different way of getting resources from supply caravans and making an army by "training" peasants spawned in villages into real units. Instead, you put a map in between them that combines these elements, so as not to shock the player too much. Of course, I'm assuming you won't go all-out melee...

I'll write as much of your story as you want, voice-act two or three characters, make some of your maps (using whatever indications you give me, no matter how vague), provide you with gameplay-enhancing ideas and the triggers that they work on. If you want me to develop a unqiue gameplay style for each mission, I'll be glad to do that, but if you prefer to keep all missions standard WC3, I'd rather not design any slight variations. The only other thing that would drive me away (in this case, from designing the storyline) is that farmboy avenger thing... That *was* a joke, right?

For instance, let's say that he starts as a mercenary rather than a true leader... In the first mission, he gains gold by carrying out simple side-quests, and spends it on his mercenaries (who all carry backpacks) and items. I haven't checked if mercenaries can use the items they hold, but I don't see why they wouldn't. After a few side-quests and a mimum ammount of reward gold obtained, the true mission appears, under the guise of yet another side quest. Say, he must protect a sorceress (elf) on the way to a certain village. The sorceress does a few unpleasant things, unknown to the mercenaries... After a while, the village gets a new quest, about strange events occouring around it. Crops have miraculously grown, and well water tastes as sweet as mead... The village leader wishes to find out if this is beneficial magic, and if so, whether it can be exploited more efficiently. It turns out that the magic leaking from an old man's corpse has caused this. In a glade somewhat far from the village, the body had been mutilated by unnatural means and placed into a ritual circle that caused this effect. Garithos reports this to the village leader, the leader gives the player a quest to escort a young hedge-wizard that must reach the circle, obtain some information by way of magic and report to Dalaran, still under the player's escort. When he reaches the corpse and attempts to use magic, a few sentry wards appear on the circle's rim and kill him before disappearing. He reports these findings to the village leader, and is told to carry the strange news to Dalaran by himself. An investigation takes place (in real time, while the player goes through side quests) and finds no traces of magic around the body... He wasn't even a wizard, as it turns out, and ritual circles like the one described by Garithos don't even exist. The mercenaries are brought to Dalaran and magically tagged so that they can't leave until investigations are over, and the story (as well as some good reasons to build up a hatred for the elves) continue from there.

By the way, it would be an interesting diversion from regular creeping to have a sort of "mini-quest generator" system - a building that provides quests just as a shop sells items. After selecting a quest, you could get a "quest item" of sorts, or just an added section in the "quests" menu.

Well anvil, that WAS a joke...

The plot you came up was excellent, I honestly think that there are few other plots better for this story...

About the mini-quests, Yes, the generated quests would effect the later on important quests ((I.E. if he didn't do some quest about bandits he would be constantly ambushed later on)) and I was thinking they selection would work like this

The player clicks on the a quest generator ((There will also be HIDDEN side-quests, that won't be so hidden until a player finds them and tells everyone the location!)) Then once he chooses a quest, and a cinematic commences, having a villager or commander tell him the objectives ((villagers in a blunt way, that's why they have better items ((slightly)) for a reward)) Then once Garithos completes the quest, other side-quests are availible and a new quest appears in the quest's place following the previous quest's plot ((And you can abandon quests.. but the aftermath of that is worse than not bothering with it))

There are also "army" sidequests, where Garithos and the rest of heroes are sent out on a skirmish, with an AI controlled army, their objective is to win the skirmish(duh), with at least 1 troop still alive.

About the heroes, I was thinking about that. Kel'Thuzad will join you no matter what ((Unless you kill him, then you just need to restart)) and After a while you choose from 4/6 heroes, the amount of heroes depending on what side quests you do :P

The game will be in real-time, and how much time it takes you to complete the game will effect the ending you get ((This is an RPG, isn't it?)) as well as what third hero you choose, etc, etc.

I would be VERY glad to have you join us anvil

://// « me to anvil's response

Should I get started on making the first campaign's map, and if so, should I use the mercenary playing style I described? Or would you rather that I took some other map while you worked on it? Another option would be to leave the first map for last... That is, after all mapmakers in the team have settled on a main theme (heavy path-based landscapes that limit the player to a few ways ahead, wide areas or a combination of both), you that not only represents this theme, but also glorifies it, highlighting the best of its features.

[I just looked at the positions needed list, and noticed that you didn't put me in the "terrainist" bit... Does this mean I'm not going to do any maps?]


I should warn you about that... Many players I know (myself included) would rather "see it all" whenever they can. That's not very RPG-ish, I know, but it's probably one of the reasons people bother with side-quests in the first place. You should be careful with how you incorporate the multiple-ending idea, for if you just put a counter to check whether the player completes his mission before/after 15 minutes, a lot of players will hurry up to finish with the first ending, reload and wait five minutes for the second ending to become available. That can be a slight problem, even if you have it so that the deadline replaces your winning objective with a new one, which you must complete to get the second ending. It's not really awful, so I leave it to your judgement whether it should be fixed or not. Maybe you could just show the different endings after the credits film, so that if people are forced to wait five minutes, they'll at least see my name for a few seconds while they're at it...

By the way, the "plot" was only for the first few missions, and was meant only to explain Garithros' hatred for the elves. As I see it, he starts out mildly racist for a variety of minor reasons, which are shown in-game (in the elf sorceress' case: Garithros could seem surprised when she asks for an escort mission, and comments that the elves usually consider humans worthless). By the time the Scourge wipes out Dalaran, he becomes very disgruntled with the way the elves have been handling the war (very poorly, and this due to the fact that they've lost their main sources of magic -both in Qael'thalas and Dalaran- though he assumes it's just not being able to cope with losing their homeland) and might have a different reason to hate the dwarves - the fact that his dwarven commander stubbornly held to a bad plan that made him lose his men, or that the dwarves in his small army always turned out to be a liability and caused him to lose some of his human soldiers. The idea is that I want to get as far away from the "Ah'm a racist cuz' me pa wuz a racist, an' his pa 'fore him" stereotype, and actually give the main hero a reason to hate every other race. Since this is mainly an RPG, the main character deserves a good dose of complexity. Either way, if you want to discuss plot, I suggest we do it over PMs rather than post spoilers here.

I should warn you again that I don't remember the WC I and II campaigns all that well (though Azeroth probably won't be included at all). I have no idea if Khaz Modan was destroyed by the orcs (the "for Khaz Modan" thing I've heard some dwarven units shout in-game makes me assume this) and don't remember Dalaran being in WC II at all. If you could point me to a summary of the WC II story, I'd be very appreciative, as it'll let me insert history-related comments. While I don't any crumb of education in the Garithros presented in TFT, he probably borrowed a few racist slogans from like-minded folks, like "The dwarves weren't good enough to fight off the horde by themselves."

I'm very, *very* eager to start... So tell me what I should work on, and how often I should expect replies from you.