Hive's Revenge II - input/suggestions

We are currently at a crossroads on the production of our Nexus map. We need to make some hard choices on how we want to finalize the project. So while we give it some thought we decided to go back and do a full update for Hive's Revenge TD.

For those who are not familiar with Revenge it was the original tower war style map. It was made back when there where TD's and well....other TD's. Most where all about the same. The biggest difference between them was the terrain and if they where co-op or survival. We liked the general idea of a TD but none of the maps that where out at the time seemed to get it quite right. So we decided to make our own. We intended to introduce new concepts and ideas into the map style that would inspire others to go farther and make better TD maps.

After four months of hard work it was a huge success. Not just in the popularity of Revenge itself but whole new styles of tower based defense maps started to appear. The most successful spinnoff from Hive's Revenge TD was the tower war style maps. They used two of the key concepts that made Revenge a step beyond just another TD. Players could choose which monsters got sent against opponents and a offense based econ system. We weren't the first to let players choose the attackers (think Vin Fox gets that honor) but we did combine that into the econ system that is widely used in tower maps of all kinds today. Tho in most cases its a simplified version of what we did in Revenge.

........and oh yea, it was our first map :ggani:

So now we have started work on Hive's Revenge II. It is a full update. 90% from scratch. We started with a blank map and imported the terrain and a few basic functions from the original. It has a new engine and all new units. The basic concept and play will be the same idea. The details will be mostly different. Players of the original will recognize a lot of the concepts from Revenge but they will appear in new ways. We are using the expanded functions of the TFT editor (and a few cool tricks we learned since the original) to make it much more balanced, streamlined and smoother. Although its still probably the most advanced map of its type, we have learned a lot since we made it. It will be getting much more than a face lift and debugging.

We are currently done with basic engine, 3/5 of the monsters and 90% of one faction. In other words we have one race, 3 levels of monster shop and and the basic game functions done. We are using lag free spawning and less monsters per round. Towers can now be upgraded so you will need less of them. Health and tower damage is starting as low as possible. Model sizes are being kept small. We are doing everything possible to add as much strategy and game play as we can while still keeping a tight lid on lag.

We have plans for 5 factions (races) that you can upgrade to. Each will have its own towers and strategy. We are introducing actual heroes instead of temples. Each race will have fully customized heroes. Temples are still around (in Elementalist Faction) but have changed a bit. They now have no attack but can cast powerful spells. We base each faction on a general strategy used in the original map. Each faction will have special abilities that are exclusive to their faction.

We are almost done with the Elementalist Faction. They use the same tower style that was in Revenge (each tower based on a single element) and play most like the original. They are intended to be the most balanced faction. Elementalists have special buildings that can cast powerful spells over large distances. The most advanced of these spells have unlimited range and can actually damage opponents buildings. The only special units they get are Elemental Lords (heroes). They are strongest when combined with explosive monsters (AOE damage on death) and weakest vs magic immune monsters. Of all the factions this should be the simplest to play. Although intended as the newbi faction they should not be underestimated. In the hands of a master they will be quite a force to reckon with.

Other factions are.....

Rune Priests - The most defensive faction. They use spirit magic and have a tower system that uses a lot of spell casting. They are the masters of debuffing and hindering targets. Their special units include heroes, spirits (fire and forget auto-attacking units) and raising of the undead.

Technomancers - The most economic faction. They use a high tech tower system that has few special skills. They rely mainly on a better econ to win. They have use of heroes, trade centers and the dimensional gate. They may receive trades in the form of special (controllable) units and resources. They also get the best exchange rate for resources.

Summoners - Mobility and speed are the mainstay of this faction. They will use mobile towers (ancients) and may field the most effective controllable force. They may summon a large variety of controlled units along with heroes.

Chaos - Two words....Chaos Gate! Yes, its back in all its glory. The most loathed unit from the original. It will have a whole new engine to run it and will have a lot better balance. It will still be the most effective pvp offense in the game however. Chaos Faction uses demonic style towers that sometimes actually kill those pesky things running through their maze. In other words Chaos has the best offense and worst defense in the game. They will be able win (and lose) quicker than any other faction.

We welcome any and all input and suggestions. Ideas for game functions, towers, skills or even whole new faction concepts will be welcome. We expect to be done with whole project in 2 months or less. So far things are going smooth, we have a lot done already and expect to have a beta ver out within a week or two.

Nice to see you back Hivemind :D
Looking forward to the new version, perhaps the option to set difficulty at the start, making the game last longer (the original was quite hard).
Could you give me a pm on the non lag spawning, ive seen it b4 but forgot the specifics.
~Thxs

The difficulty of the map is based on the skill level of the players. Since it is a king of the hill (survival) map we balanced the overall skill level to expert. Most new players who died quickly where chomping at the bit to try again knowing they would do better next time.

Yes, sometimes it was hard to get a game that lasted longer than monster shop 2. However, that is better than playing with a bunch of experts when nothing of any interest happens for 45 min.

Here is the balance for first time Revenge (I or II) players...

Total noobs to TD's should die during Monster Shop 1 - "What am I supposed to do? I don't get it."

Average TD players should die at the end of Monster Shop 2 - "Damn, this is hard."

Good TD players die near the end of Monster Shop 3 - "That (insert killing unit here) is unbalanced. This is BS!"

Expert TDers die sometime during Monster Shop 4 - "Ok, now that I know what I did wrong I will win next time. Remake?"

If you survive to Monster Shop 5 as a first time player you need to turn off your computer and go find something more productive to do with your life. We haven't made Monster Shop 5 yet and we still don't expect to live past 4 until we have played for a while. At this point in solo testing we are having trouble getting past 3 in a 1v1 setting.

This balance assumes that there is at least 1 skilled player playing (prob the host). If not, players will live longer. More than 1 skilled player and people will die faster.

We would consider your suggestion if we hadn't played Revenge TD games with at least 5 experts in one game. It takes quite a lot to even challenge players like that. We didn't want games (even ones full of experts) lasting too long. We might end up remaking Hive's Survival TD instead. That was the one without the summoner. In this case it would be without the advanced builders. They are the ones that create all of the player vs player buildings. That ver of the map would end up playing more like a standard Tower War/Survival TD map. It could also end up in a stalemate if more than 1 expert was playing. We saw that a lot playing the old Survival ver.

Edit: Sorry forgot to answer your other question. No-lag spawning is no big secret. It can be done a lot of ways. How you do it depends on your overall spawning system. The key is to prevent the creation of too many units at one time. That is what causes the lag spike. So as long as you have some kind of delay between large groups being created you should be fine. How many units you can create at once and how long the delay is will vary from map to map. A little experimentation and you should figure it out no prob.

Take a look at the Blizzard TD that comes with TFT. It has a advanced spawn system that works well for some situations. We didn't use it since we don't have fixed units each round but it is a good one. Even if the rest of that map blows chunks. :bgrun: