What is 'We Were Snipers'?

What is We Were Snipers?
We Were Snipers is a map remotely related to the movie We Were Soldiers. While that movie was the original insiration for this map, as development progressed, and gameplay was developed, the relations between the two quickly disapeared.

Game Start
When the game begins, players have 15 seconds to vote for the point limit. The options are 5, 10, 15 and 20 points. If the timer expires then it counts your vote as 10. When everyone has voted it averages everyone's choice and that is the game limit. The first team to reach this score wins the game.

Once the point limit has been voted on, players vote to watch the intro cinematic. If everyone votes to skip the cinematic then it will be skipped. If one person chooses to watch then everyone will have to watch. If, however, during the cin any players no longer wish to watch the remainder, they may press esc and vote to stop the cin. If all remaining players vote to stop the cin, then it will stop and the game will begin.

Basic Gameplay Overview
Gameplay is similar to that of Snipers for those of you that have played it. You control a single hero - a sniper. Equiped with Night Vision Goggles and a sniper rifle you play out senarios, purchase additional equipment and work with your team to defeat the enemy.

Senarios
Currently, We Were Snipers only has one type of scenario. Each team takes turns attacking each others camp area. A timer window appears with a number of seconds based on the number players. The defending team has to prevent the attackers from entering their base. If an attacker does enter the base, the timer begins counting down. If the timer reaches 0 or they kill all of the defenders, they win. On the other hand, if the defenders kill all of the attackers, they win.

The attackers only have four minutes, if they run out of time then the defenders win. The time remaining is displayed next to your gold amount. With a timer looming over each team there can be no camping and action is kept high.

When a team wins, each player on the winning team recieves 20 gold while each player on the losing team only recieves 15 gold. 1 point is also awarded to the winning team. Then it's switched up, the defenders become the attackers and vice verca.

Features
We Were Snipers features unique gameplay found no where else. The chase cam is customizable and features a look around option to allow looking left and right without moving the hero. We Were Snipers is loaded with custom icons, abilities, items and filters.

We Were Snipers also boasts a smooth operating cover system. When out in the open, your hero will always have a 15% chance to avoid an attack. However, this chance can be increased by taking cover in bushes, around trees, behind logs and rocks, or ducking in trenches. The map is littered with doodads that provide your hero with:

• Poor Cover (25% chance to avoid attacks)
• Good Cover (35% chance to avoid attacks)
• Excellent Cover (45% chance to avoid attacks)

Finally, We Were Snipers offers a measure of realism by adding limited ammo and armour that requires maintaining. You must purchase ammo in order to fire upon your enemies, run out and you become a sitting duck. Your Kevlar can only take so many bullets before it's useless, but maintaining it will ensure it protects you all game long.

Author's Notes
Due to the unique gamplay and features, We Were Snipers has a moderate learning curve. It may take some users half a game before they become familiar with everything the game has to offer. If it is your first time playing, don't vote to skip the tutorial cinematic. And follow along with players that have played before.

Is the scenarios like Battlefield 1942(sp?)?
One team try to hold all "hills" for x sec and the other try to keep control of the hill for x sec.

I'll look into that map when I downgrade to the normal war3 patch.

Scenario is basically just a fancy name for rounds. One team defends their base, the other attacks it. This goes until the victory condition of the 'round' or 'scenario' is met (all defenders killed, all attackers killed or the timer is run down). Then players are reset to their base, they can purchase more suplies and the next senario begins. Only this 'round' or 'scenario' those who where defending their base last round are attacking their enemies base. And those where were the attackers are now the defenders.

Hope that cleared it up a little.

Is it a FPS map?

I wouldn't consider it an FPS but I supose some gameplay elements are related. Like limited ammo. And you can buy grenade rounds for your gun, however, you have to use the item to fire the grenade rounds. If you wish to use the snipe ability then you must purchase special Sniper ammunition for that as well.

yeah, i dled it and it saw it was not a fps.. but it was great!! i love it! very good terrain, very good triggers, very good gameplay, what can i say? GJ :D :D :D :D

Well thank you very much. Please feel free to rate the map in the downloads section and add comments there aswell as here. This will help encourage more people to download the map and if more people have it... it becomes easier to host a game online.

Thanks for the feedback.

Mr.Safety, I just downloaded map and played offline just to check it out. Looks great will play on bnet tonight. I have a development question for you. I like the night vision goggle effect. Can you post how that was done? Thanks.

Well, I'll be making the map open source in version 2 or 3. So then you'll be able to open the map and see how everything was done. Even take the icons and filters if you want. (provided credit is given)

When I first had the idea i wasn't sure if I should use filters or fog to do the effect. And I remember last year when Crimson Creations was doing a local fog test for KDH to see if it was possible. So I asked DaKaN and he pointed me to a function that he had written for just this purpose. To create local fog effects for specific players.

So not only did i find out that I could create fog effects for local players but also happened to have a snazzy function already written for me. So I followed his easy instructions and implemented it into the map. Added a few of my own features to the ability like the ally colours to help destinguish what players are allies and which are enemies. Also, when the ability is activated it gives the hero the ultravision ability. Since the entire map takes place at night this increases the vision. So combine all those effects and you end up with the Night Vision Goggles. My base spell is Immolation because it can be turned off and drains mana over time. I just use the Unit - Issues order event and compare the order given to either 'Immolation' or 'Unimmolation'. Depending on which order it is I change the fog, ability settings and ally colours accordingly.

If you would like to use DaKaN's fog function he posted it in the Trigger Repository somewhere. Can't remember the exact link. I would recomend doing a search in the forums for "local fog" or something along those lines. That or PM DaKaN or myself. Dakan could point you in the right direction and I could send you a .txt with the function in it.

The entire thing is done in Jass so you'll need a basic understanding of how that works to use the function properly.

Thanks for good explanation. So basically change local player fog color+ultravision. It's a cool effect.

Well thank you. It took a good while to find the perfect fog settings to produce the effect you see.

Did you use a model for the 'Attack' and 'Defend' bit?

If you are refering to the text that appears at the beginning of each scenario, than those are custom filters, not models. I can upload them and post a link if you are interested in using them.

Yes Please!

I guess the idea of the game is to kill kill kill. Hiding etc. to surprise attack is good, but anyway, couldn't you just hold down Alt all the time so you can see health bars above everyone's head, so you could easily see them in bushes.
Another suggestion. I know about the hiding in bushes etc. gains you evasion, but perhaps you could add more abilities to other ares, for example, maybe you gain an attack range bonus if you're up a cliff? Just think about this and I reckon this will knock paintball right off the popular FPS scenario top spot!