Idea: AoS Generals *or gods*

I would like to get some feedback on this idea before I begin to make a map for it, and I haven't seen this idea anywhere yet, so please leave your comments. Flames will convince me to save my time and effort.

This idea uses AOS or DOTA gameplay, but with a twist; your hero can only summon units.
These units not only are more powerful than your hero, but can probably kill your hero in 2-3 hits.

This is where the name comes from: AoS generals is a map where your heroes are army commanders summoning units to battle each other; the generals stay way back away from the fight and supply units. Micro intensive :) (I think it should be called AoS chicken because of the amount you have to make your hero run away).

What makes this concept unique is the way it expands gameplay. The object of the game is still to destroy the enemy castle, but the methods are much more diverse. I'll go into in depth game diversity below:

DIVERSE TYPES OF HEROES AND JOBS:
Every hero can have different auras and different specialties. Here are some proposed hero types:

Elvish Archer General:
can summon units with extremely long range, but the longer the range, the less damage it deals.

Treant general:
summons melee with poison effects

Mortar General:
Specializes in destroying towers.

Peasant Defense General:
Can create towers *wards that last a long time that function as towers*

Peasant Council General:
The peasants attack!!! Summons weak peasants, but a lot of them… and I mean a fill up a whole screen a lot.

Chicken General:
Do what the chickens do when Link hits them too much. Very much like the peasant council.

Assassin general:
can get the only invisible summon in the game.

GENERAL general:
has the best auras in the game. can summon units that can summon other units.

Wind general:
has the fastest units in the game.

Robber General:
summons units that can possess other units, and a unit that will steal money if they manage to hit an enemy general.

Fire General:
Solid General that has both melee and ranged.

Earth General:
has large slow moving *obstructive* units

Water General:
has the smallest unit *can move through battlefields easily*

Resource General: has abilities to generate income, but needs to buy scrolls of summon units in order to battle.

Bomber general: units are suicidal and either have blood lust or explode.

Sniper general: units fire very slowly but deal a ton of damage. *good for breaking a hole in enemy lines*

... the list can go on, but I haven't thought it through yet.

THE HEROES THEMSELVES:

of course, heroes will have ways to survive a sudden attack from nowhere; they have an auto phaze out that prevents more than 1 hit on them at a time and a blink spell, and can invest in such skills as invulnerability or wind walk.

However, the heroes, once surrounded, are quite useless in defending themselves and will surely die. I haven't decided whether or not death should be penalized because its easy to die if you aren't careful.


SIGNIFICANT MAP FEATURES:

The map will have different battle ground types: small corridors, large plains, walls overlooking the battlefield, places where retreat means you're trapped in a corner, and places with multiple blind intersections for ambushes.
Killing summoned units gives you very little money, but a lot of exp. Killing creeps gives you money but very little exp. *---> this is for diverse gameplay and end game strengths*
there will be creep sights as well as units going off to battle *these units count as creeps*. There might even be creep dungeons, with a very powerful deadly creep inside *that drops very good items*.
There is no way to improve the attack, health, or hp regen of your hero except by lvling, and that only gives very little. You can only improve your armor, speed, mana pool and mana regen *through items, tomes, etc*.
Each hero will get a normal unit that has no weaknesses or strengths *compared to other heroes' normal unit*.
The summoned units themselves will have abilities *opens the door for even more creativity*, and will get more when the hero invests in that summoned unit's skill.
The skill to summon units has no waiting period, so you can summon as many units as you want. You can mix the different units you can summon, or amass a single type of unit. The size of your army is wholly dependent on your mana capacity/ regen. The summons typically last for 90 secs.
In the beginning, army sizes will usually be around 10 units. heroes will most always be faster than the units, except for high lvl wind units.

END GAME:

I would like the end game scenario *where heroes start to become really powerful* to be diverse in the path to reach uber-greatness. The person with the highest lvl hero will have the least money, and the person with the most money will not have much exp.

This is cool because whoever reaches max lvl first gets their ultimate ability first; but money can also buy you a larger army *how many units you can summon at a time*. Money should also buy you some cool abilities. This is true throughout the whole game: exp people will have stronger units; gold people will have more.

Ultimate abilities include: mass conversion, mass teleport, mass permanency *replaces summon unit with a permanent unit*, summon bahamut, summon superman, etc. Ultimates should be tide-turning or game winning spells.

Large armies can come from either a large mana pool or a large mana regen. Large mana pools means larger initial armies; mana regen means long lasting armies. Int will raise both, and there will be items and tomes for more mana and more regen.


CHARM:
Part of executing a good map is the reaction of people when they use abilities, see summons, or just play the game. Therefore, I think this is one of the most important aspects of any map -- making sure people get their adrenaline going and get wowed by the effects.

The coolness of this map will come from:

very, very, very large summons, and very unique summons *superman ^^*
different, but effective styles of gameplay. *creating walls of summons to defend*, *having soo many weak monsters filling up the screen that you start summoning next to the enemy general*, *blinking past enemy lines to start a flank*, etc.
epic player battles *not just boring battles with creeps* that can be turned around in an instant
ganging up with other people to have real combat teams *means actual STRATEGY*
A POTENTIAL FOR GOOD TEAMWORK; develop good hero comboes to devastate other less coordinated enemies.

I came up with this idea when looking at AoS copies and seeing them change the heroes around and the maps around, but keeping the same gameplay in tact. Also, it reminds me of Magic the Gathering a bit.

Sorry for writing so much, but I don't think I can shave off anything else. All these ideas come from potential situations that might arise from a gameplay like such. If many people reply positive, I'll actually consider learning map making

Yes, I am a newb at making maps; maybe a project of this calibre is not healthy for a noob to start, but I thought the idea was too good to just store away.

Thanks for reading :)

That looks very well thought out. One thing that stops me though is being overwhelmed by work, so if you considered yourself noob, you may want to try to get a team. I myself hate making heros, as I can never come up with good spells.

For the ideas themselves it sounds good, but this may end up being more of a footmen wars, because a DotA type map places emphasis on the hero and trying to level it and get it sweet items. Many people like DotA for the item recipes. If the players find their hero useless in battle against "creeps" (again, comparing to DotA) they might become discouraged.

You seem to have planned well though. Good luck!