AOS-The Chains of Fate

Hey, nice to meet you all.

For about 2 years now I've been working on a project with one other person for an AOS map based on the PS1 RPG, Legend of Dragoon. I already have about 80% of the spells and heroes designed, and in place, with mostly just some balancing to do. I am currently working on the Terrain, since that which I had prior was too large and too doodad heavy for such a graphic intensive map(spells are very flashy). It will have 2 teams, and each team will have 7 heroes, and 4 towns(1 main and 3 expansion cities). However, that and the objective is where the similarities with other AOS maps end.

Firstly, this will use an item system similar to an old map I used to play:Each item slot may only have one type of item, and likewise, you may only have one of each type of item. There are Weapons, Shields, Helms, Armor, Accessories, and Consumables. However, armor will not necessarily protect attacks, nor will weapons necessarily boost damage. On top of that, EVERY hero has their own unique set of weapons only they may use, and they may only use those weapons. Allowing item based balancing to be much more interesting. The weapons available are:Maces, Bows, Claws/fist weapons, Scythes, Clubs, Greatswords, dual longswords(both count as a single item), single longswords, rapiers, spears, chakram, Staves, Scepters, and Greataxes.

Another interesting thing is the fact that each base is also considered a shop. Each shop sells its own inventory of items, and therefore ALL bases are valuable, because not only will spawnies be important for pushing from those places, but if a base is destroyed, any heroes reliant on weapons that base sells will be in major trouble. This also means that strategically attacking the base your opponents rely on most for items, based on their team makeup, will be a factor as well.

Terrain will shift based on what part of the map you fight in, and different areas offer different advantages. For example, the "Evil(working title)" team city, Death City Mayfil, will produce corpses like a graveyard. This city will also sell consumable wands with a reasonable cooldown(the purchasing has no cooldown, but the wand itself does, so people dont squabble over who gets them), that allow you to cast a medium duration Raise Dead spell on corpses to create disposable minions for a short time(say, 60 secs, cooldown of same). The Dragoon Team city, Bale, will allow you to buy a Battle Flag(similar to WoW's version), that allows you to place it down as a short duration Command Aura Ward, that has a decent amount of hp(but it can be destroyed). And thats just the first taste.

The abilities, likewise, suggest strategic use. Every character has at least one ability with situational bonuses to damage, which mean you want to make use of it properly. For example, one attack may deal damage based on the number of buffs and debuffs the caster has, whereas another may do damage based on the hp the caster has remaining, or based on the number of targets in the radius of the effect, or even based upon whether a particular character is casting their ultimate at the time it hits them or not(one attack only works on dragoons using their ultimate, but also does a large amount of damage).

Sound good? Now here's where you can help. I currently need 2 things:

Modeler:I need someone capable of creating and animating models similar to the characters from the game. They dont necessarily need to look exact, Albert for example can just be a green teamcolored Arthas with his weapon edited out and a spear attached in it's place, precision is not that big a deal. They just have to look similar.

Trigger Editor:I need someone with a strong knowledge of the WC3 model editor's trigger system or a moderate knowledge of Jass. Most of the abilities are finished, I just need someone capable of placing down the basic triggers and polishing off some unfinished things(like the item system, its not completely finished yet).

Once I have finished the terrain, I will see about getting a test map up and running with the 12 heroes I have finished ready for people to check out. Until then, any help available would be great, especially with the modelling.

Huh? You mean WC3 World Editor's trigger system,..

For what spell making or the game system? I could maybe help, but I don't know JASS.

Lol freakazoid.- Who are you? Superman? Oh, that's right, Freakazoid! a crazy professor was it? I don't remember...

Well, ehem *coghcogh*... about the map. Oh srry, I gtg. I'll edit my post and put something on-topic later :D

Edit: Discussion moved on, so I'll make it short: As long as this is as far from other AoSs as you say, and you are not hoping to compete with DotA, then you probably have a good thing going on here :) The best of luck to ya!

For the game system, and 1 or 2 ultimates im not entirely certain how to do. 12 of the characters I have already finished nearly, just need to finish the terrain and do some polishing on the triggers for one of the ultimates.

And yes, sorry, meant the WE not model editor.

Right now there are 8 towns.

Good team:Spring Breath town Ulara, Twin Castle Fletz, Capital City Bale, Crystal Palace Deningrad.

Evil Team:Dark Castle Kazas, The Divine Tree, Death City Mayfil, Law City Zenebatos.

Each one has their own item shops and random perks(like the raise dead wands and battle standards).

There are also 2 other hidden shops that will be usable after a certain event occurs(they are blocked off at first), keeping people from just whoring for the best items. Im hoping this will encourage pushing and discourage farming.

Based on what town you are at the terrain will be different, which may or may not be a good thing(One of the characters can turn invisible, with just a shadow, but be unable to attack, somewhat similar to the DOTA hero that can Phase, except he retains his collision size. Good for hiding in a forest or a wasteland area with dark terrain, but in a winterscape area youll stick out like a sore thumb).

Another nice thing:I am doing my absolute best to make sure this map has NO stun spells/magic immunity spells/invisiblity spells. We all know how ludicrous those can make balancing in maps(cough cough DOTA cough cough spiritbreaker cough cough). Generally im balancing heroes around 4 things:
Damage-The ability to deal damage rapidly to a single target
Survivability-Evasion abilities, high hp, and damage reduction abilities
Pushing ability-The ability for a hero to rapidly clear out waves of spawnies with aoe spells or mind control abilities
Range-The ability for a hero to stay at a range, so they can kill spawnies without taking damage(most ranged heroes have a large penalty to their direct combat ability, but have a bunch of nice support and defensive spells, like heals, etc).

I'm hoping to implement Vexorians summon AI script, but im holding off on that till later, when ive actually playtested the summons themselves.

I will probably have a map you can use to test out the 12 finished heroes and check out the terrain in 2-3 days about, ill get it up ASAP. The item system wont be finished till later though.

no stun..gg no re

Well, wont mind having no invis and immu, though I wouldn't cry if it did excist as well, but please do understand that stuns are an extremely important factor of gameplay. For interrupting, for killing, for escaping... I really don't know why people go on and on about imbalance in DotA. Especially about stunners. It's elements like stunning that keeps the combat exciting. Who can time their stuns the best etc, not, who can cast the greatest amount of damaging spells the fastest... sounds to me most of your battles would end up in suicide. Please, keep a few stuns, just not any insane ones. Also, you can make all slow-spells contain a 0.5 sec stu as well, so that everyone has the possibility to interrupt channeling spells and such. This is one thing would like too see in DotA as well.

Ok, I said that a bit off. What I meant by no stun spells is no spells which primary use is to stun. There will be spells that interrupt channeling, etc, just no big stun spells. There will, however, be slow spells, root spells, ensnare spells, knockback spells, etc. I simply dont like spells that completely negate a character's ability to fight back. Dont worry, though, there are plenty of spells designed to keep your enemy from getting away.

Ive nearly finished the terrain, at this point its just a matter of copying all the trigger, ability and unit data from my old version into the new terrained map, and dropping in some random creeps for people trying it out to kill till I have the game's actual spawn systems done(by whoever volunteers for the game triggers). After that I will have a test version available for you guys to try out.

I havent decided yet, but I am considering removing gold rewards from killing creeps, and instead splitting the reward among the team. Same for hero kills. IE you kill a base melee unit, your team gets 20 gold each. I also will allow pooling gold, since this map will have fewer cases where just having uber items will mean you can dominate an entire team alone. Teamwork is what will win the map, not just stacking items. I want this map to emphasize pushing and spawnie control, not just hero killing.

A couple examples of the previously mentioned "Non stun crowd control" spells are, for example, a channeled AOE heal that prevents units in it's radius from attacking(both allies and enemies). Or a character who has a charge attack that grabs any units it hits, and drags them with the character to the charge attacks ending spot, dealing damage based on how far they were dragged from their original position. Or a unit that can summon a large number of cannon fodder units to surround the target, that do laughable damage and have low hp, but work well as a way to keep the target in melee range(not talking like rhasta's mass wards in DOTA, I mean like 15 damage a hit with a 2.5 sec attack speed, but with 400 hp each and summoned in a group of 20). Or a spell that summons a "Tornado Ward" That fires out cyclones in random directions, tossing any units they hit into the air for 1 second and dealing damage.

Trust me, there are lots of "Disable spells", they just arent stuns

- Aaah, very good :) I guess we had the same oppinion all along :D There's nothing I like less then seeing Dragon Knights 3sec stun slam into me while other enemy heroes are closing in. I love fighting to the end, so at least when I get slowed for instance I can give my attacker a fight he'll suffer from for some time.

Precisely. I might give a hero bash, but it would be dome as a % chance to deal X damage, and also interrupt channeling, not as a stun(kind of like the monkey king bar in DotA).

As for current updates, I have gotten the terrain finished, at least for now, though I may end up doing some spitshine to it later to make it more presentable. Right now im finishing off the 12th hero and cleaning up some of the other heroes' triggers. The preview map should be out either tomorrow or tuesday. Keep in mind that the map is mostly a spell and terrain preview, and the AOS triggers will not be in place. There will be placeholder buldings and character models(since I have none of the custom models yet), and a handful of random creep groups for you to play target practice on.

There will be a couple of placeholder abilities in place due to my not knowing how to trigger the effects I want;I will point those out so you know which they are.

As for today's preview teaser, I will list off the heroes the map will have:

For the good team you will have access to Dart, Albert, Rose, Meru, Haschel, Miranda, and Kongol

For the evil team you will have access to Melbu Frahma(god of destruction form), Emperor Doel, Lenus, Lloyd, Zackwell, Faust, and Freugal(The warden from hellena, if you remember him). All of them will have their own unique abilities and most of them will be triggered.

Sorry about the lack of updates, the day after my last post there was a flood and I had to disassemble my comps and move them to another room, so I havent had any time to work on the map.

I just finished the first ability for the 12th hero, Faust, this evening. Tomorrow I will work on abilities 2 and 3, and hopefully will have his ultimate finished by thursday(which is all I need to complete my "Preview" test map).

And a "preview" test map is all we need to keep this discussion going :P

Just finished Fausts other two non ultimate abilities, so he has Splitting Sky, Sirocco, and Arcane Frenzy. All thats left is his ultimate, which im currently brainstorming for ideas on.

Ill keep you updated, hopefully tomorrow evening the test map will be finished.

Heres what I have so far. I couldnt decide on what to give Faust as an ultimate so I will post what I have finished and work from there. This is an ability test map only, any existing buildings are placeholders to show where the bases would be on the terrain. Creeps are just target practice, they will be removed in the final version. Some abilities need some trigger optimization, ill get to that later, but all abilities Except one(mentioned later) should work properly. These are what is NOT done/in yet in terms of abilities:

Lenus' "Serpent's Call" is a placeholder. It will be replaced with a summonable hydra that is uncontrollable and will follow her around attacking on it's own(it comes with its own spell set that improves with rank).

Melbu Frahma has an empty spell slot. This will be for a summon spell also, usable as a meatshield for siege(unlike lenus' which will act as a secondary source of damage).

Heroes 13 and 14, Zackwell and Fruegal, are not created yet.

The dragoon "Morph" Ultimateas arent finished yet, and will be worked on next.

Emperor Doel does not have projectile art for "Blade of Darkness", and "Blade of light" may be replaced with a linear short range AOE, I havent decided yet. Storm Rage will probably be replaced as well, not sure.

Lenus' "Throw Chakram - Right" ability currently disappears from usable when cast. This is because there is a glitch in the trigger which I will deal with in the next version(It is supposed to alternate between throw chakram left and right, both of which have seperate cooldowns, so you can cast both then wait for the cooldown instead of casting one nuke per cooldown, currently its not properly leveling Left, so when it disables right and enables left, left is untrained).

Lloyd's "Divine Bomb" is using placeholder art, it will be replaced with something more flashy later.

Lloyd's "Dragon Buster" currently does nothing, returning "Invalid Target" with all targets. Reason being it only works on dragoons using their ultimate, and all dragoons do not have their ultimate finished yet(therefore it does nothing currently).

I think that covers all the bugs, though there are a couple spelling and grammar errors. I'll keep working on them ASAP and release a new version when I have something to update(probably finishing the dragoon ultimates, fixing Throw Chakram and giving Faust an Ultimate).

At present:

Terrain - 1/10; why, oh why, do you HAVE to copy DoTA? It is such an incredibly old, overused terrain layout for an AoS. At present, the terrain lacks flair as well as a complete lack of any origionality.

Abilities - 4/10; tooltips lacked useful descriptions. Even though very few of the abilities were origional (most merely modified abilities used in a normal way), I could hardly tell what they did (I'm normally good at second-guessing bad tooltips). Need more custom abilities.

Triggers - 3/10; leaky. Single biggest factor in bringing down a map's performance is leaks. Read a tutorial on them and fix them.

Overall - you need something to set the map apart. Having a copied terrain won't do that. Ability tooltips that are clear and easy to understand are a big plus point (that's something where you should look at other maps; ToB's tooltips are a prime example of easy to understand, if a bit on the long side). Your triggers need to cleaner, otherwise performance will deteriorate.

However, you have some good ideas, and if you implement them well, then this has the potential to be good.

Understandable comments in some respects. I will do my best to respond to them.

Firstly, about the terrain. Keep in mind that there are only so many layouts one can give an AOS map. Mine was considerably more diverse than most, actually shifting between terrain types(grass, desert, beach, water, wasteland, snowscape) as you travel between sections. You have to put some degree of "Lanes" perse, in the map, else you will have your units randomly wandering around. You must divide the map up evenly between the teams, else one team will get an unfair advantage(shorter distance to travel between the base and the front lines).

As for Copying the terrain from DotA, firstly, if you look, you will notice that the leveling of the terrain is completely different. This terrain was done by hand, by myself, from scratch. Granted, it is probably rough around the edges and needs some work(It is, after all, the first and currently only terrain I have done so far). However, it is not now nor has it ever been DotA's terrain. I would appreciate it if you would not accuse me of Copy-Pasting someone elses map.

Custom abilities:Here I agree with you. Several abilities need to be diversified. Im afraid that I am not an excessively amazing trigger-writer, im still learning. this is my first map I have ever done and I am learning on the fly. I hope to remedy this eventually, though. The tooltips were not written by me(a great deal of the abilities were a collaberation between someone else and myself back when I was not working alone, therefore the tooltips need to be cleaned up and checked out. This will be done, and I recognize it being necessary).

As for the triggers, as above, many abilities are not done by me. A large problem is all the abilities that came from previous versions use a specific unit reference instead of a variable reference, and on top of that, I do not know JASS, which causes them to leak. Thats the next thing I plan on cleaning up once the things mentioned in my previous post are finished:Code optimization.

Just a reminder, as for the terrain, my terrain is no less original than ToB, EotA, or AoM. More so, if I dare say so, since it varies in setting with the section being traveled through. I tried to blend terrain transitions with trees and blending the terrain itself along a "Blurred line" approach at terrain borders, though it likely needs to be cleaned up.

I do appreciate the feedback, however.