Newbie with some beginners questions

Hi, I've been playing starcraft for years now, and I've always been a very active map maker. I've finally switched over to playing Warcraft 3, and I'm amazed at all the various things the editor can do. I'm interested in picking up map making in warcraft 3 as well, I know it's a lot more complicated then staredit, however that's the core reason of why I want to make maps for WC3.

I'm not a typical noob expecting to make great maps within hours, I understand all the time that goes into creating a map and I'm willing to learn step by step.

Anyway, rather then play around with basic crappy maps, I'm diving into my first project, which i'll use to learn and have fun along the way. My goal is to create an 'arcade style' RPG, basically something that allows the players to choose a hero class and level up and gain spells as you travel through the RPG. Nothing to complicated other then actual unit balance and creating the terrain, but the point isn't to make some super popular map, it's to learn and build a simple RPG that I can enjoy.

So, I've been messing around with the editor and there's one thing that seems to be really holding me back. This is where my post actually poses a question, the reason for me describing all prior to this sentence. Since I'm working on an RPG, I of course want to have lots of different spells for my heros. I understand that in Warcraft 3, the heros are only able to have a maximum of about 4 or 5 (Sorry forgot the exact number!) spells. Is it possible at all to add spells to a hero as he levels up? (Or put a level requirement on a spell?) Is it possible to somehow surpass the limit of spells warcraft 3 has by default on a hero, without actually changing the unit? Also, I'd like to use the unit abilities as well, but I'd like them to act as 'spells' a player can choose from as he levels up. For example, let's go with the basic ability of 'eat tree.'

Being a starcraft map maker, my instinct tells me to give the ability to the unit, however require the player to research it. This would be done by giving the player say "2 gold" at level 2, meaning at level 2 you get enough gold to buy the ability from the building, or choose a level 1 ability. I suppose there's nothing wrong with this, but I'm curious if I can automatically give the player the ability as he levels up, or allow him to choose and give him the ability after selecting the choice from a dialog box of some kind.

The reason this is so important to me is because I'd really like to create an RPG that focuses on the player sticking with one primary unit (no upgrading units as the player levels up) and forces them to work on their spells throughout the game. If the player can only get a handful of basic spells and one ultimate spell, as well as no abilities other then the wc3 basic limit the game would get very boring very fast, or be a very short game to compensate for the lack of things to learn/upgrade. I realize I'm a beginner and if these questions are asking to much of the wc3 editor, or if they are really basic questions then I apologize in advance, but I learn through asking questions, no matter how silly or obvious they may seem to others. I appreciate anyone who takes the time to read over and answer this post - thanks in advance!

First: please indent your paragraphs. Makes it difficult for those who want to help you. (you can change this post by editting it).

Second: if you are new, the best advice is to playtest things. There's a whole lot of information to learn, and you learn more simply by fiddling around with world editor to see what you can do.

As far as some questions: You can have alot of abilities on a unit by having something called "spellbook" this is a unit ability that works like a file folder on a computer. Some of the fields involved to watch for: keep the max and min spells allowed the same number, otherwise it get's kinda buggy. Second, there is a field that says "Data - Spell List" where you put these spells.

When you have the hero, he will have a spellbook icon. When you click it it will "open a new window" to the abilities inside. This way, 3 icons will have, say, 12 spells. If you made some elemental mage with 12 abilities, you could have fire as one spellbook, ice as another, lightning etc.

As far as "asking too much of the editor," I find you are more limited by your own ingenuity and efforts than the editor. To give you comparison, people have made Final fantasy style RPG's, and FPS.

One other important thing I've learned is to not be afraid to experiment. Often times you have to get the wrong answer 30 times before you get the right one, and you can't get that right one w/o getting the wrong ones first.

Thanks, I really apperciate the reply. I know I probably sound like some arrogant kid who wants to start making WC3 maps without experiance, but I'm not - I just like to know 'whats possible' before I actually start playing around as you suggested, so I don't get my hopes up only to be let down. I'll re-organize my posts as they grow to long , sorry about that.

I understand completly what you mean by the spell book being like a 'sub-folder' - i'll have to play around to figure out how to get this to work best for me, but I really apperciate the answer to one of my questions. Quick 'subquestion' on this - is it possible to give a unit a spell book at "X" point in the game? So let's say I want to make a spellbook "Level 1 spells" which I give them by default, and then say a "Level 3" spell book or something like that? Or can I just restrict spells by level?

As for my other question, is it possible to do something similiar with regular unit ablities? Such as say, "Eat Tree?" Ultimatley I'll probably just give the hero Eat Tree and just have the players research prevented from allowing them to use this spell until they gain a certian level at which point i'll allow them to research it, but can I also organize the unit ablities into spell book subfolders, or are those limited since they aren't exactly hero spells?

Once again I'm really apperciative of your help so far, and in the future i'll take what you said into consideration. Sorry if I came off a bit like a typical noob, but i'm just trying to learn!

Well, if you wanted lotsa spells in just one slot, how bout usin' the spellbook ability with spellbook abilities in it?

As in : The unit has one abillity which is <custom spell>. When you click it, you get 11 abilities and 1 spell book abillity. That gives you another page of abilities and so on. I myself have not tried this before, thus, Im not quite sure if this might work.

@optics

You can add, remove, level, and de-level unit abilities with a trigger. Abilities themselves are highly adjustable via triggers. Since there are so many options it's hard to cover what you can do. Hence, see for yourself and play with the stuff.

From the simplest possible standpoint, you can always use the "Unit - Add Ability" action in the trigger editor, set to run when the unit levels and conditional on the level being a certain number.

I appreciate your attitude, and welcome to the community. I think you'll find that modding for Warcraft 3 absolutely rules!

Thanks for all the kind replies guys! I've started to really get a feel for the sheer massive amount of what I can do, and thanks to the replies in this thread I now understand spell books a bit more and I've been able to get a grasp on pretty much exactly what I want to do with them to create a fun, probably not to unique, but fun RPG of my own.

For anyone else who might be in the same situation as me and reading this thread at some point in the future, I found a nice tutorial online for spell books, which can be found here: http://www.thehelper.net/forums/showthread.php?t=34530

Thanks again, I look forward to making some fun warcraft 3 maps!

KK, just make sure that you have TFT. ROC is a lot harder to do cool things IMO

ALSO: Remember (this is what most noobs DO NOT DO); use SEARCHES, TUTORIALS, and RESOURCES. They are there for a REASON.

Hydro, either you don't pay attention or you just choose to be arrogant... he said he was looking up tutorials. As the Sin'Dorei say; Bal'a dash, malanore. Sinu a'manore. Anu belore dela'na.
Greetings, traveler. Well met. The sun guides us.
I look forward to see your acomplishmemts. If you ever need anything, send me a PM

Shorel'aran malanore
-TheSecretArts

I don't know about you, but I speak english, TheSecretArts....

Go spam about English and grammar and blood elven crap in the off topic forum. -_-
Sheesh.

And one of the most useful tutorials around to figure out how abilities work and stuff is right here on this site. This is Pitzer's ability guide.
You were rambling about abilities, optics, so I figured it might be useful.

hmph, i see that you guys dont like thallasian

I do hereby prohibit this from derailing the original topic. Cease.

Yeah, upon initially discovering this site that was one of the first tutorials I looked at. However, although I am a bit of a programmer ( I know java and some C++) I'd rather not dwell into learning a language for the task of creating new spells or spell systems, not only because it's time consuming to learn but because it's time consuming to physically do even after the fact. I may not be making fancy or complex maps, but I'm really finding the Warcraft 3 editor to be very capable on it's own with just the trigger system and object editor, which so far allows me to do all I've wanted to. Thanks for the link though, I appreciate the help and welcome.

All the initial questions and concerns I had in my first post have been answered and I'm well on my way to learning the basics and the sheer magnitude of how much I can do in the editor. Thanks again for all your help, I now look forward to working on some maps - not to become popular because of trying to be original - but just to make games that I find fun to play.

I'll stick around in case I have any other questions .. and although I may not be able to contribute as much as most people on here where I can I look forward to doing so.

If you think the GUI editor is good, wait 'till you try JASS and vJASS. Its a whole new world...