"Project WarSoc"

[MindWorX]

---

Index

1. Foreword
2. Introduction
3. The Name
4. Features
5. How is this possible?
6. I want to help!
7. Credits
8. Final comments

Foreword

Back to Top
Do you hate the 12 player limit of Warcraft III?
Do you hate the need for prehosted games?
Did you answer yes to either of the above, then this project might interest you.

Introduction

Back to Top
This is "Project WarSoc", this is a total conversion for Warcraft III The Frozen Throne. The project spans over more than just a couple of new units and a campaign. Project WarSoc works to break some of the multiplayer limits Warcraft III has, like Player Limit and the need for a prehosted game.

The Name

Back to Top
The name is derived from WinSock, which is Windows internal network communication functions, which lead to WarSock and then to WarSoc, i know the name isn't exactly great, but that's the project-name, and it makes sense in terms of what it does. The game-name will be something else, to be more apealing.

Features

Back to Top

1. No Player Limit
2. No Need for Prehosted Games

How is this possible?

Back to Top
I'm using Custom Natives, which involves some complicated things i'm not going to go in much detail about just yet. The base is, that you use a 3rd party executable to start, much like total conversions, and it all works. This is primarily possible through the work of PipeDream and Xttocs, who found and improved the way of implementing Custom Natives.

I want to help!

Back to Top
Right now, i don't need any help. Some ideas maybe for the usage, but until i have a more general idea of what i'm going to make of this, i wont need much help.

Credits!

Back to Top
- Bryan "PipeDream" Steinbach
- Andy "xttocs" Scott

Final comments

Back to Top
I realize that this is a big project, and it will require a bunch of dedicated users to be posssible. But i'm sure that with a good comunity like THW, i'll be able to pull it off. Also, please note that i'm not recruiting right now, the list above, is just what i'm going to need. Right now i want to get the whole game engine working first, then i'm going to start hirering. This doesn't mean you can't tell me you want to help, but i wont ask you to work for me, before the engine is done.

Well, i hope this thread was informative, as it took me a little while to conjure. And i hope that you will find the project interesting.

- MindWorX

 

[ragingspeedhorn]

So far the project seems interesting but the name, WarSoc, I mean, it sounds like War Sock or War Suck, which isn't all that appealing, neither is the name itself, you should try to think of something better.

And what would you need a writer for if you are not going to make a campaign?

 

[MindWorX]

The name is actually derived from WinSock, which lead to WarSock and then to WarSoc, i know the name is sucky, but that's the "project" name, not the "game" name. I need a story writer, because i'm actually going to make an open rpg(read mmo xD), with hero storage, and accounts.

 

[operator]

How exactly are you going to break the limit ?

 

[MindWorX]

How exactly are you going to break the limit ?

Added the answer in the main post.
Answer

 

[Mechanical Man]

It thought that WarSoc means soccer in warcraft

 

[Captain Griffen]

Hmm...nice work Mindy. I have a couple of ideas on how to make very good use of the natives.

 

[MindWorX]

It thought that WarSoc means soccer in warcraft

Hehe, not quite, but i see why you thought so.

Hmm...nice work Mindy. I have a couple of ideas on how to make very good use of the natives.

Then by all means tell me.

 

[ragingspeedhorn]

The name is actually derived from WinSock, which lead to WarSock and then to WarSoc, i know the name is sucky, but that's the "project" name, not the "game" name. I need a story writer, because i'm actually going to make an open rpg(read mmo xD), with hero storage, and accounts.

Well if it is just a random name then why not call it "WarMind" or "CraftWorX" or something else in that direction, just WarSoc, seriously

 

[MindWorX]

Well if it is just a random name then why not call it "WarMind" or "CraftWorX" or something else in that direction, just WarSoc, seriously

Hehe, i wrote a little about the name in the main thread, so that it makes some sense. I know it's not pretty, but still, it's a short name, that explains exactly what WarSoc is.

 

[ragingspeedhorn]

Ok, good, as long as the actuall conversion will have some flashy name it's all good, it's all good. People don't want to play anything called WarSoc.

 

[Captain Griffen]

Hehe, not quite, but i see why you thought so.


Then by all means tell me.

One idea I have is for a bit like AoS, but with each player in charge of a group of troops, and fighting a large scale war across several maps.

 

[MindWorX]

Ok, good, as long as the actuall conversion will have some flashy name it's all good, it's all good. People don't want to play anything called WarSoc.

Ofcourse. "World of WarSoc" is flashy enough for you, right? j/k xD

One idea I have is for a bit like AoS, but with each player in charge of a group of troops, and fighting a large scale war across several maps.

Definatly a good idea. I'll be sure to consider it, would be a nice first project, since it's a little more simple than an open rpg.

 

[ragingspeedhorn]

+ An ORPG has been done too many times already.

 

[MindWorX]

+ An ORPG has been done too many times already.

Not with WarSoc as background. That allows hero storage, and all that, much like professionel games. But true, Griffoo's idea would be truly unique.

 

[ragingspeedhorn]

I meant more generally, as the market is flooded with MMORPG games.

 

[Ralle]

I don't hope that DotA will be ported to WarSoc

Why not call it WarCom? War = Warcraft, Com = Communication => MMO

 

[MindWorX]

I don't hope that DotA will be ported to WarSoc

Hehe, i actually told a friend about one thing i could do, where i linked two maps together, and you could have 10vs10 maps, without a dedicated server. He got scared because he thought DotA might make a version that supported that.

Why not call it WarCom? War = Warcraft, Com = Communication => MMO

WarCom would work, but changing name now, would mean that i have to change my whole naming of all my functions, my dll, my interface and everything else. Kinda alot of work.

 

[ragingspeedhorn]

DotA in 10vs10 would be awesome, I hope DotA goes on WarSoc

 

[The Last Istari]

No you don't.

But Anyways, is this for real? Do my eyes deceive me?

I volunteer as a beta tester (Just getting my name out there. I know you're not ready yet and I can wait.)

 

[MindWorX]

No you don't.

But Anyways, is this for real? Do my eyes deceive me?

I volunteer as a beta tester (Just getting my name out there. I know you're not ready yet and I can wait.)

This is indeed for real, and i hope to be able to have a beta out soon. But i'm still working on different things of the game. Actually just started rewriting the server, since my old approach didn't work as planned. I'm happy to have Beta Testers, since not all are too fond of starting executables they got off the net. Beta Testers are a little more easy to get to try out some stuff. I'll be sure to remember you when i get a release ready.

 

[Craka_J]

If you actual break the player limit somehow, that'd be so awesome! Unfortunate thing is that you are required to use a third party program while running Warcraft III which can sometimes result in the game crashing. Another down side is that not many people will have this third party program unless if you advertise it alot, both on Bnet and on all Warcraft III sites you can find.

Eventually I am sure many people will have it since this is a very useful feature and I am sure lots of modders will be interested in using this. Maybe even DoTA will consider it once it's bug-free and works properly. About this player limit thing, can you make a specific limit to specific maps? Such as DoTA 12 players, Pokemon RPG 32, Booty Bay 15, Soul Chess 4? Or will it just be limitless and you can have like 20 people join your map, especially if they can join after the map has already started (which I think would be great, since I always wanted it since I started playing on Bnet)

Hopefully this doesn't make players lag either, especially on maps with excessive amounts of players(20+).

I understand you don't need terrainers at the moment but in the future, I may be of good assistance to you. I'm good at writing stories in general, but staying with the Warcraft Lore is a bit... boring and over-used in many campaigns. If you need a story written from scratch, I might help with that as well. My current story in progress is at: www.freewebs.com/gusefraba/stories.htm
It's a long story but it is good and worth all of the reading according to many who've proof-read it for me.
Otherwise, good luck on this mod and I look forward to it. Please answer the above questions. Thank you!
-Craka_J
PS:
Are you also saying that you're making it possible for campaigns to be MULIPLAYERABLE? If so, then Wc3:WoW will definately use this.

 

[MindWorX]

If you actual break the player limit somehow, that'd be so awesome! Unfortunate thing is that you are required to use a third party program while running Warcraft III which can sometimes result in the game crashing. Another down side is that not many people will have this third party program unless if you advertise it alot, both on Bnet and on all Warcraft III sites you can find.

The crashing part hasn't happened yet to me, so that I wouldn't worry about. I know that not many people will know about the mod at first, but i'm sure, that after some time, more people will get their friends to try, and thought their friends, i'll get more players. Hopefully. Haven't fully tested this with b.net yet, so not completely sure how that will work.

About this player limit thing, can you make a specific limit to specific maps? Such as DoTA 12 players, Pokemon RPG 32, Booty Bay 15, Soul Chess 4? Or will it just be limitless and you can have like 20 people join your map, especially if they can join after the map has already started (which I think would be great, since I always wanted it since I started playing on Bnet)

The map developer will set the limit of players the map can have, so it's 100% customizable. The developer could even set the limit to 500 if he needed it, tho i think that would need a dedicated server to work. xD

Hopefully this doesn't make players lag either, especially on maps with excessive amounts of players(20+).

That would depend on the host connection that the map is running on. Ofcourse a 56k user wouldn't really be able to host a map with more than 4 players or such, while a dsl user, would probably(not tested yet) be able to support an average of 20 players, depending on the map type.

I understand you don't need terrainers at the moment but in the future, I may be of good assistance to you. I'm good at writing stories in general, but staying with the Warcraft Lore is a bit... boring and over-used in many campaigns. If you need a story written from scratch, I might help with that as well. My current story in progress is at: www.freewebs.com/gusefraba/stories.htm
It's a long story but it is good and worth all of the reading according to many who've proof-read it for me.
Otherwise, good luck on this mod and I look forward to it. Please answer the above questions. Thank you!
-Craka_J

I'll be sure to try and read your stories, and also try and give some feedback if i can. Also, the terrain part, i might need, but as i said, doing some experiments with terrain, so still waiting to see how that goes, but i appreciate that you want to help. Also, with the story, i didn't mean that the story had to fit in with previous event's of Warcraft, but rather, keep it inline with the game, still having horde vs alliance parts, and such. But doens't have to be related to any of the previous events of warcraft.

PS:
Are you also saying that you're making it possible for campaigns to be MULIPLAYERABLE? If so, then Wc3:WoW will definately use this.

That would be cool, i think alot of people could benefit from this solution, rather than regular old Warcraft 12 player limit.

 

[moyackx]

Interesting concept I must say, but I have one big question.... as far as I know, that implies an huge modification in the core of the game, which implies that you go against the battle.net rules. So if a game with your engine is played in battle.net, it's almost sure that the user gets banned for that (it could be considered cheat).

Please correct me if I'm wrong. But I remember one discussion similar to this with a tool less extreme than the one showed in this thread.


EDIT: I want to see a proof that this can be done, I want to see one screenshot where you can select a player 18.

 

[Craka_J]

Well actually, in a campaign, only ONE player can play. I doubt Campaigns will ever be multiplayer since it's read as a singleplayer file and you need to be in Bnet to start as being online or in LAN connection. The only way to play a campaign online is if you had another special third party program that could read singleplayer files such as campaigns and probably if the file size wasn't too big and would probably require a private online server.

 

[MindWorX]

Hmm, seems i have to try and explain how this is possible.

First, i'm going to explain exactly what "WarSoc" does, WarSoc is a set of natives, that allows you to send internet traffic from within Warcraft, like, any game does, that uses TCP/IP, WarSoc is the exactly same thing.

Now, i can't change the Game's player limit, but i can simulate a higher player limit, which i'm doing through something like this, this is taken from the current thing i'm working on.

• Player 1 - Red - The User, this is the one you'll control.
• Player 2 - Blue - The representation of the other users. These will be controlled through triggers.
• Player 3 - Teal - The AI, controlled from the server, through triggers.
• Player 4 - Purple - The GM's.
• Player 5 - Yellow - The Admins/GameDevs.

As you can see, i don't change WC3's player limit, i just simulate it, by syncronising the different games, so that they all have the same state as the server. And, as you can see, if someone would want a whole faction more, all it would take, was the use of 2 more players, like this:

• Player 1 - Red - Faction 1 Users.
• Player 2 - Blue - Faction 1 Avatars.
• Player 3 - Teal - Faction 2 Users.
• Player 4 - Purple - Faction 2 Avatars.

I hope this makes a some sense to you, so you can see how this idea will work.

 

[DoOs_101]

No Need for Prehosted Games

What do you mean by this?
It will be interesting to play a map with no player limit, but I've already done a survey on player limit and actually thought about making one 3 years ago but alot of gamers don't get annoyed with the player limit, they're just fine with it.

So... why not focus on the gameplay instead since gameplay is the most important factor not the player limit.

 

[Horn]

The system hacks are cool, but you need to actually tell us SOMETHING before you get story writers and modelers knocking at your door.

I could help with either/both if your concept is good, aloso any PHP/web help you may further need.

 

[MindWorX]

What do you mean by this?
It will be interesting to play a map with no player limit, but I've already done a survey on player limit and actually thought about making one 3 years ago but alot of gamers don't get annoyed with the player limit, they're just fine with it.

So... why not focus on the gameplay instead since gameplay is the most important factor not the player limit.

The whole point of the system, is to break the playerlimit. So that's what i'm focusing on.

The no need for prehosted games, means, that you don't have to wait for all players to join, before you start the game, they'll be able to join after you started.

The system hacks are cool, but you need to actually tell us SOMETHING before you get story writers and modelers knocking at your door.

I could help with either/both if your concept is good, also any PHP/web help you may further need.

Yea, i know that asking for story writers was a little early, going to remove it, until i have a functional system going, and have some more ideas about the game. Thanks for the assitance for the php\web help.

 

[moyackx]

Correct me if I understood right... it means that one player slot could be controlled by several players???

Guauu, that's something that I must see.

 

[MindWorX]

Correct me if I understood right... it means that one player slot could be controlled by several players???

Guauu, that's something that I must see.

Well, it really hard to explain. The unit you control, shown as "Red" to you, will on the other players screen, be "Blue". And same, the "Blue" for you will be controlled by other users, that see themself as "Red". Kinda hard to explain in an easy way, but i think, once you see how it works, it's going to be easier.

 

[Captain Griffen]

Simple explaination:

WC3 will think you are playing SP for each player, and the custom natives will send the info needed to syncronise it, via a hosting player/server.

This won't work through battle.net.

 

[DaFranker]

Obviously, battle.net will not be an option for this. The "no need for pre-hosted games" part obviously implied that; battle.net has server-side systems that manage and regulate hosting so that players can only join lobby games.

Circumventing this would require the use of another hub similar to battle.net but with different systems regarding inter-player connection, or a major hacking of the battle.net servers without them noticing anything. Both are going to be a huge amount of work, if they're ever actually done.

The easiest solution would probably to use a modified battle.net hub server that players could access through common registry mods, but a third-party tool that force-connects WC3 to an already-open game on a virtual LAN network might also be quite efficient.

 

[MindWorX]

Simple explaination:

WC3 will think you are playing SP for each player, and the custom natives will send the info needed to syncronise it, via a hosting player/server.

This won't work through battle.net.

Very good explanation.

 

[Captain Griffen]

Obviously, battle.net will not be an option for this. The "no need for pre-hosted games" part obviously implied that; battle.net has server-side systems that manage and regulate hosting so that players can only join lobby games.

Circumventing this would require the use of another hub similar to battle.net but with different systems regarding inter-player connection, or a major hacking of the battle.net servers without them noticing anything. Both are going to be a huge amount of work, if they're ever actually done.

The easiest solution would probably to use a modified battle.net hub server that players could access through common registry mods, but a third-party tool that force-connects WC3 to an already-open game on a virtual LAN network might also be quite efficient.

Please read my previous post.

Though I wonder how you're going to have connections established, Mindy. IP addresses, or what?

 

[MindWorX]

Please read my previous post.

Though I wonder how you're going to have connections established, Mindy. IP addresses, or what?

It's done using IP's yes. So i'm going to see if i can create a small server to keep track of created games, if there's the need for one. I saw a clever solution where someone used a mIRC channel as server. Low Cost and effective. But right now, the server the game connects to, is hardcoded in the map.

 

[DoOs_101]

This doesn't work, you gotta get some private server to host you and help you. If not or ur establishing the connections urself, I don't think many people will come anyways with the Dota factor and the coming of starcraft II.

 

[Horn]

I disagree. The new features are very appealing and I'm certain various projects will piggy-back the new system to further encourage players.

If anything, avoiding the mass bigot-infested, moronic player base that is Battle.net can only mean GOOD things.

 

[MindWorX]

This doesn't work, you gotta get some private server to host you and help you. If not or ur establishing the connections urself, I don't think many people will come anyways with the Dota factor and the coming of starcraft II.

I'm not doing this to get many players, i'm doing this, to prove the possibilities of Warcraft III, and if i get a small playerbase in the process, then i'm happy.

I'm curious what it is you say that doesn't work?

I disagree. The new features are very appealing and I'm certain various projects will piggy-back the new system to further encourage players.

If anything, avoiding the mass bigot-infested, moronic player base that is Battle.net can only mean GOOD things.

I belive too that this project will spike peoples interest in wc3 again, since i'll be able to show them enough new features, that it'll almost be an expansion to the game.

 

[ragingspeedhorn]

If you get DotA on your mod and it can support more players than the current BNet then it will be a succes.

 

[Kixer]

Im very interested in hearing how easy it would be to create maps with this. Are you going to change WE or something?
Id also like to know if you could use this via LAN without internet acess...
Hope you finish this

 

[Captain Griffen]

IP addresses work fine, LAN or internet, basically no difference. So as long as your network is setup fine, it could be made to work with it.

 

[MindWorX]

Im very interested in hearing how easy it would be to create maps with this. Are you going to change WE or something?

This will require a modified WE, made by Vexorian, called NewGen Jass, but it doesn't require anything else than that. It wont be easy to create your own mods i'm afraid, since alot of wc3's systems, combat, damage and spells, are rewritten to work with my custom natives. That means, any spell you make, has to be written in jass.

Id also like to know if you could use this via LAN without internet acess...
Hope you finish this

As Captain Griffen said, this works with tcp/ip, so using it on LAN wont be a problem.

 

[noctune]

I love this idea, joining a game that's already going on would cause a huge twist on how maps are designed and it would open many many doors to new interesting maps.

I also apply for beta testing it. Please PM me when you're ready to release a beta version of WarSoc.

 

[HappyTauren]

does it mean that maps will have to be specially made for this hack?

 

[Horn]

does it mean that maps will have to be specially made for this hack?

It runs on custom natives and a modified engine, so existing maps won't work.

 

[MindWorX]

does it mean that maps will have to be specially made for this hack?

As Whitehorn said, this is based on custom natives, so yes, it does require you to make maps for this specifically i'm afraid. But that being said, i'm hoping to make some nice easy functions that you can use for it, so it wont be hard for new people to do it, tho it will require some Jass knowledge, but wont require any knowledge of network traffic and the like.

 

[noctune]

As Whitehorn said, this is based on custom natives, so yes, it does require you to make maps for this specifically i'm afraid. But that being said, i'm hoping to make some nice easy functions that you can use for it, so it wont be hard for new people to do it, tho it will require some Jass knowledge, but wont require any knowledge of network traffic and the like.

Since there's no need to know about network traffic, will it take a lot of work to convert a map to your engine?

 

[DoOs_101]

You should contact private servers and gaming platforms to see if you can get a deal for this. The engine seems obstruct however if it works successfully alot of private servers or gaming platforms are willing to engage on this engine you're about to make.

 

[MindWorX]

Since there's no need to know about network traffic, will it take a lot of work to convert a map to your engine?

Well, the network traffic itself wont be a problem, the problem will be, that all spells has to be jassed, using new functions, also, the regular combat system has been replaced, again, to get it to work with warsoc.

You should contact private servers and gaming platforms to see if you can get a deal for this. The engine seems obstruct however if it works successfully alot of private servers or gaming platforms are willing to engage on this engine you're about to make.

A deal? Like server hosting?