A Land Divided AoS v3.3 FINAL

Moderator · Aug 11, 2008

02:54, 6th Oct 2008
VGsatomi: Approved. 3-way AoS maps are always fun- and especially this one. Its nice to see another map where the combat doesn't just revolve around hero combat, but supporting the spawned armies as well- the way it should be. Large selection of heroes keeps variety up. I didn't have time to test balancing on each though. Only flaw I saw was the lack of emphasis on terraining. The landscape was very bland and devoid of texture work. Overall good map.

NeverDeath · Aug 11, 2008

The map's back up with what I believe are some important fundamental improvements.

Enjoy!

-NeverDeath

NeverDeath · Aug 12, 2008

Version 1.72 is up, and it fixes a lot of potential balance issues, hopefully making the game a lot more fun to play. Enjoy all

-NeverDeath

Aaaand 1.73 is up now, because I noticed a major bug, but it has been fixed and I double checked all existing triggers to make sure it was the only such glitch.

rival935 · Aug 16, 2008

hey i like the originality in what you did, im not sure ive seen an AoS with 3 teams, nice. becuase originality is on a low... as long as you dont make it like DotA is, then its great. nice job.

NeverDeath · Aug 16, 2008

Thanks

As many doors as DotA opened in terms of bringing people into the AoS genre, I rather dislike the imbalance the items in the game bring. I tried to go in a different direction with mine, and hopefully it's fun in its own way

As much as I'd like to take credit for the 3-way idea, the template is actually from an old map called AoS Tri-War, I just added my own triggers, heroes, custom skills and such to it, to make it hopefully a lot better

Cheers!

bountygiver · Aug 20, 2008

That's a great idea for an AoS to be 3-team.
But you might want to try to use free up the slots for computer players so that you can support more players in each team. Just like what I've done in my 4-team AoS map.

Click on my sig for the link.

NeverDeath · Aug 24, 2008

Version 2.0 is up, with a brand new map layout it should be much more fun

Enjoy!

locked_twilight · Sep 3, 2008

I can't play with my college friends because they're not fans of WC3, but is this map have an AI?

NeverDeath · Sep 3, 2008

No AI, sorry bud. The map is really best for competitive gameplay, and you can't get that out of AI.

Conlan · Sep 15, 2008

Well, i've played the original Three Kingdom AoS (ismokeweed's) so long ago, and this is a REAL upgrade. Need's a better terrain with alot more doodads, more trigger based original spells, every recipe needs it's own icon (it's important) and their description must be fixed for easier read. The farms need to be removed, you can add food cap by triggers.
Overall I would rate 4 but instead i give you a 5, you should perhaps upgrade more.

NeverDeath · Sep 15, 2008

Thanks Conlan, but there are a few things worth mentioning pertaining to some of your points.

The farms for one thing, are only there for something to destroy and to give the effect of an outlying village (not for population), they are after all, rival kingdoms at war

. The population is actually handled by farms at the top right of the map, outside the playable area.

The maximum allowable Doodads are 6-thousand something, I don't recall at the moment; Of these I have I believe about 4800 in place, which I thought was not so bad. I thought that the item descriptions were fine, but I could easily change the icons of the recipes to resemble the items they create, if you think it would really make a difference. The terrain is not as varied as it could be, but I feel that for my first time using the editor, it is not coming along so badly

Thanks again for the rate, perhaps I will make some changes to some of these things. I am after all, waiting on my Warhammer SE Preorder to come through

. One last question, what exactly did you find troublesome about reading the recipe? Do you have any suggestions as to another way to display the information?

Edit: Made a few changes to the map, nothing too overly drastic but give it another go if you like, and lemme know if it's any better for ya. Thanks again for the input!

Revan(Rom) · Oct 6, 2008

First non-dota-aos I see on site for a very long time...
5/5
+rep

NeverDeath · Oct 6, 2008

Thanks for the rate Revan, and thanks to VGsatomi for the approval

I will take some time to mess with terrain - this was/is my first map and first time using the editor, and I will definitely work on that terrain, I'm just new to it, is all

NeverDeath · Oct 6, 2008

The map has now been updated to version 3.1F, with a terrain overhaul which hopefully will improve the visual appeal of many areas of the map.

Thanks to all who made the suggestions.

For possible future changes, I have looked into improving a few select abilities of existing heroes, further implementations to the terrain, as well as adding a sixth and final skill to each hero currently in the game. The last idea is not a certainty as yet, but is something I would like to do, as I feel if properly done it will add further depth to the combat between heroes. Some price changes will also be made to a few of the items found at the randomized Marketplaces in order to make them slightly more cost-effective and actually worth buying. Again, thanks to all for the feedback, keep bringin' it!

Conlan · Oct 8, 2008

i strongly suggest you to use pitzermike's widgetizer program which can be found in this site. It will reduce your maps loading time greatly

NeverDeath · Oct 9, 2008

Thanks for the suggestion. I will look into adding it into the next batch of changes I'm currently working on.

Revan(Rom) · Oct 9, 2008

If its your first map,you will learn a lot in the next time,as well terraining.
But its a gppd start at hive

NeverDeath · Oct 10, 2008

Thanks Revan, I appreciate that. I'm trying to get better with each new version though, this next one is going to be a real step up I think, I have some major improvements being added to the map, among which is some further improved terrain. Like you said though, I'm not really used to making maps as this is my first, and I imagine I will get better at the terraining with time.

NeverDeath · Oct 14, 2008

Massive update coming within days, very excited, it's been a lot of hard work but is now near completion. This will be possibly the biggest overhaul I've done to the map, including when I scrapped the original map template and made a new one.

Many big improvements and fun changes, will edit this post when it is updated. 3.2 is going to make 3.1 looks terribad. I hope.

Conlan · Oct 15, 2008

You dont need the farms at the top right corner. Just set each Player's food cap to (x) in triggers.
Also don't forgot to use Widgetizer Widgetizer 1.3.0.9 - The Hive Workshop - A Warcraft III Modding Site in your 3.2 version

NeverDeath · Oct 15, 2008

I'm aware of that, but it's entirely unimportant whether I have farms outside the playable map area, or food-cap triggers. If I wanted, I could also set the hero food value to zero. There's a lot of ways to do it, none work any better or worse than another. Thanks anyway.

As stated before, I intend to use map optimizers once I am finished with this new version I'm deep into working on. It'll be done soon.

Conlan · Oct 15, 2008

I think you should do that, of course it wont effect gameplay but it will make your map more professional, think that way.
You can both use Map Optimizer and Widgetizer. Also widgetizer itself optimize maps alot (slightly lesser than Map Optimizer)

Edit; for example, you should also make towers dissappear after hero selection (remove them instead of kill them). And hero's should be hired instead of trained. Display the recipe item details (bonuses, item requirements) one under the other to make them easier to read. These kind of details will increase your map's quality, believe me

It is a good map, I also loved the old Ismokeweed's AoS Three Kingdom (You remade that map don't you? A great remake). Keep updating it. 3 way aos are very rare.

NeverDeath · Oct 15, 2008

Yeah man, I fully intend to use both the optimizer and widgetizer (I heard they go well together) in order to help with the map's load time.

Yeah you caught me, version 2.0 was a complete map remake, I'm still learning the texturing and some stuff, but as much as I loved the old smokeweed version, I wanted something different, something my own. Thanks by the way, I've been working pretty hard at it. This update I'm working on is going to be huge, I'm nearly finished but it's been a big overhaul, I did a lot of things like you say, to improve quality.

For example, heroes will now say in red/green/blue text, whether they are melee/ranged, fighter/caster, and the color coding will dictate Strength, Agility, or Intelligence. I've also added "Passive" and "Active" tags to every skill in the game, and highlighted them green for passive, red for active - so people don't have to read the whole thing or try clicking the button to figure it out. Also one of the major reasons it's taking so long, is that I'm going through and adding a 6th ability to each class, of which there are 44. Add in balance and numerical value testing, and you can see why it's taking a bit XD

Thanks again, back to work for now

Conlan · Oct 15, 2008

Well, good to hear it.

DONT FORGET to uncheck ''compress Names'' in Map optimizer and uncheck ''Destructibles/Doodads and Remove unused Destructibles/Doodads'' in Widgetizer. It is very important.

I'm not sure about it but i suggest you to use widgetizer first and map optimizer next. Only use them BEFORE you completed the map. And of course always use a copy of your map.

EDIT: Wow! You even give credit to me just for recommending. I'm checking 3.2 immediately

NeverDeath · Oct 16, 2008

Heh, I made an oopsie, had to do a quick ninja fix, but no harm done. The only changes were a fix to a glitched graphic on the abyssal lord's death ability, and two heroes somehow didn't get static abilities, which were both fixed.

I made a few minor tweaks throughout the day, and am now pleased to say that everything is working properly with the map, and it should now be much improved from version 3.1, and even improved from my first posting of 3.2 this morning. If you want the completed version, it is now up. This is definitely one of if not the, last version

Any feedback would still be helpful.

Conlan · Oct 18, 2008

This map needs following;
---Revive timers (a countdown timer or a leaderboard), revive time should be proportional with dying hero level
---Hero kills should also give gold proportional with dying hero level like; 100 + (Hero level x 20)
---Multiboard which may show hero kills, unit kills, deaths, hero level(perhaps) and so on... (making a multiboard takes really much time, but it really worths)
---Attacking own unit must NOT kill you, please fix that! You can accidently click on your own unit/building. Instead just make a simple trigger like this: A unit attacks(generic) (Event), Owner of attacking unit equal to an ally of owner of attacked unit (Condition 1) AND Life of attacked unit greater than 10% (condition 2), Action: Order attacking unit to Stop. This works perfectly
---You may rename all items in ''Weak Item'' building, I cant remember it's name. The map should be more serious.

NeverDeath · Oct 19, 2008

Making revive times longer isn't something I wanted to do. When people have to wait longer than 40 seconds to revive, I've found that's about when it starts getting boring. 40 seconds is a lot of time with the way the map is designed, and a lot can happen in 40 seconds with a player missing from the action.

Gold scaling is something I could do with hero kills, but I fail to see the purpose of it. I think that by offering 450 gold flat as a bonus for killing heroes, the money is always useful, and never too much. I don't want killing heroes to ever be too much money, 450 is a fine amount.

It's pretty hard to kill yourself by attacking your own stuff accidentally, I don't think it's ever happened to me. If I had more people saying this, I'd probably just dotafy it so that you got poly'd for attempting to attack friendlies. But for people who pay attention it shouldn't be a big problem, especially as AoE abilities do not kill you if they hit friendlies, and single-target abilities are not usable on friendlies.

The item names in the "weak" item building never got revamped from early beta versions because I felt the names matched the unimportance of the items. Silly names for silly items

I might change them eventually but the question is, why

I must admit I currently don't know how to make a multiboard, but I might learn. I agree on this point you made, but some of the other ones I just simply don't feel are big enough issues at the moment. But still, thanks for your input, and I suppose the fact that you didn't mention hero imbalances and huge map glitching means I'm doing pretty well overall

Thanks again Conlan for your support.

Edit: I do have another version I am currently working on, I wanted to add one final (5th) tower to the mix, with some new hero concepts I've been tossing around, and definitely will look into making a multiboard. I'll also make the trigger with the stop command, for attacking friendlies. I kind of liked killing people who tried to be jerks and mess up their teammates, but alas

Conlan · Oct 19, 2008

There should be a multiboard tutorial somewhere in forums i hope. You may check for it.
No need to thanks. I actually don't have a chance to play your map in multiplayer, but as far as i see, hero abilities and items are pretty good. And it is a very good map for a first map.
I only want this map to be best 3 side AoS since there are almost none and almost all classic AoS are stupid DotA clones.

NeverDeath · Oct 19, 2008

Aye, I can understand that, I also enjoy 3-way AoS, I played the first ones back in the day, the tri-war and tri-force maps. I'll be continuing to make it better until I feel I no longer can, so trust me I'll be listening to suggestions.

I'm pretty new to this stuff, but I'm learning through trial and error and experimentation. After this last batch of heroes I'm working on, and perhaps some item additions/tweaks, along with a multiboard and a quest log instead of pop-up messages displaying the map rules, I think I'll be about done. I also wanted to go over with a fine-tooth comb and refine some of the descriptions written for the earliest heroes, to make them as cool as some of the newer ones.

Definitely gonna look for that tutorial, I'll need it haha. I tried to tinker my way through that awhile back and without knowing what I was doing, it wasn't happening. I'll give it a go one of these days, hopefully have it in by next release. But as is, the map is playable, and shouldn't have any outstanding balance/performance issues, just room for polish improvement and more advanced features

bountygiver · Oct 21, 2008

OK. Here are a few things going on with your map.

1. The creeps on the middle lanes are being spawned at a much faster rate than they are killed, causing them to clump and render melee heroes useless.

2. A hero revival timer is needed.

3. Try to make hero abilities on each hero to have more synergy, or make them complement with each other.

4. Try to have more detailed information about your spell tooltips, including the stats of each level, or at least by saying what will the spell gain with each level. It will be nice to know exactly how powerful the spell we are learning is going to be.

Apart from these, by overall, it's a well-made map. The balance of spells and heroes are much better than expected, and the creeps involvement in combat are much greater than other AoS maps. Terrain is fairly well done, and the fast paced and dynamic gameplay greatly increases the fun factor.

Come on, don't just say this map is "final", this map has excellent developing potential and I'm sure that it will gain much popularity in the future.

5/5 given. Good job done.

NeverDeath · Oct 21, 2008

Thanks for the feedback, Bounty.

Lemme see what I can add or comment on myself, in reply to some of these problems.

1. I had problems with this in the past, but by reducing the collision size of MOST heroes, I do believe it's not quite as bad as it once was. I'll definitely reduce the spawn rates slightly, however. It sounds like a good idea, I might have thought of it myself if I didn't have a million things racing through my head that I wanted to do to the map :grin:

. A fresh perspective is good.

2. The revival timer will definitely be added by next map version.

3. There is a known shortage of support heroes on my map, maybe about 5 of them out of the 44 currently available. I'm also adding a final (fifth) hero tower, with more support heroes in it with the next update. A lot of the spells do have a good bit of synergy, imo, there's a bit of potential to get people really pissed off by playing well, which is something I aimed for the best I could. I'll continue to work on it, however, with the next update.

4. I suppose it wouldn't hurt for me to add to the ability tooltips for research. Currently all of the learned spells are very detailed and precise, but not so much in the learn tooltips, I admit. I'll see what I can do to remedy this.

I appreciate what you've said Bounty, and thanks for the rating

. Lastly however, I feel it's worth mentioning that this is not quite *THE* final version of the map, as the last couple (since 3.0) have been in the final stages. I do consider the map to be in the home stretch, with only some polishing, tweaking, and this last tower of heroes to be added before I consider it done. Among this polish and tweaking however, would be some of the things you suggested. Thanks again!

KYTON · Nov 3, 2008

Great map! Sorry, I'll give better comments after I played the map more:

Just two things I have noticed: The Atlantis naga warrior, the units that he summon has the ability "Command Aura" but the buff it gives is "Battle Drums". The other thing just my personal opinion is that the bridges are a bit small for all those creeps. It prevents the potency of melee heroes when fighting across its since you tend to don't have the needed space and get stuck. This on the other hand is a interesting factor.

NeverDeath · Nov 3, 2008

Hey man, thanks for gettin' back to me, I appreciate it

I see what you mean about the Naga's atlantean summons, but I don't think it's worth patching over

. Thanks for letting me know, though.

The thing with the bridges is actually intentional. It can *sometimes* be a little difficult to directly cross the bridges, but there are ways around the bridges, if you go through the woods. I kind of wanted to give each bridge more than just one point of defense and attack, so if players want to assault a bridge as melee, but the bridge is packed - they can go around and flank it. Anyway, I look forward to any further feedback you have to offer. I just got up a few mins ago, time to go test out your map ;D

NeverDeath · Nov 4, 2008

Had to make a quick hotfix. Fixed version is up, should be bug free.

KYTON · Nov 4, 2008

Frikken good man! 5/5 (HA HA! Forgot to rate). Anywhay its a great map with a large selection of heroes. Initially i found the ratio between buyable items and upgrades quite poor. Later I realized that the amount of upgrades is quite reasonable and adds a interesting effect. Unlike in other maps where you buy one item and upgrade it all the way to some amazing artifact, you now actually should sometimes save your gold for decent items, else you tend to end up with a lot of useless items and no free space.

Just an idea, altough this might be a lot of work and have mayor changes in your map: Change the races of the differant teams, altough keep them rather neutral. So maybe make one race like bandit tipe: Replacing some of their models with the creep bandits and the like. Altough it is quite interesting that all factions are human and would be cool if you kept it that way.

Also the towers where you buy your hero: Change their models. I think it would be more fitting, but this is just my view. You could maybe also make them like tiny altars.

*OFF TOPIC* Sorry man, but I can't give a lot of decent ideas and stuff due to us currently whriting exams. Altough if you need hero or item ideas, feel free to ask with a pm.

NeverDeath · Nov 4, 2008

Hey thanks Kyton

Yeah, I have all of the races as human because I like that it's like a kingdom of men battling it out, and the heroes are like mercenaries who join the fight for their own reasons, depending on their alignment. The idea to individualize the looks of the towers however, is a good one. The next time I update the map, if I do, I should definitely do that. Thanks for the idea

I may add more recipes in the future, though I think the ones that are currently in are pretty good, I would like perhaps one more shop per stat type, eventually.

Thanks for the rate, man. You definitely gave me some things to think about

KYTON · Nov 14, 2008

Hey, just some things I have noticed...

> When you attack the barrackses with FURY the hero who has the ability to gain resources you gain lumber... I don't think this is supposed to happen.

> The mounted generals and I think the Royal Gaurd (cant't remember name, but final gaurdians) are non-organic... Should they be?

> When the daemonologist turn into his demon form and then returns to his normal form it turns into illadin for a brief moment... Last time I checked you can fix that by removing the Morph animation with the trigger editior and then maybe add a few special effects just to make it look better.

> The Scourge summon these areas of blight reducing movements speed and life regen (I think) now at the center of these areas are these pedestals which has an attack? But its attack is not mentioned in the description... Maybe you should remove the attack? Anywhay thats only my opinion... You could also add the Locust ability to the pedastals to cause them to behave more like spell effects and less like an actual unit, but I believe you are aware of this.

Also people has mentioned this before but your useless item shop: ... PLEASE rename the items and you can still give them USELESS names like:

Old lether gloves, worn boots, bronze pendant, old cape or Lucky trinket or something...

HaHa also something else that other people also mentioned is your descriptions add |n after each component of your items it will cause it to whrite to following text in the next line which will cause you to have a nice list....

NeverDeath · Nov 14, 2008

Hey Kyton. Thanks for this, lemme see what I can say about the problems currently.

The Fury hero uses an ability based on Pillage, to gain resources for attacking buildings. Lumber is not used on my map (obviously) and so therefore you are correct in saying that the lumber serves no purpose. However I never triggered it not to give him lumber, I'll have to do that sometime, since the ability itself has no settings for this, the resource given is combined gold/lumber, not separate.

The Royal Guards and War Generals are flagged as Mechanical in order to make them harder to hit with spell abilities in most cases, and also to make them completely immune to charm effects, as blizzard's "max charm level" function does not work in some cases, it seems. I didn't want people charming the base guards now did I

The bug with the Daemonologist is known. I'll have to do that sometime.

The blight pedestals aren't supposed to have an attack, no. I should disable it, but their only purpose is to generate the aura and look shnazzy. The attack *shouldn't* work, but I should disable it graphically as well to avoid this confusion.

I didn't think the lame item shop's item names would matter much but ahh. I guess I might as well revamp them

Thanks for the advice, I suppose the lines on some of my descriptions could use some tidying up.

Good suggestions, I will look into them for sure.

KYTON · Nov 15, 2008

Btw you can fix the lumber that fury gives easely (I think). Just check but I think if you remove the barracks lumber build cost and lumber repair cost and annything to do with lumber and barrackses (-: chances are it will no longer give you lumber since last time I checked it gives you a resources based on the cost of the building and damage you dealt.

Swerd · Oct 4, 2009

I saw your comment on Softmints RoW so i decided il come see your AoS if you use the widgetizer il be glad to check out the map im just to lazy to sit through a long load screen.

A Land Divided AoS v3.3 FINAL

A Land Divided AoS v3.3 FINAL (Map)

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