~Reserved

-The area around player spawn and particularly the gold mine is too wide. Try to look at Northern Isles for how much space the player has around gold mines.
-Bit too much use of cliffs, when not strictly necessary or enhancing gameplay in any meaningful way.
-Lots of holes in the trees.
-Item drops have 50/50 chance to spawn either powerup or permanent item. Obviously not intended, so it's a bug. Use item set for powerup and a new set for permanent item.
-Good use of tile texture
-Creep difficulty is very steep for such a small map. You should lower creep camp difficulty. Usually you have something like: 4, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21 camp. Approximately.
-Nice ashenvale look
-A mercenary camp with some form of dispel (abolish, purge, etc) is necessary for balance reasons.

Nudl9 said:

-The area around player spawn and particularly the gold mine is too wide. Try to look at Northern Isles for how much space the player has around gold mines.
-Bit too much use of cliffs, when not strictly necessary or enhancing gameplay in any meaningful way.
-Lots of holes in the trees.
-Item drops have 50/50 chance to spawn either powerup or permanent item. Obviously not intended, so it's a bug. Use item set for powerup and a new set for permanent item.
-Good use of tile texture
-Creep difficulty is very steep for such a small map. You should lower creep camp difficulty. Usually you have something like: 4, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21 camp. Approximately.
-Nice ashenvale look
-A mercenary camp with some form of dispel (abolish, purge, etc) is necessary for balance reasons.

Click to expand...

Thanks for your suggestion. I'm actually thinking of adding mercenary camp. I will update this.

Love the use of Ashenvale tileset. Really love it here. Map is simple and easy. I appreciate it for ladder purposes.
In addition to Nudl9 comments, I tried the map a couple of times. Regarding creeps, the level is just insane. Mercenary camp creeps and Lab creeps are a bit heavy to kill. Level 9 satir is a bit rough. Gold mine creeps are just insane.. that level 8 + 6 destroys everything in my orc/human army. I can't handle them until tier2. Dragons on the corner are just impossible. I need a million range units.. no other way to creep them. Adding more trees around the expansion gold mines might be better (but this is my opinion, not sure what its better). Did you test your map against A.I. ?
Overall, good job!

btp|Lancer said:

Love the use of Ashenvale tileset. Really love it here. Map is simple and easy. I appreciate it for ladder purposes.
In addition to Nudl9 comments, I tried the map a couple of times. Regarding creeps, the level is just insane. Mercenary camp creeps and Lab creeps are a bit heavy to kill. Level 9 satir is a bit rough. Gold mine creeps are just insane.. that level 8 + 6 destroys everything in my orc/human army. I can't handle them until tier2. Dragons on the corner are just impossible. I need a million range units.. no other way to creep them. Adding more trees around the expansion gold mines might be better (but this is my opinion, not sure what its better). Did you test your map against A.I. ?
Overall, good job!

Click to expand...

Yes, I tested this multiple times against AI.

Review - Old Grove
(Version October 30th 2022)
Description: Old Grove is an Ashenvale-themed melee map for two players. The open map offers room for large armies, though small map size and vulnerable expansion sites offer little time to accumulate a high number of units or high-leveled heroes.
Terrain: The terrain is lush, which is typical for the Ashenvale tileset. The playable area is visually clear and in many places surrounded by heavily decorated areas, perhaps even too heavily, as the contrast between areas that are decorated and areas that lack a little detail is drastic. There are some sweet spots like the Spider Creep camp that are specifically decorated to fit the thematic aspect of it, nice job with that. In some spots the terrain has been put before gameplay clarity (for example where the Night Elf Village Buildings are), leaving strange gaps or spots on the map that are not ideal or typical for melee gameplay. The tile usage is nice, though it could use a little more contrast (a mixture of different grasses that break the smoothness), but it is decent.
Layout: The layout is properly mirrored, with the only difference being the Mercenary Camp and Goblin Laboratory not being mirrored between the players. The openness of the terrain however reduces the importance of exact mirroring, and the layout is very open indeed. While the open layout functions for melee gameplay, it does result in very few strategic opportunities and thus can turn out a little boring. The expansion sites look to be very open and exposed, making them very vulnerable in such a small map.
Creeps: Thematically the creeps fit the map nicely (perhaps the Wildkins are a little weird) and the creep camp placement is decent - though the spiders and the fountain camps are quite secluded and can be hard to reach, being at the end of dead-ends. This is fine for the fountains, considering their strength, giving some kind of drawback for their power. The central orange camps could be slightly stronger, considering the imbalance between the neutral objectives they guard, giving a bigger window of reaction for the opponent. The green camps are fine with the item drops, but the orange camps are quite inconsistent in the power level of item drops: Level 13 Camp (Goblin Laboratory / Mercenary Camp) drops Level 4 Charged item, which is a little too strong considering the level of the camp, meanwhile, the Spider camp (Level 15) drops only Level 2 Power-up, which is quite a weak drop for the camp, especially considering the awkward placement of the camp. Generally higher level creeps are tougher than multiple weaker ones combined, making some of the creep camps quite strong for a small map this size (Expansion and Central Orange camps), so perhaps the item crops are justified, but the creep levels are not very usual for this kind of map. The red camps are guarding Fountains of Life, which are gated by sight blockers, making the places very strong, the creep camps are Level 25 and drop Artifact, Red Drake Egg, and Level 4 Permanent, which seems very strong. The creeps are strong, but if a player manages to take them down, he can easily heal his troops back up, making the camps high-risk plays. In a such small map, it seems a little illogical to have two of such camps, I'd rather see only one of them, and players contesting for it, in case one player attempts to fight it - currently, the camps are so strong that taking it out, despite the superb drops, is probably not worth it, especially considering the narrow entrance to the camp. I'd recommend making the camps a little weaker and giving them weaker item drops, encouraging players to include them in the gameplay more often.
Gameplay: The map is open and offers a limited amount of strategic elements: 1) The unequal mirroring of the Mercenary Camp and Goblin Laboratory and 2) The Red Camps which grant strong items. The expansion sites are a little too vulnerable to be very desirable in such a small, unrestricted map, and the red camps are so strong that I can see them often going unnoticed. A hero like Blademaster would love to abuse the small size of the map and the possibility of healing at the Fountains of Life without clearing the camps, this is even more true when applied to possible expansions.

Recommendations:
The map offers the basic requirements for melee matchup, but there is room for improvement: the terrain could be clearer and easier to read at certain places. See the comments regarding creeps and items. One more note: you could place one or two more critters near the bases / green camps for corpses to be used. I'd also consider changing one of the red camps into something else - perhaps an easier camp to be contested?