At the risk of broken record-ism: The Naga Knight's Geyser also lags quite a bit (on a playthrough with both north and south barracks removed, but with full bots), and also seems to have a slightly smaller AoE than the target circle.
Geyser is going to be replaced. May not make it for 1.1 though.
Also, at which age do the siege units no longer spawn?
They *ALWAYS* spawn. But siege units spawn COMPLETELY DIFFERENTLY than the other units. Siege units have zero food. And when they are made at a spawn point, the spawn point cannot make any more until those siege units have been destroyed (which doesn't take long on a map like this).
Siege units are working correctly and through all the ages.
Siege units will spawn based on whether your army is at the other side's base. Then they appear. Often, your guys die and your siege units just run around with no protection. But more appropriately, the siege units will tip the balance if you are attacking consistently. So if your early guys died and more coming, the siege tanks will do their job.
On the last age, the siege units (POW Tanks or the big hydras for the Night Elves) have absurd speed, and their job is to help end the game.
MASSIVE EDIT:
Space Marine
* Spelling: There's a birage instead of barrage, and the Scattershot should read maximum instead of optimum
* The bombardment via ship takes too long depending on lag, sometimes it starts shhoting after all units are gone. i think a marker of some sort would be nice (signal flare or such)
The Space Marine was one of the earliest heroes put in. He was one of the AI heroes for a while. So he probably does need some work.
The air strike's delay has nothing to do with lag. It is just the way the spell is. The ship appears in the south and has to fly on over. I always thought it looked pretty cool, but it isn't that useful since it takes a while. The Air Strike will likely become a 'triggered item' and Space Marine will get a new spell.
* Why is banish his standard ability?
It's a fill in. He will get something else.
* The Starship summon might be too powerful, as they're permanent and apparently infinitely summonable, not to mention that they stay after switching heroes.
Switching heroes isn't a problem since whenever you switch heroes, your experience goes to zero. But you have a point that his starship shouldn't be permanent. It will be changed in 1.1.
Ogre Wizard:
* The Fart spell icon is flat, so it looks like a passive ability, use the Research Disease Cloud icon.
Done
Bane:
* The learn Raise Dead tooltip says he raises one skeleton, and the actual spell description doesn't tell you what type of skeletons are summoned.
Crypt Lord (custom)
* Major problem: he can't be picked. Going up to him, right clicking repeatedly on him, nothing (though it works for the bots).
The location around his was pretty small and your hero was too fat to get inside it (but fairies can get there). I have enlarged the location.
This will appear in some heroes. But I'm trying to keep the location size for the heroes down so they are not accidentally triggered.
Managed to look at his abilities through the Jello's ultimate (why is the Summon Giant Beetle spell called Enragement?)
Jiggly's ultimate is Super-Sized Jiggly! You mean the shapeshift ability.
What would you name the Giant Beetle? Maybe the Crypt Lord is enraged.
The name probably came because the Crypt Lord's abilities kept changing all the time and he had an earlier ultimate where he turned red. The reason why the Crypt Lord is the only model that hasn't been replaced is because only his model works with the Burrowstrike spell (which I think is too cool to get rid of).
** EPIC GLITCH discovered, though I doubt it will ever show up in gameplay: Using Slicer's Deafening Strike (and presumably any other blink-strike attack) on the Crypt Lord does switch to him in the Hero revival area, but without spells or even the ability to move!
See, I'd never have thought to try using Deafening Strike on a passive hero sitting all alone in the glass in the palace. I'll take a look at it.
Slicer
* Stealth Stomp does not work as advertised, instead of stealthing, it unleashes Shockwaves in every direction, causing horrible lag (and since he didn't stealth, gets him rapidly killed).
Stealth Stomp is going to get changed. Just not in time for 1.1.
* Bladestorm seems all-around weaker than Razor Edge. For a level-10 ultimate, this is problematic.
I tried out different types of Bladestorms and they all either slowed down the game or didn't do much at all. The default Bladestorm is just a place holder.
Tree Warrior
* Default skill is poison wave, not Eat Tree. Speaking of Eat Tree, it's useless on this map, as there are no non-decorative trees.
Once upon a time, Ancient Warrior did eat trees as his default and they used to be on the map about five betas ago. Most of the wrong descriptions aren't 'mislabels' but artifacts from a previous beta. They're still wrong and will be changed. I just forgot they were there!
I had remembered about the 'Eat Tree', and it is already fixed.
* The description says the Nature's Armor is at 4.5 for levels 3, 4 and 5.
Fixed.
That's all for the individual heroes, on to the game:
* You can't skip the introduction until the second line of narration. Not a big deal though.
Introductions have to be segmented (so you can skip within any link in the chain) or else the camera movement will still be going even if you skipped it.
I want to make it more responsive where it works after the first second. But it is pretty much low priority at the moment. You guys can wait two seconds. =P
* Out of curiosity, what's planned for Victory and Hero settings? Victory is currently empty, and Hero only contains start with 2K gold.
The 'Enable' in the options is ADDING elements to the game (such as tons of gold) as opposed to 'Disable' which is REMOVING elements of the game.
Victory Settings can be divided into the 'simple' and the 'complex'. Simple would be a victory setting of whoever gets a hundred kills first or who holds the fort for a certain time or even capture the flag. A more complex victory setting would be spawning kings and you would have to fight into the enemy's palace and try to kill their king. Another complex victory setting would be to achieve an RPG victory by defeating dungeons and territories (which do not exist yet).
* Please place a warning for those heroes that have an attack affected by orbs (e.g. Huntress' bounce attack is cancelled with an orb equipped)
Isn't the Huntress the only one affected by this?
* There appears to be no detector unit of any kind, the spawning buildings and palace/gate at least should have True Sight (I'm predicting a lot of teleporting to the hero Wind Walking in the rear of the enemy base).
Hmm...
* Similarly, there's a huge hole to the west of the bottom center Astalder barracks (behind the keeper and naga statues), you can explore a huge amount of unterrained area (and again, backdoor into the place). Also, is there something planned for the entire southern region? It just seems to take up space for no reason.
As said in the description, this map is nowhere near finished. This is the approximate I wanted this map to be...
-Seven Races to choose from (only have two).
-The number of heroes on the Astalder side would be equaled on the Hallaer side. Of course, I ran out of time. And there are still two spots open on the Astalder side.
-Double the items at least. Most of the items would be triggered.
-Various different 'forts' to *buy*. Aside from different towers, some would summon up automatons and other units to help defend the fort.
-All the options would be tripled at least with different settings.
And the big thing was to transform the unterrained areas into territories where your heroes can go off adventuring away from the battle. The AI was going to be designed to assist you if you *asked* the AI politely (AI would take great offense if you ORDERED it. I prefer my AI with some spunk.) Think of them as dungeon raids where a very cool item or boss or both would be at the end.
This is not in the map currently because of time and because I am wrestling with lag issues. I believe it would be a very interesting choice for a couple of heroes to sacrifice their lack of presence on the battlefield (which would ultimately be to their enemy's advantage) to adventure through a territory to gain mad experience and/or uber items. There is a risk involved which I think makes it interesting.
In the original version of the map, new Ages were toggled only by defeating a boss in a dungeon. So if a few heroes sacrificed their presence on the battlefield to defeat the boss, their side would benefit greatly. But it was a risk that with their absence, their side could lose while they were busy in the dungeon (of course, they can transport back but then they have to go back).
I prefer the idea of a map that can be played a number of different but interesting ways and can be replayed over and over and have a different experience. This is why there are options in the map currently such as deciding what 'Age' or 'Race' you want to play or what the experience rate (low or high would greatly change the experience of the game) to how fast or slow the Ages change and so on. In the end, it was intended for this map to become so flexible that it could be played as a RPG if the player wanted it.
* Switching heroes is much faster for the Astalder side, as they don't have to go through the area with a bunch of gateways.
It is not intended for the player to switch heroes often. It is mostly for new players who don't know what hero they want.
* The change in color when switching from one region to another can be a bit jarring (and laggy), and I only see it as being useful for the atmosphere, so perhaps there could be an option to switch it on/off.
It has already been changed in 1.1.
* The various Champions' corpses seem to take a bit long to disappear, but maybe that's just me.
It is because their models are hero models.
* Something I think would be a good idea for the king mode: have an option to list each unit and its capacities (spells, functions as tank/healer/ranged, etc.) for the current age, as this would make it easier than finding out by trial and error.
Do you realize how many units there are? For each race, it is around fifty units or more. Each age has a dozen different units.
But they easy to figure out. Until the later Ages, they all share the same role:
Footman (melee attacker)
Archer (range attacker)
Champion (Tough to kill, buffs and heals the army, defensive unit like a paladin)
Priest (healer)
Mage (spell caster)
Elite Archer (strong range attacker)
Archmage (strong spell caster)
Siege Unit A
Siege Unit B (Both provide the same role)
Hero (This would be the 'General' or 'Warden' that appear. Only one of them can appear at a time. They are essentially the 'hero' unit, and they haven't been fleshed out yet. They are supposed to be an offensive version of the Champion. They provide offensive buffs and make an army dangerous. They should become a player's first priority to kill since their presence alone makes an army so much more powerful. Currently, they are weak but that will change.)
When a new Age appears, the roles stay mostly the same. The Archmage often becomes the regular Mage. The Elite Archer often becomes the regular Archer. And new units fill in the empty roles.
As the Ages increase, more and more units cast spells and become more unique. The Archmage role for the Age of Order for Humans is not a mage at all but a gigantic golem trampling around the battlefield. But those units are more rare to the meat and potato units of footmen and archer roles.
I could make new races be essentially identical to Humans but with aesthetic differences (a grunt instead of a footman, etc.). But that would be repetitive and boring. I think it is a challenge to make a race come at it with very different roles so they have a different feel. Night Elves were dull, dull in their first versions of sentry/huntresses with archers. But with giant slow treants and strong archers behind them, the race felt very different from the Humans and was different to fight. It took a while to make them somewhat *balanced* with the Humans.
So while the spawned units tend to fit a role, different races will warp those roles to differentiate the race. But there will always be a healer, a spell caster, and so on.
I'm tired at fighting these tree loving Night Elves, so I am looking about putting in the Orcs. How should they be different? Certainly, they would be a stronger melee but that cannot be enough. How can fighting the Orcs be different than fighting Night Elves and Humans?
I like Blizzard's idea of the 'shotgun' way. Just throw things out there and see what happens. So it is going to take a while before Orcs appear in this map.
** Also, a major problem with the AI is when during a battle, it uses different spells than you (it once interrupted a channeling spell I ordered to cast a different one). Not to mention the fact that units tend to fire off a spell and then run back to their base, getting in each other's way (VERY frustrating to watch them die without even attacking).
You're confusing me here. The two sentences cannot apply to both the AI heroes or AI army. The AI army will always attack whenever an enemy is near. But the AI heroes, when they are retreating, will ignore all enemy.
The AI heroes are supposed to be *dumb*. They are the 'easy' level. Medium and Hard haven't been put in yet.
Don't worry about the AI heroes dying. When they revive, they get a free beer which they will use to get wildly drunk and heal themselves in the middle of battle.
There used to be a penalty for dying, but I took it out. Gold is hard enough to get as is especially at the beginning. So when a AI hero dies, they just pop right back up a minute later.
I haven't seen the AI heroes get stuck (unless they are in the middle of a traffic jam). The only time they act weirdly is when the flag is dropped somewhere on the map. When this occurs, the AI heroes will drop everything that is going on (except battling any enemy nearby) and will RUN to the spot the flag was dropped. Once a hero picks up the flag, they all return to their normal runs. The only time I've seen a hero stuck was if they were charging for the flag and were in an odd angle to do it at. But once the flag is picked up, they return to their normal wandering ways.
If you want to bait the enemy heroes to come to you, get their flag and drop it somewhere. All the enemy heroes will come charging at that spot.
(* Some units' names are the same from one age to another, this gets annoying when they have the wrong spells (for example, the Flurry/Immolation Hippogryph Rider and the Firebolt/Flame Strike one).}
Hmm, well they have a different name in the editor! OK, name changed.
* The Tree Mage's Entangle can't target Heroes.
Spell is going to be dropped anyway.
* A lot of units have researchable abilities, but if there's no way to research them, why have them in the first place? (Tree Knight has Sentinel and Moon Glaive, Druid of the Talon has Cyclone...)
There may be researchable abilities in the future. That is why they are still there.
* And finally, the gray bot has no death quotes. Surely a hero with a name like "Universal Ex-Wife" (great find by the way) has something interesting to say about getting killed?
That would be Jasso. I always wanted to personalize the bots so they are not just 'bots' but actual personalities. But there isn't enough time to do this.
Anyway, Jasso is from 'JASS' the War 3 programming language. In 1.1, when Jasso dies, he will blame his death on an undeclared variable somewhere and pray to the Vexorian god. Another AI is going to get death quotes too in 1.1. Only one bot is left without any quotes.
The original idea was for them to say far more than just death quotes. I wanted them to be sophisticated enough where you could have a conversation with them.
That's all for now, and I hope you don't take offense to the quantity of issues reported.
Not at all! I'd only take offense if no one said anything. I interpret feedback and bug reporting as people wanting to make the map better. If people hated the map, they wouldn't be making an effort. Everything being said here is making its way into the map.