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Epic Melee by Vel: Full A.I. Support

This bundle is marked as useful / simple. Simplicity is bliss, low effort and/or may contain minor bugs.
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Welcome to the home of a melee bundle that changes Warcraft III metagame!

Epic Melee by Vel (abbreviated EMV as follow) is a currently-under-testing bundle that supports genuine Warcraft III: the Frozen Throne clients that have been updated to the latest version via Battle.net: 1.27.0.52240

It is a series of maps that are designed with Fun, Balance and Lore in mind.

All maps are modifications of existing maps, either made by Blizzard or found on Hive Workshop and/or EpicWar.com. I will list out the original authors in the Credits section.

EMV maps play out just like Warcraft III Melee but balance changes have been made to promote some previously underwhelming units/heroes/strategies. Navy units have joined all four races and maps have been redesigned to support them.

Be sure to read INTRODUCTION to see what this bundle does

:infl_thumbs_up:UPDATES AND IMPROVES EVERY WEEK:infl_thumbs_up:
EMV updates every week, adding new maps and modifyin old ones, too.
Expect to see more maps by the Hive Workshop community, Twitch, YouTube and Blizzard Entertainment over the 14 years of Warcraft III history----will join Epic Melee by Vel.




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Update 31/08/2016: 2 new maps have been added
(2) Zangarmarsh is a map made by Filmting
The map has received additional Gold Mines being featured by this bundle.
(4) Renegade City is another map created by him. Its player starting locations and gold mine counts haev been adjusted to support a 2v2 game. Several Sylvanas Statues have also been adorned around the map for decoration purposes.


The starting locations of 2nd players on (4) Emerald Shores Showdown have been moved from the middle part to the north so players can make use of expansions more evenly.

All exsiting maps have received updates:

In this week's update, new abilities have been desigend to introduce positional gameplay and map control elements into WC3 melee. As updates continue to go up, previously substandard abilities will be revisited as well.

Pandaren Brewmaster's 5th ability and racial ability has been added.
-Legacy of Xiang is a new passive that replaces Drunken Brawler and enhances all other Brewmaster abilities' effects.
-Yu'lon Perfume is an AoE ability that temporarily increases nearby friendly units' armor value.
-Amethyst Wine is a built-in ability that restores the heroes' hit points and mana overtime. Its effect is canceled out upon entering combat and can be upgraded by slotting Legacy of Xiang.


Eredar Pyromancer's 5th ability has been added. Shrine of Gul'dan constructs a ward that takes 60 seconds to charge up. Once it is completed, an permanent Immolation effect (with a much wider radius and lower damage per unit) can be activated.

Pit Lord's 5th ability has been added. Legion Warp Gate creates a demonic device that can teleport your troops across the map. Its unit capacity and hit points increases as the ability levels up.

Eredar Alchemist
's 5th ability has been remade. Enchanted Reservoir creates a temporary structure that works like a Moon Well but exclusively restores mana. Its maximum mana scales with ability level.

Mountain King's 5th ability has been remade. Wendigo Companion summons a permanent Wendigo whose power scales up with level and receives slightly different abilities from its neutral creep counterpart

Far Seer's 5th ability has been replaced with Monsoon, which is a channeled AoE ability that applies damage to units and structures in a medium area.


Update 21/08/2016: 1 new map has been added
(2) Legends of Pirate Cove is a 1v1 classic originally created by WTii, who remains an active and perhaps the longest-standing Warcraft 3 commentator in history. You can visit his YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/user/wtiiwarcraft/feed

All Transport Ships now have a load capacity of 24, up from vanilla's 10
This change affects majorly the following maps, whose terrains support navy combat:

(2) Queen's Port
(2) Ancient Isles
(2) Shrine of Azshara
(4) Emerald Shores Showdown
(4) Battle for Deathknell
(4) Tidewater Glades



Update 20/08/2016: Added 5th, newly-designed abilities for the following heroes:

Reminder: The 5th abilities are designed to be normal abilities, each of them having 3 levels. The level cap for heroes is still level 10, and because the slots on the command card is limited, you have to pick 3 out of 4 normal abilities to specialize in.



Update 19/08/2016: Map updates
The following maps have received adjustments:

(2) Shrine of Azshara
-The nearest expansion gold mines have swithced places with the Laboratories protected by red creep, and now house 20,000 (up from 10,000) gold each


-2 orange creep camps have been swapped out for Fountains of Mana to encourage caster or other mana-intensive playstyles on this map

-Renamed to Shrine of Azshara from Shrine of the Ancients

(4) Battle for Deathknell
-The water area in the central part of the map has been greatly expanded to allow ships to reach a total of 4 rich gold mines and secure territories (or do harass attacks) around them

(4) Tidewater Glades
-The shoreline regions near the 2 red creep camps have been expanded to allow Shipyard building.

-The trees at the 2 gold mines between you and your ally (depending on where your team spawns) have been cleared out to allow tower construction or Shipyard building.




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:fp:1. Amphibious Architecture
Shallow water used to stop you from building your empire. Well, not anymore!:grin:

To start off, your workers can now build structures anywhere reachable by your ground units, including river banks and shallow waters. Apparently there has been a breakthrough. In addition, you can hire Mur’gul Slaves at the Laboratory to construct static defenses across the sea. Thalassian Seadogs at the Laboratory can build different Shipyards and let you deploy a total of 12 types of ships based on your race.


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:fp:2. Double Efficiency Collectors
Get ready to be 100% richer~and spend 200% faster! :mwahaha:

Your workers collect gold and lumber twice as fast on EMV maps.
Note that it does mean TWICE AS FAST, not twice as many. It is not the same as an Insane computer AI that receives 20 gold for every 10 gold it mines.

Instead of carrying 10 gold in one trip, your peasants will carry 20. A Gold Mine with a capacity of 10000 will be mined out as quickly as a mine of 5000 in the original game. The same goes for the trees. Your Peons/Peasants/Ghouls chop down 2 trees with the time they could only chop down 1 in the base game. The exception here are the Night Elves, whose Wisps can mine 15 gold and 12.5 lumber per tick.

To compliment this change, all the maps you can see here are heavily modified to host more gold mines, more strategic locations and more areas for expansions.


This macro overhaul should allow you to play a more ambitious economy, something that would add tons of large-scale battles to the Warcraft III melee.

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:fp:3. Harness the power of Depths
Tavern is for drinking. Altar of the Depths is for fighting!

For all the aethetic and lore-friendly reasons~Tavern has been replaced by Altar of the Depths.
Its functions remain the same: Providing neutral heroes and instant revival of slain heroes at a premium cost.
Seriously, how could a Pit Lord---a massive demon born out of the Twisting Nether--- actually be in a tavern???
Now, a Naga altar, you say? That makes a bit more sense. Naga are talented magic users. Surely they know how to summon devils of all kinds----including genius tinkers and pandas!
For more aesthetic and lore-friendly reasons~~Alchemist, Beastmaster, and Firelord have received new models, new names, and new lore. Beastmaster is now Naga Tide Master and Firelord is now Eredar Pyromancer. Alchemist has also become an Eredar

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:fp:4. Balance Changes Everywhere
Balance updates so vast it almost feels like this game is made in 2016! :vw_love:

-Most Night Elf ground units can now use Shadowmeld.
-All Orc units can learn how to Pillage and make you rich, and their heroes can do it right from the beginning.
-All Undead ground units and heroes that have a mouth can now Cannibalize.
-Human Footmen has an overhauled version of Defense that can shake off magical damage.
-You can exchange gold for lumber (and vice versa) at the Laboratory.
-Ring of the Archmage can now be purchased from Arcane Vault. And if that doesn't feel epic enough, check out other more expensive (and more game-breaking) treasures sold at Ancient of Wonders, Tomb of Relics, and Voodoo Lounge.


And if these still don't impress you, check out Troll Witch Doctors and Undead Destroyers with their glorious new look.

Almost every single unit from Warcraft III melee has been altered a bit, and you no longer need to stick to Undead imbalance or Blademaster rush to be a good player!


:fp:5. Full A.I. Support
Singleplayer? No Problem!:goblin_good_job:
EMV maps ship with Advanced Melee AI, which completely changes the way AI plays WC3 melee. It hires neutral heroes, uses unit compositions that are actually competitive, and can be commanded by a fellow player. This allows infinite replay value for you, sir/ma'am, who may start downloading the maps and having fun RIGHT NOW.

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Hi, thanks for coming by. I am Vel, going by the name ericwu102 on Hive Workshop.
This bundle brings together many materials that are developed by many exemplars on the Hive Workshop. They are listed below:

All maps in EMV use Advanced Melee AI developed by Strategy Master

(2) Windrunner Vale
is a reinterpretation of Blizzard's original map (2) Secret Valley, found in Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne vanilla.

(2) Queen's Port is a reinterpretaion of Blizzard's other map (2) Road to Stratholme, found in Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne vanilla.

(4) VanCleef Cherryville and (4) Battle for Deathknell are redesigned versions of Battle.net's current 4v4 Ladder Maps (8) Cherryville and (8) Deathknell to support EMV's macro-oriented 2v2 environment.

(4) Tidewater Glades, (4) Upper Kingdom, (4) Emerald Shores, and (2) Shrine of the Ancients are modification of Blizzard's maps.



(2) Ancient Isles is a remake of Ancient Isles 2 found on EpicWar.com and made by Tehscourge
(2) Bloodwater Oasis is a modified version of BloodWater Oasis created by [z.Ky]

The new Undead Destroyer uses the intimidatingly beautiful Val’kyr skin made by Sellenisko
And her hero icon by the extremely talented Sin'dorei300

The Statue of Sylvanas, Banshee Queen of Lordaeron, is an example of great immersion boost brought to EMV maps by fellow Warcraft modders' creations.
Maps like (2)Windrunner Vale, (2)Queen's Port, (4) Battle for Deathknell use the delicate Forsaken Doodads made by Vexiant on Warcraft Underground. May Dark Lady watch over you, great one.


The new Witch Doctor gets her incredibly sexy Forest Troll Clan Queen skin from PROXY on Hive. Spirits be with you, mon!
The fine Troll Ravager icon that fits nicely is made by jigrael, also here on Hive.


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Please upvote this thread and leave a comment below to let me know what awesome map(s) you would like featured by this bundle.

Also vote for your favorite map(s) in the poll down below. Leave a comment to let me know which map you would like improved.

-Vel,
August 14th, 2016
Contents

Ancient Isles (Map)

Battle for Deathknell (Map)

BloodWater Oasis (Map)

Emerald Shores Showdown (Map)

Legends of Pirate Cove (Map)

Queen's Port (Map)

Renegade City (Map)

Shrine of Azshara (Map)

Tidewater Glades (Map)

Upper Kingdom (Map)

VanCleef Cherryville (Map)

Windrunner Vale (Map)

Zangarmarsh (Map)

Vote for your favorite map(s)!

  • (2) Queen's Port

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • (2) Ancient Isles by Tehscourge

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • (2) Bloodwater Oasis by [z.Ky]

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • (2) Shrine of the Ancients

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • (4) Battle for Deathknell

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • (4) VanCleef Cherryville

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • (4) Tidewater Glades

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • (4) Upper Kingdom

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    1
  • Poll closed .
Wow,that's some good stuff over here!This map really got me,as the dialogs are so cool!^_^
If I was a moderator,I'll approve this map.I am not Warcraft for the first time,freakin' noob! xD
Thanks a lot! Those dialogs were generated by Strategy Master's AMAI. Hope you enjoy them. Be sure to check back every once in awhile for more updates :plol:
 
Last edited:
Level 26
Joined
Oct 2, 2011
Messages
2,482
The AI is quite smart, and challenging at times.

The hereos new abilities are not as good, as they are slightly modified standard abilities, sometimes on heroes where they don't even make sense. For example, the blood mage had an ability based on Death Coil, but he could barely use it since there are no allied undead units when you are playing human. The home teleport that each hero has is ok, but a little overpowered. With this, your hero can almost never die.
The heroes from the tavern was barely changed at all either. The beastmaster was the most altered hero and even here it wasn't a great deal different to what it was before.
The races themselves also had very slight alterations.

It works at is, but it would require a ton more work in order to be radically different from just another melee game.

Moved to substandard until more changes have bee presented, and until the heroes have more fitting abilities.
 
The AI is quite smart, and challenging at times.

The hereos new abilities are not as good, as they are slightly modified standard abilities, sometimes on heroes where they don't even make sense. For example, the blood mage had an ability based on Death Coil, but he could barely use it since there are no allied undead units when you are playing human. The home teleport that each hero has is ok, but a little overpowered. With this, your hero can almost never die.
The heroes from the tavern was barely changed at all either. The beastmaster was the most altered hero and even here it wasn't a great deal different to what it was before.
The races themselves also had very slight alterations.

It works at is, but it would require a ton more work in order to be radically different from just another melee game.

Moved to substandard until more changes have bee presented, and until the heroes have more fitting abilities.

Thank you, Rufus. I will continue to update this bundle every week improving the new abilities gradually. Hopefully it will crawl out of the friend zone, uh i mean, the substandard section soon.
Those added this week should prove better than previous ones.

The Blood Mage one was given to him because in lore, Blood Magi are commonly seen alongside demons like Pit Lords and Eredars. The ability allows him to heal said neutral, demonic heroes when a Human player is going for a more demon-themed gameplay.

Personal Teleportation only teleports the hero but does not give Invulnerability like Town Scrolls do. It allows heroes to travel between your main base and frontlines to resupply items from your racial shops. It is added as the new economy allows much bigger armies in shorter times, resulting in more focus-firing on heroes.

In general, though, I do not aim for the bundle to depart too far from standard melee. It ought to feel more like an update, in contrary to an overhaul.

This is a bit much to ask, but please do continue to moniter this bundle. My thanks again.
 
Level 26
Joined
Oct 2, 2011
Messages
2,482
This is a bit much to ask, but please do continue to moniter this bundle. My thanks again.
Not at all!
It is a good sign that you can take critique and want to continue. Some people just throw a tantrum.

Send me a message when you have updated the map a little more and I'll move it back to submissions for new consideration.
Cheers! :)
 
I love the general idea, though it can be improved further since it feels weak when compared to other altered melees. The thing I liked the most from this pack though, weirdly, is the AMAI instead of the content. Still, it's a fun alteration to the melee game.
I appreciate you checking this out after these many years.
Back when I made this "package", I was unsatisfied with the melee meta and thought i've figured out something cool, while most things in there were just modifications of stats, assets and combos.

So it makes sense that you're enjoy AMAI the most, because it deserves recognition. I still use it myself.
With Reforged, the melee meta is going in a direction I like (the map pools and the unit balance patches), so I'll probably take this thing down at some point, seeing how it was made for classic and most things it was trying to address have been addressed by the recent balance changes

I'll see you around
 
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