(8) Cold Nights - Hero Defense /Survival /Wave /Boss

[hellburke]

Gameplay : Hero Defense/ Survival/ Waves/ Boss

A hero defense/survival map, where the only thing each players have to defend is only
their own lives. Bound by the harsh cold environment, heroes can only stay alive while
being near to the encampment's fireplace, venture far, and the cold weather will knock
them out cold. Heroes will attempt to defend themselves against waves of creeps until
finally a round boss arrives.

Once the round boss is defeated, any killed heroes will be revived, if every hero falls,
then it is over.

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Features:

- 2 Hero types available for now, here is the Death Knight and Champion.

- Damage Meter on bosses to determine who did the most damage & properly reward
contributing players

Other Features:

- AI players available to spruce things up in single player
- 6 Bosses at the end of each wave rounds
- 2 Random Boss skills to pair with Boss's Ultimate Skill

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Screenies

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"Hero Talent Tips"

Hero talent possibilities:
With 45 talents for each hero(15 talents in separate 3 talent trees), it's possible to
develope them to a Tank, Damage Dealeror a Hybrid of the two.

Tanking : Recommended 5/5/15
Tanking talents are always the 3rd skill. And the early 1-4 talents of each tree always
gives stats. Maxing the 3rd tree and picking the early few stat talents of the other 2
trees will be a safe recommended setting for a tanker.

Damage Dealer : Recommended 15/10/0 or 10/15/0
The 1st and 2nd talents are always damage talents. Maxing either 1 of the 2 will give
you a significant damage edge. For added survivability or utility for the team, a few
points in the tanking talents are always welcomed.


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"Bosses Tips"

Boss's Skills:
Bosses have 4 abilites in all, 1st and 2nd skills are selected at random, the 3rd is fixed
and usually works in combination with their 4th Ultimate skills. When attempting to cast
the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd skills, the boss's color will change. The casting of an Ultimate
skill by the boss will be marked by a scorching effect on the ground.

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Rantings:
-An already old project, didn't really want to proceed after I found out there's already
something almost similar to the concept, but after giving it a few thoughts, mmm,
it can't be that similar, can it?
-Not every element has been really balanced, I can only tune things at a multiplayer
environment with my.. null bots. This may take a while.
-Map is unprotected, just give credit to where credit is due.

Looking forward to feedbacks.

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Latest Changelog Updates
1.19b
- Added 2 talent trees to Infiltrator.
- Re-Tuned Infiltrator abilities.
- Reworked buff systems, to promote stackable item/skill buffs.
- Replaced some ability icons.
- Added new final boss, Grimaudon the Frigid Knight.
Note: Due to some unknown causes, I'm unable to make enemy dummy units to channel spells for more
than 3 seconds, neither do I know a way around this at the moment.

Later Changelog Updates

1.19 (1.19a HotFix)
- Chainz escape attempts now shows an amount.
- Fixed Unbroken's Tentacles to spawn slightly less far and deals less damage.
- Increased Ankh of Reincarnation price to 100g.
- Death Knight's Rune of Blood now has a longer cooldown.
- Death Knights no longer gains any armor in the Blood talent tree.
- Re-tuned Champion's damage output. Mortal Strike deals more damage with less cooldown.
- Introduced beta-stage hero, Infiltrator. No talents yet and some skills are not permanent.

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1.18c
- Removed irrelevant skills from the Champion.
- Tweaked defeat check condition.

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1.18b
- Added possible potion drops to Banshees, Rampagers and Chainz.
- Ankh of Reincarnation available for purchase.
- Added map information and story in quests.
- Fixed Chainz not devouring hooked targets.
- Reduced Chainz's Hook damage.
- Attacks now properly generates mana.
- Auto selects hero and hero camp at map start.

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1.18a
- Fixed a few Boss skills.
- Added potion(now Spirit Flask) effectiveness element, scales with Strength.
- Renamed select Bosses and Skills.

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1.18
-New Boss Cast System.
-Fixed Hero Revivals.
-New Boss Behaviour System(Agro).

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1.17b
-Fixed the defeat condition.

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1.17a
- Fixed preview picture.

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1.17
- There will be a warning when Chainz attempts to hook a player, now it is possible
to escape from Chainz via a spamming of the ESC key. - Idea by Zack1996

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Map Direction as of version 1.19

Currently I'm giving more attention towards finishing with the core gameplay concept before
adding more content(Heroes, Bosses, Items), which explains why there's only a few heroes
and bosses all this while. Infiltrator is an exception, 2 heroes are way too limited

Also, I'm open to suggestions on these subjects:

Boss Skills - one ability for his Ultimate.
Infiltrator Model- Basically a model of a Rogue/Thief/Agility hero.

Note: Due to having broken the "100% completed Maps should be uploaded in the Hive's Map Resource Section",
this map is no longer downloadable in the Hive's Map Resource Section. Silly me .



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Credits
BerzekeR - Wound Poison (Spell)
Oblivions_Wrath - Weaponless Models (Model)
Zack1996 - Whirlpool spell (Spell)
Elfian - Damage Detection System
Shdow89 - Grenade Spell (Spell)
Dan van Ohllus - HeroDeathKnightNoHorse (Model)
b17rider - FelGuard (Skin)
General Frank - OrbBlood (Model)
l0w_kwaliti - Force Edge (Model)
HappyTauren - DragonBlade (Model)
assasin_lord - HeroGlow (Model)
Tinki3 - MeatHook (Spell)
Unknown - Charge (Spell)
RMX - Spinning Vortex (Spell)
Jigrael - Demon Knight (Model)
Crazy Russian - Icon(s)
SkriK - Icon(s)

Devine - BloodElementalMissile

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[Ranger21]

Mmmm, i love description and screenshots, will look for map:0

 

[TheHunterKiller]

Delicious description. Terrain could be a bit better, but sounds interesting!

 

[hellburke]

Ranger21, TheHunterKiller, Thank you both for kind compliments, I sincerely hope the map is interesting for you guys.

 

[D a w n]

played it with Devine some days ago and we actually enjoyed it. Our only problem was that the game was too difficult/impossible for us 2. That's why we had to host a public game :/

Some balancing triggers could be very useful. Oh and more than 2 heroes would have been nice, but at least they were polished

 

[hellburke]

Thank you for your comment DonDustin, I'm glad you and Devine enjoyed the map and went to such
extents as to host a public game, It's very nice of you and Devine.
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Some balancing triggers could be very useful. - DonDustin

Noted. I will put more effort on balancing to make it approriately challenging for any amounts of players.

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Oh and more than 2 heroes would have been nice, but at least they were polished - DonDustin

Noted. Right now I'm hesitating on which kind of hero I should work on, as it takes considerable amount
of ideas to work on one, I wanted a hero that would give a deeply varied gameplay than the current ones.
My options were:

1. [Melee] Rogue/Thief - My original choice, but being another melee, I'm fearful of a similar gameplay
   with the current heroes.
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2. [Ranged] Hunter - Normally, casting a skill while attacking will cause the hero to reset targets, with
   a ranged unit it might be so obvious and cause some annoyance, so one of the earliest idea was to
   implement a missile launching projectile system as the hunter's primary attack.
   Would the concept of having no auto-attack, be enjoyable?
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3. [Ranged] Mage/Caster - Wasn't planning on having this type of hero at all, again ranged attack issues,
   yet the thought of having an arsenal of spells ready at a spam's command are very tempting to me.

Now, to top it all off, the 3 mentioned hero classes are, in a way, pure damage types. I'm puzzled
on either all giving 3 trees of full damage dealing talents? Or should I somehow give them a tanking
or survival talent tree? Also considering of having only melee heroes.

 

[Zack1996]

Testing in Progress: This will be edited as I go.

I really like the Chainz izz hungry! thing. Its rather funny and cool. Still, Meathook rips my life off. Who cares, its cool xD

The first boss was relatively easy with me and 2 computer bots. The only problem is the player who dealt the most damage (in my case player 3) did not level up. I'm not sure if its always true, but it happened here.

Sometimes, there's a lack of mana. For some reason, attacks don't seem to generate mana sometimes, do you need to learn Arms for the champion to gain mana on attack?

Some comments (I got owned).
Is there any way to get another Ankh? Because that would be really useful sometimes.
Perhaps it could be found lying around some places or something. Or stronger monsters like Chainz and the Banshee could drop some small little items (potions or something). That would be nice. Its hard to regenerate much health IMO, except when you use potions.

As for the new hero idea, I like Thief. You could make it such that he uses combo-based skills, which deal more damage if another skill has been cast on that target before this. e.g.
You cast Skill A (Blink Strike, for example)
You cast Skill B (Piercing Slash, for example). You deal more damage because you have cast another one of your skills on that target a while before.
You cast Skill C (Shuriken, for example). The target takes more damage and is slowed. Blink Strike granted the extra damage and Piercing Slash allows other spells cast on the target to have a slowing effect.
.....

Something like that. Doesn't need to be too complicated though

 

[hellburke]

Its rather funny and cool. Still, Meathook rips my life off. Who cares, its cool xD
- Zack1996

Thank for pointing out this important aspect to me, as Meathook is only meant to rip you away from your teammates, not your life, that's a job for shackle xD

Yet shackle is somehow not working in this version

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The only problem is the player who dealt the most damage (in my case player 3) did not level up. I'm not sure if its always true, but it happened here.
- Zack1996

Noted. I'm going right into this.

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Sometimes, there's a lack of mana. For some reason, attacks don't seem to generate mana sometimes, do you need to learn Arms for the champion to gain mana on attack?
- Zack1996

Thank you! This is rather careless of me, as the math string was lacking a digit. Thank you for noticing this.

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Is there any way to get another Ankh? Because that would be really useful sometimes.
- Zack1996

I don't know how you can come up with so many important elements, but this is really helping me alot, and yes it is definitely useful to have ankhs.

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Or stronger monsters like Chainz and the Banshee could drop some small little items (potions or something). That would be nice. Its hard to regenerate much health IMO, except when you use potions.
- Zack1996

This is a wonderful thought, this goes straight into development.

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As for the new hero idea, I like Thief. You could make it such that he uses combo-based skills, which deal more damage if another skill has been cast on that target before this. e.g.
- Zack1996

Nice idea on the combo concept, I'm going to figure this out during development.

Having a quick version release soon, thanks for these wonderful feedbacks Zack.

Edit : not so quick

 

[Devine]

When me and don were playing a public game, we died because all heroes were dead. Though Don still had an ankh. So he revived when we got our defeat message.

 

[hellburke]

When me and don were playing a public game, we died because all heroes were dead. Though Don still had an ankh. So he revived
when we got our defeat message.

Thanks for feedback Devine and playing a public game with the map! That is unexpected >< I'll improve the coding for defeat conditions,
however there's 1 thing I'm not sure of :

• Unit - A unit dies

Will this includes a hero carrying an unused Ankh?

• ((Dying unit) has an item of type Ankh of Reincarnation) equal to false

Will this fix the problem if used it as a condition? Not sure if the trigger is ok, but using this as a hotfix for now and hope it works, doing
testing to find out if this works and improve it.

Anyway, Devine and Don, thank you both you much.
Updated - 1.18c

 

[Zack1996]

Well, I had another go at the game together with 4 AI players. I'm sorry I couldn't play this in Multiplayer, but I can't host :S

There are two main things I noticed:
1) Some of the heroes still do not level up.
2) Heroes will tend to randomly respawn during the game.

You will see it in the attached replay (I put 1.18c in a folder called Member's Projects). It also shows Death Knight soloing the level 1-2 Bosses and fighting the Level 3 boss with a single ally. Somehow, this feels kinda broken.

Some suggestions for this:
1) The ankhs really helped! They could be slightly more expensive though.
2) The potion drops were really sweet! They saved me mre than a few times.
3) Chainz' eating thing is kinda weird. I once escaped after pressing ESC for about 3 times. Other times, I have to spam it like crazy just to escape. Its ok though, much better than when it lasted for a long time.
4) Unbroken is, ironically, broken. His tentacles seem to unleash those poisonous things at me from more than 1k distance away. The thing about this is that he had 3 of them, therefore he somehow owned me in 5 seconds or something.
The other bosses are okay. Rather balanced.
5) Not really much left to say, expect that the map is awesome xD

Looking forward to future updates! I'm sure this map will go far!

By the way, I feel that Champion somehow lacks killing potential. Even if you were to Whirlwind, slam and all that, its hardly as effective as Death Knight's disease thingy or Death and Decay thing. I'm not sure why, but Heroic Strike (is that what its called?) doesn't seem to do any damage, or I may just be mistaken.

Replay attached.

 

[hellburke]

1) Some of the heroes still do not level up. - Zack1997

Noted. I'm going to implement a more reliable method to handles this.
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2) Heroes will tend to randomly respawn during the game. - Zack1997

This might be my counter measure to heroes not respawning I've set 2 respawn times, going to remove this and use a new approach.
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I saw the replay, my god I'm speechless! The boss still had about half hp when you were the only one left, and you ate him off, the poor wolf. DK is going to face some changes.

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1) The ankhs really helped! They could be slightly more expensive though.
2) The potion drops were really sweet! They saved me mre than a few times.
3) Chainz' eating thing is kinda weird. I once escaped after pressing ESC for about 3 times. Other times, I have to spam it like crazy just to escape. Its ok though, much better than when it lasted for a long time.
4) Unbroken is, ironically, broken. His tentacles seem to unleash those poisonous things at me from more than 1k distance away. The thing about this is that he had 3 of them, therefore he somehow owned me in 5 seconds or something.
The other bosses are okay. Rather balanced.
5) Not really much left to say, expect that the map is awesome xD
-Zack1996

1) Yes I was thinking about the 50g being so little, glad it wasn't just me.
2) I like the potion drops too, thank you for that idea.
3) Chainz is just throwing a tantrum in a rage, don't worry about him tho he'll cool off next patch (his skill cooldowns are off, he's really gonna cool down next patch )
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4) Those tentacles were designed to be spawned a "little" far so that players will have to run out to kill them. Going to fix 2 aspects to balance this :
-Reduce spawn range : so that it's possible to grip and charge
-Reduce damage : so that players have more time to handle them

Mmmm maybe
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5) Thank you, won't be so without your help

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By the way, I feel that Champion somehow lacks killing potential. -Zack1996

Yes you're right, he lacks killing potential somehow, as of now I'm unsure of whether the talents are off, or some mechanics aren't working.
But he's going to make a strong comeback, because he's going to have a new competitor.

Well, I had another go at the game together with 4 AI players. I'm sorry I couldn't play this in Multiplayer, but I can't host :S - Zack1996

Don't worry about it
I'm trying to figure out how to change their player names + probably going to work on improving their AI soon, after I finish up with next hero.


Thanks heaps for the replay Zack, It's very very helpful + your comments = knockout.

Edit: The amount of ESC button you have to spam in order to be released from Chainz's bite is random,
going to display the amount needed next patch..

Edit: Updated 1.19