Custom Hero Arena (Remaking)

[Glorn2]

Background: I have been the editor of Custom Hero Arena (pretty popular US-East map) for a year or so now, and I have decided to remake the whole thing. The current public edit of the game is being hosted ~20X more than the original edit was a year ago, so I know I've made some good progress. My next goal is to remake the entire game from a blank map, and bring it from hovering around top 14-16 hosted, and keep it in the top 3-4.

Reasoning: Slayerdragon created this map ~5 years ago. He quit editing because he lost his unprotected copy. Labmonkey123 got permission from him to deprotect it, and work on it ~2 years ago. Labmonkey then became too busy also, and passed the map on to me. Due to the map being deprotected, then lab working on it, then me working on it (before I really knew anything about editing) the scripting is just.. awful. Painfully awful. All of you would vomit if you saw it; it is that bad. It has gotten to the point that as the game currently is; there isnt much I can do without rebuilding the whole thing, that wont cause errors.

Testing: The current CHA edit out has ~2000 hours of testing invested in it. I have about 30 people on my testers list, and we test for about 2 months before anything is released. As far as "custom hero" games go; this is by far the most balanced. It is balanced for any sized game, ranging from 1v1 to 6v6. The new map I am working on will have about the same amount of testing on it. So when I get close to that point; if anyone wants to check it out, just ask. (wont be for a while)

How the Game Works: You start out with a hero picker (after red choses options from taverns) and you select a hero model. All heroes have various ranges, base stats, and stat gains. You then select an offensive skill, defensive skill, misc. skill, Hero based skill, innate, and ultimate. To clarify, offensive skills are just as they sound. the majority of them are nukes, crits, things that increase your damage output in some way. Defensive as as you would assume, things that reduce damage done to you; allow you to flee, or overall extend your life. Misc. skills are skill that could fit into more than 1 hours, wouldnt fit into any, or are just there for the hell of it. a wide variety of skills here. Hero specific skills are mostly custom spells, dealing damage based on stats of heroes. Also ranged/melee only skills go here. Innate skills are not hero skills and do not level. It is a base skill that you can pick to make your hero a little more original. These skills are not really game changing at all, but are nice to have. these are generally passive; or skills that are equally useful all game. Ultimates are just kick ass skills. Some are passive, some are nukes, some are for pvp, some are for creeping. Some are strictly for team games too. Just a note, in the current CHA edit, innate skills are on heroes when you pick them, not pickable. And the hero-type skill tavern doesnt exist. they are planned for my re-made edit.

Plans: I plan to make this like no other hero arena. It is already unique in the fact that it is a balanced "custom hero" arena type game. However the best way of explaining it would be like "mario party" of custom hero arena.
Various FULL modes:

Normal Mode: A normal, hero arena type game. Kill creeps, fight bosses, kill opponents, fight in arenas. There is a side quest involving a lot of quests leading up to a big boss fight. (story mode is just where the first person to finish the quest wins)

Capture the flag: You all know what CTF is. Creep spawns will be reduced insanely, maybe 1 spawn a minute per area. Heroes will gain gold and levels based on hero kills, flag captures, flag returns, flag steals, and other CTF related things. This will be an entire CTF system, with multiboard.

King of the Hill: (both 1 hill and 5 hill mode) I hope you all know what KOTH is. There are 5 hills (or 1) on the map, and your team wants to control them. There will be a set time you need to control them for (time can be selected by red). This will be an entire king of the hill system and multiboard.

Plant the bomb: Again, a classic game. you will have to blow your opponents base up by arming a bomb outside of it. Round will have a time limit to them, followed by an all-team arena duel. Blow up the opponents base X times to win!

gladiator mode: Everyone versus everyone in a giant arena. (this mode is in CHAU 3.0) there is no creeping, after every round you gain 4 extra levels and 8000 extra gold. A round ends when only 1 person is alive in the arena. First person to win a total of 10 rounds wins. (working on a multi-board for this)

4 team mode: Rather than having only 2 teams, it will be possible to play with 2 teams, OR 4 teams. I am also making all of the other modes in this game playable with either 2 or 4 teams.

other options: Aside from full on game modes, you can change the kill count to win, you can increase creep spawns, enable unlimited weapons (normal limit is 1) bonus stats mode, super start (high lvl and gold), fast leveling mode, slow leveling, drop mode (all items are dropped in base when a player leaves), pro mode (harder creeps and bosses) noob mode (boost to player units), and well... a handful of other modes I cant think of off the top of my head.

Items/heroes: Currently there are almost 300 items in the game (not including consumables and power ups), MANY of which are recipe items that combine and upgrade. By the end of this my new map, I plan to have around 350. With my new addition of skill shops, there will be over 8,000,000,000 different builds. (8 billion, right?)

Statement: To make all of these modes playable, I will essentially have to make each mode its whole game, and disable all of the "normal game" triggers when a special mode is picked. I would also like to add that I am really not good with triggers, and how I made it this far I have no idea. I am uploading the current public version of my map to this post; because the one I am working on is far from playable yet. Before next semester starts, I plan to have a semi-playable version to upload. The final product I am planning to release before June.

This is pretty wall-of-text-y, sorry! I will update with progress on the map, and get a version up for anyone to look at as soon as I feel adequate progress has been made.

 

[RPD_Survivor]

Since you posted that your recreating the map I was just wondering are you going to keep any of the original items or bosses?

 

[Glorn2]

Yes, I am keeping the heroes, skills and items that currently exist. We have spent hundreds of hours balancing them all, and it would be a waste to throw them all away. I am also adding many more heroes, items, and skills to the game. The majority of the bosses will have different skins and stats, though the "goals" and "rewards" similar. There are still elemental bosses who drop essences to upgrade your orb items.

An update on progress:

I've been working mostly on the end boss temple, mountain, dungeon, whatever you want to call it. I may get some friends together and make a quick video of it, with explanations of how the fights work; until then, I will just type up the basics.

Rather than the typical tank and spank fights like so many games have, I have attempted to add some excitement to the boss fights. With enough spank, you can still solo the whole thing; but it is intended to be a group effort.

1st room: After hitting some levers, A small army spawns. There are 4 tanking units with a custom taunt that forces you to attack them for 5 seconds when they cast it. As tanking would imply, they have higher life and armor, and lower damage. There are 4 shaman with abilities like frenzy, rejuv, purge, ect. They have high spell resistance, but lower armor and life. 6 ranged minions also spawn. They have the lowest life and armor; but they spawn behind the tanks. They also have a slowing ability; making it hard to bypass the tanks and attack them first; though with a team, it is possible. Leading them all, is a general. He has magic immunity, highest life and armor, slow attack speed, and gives devotion and endurance auras. He also has tranquility, which he will cast if more than 3 units have taken substantial damage.

The goal here is teamwork of course. The tanks drop easily to spells, and you can buy bombs that deal spell damage if you have no spell based allies. you need to focus fire or else the shaman will cast rejuv on single targets, and the general will heal them all. Ranged heroes can take out the ranged creeps while your tank takes the focus of their tanks.

After the fight, some rewards appear on the ground, and the gate to the next room is open.

2nd Room: This personally was my favorite fight to create. There is a simple Tank and spank boss who has a few castables; but nothing too powerful. He has high damage, and a slow attack. He has a very powerful heal on a big CD also. Every 20 seconds during this fight though; a Healer is spawned. These healers dont deal much damage, but they have a 400 HP heal on a 2 second CD. They also have divine armor (which takes 2X damage from spells in my game) If you simply ignore them, eventually there will be so many healing the boss that you cant hurt him. They have lowish life, so any 2 spell casts should be able to kill them. Again, if you have no spells, you can buy some bombs to kill them. If you have no spells, no bombs, and no skill that adds magic damage to your attacks; you cannot finish this fight. Bombs are cheap though.

3rd room: I am still working on this one; finishing touches and all. However, it is 2 bosses who use quite a bit of teamwork. 1 has heals, medium life, high mana, and long duration sleep (your ally can attack you to cancel it) and decent armor. However, this hero has very very low base damage; but has frost arrows; which cost a lot of mana, and deal a lot of damage. General Idea being to drain this units mana, if you have the proper abilities. The other unit has a lotta life, and has a pretty powerful attack. Also has brilliance aura, spirit link, anddd... some other skill. These bosses are subject to change as they are tested to enhance game play without making it take too long to defeat them.

I need to do the final boss now. I want a truly unique fight, but I dont want to take the focus of the fight from the boss unit. If anyone has a suggestion or Idea for this; I would be glad to hear it. I've run out of interesting yet simple boss fight set ups.

 

[Glorn2]

SCREENSHOTS:

The Brief cinematic scene at the start of the game. during this time I am loading in all the units, skills, and items to prevent lag spikes during the game and reduce loading time during the load scene.

This is the first part of the end boss fight. these are all normal units, not heroes. The Big tankish guys you see have a taunt that makes you lose control of your hero for 6 seconds. They also have good armor, a good slow, and decent HP. They have no spell reduction though. The other units all have good spell reduction, and the general is immune. the general has devotion and endurance auras. If more than 3 units take a decent bit of damage, he will use a high powered tranquility. You need to focus fire in this fight. The shaman cast a strong rejuv and bloodlust. The minions in the back are low armored, low lifed, ranged units with a decent bit of damage. They are the weakest units, so you should save them for last.

This is the second boss in the quest line. He is a normal tank and spank boss. The drawback? As you can see in the screenshot, there are little minions with some kick ass armor. They take almost no damage from normal attacks, but take double damage from spells! these little bastards have some nice very low cool down heals, and they wont think twice about casting them on the big guy. If you let too many healers spawn (they spawn every 20 seconds) then the boss will become fully healed, and you are hosed. Never fret though, bombs have spell damage! With a stack of bombs you can easily clear all of the minions on this fight. Or, use a staff spell, or just have an ally with you who has an AoE spell. The boss also has an occasional large heal he will cast on himself.

The third and final fight before you are allowed to fight rag. these guys go down easier than the previous boss, but they have a lot more damage output. the fat guy has a decent stun, some splash damage, high damage, and spirit link. the siren has sleep, a heal, and a slow attack. The siren has a cold arrow though, that adds 1500 damage per attack, costing a lot of mana. If you can make her run out of mana, her damage goes down a LOT, and she cant heal herself or fatty. Fatty has a 2k heal from items, and siren has a 1500 mana burn from items.

This is the start of the rag fight, before I hit him. Check his size and stats. Every 20 seconds he grows 20% larger, gains 1000 HP, and 100 to all stats. He is pretty easy to start, and if you have a lot of damage, he is pretty easy. With multiple weapons, he is easier than the boss fight before him! If you take to long fighting him, he turns into this:

And well, at that point; fighting him isnt fun anymore! He is big and angry and has a lotttt of stats!


Additional Rag Fight Information:
Other than archons and elementals, this is the only series of boss fights in the game.
These fights can be done multiple times
After each fight, your progress is saved, in case of duels or death.
If you do not finish a fight, you have to restart that part of the chain. (death or duels)
After you defeat rag; you can restart the entire chain quest again.

These fights are all designed to take skill, while being "easy". That is, you dont need a shit-ton of immortals to do these fights. 2 immortals plus a weapon, with just 2 players, makes these fights easy. Damage is actually a lot more important than having to stack 250 armor and 40,000 HP to survive the fights. Remember, this is a hero arena, not an RPG; boss fights aren't the "high points" of this game. ^_^

that be my insanely cool scoreboard. I re-aligned the numbers so they are centered under their titles. Also, I made it so all the titles fit.

This is just my CTF scoreboard, I need to make a few more for other modes
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Other new thing: CAPTURE THE FLAG
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My completed goal list for CTF which is now up and working:

Leveling:
(X) when you capture a flag, everyone on your team gains a level.
(X) When you steal a flag from the spawn you gain a level, after crossing midfield...
(X) When you return a stolen flag you gain a level.

Gold:
(X) extra gold from killing the flag carrier. Maybe 200X hero level.
(X) Normal hero kills grant 100 gold X hero level.
(X) Capturing a flag gives your entire team the average hero level X200.
(X) Gold will be given out in intervals based on the average hero level.

General Rules:
(X) You cannot capture the flag if your opponent has your flag.
(X) you cannot enter your base if you are the flag holder and the other team has your flag.
(X) Flags will be sent back to their starting spot if left un-touched for 10 seconds.
(X) The hero with the flag will have reduced move speed and will be always visible.
(X) Creep spawns are INSANELY slow.
(X) Exceptional orbs can be purchased in bases.

Along with the completion of all my scoreboard triggers; the map is now being tested! Well, CTF mode only!

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Alsooooo
I finished my 3.1 edit of CHA and can now work more on this.
For the most part, CTF is finished. I have been landscaping quite a bit to "pretty" up the terrain; though I dont play to do all of it yet.

I will try to upload a replay to youtube or something if we can get a 5v5 going; so people can see what it is all about.

With CTF mostly done; I plan to go back and fine-tune the arena system I made, and fine-tune the rag quest. I left parts of both things still... "breakable" and want to make sure nothing can be abused.

The next mode I make will be king of the hill; once I get my general plans laid out; I will post them here. Anyone with an idea of what they would like to see in a King of The Hill game; post your thought and I will try to work with them.

Anddd my newest update:
I have been very busy with college this semester, I have 4 writing classes, and well... I have to write 4 essays a week. HOWEVERRRR, I have still been getting some work done!

I finally got around to terraining the map! Well, 90% of the way done. Some of the areas I am still unsure about I havent done anything with yet. This edit is very easy on the eyes and has very few doodads compared to all the other edits of CHA. Just for a scale; it has 600 doodads (will end up around 700, maybe 750 if people request more) This is very few... 3.1B has 1150, 3.0 had 1300, 2.1 and 2.0 had 1600, beta had 1800; and the old edits before I started editing were around 2400. To a lot of people this may not seem to be of any importance at all; but limiting the number of objects in the game at once can fix a lot of lag problems for people with bad computers.

Alsoooo, I have started re-working the entire rag-quest-trigger-stuff! For the 3rd time this is now. I keep finding tiny little abusable loopholes, and better ways to write the triggers; so I keep doing it over. Hopefully this will be the last time.

I have decided rather than trying to get each of the modes out first (which is a lot more fun, IMO) I am going to complete the "basic" game; and do a lot of skill, hero, and item adding. Then I can have all of that be tested for balances while I work on the rest of the game.

As far as a basic, working version of the game goes; I would say I am about 80% done. On the grand scale of things, It is more like 50% though... Maybe even 40%... Ahh, the joys of caffine...

This is mostly a copy/paste from my other sites I am keeping up to date with the updates. Just figured some of the site-goers over here might be interested.