[Altered Melee] Custom Race Creation (v7) -- _PROJECTNAMEHERE_

[Kyrbi0]

Hello, and Welcome to _PROJECTNAMEHERE_, my Great Work. This thread is meant to serve as the public face & discussion sub-forum for my various projects, linking it all together. Like, Comment, Favorite, Subscribe. ;D

My goal/theme/motto with these factions & heroes is 3-fold:
- Follows Blizzard precedent "as well as possible".
- Does not conflict with existing races/abilities, except where noted.
- Create the "best" (IMO), most Warcraft-y representation possible.

People visiting this topic are welcome to:
- Suggest ideas for the topic at hand.
- Provide feedback for ideas posted by me.
- Post any kind of cool race-related ideas.

Thanks for checking this out; hope you can learn something and/or help me out with my progress.

[UPDATES]
2020.07.26 - Added the Jungle Troll Playable Alpha

=GOALS=
_PROJECT.ALPHA_
"Rise of the Skull Empire"
Jungle Troll custom race
Playable Alpha
Teasers for Full Release
Jungle Troll campaign

_PROJECT.BETA_
"Warcraft 2 Veterans Tavern"
...

_PROJECT.GAMMA_
"Monolith Redux: Heroes Edition"
...

_PROJECT.DELTA_
"Hidden Factions #1"
...

_PROJECT.EPSILON_
"Hidden Factions #2"
...

_PROJECT.ZETA_
"Expanded Tavern"
...

_PROJECT.ETA_
"Goblin Warz"
Alchemist's Union WIP
Mektology Industries WIP

...

The Archives

-Lost to the Sands of Time
"Custom Race Topic #1"
"Custom Race Topic #2"
Troll Conversion Topic //#3 presumably
-GameFAQs
Custom Race Topic #4
"Custom Race Topic" #4.5 //"A Few More Questions"
Custom Race Topic #5
-Wc3C
Custom Race Creation //#6 basically

~List of Helpful Users / "Team Members"?~
User Contribution
cosmicat Original Discussionist and Idea Man
theRowboat Custom Gnoll Race, Discussionist
jigrael Freelance Modeller (so.. many... models )
Askhati Concept Artist, Discussionist, Tester
RenegadeMushroom Topic BUMPer, Custom Races, Tester
Alexander244 "Wall of Zombies" Code, Coding Help
Furion Tester
Mechmap Tester (reviewed)
Weazel Tester
Purification Tester
Michael Peppers Tester, Discussionist, some Concept Art, Custom AI
deolrin Freelance Modeller

 

[Wareditor]

Interesting ( :

 

[Hantoo]

So Is the troll raptor guy screenie will be here?

 

[Kyrbi0]

So Is the troll raptor guy screenie will be here?

Sure. I should be doing it myself (big "race compilation" thingie), but I would definitely encourage the artists I work with to post WIPs here. This is the new Public face. ; )

 

[Naze]

I really dig the Alchemist's Union one, looking forward for the rest!

 

[Shar Dundred]

#BestProjectNameEvar

 

[stein123]

¿Y yo? :'c

 

[Kyrbi0]

¿Y yo? :'c

Oh no, man, worry not; didn't you see the ellipses ("...")? That list is faaaaar from complete; in fact it hasn't been updated since probably 2009. xD

Besides, my Troll map has way more on it (in terms of credits).

 

[stein123]

>:I ...... ♥

 

[Banelingline]

Okay, I'll be tackling the Nerubian idea, primarily, as I have more thoughts on the use of elements of it than the other things. By mechanic, to start with.

Eggs: I have some opposition to the idea of using them for higher-up units, as the Nerubians are not minion spamming powerhouses like the Zerg, lore-wise (there's also the sizable increase in macro skill needed to make it work and the build space issues from needing to outright spam Town Halls to keep up in production, something none of the maps are designed to handle). They work for number-focused things and weak units (so t1 by definition), but not stuff like Spiderlords. So having them be a quick production method for t1 units is fitting, as is being part of the production method for higher-tier swarms. That said, it does fit some of Blizzard's design philosophy for the actual WC3 races, that being "How can we remix Starcraft race features?" By restricting it to the low-power units, having a mobile production method for them becomes easier to balance as you don't have as much problems coming from being able to suddenly pop out a t3 unit behind the enemy's largely-unprotected base. Maybe have all the production structures produce eggs for t1 units, so that the exceptionally weak t1 units come in absolute droves.

Golem Builder: I think this is a bad idea, and is actually a mismatch with the lore. Not to go into detail, but the Obsidian Destroyers are Titan Constructs and the Gargoyles... Are unknown in origin. Mechanically, the problem here is that a unit subset is being made by a relatively mobile unit that does nothing but produce that subset of units, and said subset is primarily heavy hitters, and your builder is built by another builder, thus making expansion excessively micro/macro-heavy and easily interrupted because your worker bottleneck is another worker, and thus extremely fragile relative to the standard Town Hall.

Morphing: This has some issues, particularly owing to the fact that you have a fast-moving fairly quick to make t2 unit turn into an outright flying siege unit of the long-production t3 variety. This means that an expensive, high-power unit can be produced at the speed of a unit you're intended to mass with, after a delay corresponding to an appropriate construction time for such a unit. The flanking potential brought on by this is extremely worrying, and you end up with a case where, upon getting to t3, the enemy now has to hurry and locate all of a t2 skirmisher or else face being surrounded by t3 siege units. Yes, this is high micro, but this is the sort of thing you have to account for higher end gameplay. It's made worse by having all Town Halls be able to produce any unit, so every expansion has almost the same production ability as your main base and need only have defenses and more Town Halls ever built there, rather than any thing vulnerable.

My ideas on particular units/structures will wait for another post...

 

[Kyrbi0]

Okay, I'll be tackling the Nerubian idea, primarily, as I have more thoughts on the use of elements of it than the other things. By mechanic, to start with.

Oh, wow, wait... You actually followed the links & read some of my previous topics?? I'm flattered. : )

Unfortunately, the Nerubians are a bit far-distant (& possibly to-be-replaced, for a few reasons). I love them & many of the ideas associated with them, but such is life. That, plus, my general distance from them (been a while since I thought of them) means I might not quite be be able to say much about your critique. However, I greatly appreciate it; it's obvious you've put thought into it, so I'd be remiss not to respond. : )

Eggs:

I have some opposition to the idea of using them for higher-up units, as the Nerubians are not minion spamming powerhouses like the Zerg, lore-wise (there's also the sizable increase in macro skill needed to make it work and the build space issues from needing to outright spam Town Halls to keep up in production, something none of the maps are designed to handle). They work for number-focused things and weak units (so t1 by definition), but not stuff like Spiderlords. So having them be a quick production method for t1 units is fitting, as is being part of the production method for higher-tier swarms. That said, it does fit some of Blizzard's design philosophy for the actual WC3 races, that being "How can we remix Starcraft race features?" By restricting it to the low-power units, having a mobile production method for them becomes easier to balance as you don't have as much problems coming from being able to suddenly pop out a t3 unit behind the enemy's largely-unprotected base. Maybe have all the production structures produce eggs for t1 units, so that the exceptionally weak t1 units come in absolute droves.

Hm. I could see that being a potential path to take; low-Tier units being spawned. However, the thing that comes to mind is "How did Blizzard do it & have it be OK in Starcraft"? Because obviously in Starcraft the Zerg do exactly that (spawn everything from Drones to Ultralisks).

Golem Builder:

I think this is a bad idea, and is actually a mismatch with the lore. Not to go into detail, but the Obsidian Destroyers are Titan Constructs and the Gargoyles... Are unknown in origin. Mechanically, the problem here is that a unit subset is being made by a relatively mobile unit that does nothing but produce that subset of units, and said subset is primarily heavy hitters, and your builder is built by another builder, thus making expansion excessively micro/macro-heavy and easily interrupted because your worker bottleneck is another worker, and thus extremely fragile relative to the standard Town Hall.

Thematically, ill fite u IRL I may disagree... But in part because I have a smaller scope. See, I really don't love many of the Lore decisions made in WoW, so I tend to limit how much I let it influence me & my custom stuff. Basically, I tend to design stuff as if WoW didn't exist, or in the interim between TFT & WoW-Vanilla.
So lore-wise (*looking for manual*) , all we know about the Obsidian Statues is that they are "believed to be gifts granted by Ner'zhul... often used as figureheads... of... armies". Gargoyles are "voracious flying creatures... brought from the frozen north by the ... Lich King". (so yeah, basically 'unknown')
Anyway, it's clear we don't know much about them, but I vaguely recall reading some rationale for them being Nerubian in make (or design or something), and that was part of what inspired me. (In actuality, though, I didn't plan on using the Obsidian Statue/Destroyer/Gargoyle in the Nerubian race (since I try to design without overlapping standard Wc3), so I don't know where the concern came from to be honest...)

The other part, though, is just that (again vaguely) I recall Nerubians being golem-builders, that that was their 'thing'. And it makes more sense for big burly Golems to construct buildings than spindly spider-dudes, right?

Finally, mechanically... You may be right. While it's unique, it may be a step too much. I'd like to say that it could be balanced, but ah dannae.

Morphing: This has some issues, particularly owing to the fact that you have a fast-moving fairly quick to make t2 unit turn into an outright flying siege unit of the long-production t3 variety. This means that an expensive, high-power unit can be produced at the speed of a unit you're intended to mass with, after a delay corresponding to an appropriate construction time for such a unit. The flanking potential brought on by this is extremely worrying, and you end up with a case where, upon getting to t3, the enemy now has to hurry and locate all of a t2 skirmisher or else face being surrounded by t3 siege units. Yes, this is high micro, but this is the sort of thing you have to account for higher end gameplay. It's made worse by having all Town Halls be able to produce any unit, so every expansion has almost the same production ability as your main base and need only have defenses and more Town Halls ever built there, rather than any thing vulnerable.

Again, I have to say "sounds good, but how did Blizzard get around it?" Because the Mutalisk (swarmy T2 aerial unit) could transform into the Guardian (giant T3 siege-y aerial unit). It worked/is balanced there... Why not here? : )

My ideas on particular units/structures will wait for another post...

Looking forward to it. Can't promise I'll get to respond as fast as I did here... I've really been piling up the To-Dos & have to catch up on a lot. :<

 

[MogulKahn]

Sup!

 

[Banelingline]

I have had to retype this... Three times. Because for some reason, the draft keeps getting axed.

Hm. I could see that being a potential path to take; low-Tier units being spawned. However, the thing that comes to mind is "How did Blizzard do it & have it be OK in Starcraft"? Because obviously in Starcraft the Zerg do exactly that (spawn everything from Drones to Ultralisks).

They have a lot more time and skill to balance it than you ever will, and the end result is still a janky mess at the low end. Zerg Rush exists because of the system's innate function, if you turned down the rate much you'd end up hopelessly behind on economy, or be forced to have an absolutely insane early game economy that falls off extremely hard late-game.

The other part, though, is just that (again vaguely) I recall Nerubians being golem-builders, that that was their 'thing'. And it makes more sense for big burly Golems to construct buildings than spindly spider-dudes, right?

They did the architecture for the Scourge, not any golem work. So you probably confused types of construction (seriously, it's called the Nerubian Tower, what the heck were you thinking?)

Again, I have to say "sounds good, but how did Blizzard get around it?" Because the Mutalisk (swarmy T2 aerial unit) could transform into the Guardian (giant T3 siege-y aerial unit). It worked/is balanced there... Why not here? : )

The way armor works in WC3 and the mechanical needs of the Stinger, really. Being a non-spawned melee unit, the Stinger has to be fairly durable in addition to being rather high speed in order to live long enough to deal decent damage. Throwaway built units, in general, don't work out well in WC3 as the forces are smaller by a lot and resources are less desposable. It's a much slower game with a much stronger emphasis on endurance, with the frailest units all being stuff not supposed to be on the front line.

---

At any rate, I'll be covering just one unit this time (the first two times died because I tried covering all four heroes). Namely, the Spider Lord Hero. My biggest thing is that I'd like it to be more of a Paladin kind of melee than a Tauren Chieften kind, mostly because we have something of an overload of melee beatstick damagers and I like quirky support heroes. Another dichotomy to somewhat follow would be the one between Paladin and Death Knight, having similar in outcome abilities that act differently in practice and support very different playstyles. Given this, have a proposed ability list:

Sanguine Scarabs: A variation on both Carrion Beetles (using that ability for the base ability) and Locusts (somewhat the theme of the unit itself), this would be the "heal" for the Spider Lord and the main summon. Less baseline health than the Carrion Beetle, it'd make that up with a life-transfer ability based on Drain Life from the Dark Ranger. This ability has a field for transfering life just like the Blood Mage's ability to do so with mana, complete with overcharge values, so the ability can transfer life to allies by draining it from the Sanguine Scarab. Level 2 gives a passive lifesteal to reduce the cooldown conflict and boost durability, while level 3 makes them airborn and able to drain and heal air units, as well as ground units. If mana is used for the ability, it could also drain mana at level 2 and up to use the ability more frequently. Fluff-wise, Carrion Beetles and Locusts are too in line with existing Nerubian abilities to be purely a result of Undeath, so the Locusts being underdeveloped/larval/young Carrion Beetles and the Beetles being twisted by Undeath/rapid growth to lose the life stealing where they normally wouldn't is at least excusable.

Frigid Aura: In replacement of Spiked Carapace (which is obviously undeath-based mutation), this gives durability increases... By slowing enemies to reduce the damage they deal, improving attack capacity at the same time by reducing their ability to escape. While decidedly offensive in most effective use, this downright forces the Spider Lord to be in melee to get the most enemies possible, as well as encouraging flanking to block off enemy escape and slow down their ranged unit's attacks to reduce damage dealt more than the front lines. Fluff-wise, the Nerubian Tower shows that the Nerubians have a significant amount of skill with frost magic. A passive ability based on using this to slow enemies in a decently large area works out thematically, though balance could require it to be an Immolate variation that uses triggers to pull the slow with the channeled mana cost AoE.

Toxic Spines: More mana efficient, but DoT instead of stun,version of Impale. No idea on the fluffsplanation, but you basically have more damage per point of mana, with about a third of the total shifted off to a DoT to make the immediate damage a little lower or the same as Impale. Not much to say, stun swapped for moar, cheaper, damage that comes at at a delay. Keeping the stun would cause problems in combination with Frigid Aura, as escape ends up practically impossible due to stuns allowing catchup.

Ultimate: Not sure what to do here. Either a personal life transfer/steal of some kind, allowing for long-duration overheals that decay extremely slowly and using it to save allies in emergencies or Upgrade for a sizable boost to speed and/or damage, while getting better versions of the normal abilities (such as enabling overheal on Sanguine Scarabs, making Toxic Spines apply a slow to cause rock-bottom movement on most units and boosting range on Frigid Aura to cover most of the screen)

 

[The_Warchief]

Perhaps I've missed it through trying to work around the navigation here, but I don't see your other two goblin mini-race concepts aside from the Alchemist's Union and Mektology Industries, haha. I wanted to suggest alternative names and concepts, so I guess I'll just list whatever comes to mind and you can mix and match as you please for what you need.

And we're pretending WoW doesn't exist, you say? Alrighty, I'll keep that in mind.


Former Name: Alchemist Union
New Name Suggestions: School of Mixology, Test Labs, Mad Chemists

Former Name: Mektology Industries
New Name Suggestions: Steampunkz, Steam-Warriors' Guild, Tinkers' League

New Concept Suggestions
CHURCH OF BOOM
Faction: Explosive/suicide-focused Goblins.

Description: The one and only thing that goblins find holier than coin is a good, earth-shattering explosion! While all goblins have a healthy degree of madness, the Priests of Boom are considered mad even by the standards of their kin. When this "holy order" takes the field, nothing is left standing on either side. Natural resources are stripped away, craters litter the battlefield, and structural integrity becomes a myth.

Concept: Almost every building and unit will have some sort of self-destruct function and the faction will rely heavily on sappers, grenadiers, dynamite-throwing caster units and some insane anti-defense. Unlike the mechanically focused faction, most of their units are biological - even their "artillery." They can also have reckless economic abilities like, say, strip mine a gold mine to get half of it's remaining gold instantly, blowing it up in the process, with a similar ability for a large section of trees. The whole faction would be very give-and-take and friendly fire is just something they're going to have to live with. This is not the kind of faction a heavy micro "no units lost" player would want to touch!

MERCHANT'S GUILD
Faction: Economy-focused Goblins.

Description: Money makes the world go 'round, and nowhere is this more true than in goblin society. The Cartels are run by powerful merchant guilds backing the Trade Princes, and they know whose pockets to slip a few shiny gold coins into to get what they want. Mercenaries, lawyers and special operatives slink and slither their way across the battlefield for these guilds, using espionage, guile and fine print over any sort of brute force.

Concept: Very limited tech-tree, but very strong units, like snipers and bodyguards and secret agent "caster" units. Specialist core unit, the Contractor, has permanent invisibility but very low health and no ability to attack normally. Instead, they can sabotage enemies by issuing fines at their Great Hall to steal money from them, bribing units to their side and buying out neutral buildings like mercenary camps, taking them over and locking them out for the enemy. Contractor's abilities cost no mana but have long cooldowns and cost gold, instead. Only one Contractor can be trained at once. Very high cost to get a new one. Many upgrades around improved harvesting and infrastructure, and mercenary units benefit from their weapon/armor upgrades. Ultimate, tier 3 building is the Embassy, which has a variety of upgrades to choose from to give access to units from another race. For example, the Embassy might upgrade to a Slave Market, giving access to Troll units dependent on the map's region, or they can sign a Horde Contract, giving access to certain orc units.

AETHERIC COALITION
Faction: Magic-focused Goblins

Description: Founded by enterprising goblins who sought to combine magic and science, the Aetheric Coalition is all about the occult and the mysterious, usually more occupied with research and archaeology than warfare, though more than willing to fight over dig sites or to avoid legal battles. Technomancers and dark-dealing Warlocks alike bring the Coalition a magical superiority unseen in other goblin factions.

Concept: Semi-weak in the early game with limited melee units but starts gaining power as they tech up to spellcasters. Their buildings also have various spell-like abilities, like Generators for farm buildings that can restore mana to other buildings, a worker speed boost ability on the main hall or tree regrowth spells at the lumber mill. Upgrades are flipped from normal, with no normal melee/ranged weapon damage upgrades but instead the ability to upgrade the damage/armor of spellcasters. Technomancer type units can stun mechanical units and use chain lightning type abilities while Warlocks can steal enemies' mana, rain down fire and summon demons on the field. Most heroes are intelligence based and even the ones who aren't have a high focus on spellcasting and mana.

 

[Shar Dundred]

Re-opened!

 

[Michael Peppers]

So... you doing this or what?

If you need AI support and... playtesting hit me up.

 

[Kyrbi0]

UPDATE: I've now uploaded this to the Map Submission section; that's where the most-updated version of this will now reside.


==============================================================
====================(6)JungleTrollFever - Jungle Trolls (v0)==================
==============================================================

Jungle Trolls
Version 0.0

by Kyrbi0 & Cosmicat
(With extensive help (coding, testing, etc) from MichaelPeppers & ArchmageOwenalacaster)

1.26	Works

(feel free to test it in other versions & let me know)

In order to play as the Jungle Trolls, select "Orc" & "90%" HP Handicap.

Welcome to Version Zero of my long-awaited custom Jungle Troll race. To be clear, this is not the fully-realized Final Version; you can think of this as merely... a Tribute. Sort of like a Playable Alpha; sufficiently finished to be "complete" & playable, but pretty far removed (at this point) from all the stuff I have planned for the Final Version.

Enjoy!

===
===
===
Introduction

The wily Jungle Trolls of the southern Stranglethorn jungles are a vicious and cunning group. Hunkered in the shadows of their former world-spanning empire, the vigorous Gurubashi blood still pumps through their veins. Fiercely xenophobic and territorial of their ancient lands, the Jungle Trolls field powerful voodoo magicks and guerilla tactics, honed by millennia of inter-tribal conflict. Jungle Trolls can be barbaric in their defense of home & tribe; mutilation, cannibalism, and ritualistic sacrifices are not uncommon. With their vaunted regeneration and mysterious rituals, the Jungle Trolls maintain the sanctity of their ancestral home with ferocity and guile.

Now, with a headstrong young Warbringer at the helm, the Jungle Trolls are poised to bring a new era of conquest to Stranglethorn Vale... And beyond.

Racial Identity

The Tribesmen are a loose affiliation of Troll tribes and vicious jungle beasts. They focus on guerrilla tactics, with enhanced mobility and both ranged and magical superiority. Many of their abilities take advantage of the dead and of spirits, so every death can bolster the Troll army.

Advantages

• Stealth and Mobility

Troll infantry units, the worker & one hero (“Viper Priestess”)) have the Crawl ability. Crawl can be toggled to render them permanently invisible but removes their ability to attack and reduces their move speed. Crawl can be researched at the Grisly Message (The worker does not require the research).​

• Racial Regeneration

All Troll units have enhanced health regeneration innately; higher than any other races’ aside from Undead on Blight. This helps to compensate for the sparse Healing spells among the Trolls.​

• Increased Food Production

Trolls gain Food by constructing Boar Huts which passively trains Boars. Each Boar provides food. The rate at which they are generated can be upgrade.​

• Defense Towers

The basic Troll tower (the Sentry Post) can be upgraded in one of two ways: either to the offensive Tiki Tower with a ranged magical attack, or to the Jungle, a defensive building which can garrison units, slow down enemies, and summon a Swarm of Bees to defend itself.​

• The Tiki Warriors, with Spell Immunity and the Sacred Staff ability, are very good at killing Heroes.
• The Null Ward can cancel all magical activity in an area.
• Vampire Bats are especially adept at swarming and taking down large enemy flyers; the Feeding Frenzy upgrade increases their damage based on the number of nearby attacking Vampire Bats.

===
JUNGLE TROLLS v0 - Credits
(ripped from the map & edited)
===

BY AUTHOR

BY RESOURCE

Kyrbi0	- Lead Creator - Original Concepts - Primary "Coder" - Designer/Implementer
Cosmicat	- Follow-Up Implementer - Coder - Tester - Original 'Releaser'
===	===
Alexander244 (code)	- Medicine Mon: Wall of Zombies
AnemicRoyalty	- Headshrinker: Skin - Combat Upgrades: Icons ("Axe_1/2/3", "Voodoo Sigil_1/2/3")
Anitarf	- ABuff library - SpellEvent library
Archmage Owenalacaster	- Custom Race System
Blizzard	- Some Models & Most Icons Not Otherwise Credited, having been Edited by Kyrbi0
Cavman	- Marauder: Model (Mount)
Cosmicat (code)	- Medicine Mon: Convalescent Curse, Wall of Zombies fix - Headshrinker: Bewilder, Shrink fix - Viper Priestess: Mark of the Viper, Mesmerize, Aspect of Hethiss - Ravager: Kukri Toss
Deolrin	- Grisly Message: Icon, Model (edits) - Lurid Warning: Icon, Model (edits) - Gruesome Testament: Icon, Model (edits) - Altar of Blood: Icon, Model - Training Log: Model - Jungle Bungalow: Model
[Ð]	- Groundling: Model - Dartmon: Model
Falcoknight	- Ravager: Model, Skin
GreyArchon	- Vampire Bat: Model
Jigrael	- Headshrinker: Model, Animation, Icon - Viper Priestess: Model, Skin, Animation - Ravager: Icon, Model, Skin
Juice_F	- Warbringer: Skin
Levigeorge1716	- Marauder: Icon, Model (Troll)
Metal_Sonic64	- Hexxer: Model (Troll)
Michael Peppers (code)	- Jungle Troll AI - Viper Priestess: Serpent Steel
Norinrad	- Warbringer: Model
Ominous Horizons	- Headshrinker: Base 3dsMax Model
Tales of Raviganion (Rightfield)	- Tiki Warrior: Icon, Model - Grisly Message: Model & Custom Textures - Lurid Warning: Model & Custom Textures - Gruesome Testament: Model & Custom Textures
Tijil	- Basilisk: Icon, Model
Vexorian	- Table library - TimerUtils library
===	===
Testers	- Alevice - Anopob - Archmage Owenalacaster - Cosmicat - Michael Peppers
Special Thanks	- Tim. - Vexorian - Rising_Dusk - Michael Peppers - Alevice - Anopob - Archmage Owenalacaster - Deolrin - RenegadeMushroom - [Ð]

===Systems & Libraries===
Custom Race System	Archmage Owenalacaster
ABuff Library, SpellEvent Library	Anitarf
Jungle Troll AI	Michael Peppers
Table Library, TimerUtils Library	Vexorian
===Spells & Coding===
Convalescent Curse, Wall of Zombies (edits), Bewilder, Shrink (edits), Mark of the Viper, Mesmerize, Aspect of Hethiss, Kukri Toss	Cosmicat
Serpent Steel	Michael Peppers
Wall of Zombies	Alexander244
===Models, Textures, Icons, Etc===
Grisly Message -> Lurid Warning --> Gruesome Testament	Rightfield (original model); Deolrin (edits)
Groundling	[Ð] (model)
Altar of Blood	Deolrin (model, icon)
Warbringer	Norinrad (model); Juice_F (texture)
Headshrinker	OH (3dsmax Mesh); Jigrael (model, anims, icon); A.R. (texture)
Python Warrioress	Jigrael (model, texture, anims)
Training Log	Deolrin (model)
Ravager	Jigrael (model, anims, icon); Falcoknight (texture)
Marauder	levigeorge1716 (icon, model (Troll)); Cavman (model (Raptor))
Vampire Bat	GreyArchon (model)
Basilisk	Tijil (model)
Hexxer	MetalSonic64 (model (Troll))
Tiki Warrior	TToR (model)
Jungle Bungalow	Deolrin (model)
Jungle Dartmon	[Ð] (model)
(Keen->Honed-->Wicked) Blades (Boundbark->Splitbark-->Barkplate) Armor	A.R. (icons)

SCREENSHOTS

CHANGELOG
v0.0 - Original upload

 

[Kyrbi0]

===HISTORY TEIM===

So many of you probably have a lot of questions about this, if you've known me for any length of time: "why now?" "why just an Alpha?" "is this really what you've been working on this whole time??" "why only 1.26?" "why not upload it to the resource section?", etc. I don't know if I can answer all of them, but I think the history is interesting & the insight might be... insightful. x )

Basically, waaaaay back in 2009 I was frantically trying to Finish the Jungle Trolls, because I had worked on them for nearly 6 years (oh, so long... ha) and was about to leave on a 2-year proselytizing mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (wherein I'd be unable to use the Internet or "basically" any technology, thus no work on the Trolls). I figured I might not even want to bother finishing it after that.

When it came right down to the deadline (& I mean literally, past midnight on the day before I am scheduled to walk onto a plane & fly far away), my procrastination had gotten the best of me: I wasn't finished.

So I began even more frantically to rush about, 7zip-ping everything up into little packages, and contacting my long-time modding buddies with explicit instructions: "Here's everything. If you want to & are able to, please finish my work. No big deal if you can't/don't want to". Into a Pastebin I poured my cruelty files, my malice documents, and my will to dominate all life WIP custom maps.

And then I left.


Fast forward two years, and I come back to a wondrous surprise: in my absence, not only had my modding buddies (spearheaded, led & organized by @cosmicat) worked on the Trolls; they had finished them! And packaged it all up nicely in a standard melee map ("Jungle Fever", natch) for easy playing & everything! I went back through my "custom races" topic & was blown away by the care & concern that had gone into a project that wasn't even theirs.

So I played it once or so, and then promptly forgot about it, moving on to continue my work.

I admit I'm ashamed to think that it never even crossed my mind to release it at that time. I think a part of my reticence came from how fresh it was; I hadn't made much past that point, and I've jealously guarded my ideas (basically my only 'skill'), so releasing it didn't make sense. Also Wc3C.net had become a ghost town, and I'd never really planned on uploading to the Hive. Also, there was this crazy equine fandom phenomenon sweeping the internet, and I just had to be a part of it...


Fast forward another, eh, ~5 years (give or take). I've gotten married, I've had some kids, I'm working multiple jobs to make ends meet, and I'm still (kinda) plugging away at the Trolls, but it's hard. Harder than ever before. Progress is slow & people have been wondering for years "is this guy ever gonna actually finish?" Heck, I wondered that.

Somehow I'm reminded of "Jungle Troll Fever" & think "HOL' ON... this might just be the ticket." I realized that it's totally self-packaged & self-playable (no custom MPQ like I was using, all the resources are imported); it's far enough away from where I currently am with the Trolls that I don't mind releasing it (see below); it's not the Jungle Trolls but it is like a "playable Alpha version", which would allow me to "release" something meaningful, with the promise of a big update someday... It just seemed ideal.

Of course, even after deciding this, Kyrbi0 will be Kyrbi0... I have literally sat on releasing this thing for the last 2-4 years (granted two of those years I was basically on Hiatus but still). And I mean "had a whole bunch of Internet tabs bookmarked & open to Do The Thing", for months at a time. It took so long, we got the new patches (one of which gave me native JassHelper, meaning I could finally open, modify & save the map without issues!)... then we got Reforged (which broke a lot of compatibility with old stuff like mine)... and here we are now.

Yeah, it's a bit late. But hey, better late than never! (right? right??).

And with alllllll that being said, I also have some fun Teasers for you guys. : )

===TEASER TEIM===

So I mentioned how much has changed (which ultimately left me feeling comfortable enough to upload Jungle Troll Fever). I'm not just talking about cool custom models & such (some of which you can see below), but I've honestly made pretty drastic changes to over 75% of the faction from the playable Alpha. I mean seriously, it's only barely recognizable, and that's exciting to me. Plus I've got custom music, a custom UI & cursor, plans for soundsets (don't quote me on that; soundsets are hard). And more to come.

I absolutely refuse to promise an End Date (even though, looking at my custom 'faction tracker' I'm probably 85% of the way finished), because, well... Just look at what I'm doing now. xD

But I am, as always, determined to try & finish this whole thing. I look forward to the day I can grace ya'll with the amazing Jungle Trolls, fully realized as I have envisioned them.

Enjoy!

 

[stein123]

OMG!!!

 

[Linaze]

So you've basically released it, and yet you haven't. Clever.

(For some reason reminded me of when I released SoC on WC3C, got some negative reviews but then the server rollback happened and all of that disappeared from the pages of history. Little did Vex know who was behind that server failure...)

I'd love to play but I assume it doesn't work on the latest patch.. Perhaps it could be made future-compatible?

 

[lichao001486]

Very good troll race map.

 

[Michael Peppers]

Hey! Is this what I think it is? I don't have wc3 installed at the moment, did you fix the Custom Race System bug with versions starting from 1.28 (I think)? According to my old tests (12/2018) after fixing a line in the code it works fine even in never Wc 3 versions.

Anyway, I don't see my name in the credits for the AI, naughty 'mon. Is it not there? :O

(Want me to upload my version? With AI and fixes?)

EDIT: I'm editing so you know I edited this multiple times

 

[Kyrbi0]

Mike, my man! Glad to have you back in the ol' "Custom Race Creation" topic. : )

Oh man, I knew no matter how hard I worked on the Credits, I'd miss something... However as far as I know there's no AI file imported into the Jungle Troll Fever map (isn't that still how it's done?). If you did it entirely in code, on the other hand...

Either way, let me know & I'll absolutely get you in there. We can add it in, and all the better if it works with Reforged (against my better judgement, I'm looking into the updates necessary to get it working on modern (post-1.26, lol) versions of Wc3. So far it just seems like an issue with certain custom icons causes a crash...)

 

[Michael Peppers]

D00D!

This is from early december 2018, I checked on it (like half an hour maybe) and made it working fine on whatever 1.32 version was rolling at the time, as an easy aside (and casual melee fun) to getting back my old mod into a working *and* workable state in the editor (which has stopped for weird code glitches). As far as the icons go I *may* have reimported some of them, I don't remember doing it specifically for your map but I noticed and fixed this issue in my old stuff.

Probably the version of the map you dug up is before we added the AI in, AI in this version is working and stable, if a bit more aggressive than standard melee, as usual when it comes to my template, handicap rules for AI Trolls are the same as for Players ofc. (90% Orc) AI could be unable to use some Unit Abilities correctly but that's tied to the base of said Custom Ability... or at least was, I sure hope they fixed this shit by now by making us decide what Spell behavior to use instead.

tl;dr: Worked in earlier 1.32 versions, dunno if it works now. AI is teh shiz.

EDIT: I checked again in the modding folder, I downloaded BTNOrcLumberMill around the same time, if I remember correctly it's the only icon that caused any issues in the map.

 

[Linaze]

Can confirm it appears to work (in singleplayer at least) just fine on the latest live patch. I Will hopefully find the time within a few days to test it a bit further (and more thoroughly as well).

For now I'll just leave this little screenshot here which I found rather entertaining:

 

[Kyrbi0]

Awful kind of you to test 'em out. : ) I'm definitely curious for your thoughts (recognizing that much of the stuff I've replaced, so don't put too much effort into critiquing it ; )

I'm very curious, though, about your statement that it worked in the latest version. Like, not just the AI, but the whole thing? No crash when you open the Build menu???

 

[Linaze]

I didn't put any computer player into the game so I will have to get back to you on the point regarding whether the AI works.
However I couldn't replicate any crash by messing around and building/training most of the stuff available, so that's a good sign.

 

[Kyrbi0]

Heck yeah it is! In fact I just finished a test of my own, and not only did the AI work, but the game didn't crash!

Honestly I might just be able to submit this to the Maps section as is now. Might tweak the Credits a bit, but I'm certainly not going to add any new resources or spells...

Thank you, Peppers!

 

[Michael Peppers]

No worries, I had fun doing it, I wish it was that simple for my own stuff but... no dice.

 

[Whitewolf8]

Finally got around to being able to play with these guys. (Playing in v1.31)
I love that the workers have piercing attacks, for some reason. So simple but usually everyone just keeps worker attacks being normal.
Headhunt skill is really awesome (although it may also work when your trolls get squished, the effect popped up when my Hunter got killed by a Sea Elemental.) ...Looking at the triggers, it says to fix, I'd think the intended fix was to add if they even have the Headhunt skill in the first place.
Mangonel's passive says it hits 0 targets. my my. ...and apparently has no disabled icon.

Tiki Warrior essentially being anti-hero intrigues me. hmmmmm. ideas.

Vampire bat has catapult icon and no model. huh.
Basilisk's Myotoxin ability says it stuns target unit, but seems to slow in an AoE

Dartmon's tree climb is really really unique. I love it. apparently you can climb up a tree on top of a cliff and get your friend stuck there. Oh dear.

Aaand Hexxer's Null Ward killed the game. Huh.

 

[Kyrbi0]

Thanks for playing; I'm glad you enjoyed. Don't get too attached to all that, though, as much of it has since changed. : )

I appreciate the list of errors. I'm only willing to fix so much (given that it's really just an 'Alpha' & I'm working on much later versions), but it's good to know because I planned on putting it into the Resource section.

 

[Whitewolf8]

Has it? Now I'm a bit curious to how much it's been changed up then.

i'd think that killing the game should be fixed at least.
Or maybe the way these guys win is by crashing everyone's game. Hmmmmm. That'd be weird.

 

[Kyrbi0]

You didn't know? You downloaded the Alpha; did you not read the post directly underneath it? : ) Some fun teasers in there.

 

[Whitewolf8]

I grabbed it when it was uploaded, memory's about as much as a goldfish, haha.

 

[Kyrbi0]

Alright, I've fixed the Null Ward crash (& in the process, actually reworked it so it, um, works), and I've updated the Myotoxin ability to have a non-Zero % chance of Stunning (err, Paralyzing).

I double-checked & the Vampire Bat does have a (custom) model & has the Destroyer icon, so I'm not sure what's up with that.

0's in tooltips are too many to count; we'll see if someone dings me on that. xD Same with missing icons.

Many thanks! I've made the "map submission" upload to Wc3C; now just gotta work on the one for the Hive.

 

[Linaze]

I will update this post with more thoughts as I test further. A few points straight away:

• Because of the new way Reforged displays hotkeys it currently looks a bit funky:
  
  
  
  
• Regarding Crawl(ing), it's a nice concept but I personaly dislike how the unit type changes when the unit begins crawling because the game then treats it as separate units when you for instance CTRL+Select a given type, also it is regarded as two unit types in the unit tab:
  
  
  
  This might be a design decision (in which case one I would love to discuss in further detail).
• Like someone mentioned about it was really cute how the worker has a ranged (and piercing) attack - nice attention to detail.
• Disclaimer: I have not checked all units in detail so far.. but: It feels like even the basic units from the normal barracks have quite a lot going on in terms of abilities (both passive and active). This isn't inherently bad (albeit a bit intimidating as a new player), but I thought it worth mentioning.
• Boar Hut seems kinda nifty and it's a nice way to recycle the Pig Farm model (we do the same in SoC). However it wasn't 100% clear to me what it does, it spawns pigs with wander that go around and attack enemies randomly? I'm thinking if you have a 5-6 farms and the game goes on for an hour that's a lot of units, I hope it's not an issue with regards to the game engine (honestly don't know)
• This ability tooltip seems a bit broken:
  
  
• Spawning Troll Berserkers from the shop is kind of cool, but it seems to be the default Orc unit?
  
• Chopping down a tree with a mounted Dartmon behaves a bit funky, maybe the unit should be unmounted or killed?
  

Now I gotta run but I will update this down the line. I would also love to play it "for real" within short.

Edit: Forgot to add the most important point: This looks really well made and the overall polish is there, and although a few models look a bit "meh" it's clear that you've made great use of the community resources available.