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Echoes of Northrend v3.3

This is a custom cooperative campaign map. It is made for 5 players and it has its unique story-line based on, but not following Warcraft's story and an interesting map and encounter design where strategy and cooperation are very important. Each player controls 1 hero and some additional units to complete the tasks at hand and each one has its unique role. It is recommended to play this map with all 5 players, but you can also play with 2, 3 or 4. The map cannot be completed in single-player.
More maps will maybe be added to the campaign in the future, continuing the story-line.

The story-line takes place some time after the defeat of the Scourge and Arthas and while the Alliance and the Horde are battling the Legion, where the New Scourge was born with its new leader, Bolvar Fordragon. The heroes which players control are: Kel'Thuzad, Balnazzar, Anub'arak, Mak'catl Aforedoom and Selqar the Cliffshaper.
Mak'catl Aforedoom is a former necromancer of the Scourge who is the initiator of the plot with his well-reasoned plan, the reason for which is that in his past life he was killed by Bolvar Fordragon. His desire for revenge surpassed even the virtually unbreakable will of the Scourge, by which he was bound to serve the Lich King, whoever the Lich King was. He has put up a resurrection spell in secrecy on one of his visits to the facility where Kel'Thuzad's, Balnazzar's and Anub'arak's remains were being held which were to activate after some time. The time of the resurrection has come and he returns to the area to continue with his plan. On the way there he is to meet a banished troll Shadow Hunter, Selqar the Cliffshaper, and the Shadow Hunter agrees to join him. They must reach Kel'Thuzad, Balnazzar and Anub'arak who start at the other end of the map. Unknowing of anything after their resurrection, the big trio of Scourge heroes is to destroy the facility made for the preservation of their remains, thinking they are imprisoned, and also the base of the New Scourge, where they would ultimately meet with Mak'catl and Selqar and continue with the plot.

Some of the most notable features:
- Take down formidable strongholds with limited forces using special tactics and cooperation
- Dynamic gameplay - random item drops, random creep camps, dynamic weather which affects units, choices which affect what happens after
- Two teams start from two different ends of the map without shared vision to meet at the end and destroy the main base
- Beautiful scenery

The idea for this map started several years ago when I made the first prototypes. Back then, it was with Illidan, Vashj and Maiev (instead of Kel'Thuzad, Anub'arak and Balnazzar) escaping from imprisonment in Icecrown, and there wasn't the second team. Eventually, I stopped making it and that map was lost.

Author of the map: Alok
The story-line is based on, but doesn't follow Warcraft's story.
The picture used in the custom map preview picture is from here: http://media.blizzard.com/wow/media/artwork/wow-wrath/env-northrend13-large.jpg
Custom resources were made by JesusHipster, Tiodor, Spellbound, -Grendel, Nightcrime, epsilon, JetFangInferno, SA Dashie, Boogles, Callahan, Stanakin, Kwaliti, Mephestrial, Ujimasa Hojo, ~Nightmare, viiva, Talon the Mage, Legal_Ease, Grey Knight, and myself (Alok).


v3.3 changelog:
- Changed the food cost of Ghouls to 0 so the enemy forces will amass forces properly now
- Removed the dot from the name of one of the forces, so it appears correctly in the starting screen
- Dislocated certain trigger functions from the Map Initialization
- Created new triggers
- Merged certain triggers
- Removed redundant and unnecessary triggers and trigger functions
- Removed all trigger leaks
- Decreased the HP regen of the Forgotten One by 5
- Increased the attack damage and health of The Warder once again
- Increased the attack damage and health of The Purple Beastiary units at the ending portal once again
- Reset the bugged Burrow (Neutral Hostile) ability with which I had been trying to make a Burrow ability for Anub'arak and which had been causing crashes
- Fixed the button positions of Mak'catl's spells
- The name of the Unbroken Guard is now team-coloured in the dialogue at the beginning
- Added four more Tomes of Experience that drop from the remaining four Skeletal Mages at The Warder


v3.2 changelog:
- Removed the Damage and Spell Detection System
- Replaced the old Anub'arak and Selqar heroes with the new custom ones, which are the same
- Removed the custom Anub'arak skin
- Removed the clear dialog function from the difficulty dialog trigger
- Made the second gate after the Water Purification Facility also invulnerable at the beginning, until the facility is destroyed
- The trolls after the Tuskarr stronghold will no longer spam their message
- The prisoners at the Troll stronghold will no longer spam their message
- Increased the health of The Warder to 900 and its damage to 75
- The path through trees to The Purple Beastiary portal is now automatically cleared after the Undead main base is destroyed
- Increased the damage of The Purple Beastiary units at the ending portal by 40
- Changed the text of the ending dialogue after destroying the Undead main base
- There is now 3 seconds more time before the second part of the endingue dialog appears
- The names of the characters taking part in the ending dialogue are now team-coloured
- The fire and frost traps can now be seen in the fog of war


v3.1 changelog:
- Reincarnation now increases cooldown each time the hero dies
- Added two more creep camps on the map
- Increased the damage and/or health of many units
- Added some units and replaced some with other ones
- Fixed a bug where Skeletal Orc Champion was Neutral Hostile
- Fixed an exploit in the magnataur stronghold
- Removed the resurrection runes from the tuskarr stronghold
- Increased the mana gained by Kel'Thuzad with his Dark Ritual spell
- Changed the model of The Magnataurminator's missile
- Removed the upkeep gold gain reduction
- Numerous terrain and doodad changes
- Numerous textual changes
- Other minor fixes and changes


v3.0 changelog:
Complete overhaul of the whole map and increased map size with new areas:

- Doubled the map size, adding many new areas with epic new adversaries, strongholds, strategies, items, etc.
- New factions: the Magnataur and the Tuskarr
- The map can now be completed by 2, 3, 4 or 5 players, when a player leaves or the slot is empty that player's units are granted to another player on their team
- Many changes to the previously added content
- Moved the starting areas
- Changes to hero abilities and all heroes now have Reincarnation with a five-minute cooldown
- Completely new game interface
- Many new custom models, textures, icons, etc.
- Added hints all over the place, new info quests, dialogs and other textual stuff, and changed the old ones
- New game mechanics
- Added the dynamic weather which affects units
- Added one more difficulty above Insane - Imbalanced, and the difficulty can now be changed up to three minutes after the start
- Added the damage and spell detection system
- The map is now covered with a black mask
- Many bug fixes and balance changes

And much, much more...

v2.1 changelog:

- The map now has 4 difficulties: Easy, Normal, Hard and Insane (Player 1 sets the difficulty)(Hard is the old difficulty)
- There are additional hints at the beginning for Easy and Normal difficulties
- Death Towers' damage has been reduced by 2
- When the foot switch is activated, it moves the camera for the players getting the control of the Advanced Death Towers to them
- Some parts of the text messages are now colored
- Other minor changes

v2.0 changelog:

Main features of this version:
- There are now numerous creep camps scattered across the map which have a chance to spawn different creeps and drop different items, some of which are hidden or tricky to reach, and there is a quest to destroy them
- Added a shop on the map where players can use their collected gold to buy items
- The New Scourge will now slowly amass troops in their base as time passes, and there are also new starting units in their base
- Kel'Thuzad, Balnazzar and Anub'arak are now enemies with Mak'catl and Selqar until the Forgotten One becomes controlled by them
- There is a new, mysterious faction emerging from the voodoo portal
And many other changes, alterations, additions, optimizations, fixes and updates.


v1.1 changelog:

- Renamed the map file to (5)EchoesOfNorthrend so it appears in the in-game list correctly
- Calculated shadows, so that the terrain and objects have their shadows now
- Altered the spawn area of Mak'catl and Selqar so it has more space, and also reduced the collision size of all player-controlled units there for less blocking
- Altered the spawn area of the Scourge hero trio, because it doesn't fit the great heroes of the Scourge's remains to be kept in water and replaced the Icy Gate with Dungeon Gate
- Reduced the health of Death Towers 450 -> 400, and Advanced Boulder Towers 500 -> 450
- The Warder now has 700 health in both of his forms (not 600 in the Gargoyle Form)
- Added some items that drop off of Tyrant Ratface, The Crane and The Warder
- Added two Crypt Fiends and a Nerubian Ziggurat to the eastern entrance to the New Scourge base
- Replaced the three Burrowed Carrion Beetles with three burrowed Crypt Fiends
- Researched some upgrades of the New Scourge so their units now have more abilities
- Mak'catl now also has Long Rifles, Flare and Fragmentation Shards researched for his dwarven units, same as Selqar
- Added spikes to the Ice Troll stronghold and protection runes under the gates to indicate that the units inside the stronghold become vulnerable and active only when the gate is destroyed
- The Mortar Teams now have Flare ability from the start
- Changed the orientation of Waterworks Technician and The Crane so that they look as if they are working, and not like they are expecting enemies
- Added some metal fences near the water system of the New Scourge, because even they care about having unpolluted water
- Changed the name of Selqar Cliffshaper to Selqar the Cliffshaper, because Cliffshaper isn't his surname and Nuke Squad to Nuclear Squad
- The Forgotten One is now correctly awarded to Player 4 (instead of Player 1) when the Control Skull dies, and its two already-spawned tentacles also
- The Warder now correctly becomes vulnerable only when Empowered Sapphiron dies
- Moved the start location of the New Scourge to their Black Citadel
- Tyrant Ratface now speaks when attacked
- Minor changes to the dialogues of the characters and the quest texts
- Numerous trigger fixes and optimizations
- Numerous doodad and terrain alterations and fixed some hovering doodads
- Numerous other minor changes, alterations, additions, optimizations, fixes and updates

Keywords:
echoes of northrend, northrend, kel'thuzad, anub'arak, balnazzar, sapphiron, snow, blight, bricks, ice trolls, faceless ones, undead, cooperation, nerubians, magnataur, tuskarr, mak'catl, aforedoom, selqar, cliffshaper
Previews
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Echoes of Northrend v3.3 (Map)

Reviews
01:36, 26th Sep 2015 StoPCampinGn00b: My rushed comment October 4 StoPCampinGn00b: After 9 times of failing and hosting, two of those times foolishly hosting without five players, we couldn't do it on both easy and normal. Just couldn't pass...

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01:36, 26th Sep 2015
StoPCampinGn00b: My rushed comment

October 4
StoPCampinGn00b: After 9 times of failing and hosting, two of those times foolishly hosting without five players, we couldn't do it on both easy and normal.

Just couldn't pass the forgotten one. I played on the other side only once, and that was on lan with one other guy on my team. We got as far as the "elevator" area where the forgotten one had to be killed in order for us to progress.

Anyway, I feel that this map has a high amount of potential because of how one must think of non-straightforward ways in defeating an enemy in standard WC3 combat. I think that you just really, really have to play this in a LAN party or a close group of friends to enjoy it. Playing with randoms makes it harder to coordinate in this extremely unforgiving map. Plus, they wouldn't want to come back.

I'm just really tired of just hosting and losing. People leave the map early which makes it much harder. To fix this, I think you should have share control enabled if someone leaves or if a player slot is left open.

I'm still really concerned about the depth of the map considering how there seems like very little space after the forgotten one. Maybe I'd be surprised, but how much can there actually be?

I highly suggest you make each task slightly easier and compensate by making the map longer. Map set to rejected. Feel free to PM me about a significantly updated version.
 
Level 32
Joined
Apr 2, 2013
Messages
3,953
Here's the problem. The first game I've played, the heroes died in one minute ending the game. The second time I've played, the heroes died after two minutes.

While it is fine to have maps that give a surprise of intensity at the beginning that coul end the game, very few maps pull this off. This map is destined for 1/5s from users just because of how much of a "turn off" it will be for most.

Why have I only tested it two times? Well, honestly, I didn't want to be that guy wasting other people's time. Both lobbies filled in three minutes maybe because of the appeal of titles I put out (New 5 player map! Test it!), but it's still wasting people's time and of course causes irritation.

The second time I hosted, I even warned the other two in the hero faction to pay attention, move quick, and don't die or else it's game over for everyone. Mistakes we're made.

Anyway, enough about the beginning. The terrain and decor was decent all around the map. You captured the right atmosphere of Northrend.

And after playing it on single player with whosyourdaddy then later iseedeadpeople. I realized there's a tiny bit of standard puzzle thinking required to get through obstacles. Maybe they aren't considered puzzles when comparing to other WC3 maps, but the for sure the map isn't a mindless game. I gave up after trying to figure the way to kill / cross the forgotten one after 8 minutes and turning iseedeadpeople on.

Everything else seemed okay in the map (no bugs, tool tip errors).

Anyway, the map has potential but the start in the experiences I had with other people we're extremely bitter. Most successful level developers usually take the traditional easy first to gradually harder route. I suggest you either nerf the start, give better tips ahead of time, or have it start somewhere else on an easier level.

Plus, I have the idea that this map is lacking content because of the size and genre. If you at least triple the map size you can get much more quality to fit in.

Map set to needs fix. It go back pending once you update it.
 
Level 15
Joined
Sep 6, 2015
Messages
576
The map has been updated.

I gave up after trying to figure the way to kill / cross the forgotten one after 8 minutes and turning iseedeadpeople on.

By the way, the map can't be done in single player. The two players starting from the other side of the map have to take control of the Forgotten One for the other three players to pass him.

Plus, I have the idea that this map is lacking content because of the size and genre. If you at least triple the map size you can get much more quality to fit in.

The map is small, but I tried to fit in as much content as I could in it, especially in version 2.0. Also, this is only the first map of the campaign and it being co-op campaign with many players, it shouldn't take a lot of time to complete. Furthermore, since all players lose if any of the heroes die, bigger map would be much more difficult, because the encounters are hard and tricky. The following map(s) of the campaign will be bigger.
 
Level 15
Joined
Sep 6, 2015
Messages
576
Can you try it out a few times?
Maybe your latest version made it break or something.
Can you tell me when it crashed exactly? At map initialization or a little after or at loading screen? Had you already chosen the difficulty? What exactly did you do or were you doing when it crashed?
Edit: And which player slots were occupied?
 
Level 26
Joined
Oct 2, 2011
Messages
2,482
This is certainly an interesting map.
A multiplayer campaignish thingy that was quite challenging and fun.

Although I didn't get really far, it was bug free for the part I played, and so it was for my gaming mate too.

I'll approve this based on the good game I had, and assume that you are going to want to update any bugs that may turn up in the future!
 
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