[Escape / Maze] Just another escape map? Oh noooees!

[SeriousEnemy]

Mad Escapers - Need feedback!

Hello and welcome to my first idea thread!

This post is for everyone who is interested in giving ideas, discussing gameplay adjustments and helping me not to create just another escape map.

Loadingscreen

Map name	Mad Escaper
Project started	18.01.13
Project expected to release	March 2013
Map protection	unprotected
Trigger language	Jass
Map makers	SeriousEnemy;
Ideas	bowser499; Doomlord; MiniMage
Current development time	Around 20 hours
Language	English
Singleplayer	Allowed!
Singleplayer cheats	Disabled
Systems	Mostly finished
Playable levels	currently 3

Tileset:
Every escape has the same tileset rules.
Do not touch snow, slide on ice,..

To keep traditions I've edited it just a little bit.

Snow	Death
Rocky snow	Death
Vines	Little damage over time
Poison	Much damage over time
Snowy ice	Slow slide
Dark ice	Fair slide
Light ice	Fast slide
Black Bricks	Vanishing in X
Black Squares	Vanishing in Y

Enemies:
And again, I will follow the tradition.
So some of them seem to be basic, but I will add special units.

Footman	Kills when touched
Knight	Kills when touched
Mortar #1	Slow firerate, high radius
Mortar #2	Fast firerate, average radius
Sorceress	Spell 'Cloud of truth'
Priest #1	Low Aoe damage, short range
Priest #2	Low Aoe damage, high range

Spells:

Not much to tell about..

Escaper Jump The escaper will jump into the air and ignores tileset modifications. But he will not ignore enemy units, missles and spells! Enemy units Cloud of truth Clouds appear in a line infront of the sorceress, consuming negative energy.

Gameplay
Level 1 and 2 are training levels. Which means you do not loose lifes and you can test anything you want.
I think that this is a good and useful idea, because it's always hard for first timers.

Most of the times you need to activate a switch or trigger a lever to open a door.
Some of the doors need player interactions. So two different switches need to be pressed down at the same time to open a door.
This is of course not required if you play singleplayer.

The game starts very easy and increases its difficulty from level to level.
Each level has it's own level info message with your objective.
So you always know what you should do there.
I will add puzzles, so you need to think about what you do.

Only the beginning levels (max. 5) are not unique. Any other level objective will be!

Bonus levels: There will be bonus levels for sure.
I'm not sure at this moment how they will look like. But they should be hard and random.
So you can earn lifes, spells or whatever.
I really need to think about that, but this is not important right now.^^


Death messages
What? Death messages? Players will notice when they die anyway..

Guess what: true, they will notice.
But I will add random (and hopefully funny) death messages for any kind of death.
So you will always recieve a fitting message.

A few examples: PlayerName, never touch the ice with your tongue again! PlayerName once was a mighty hero who slaughtered millions of units, but died by non moving plants.. PlayerName succeeded in becoming poisoned. Nice plan! PlayerName gained the "Poisoned Heart" award! PlayerName wanted to tickle a footman. He accidentally vellicate with his sword hand.. PlayerName, did you know that footmen are running around? PlayerName tried to mount a horse, but forgot about the knight.. And so on..

So why are you writing all this now Enemy?
To steal your time with useless mass texts of course.
And maybe because I want YOUR ideas.
Spell ideas, unit ideas, maze ideas, objective ideas, whatever you have in your mind.

Any help is appreciated and if I'm going to use your ideas you will be credited.
I do NOT want just another escape map, so I want to make it traditional, but still somehow unique.

Want to join my project? Tell me about your knowledge. Even if you are not good, you can still help! So don't be shy to ask!

Do not say anything against my terrain, it is far from beeing finished!

Screenshots

 

[Doomlord]

A few (maybe not funny) death messages

1. looks like you need Burn-Heal!
2. weee... (moved into Black Bricks/Squares)
3. was sent straight to Heaven by a priest
4. needs to pull himself together (killed by mortars)
5. showed us where to avoid (death by terrain)
6. is now history
7. has boldly traveled to where no one has gone before (stepped on Black Tiles)
8. is six feet under (snow death)

 

[SeriousEnemy]

A few (maybe not funny) death messages

1. was sent straight to Heaven by a priest
2. needs to pull himself together (killed by mortars)
3. showed us where to avoid (death by terrain)
4. is now history
5. has boldly traveled to where no one has gone before (stepped on Black Tiles)
6. is six feet under (snow death)

Good ideas, I've added the strings and your name

 

[MiniMage]

You're a bastard of a necormancer, left hanging in incinerating heroic heroes and dragons alike. Caught in a rut, where your exessive power no longer amuses you, you've chosen to go undercover as a priest and learn the other side of the teachings you've always lived by. You've been suspected of setting fire to dogs and acting unlike how a priest should act like, however, you are powerful and with a war at hand, strong disciples can't simply be dismissed,

You've instead been punished by being forced to go through the trials of the priests prematurely to learn the error of your ways. Something which one would assume to be easy. However, these trial grounds are blessed ground and your dark powers has thus been severely weakened while in this area. Knowing little of the light arts of mending and healing, you only got one option in your arsenal. Lies, backstabbing, using other priests as shields and petty dark arts to pass obstacles intended to be passed with the light arts. But are the others really regular priests? Or may they also have a foot inside the dark arts as well? Well, who cares, you need to get out of this place!

Spells would include stunning your allies/enemies, pushing your allies who get too close, if you so choose to do so. Lightning, leeching mana from your allies and later on, you may even work together with each other to summon minor summons to pass certain obstacles! Users who die has an annoying cooldown before being revived by a Master Priest at the back. Until then, the corpse is fair game and can thus be used as a shield or a player could leech life out of the corpse and get himself a boost, so that he may continue his quest to regain his/her power all the while joining priesthood.

Pushing could for example, be to push the ally into a hail of arrows then using the ally as a shield to pass the place. Although being a escape maze kind of game, this would give it a race spin on it as well. ;P

Enjoy, dude. Story, Ideas. May them be of use to you.

 

[SeriousEnemy]

Awesome.. really..

Well I guess I will use a lot of your ideas.
The story is nice and will be added for sure.

I'm not sure if it's a fun idea to make players fight each other.
But hell for what do we have settings?

+rep for this awesomness!

 

[Vladadamm]

Okay, you should start by renaming your commands ^^'
-cam -> -cf
Use the InvisUnit technic so that people can't right click on other heroes.
Change Tiles order : Death path should go above Slide/Run path.

Also, i don't like the Jump thing, it makes it too easy.

And finally, dunno if you have saw that ressource : http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/tools-560/max-escape-creation-v1-2-a-222928/, it might help you doing the map easily and it's the reference for slide maps atm.

 

[SeriousEnemy]

Okay, you should start by renaming your commands ^^'
-cam -> -cf
Use the InvisUnit technic so that people can't right click on other heroes.
Change Tiles order : Death path should go above Slide/Run path.

Also, i don't like the Jump thing, it makes it too easy.

And finally, dunno if you have saw that ressource : http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/tools-560/max-escape-creation-v1-2-a-222928/, it might help you doing the map easily and it's the reference for slide maps atm.

The jump spell is well balanced, it is hard enough with it
About the commands, I just started doing them.
Guess I could add shortcuts for it.


According to MiniMages post I made a loadingscreen.

 

[MiniMage]

So what kind of levels are we talking about here? I could expand on the story given a set of explanations of the trials you are to face. Then you could make it an extra mode. Narrative mode. Which would also have to include a story for the good guy as well.

 

[SeriousEnemy]

The priests have to solve a couple of different stages to become a master priest.

The first part is the classy walk. Which means you will have several different terrain pathings which will make your moves harder (slide, damage, avoid enemys and bullets).

The second part checks your reaction and fast thinking.
A priest always needs to keep an eye on what is happening, even before it happens.
Mass spawns from random locations should be avoided and terrain might change under your feet.

And the third part includes riddles, maths, general questions and other stuff.
You should start working as a team here.
Which means good and evil start helping and killing each other here.
Some negative spells can cause positive effects in some levels.