Warcraft 4 - New Content Patch

[Maxwell]

PATREON
DISCORD

Thanks for playing.

 

[stein123]

"Feel free and write about the found bugs"
I found an entire race! and they're awesome btw XD

 

[lichao001486]

Very good custom race map.

 

[HuanJuan]

You forgot the #reforged hashtag. I recommend to add it.

 

[Deleted member 247165]

Reserved for review!

 

[Maxwell]

Reserved for review!

I'm glad if it makes you excited!

 

[Deleted member 247165]

I'm glad if it makes you excited!

It looks like a pretty solid custom race and knowing your attention to details, I'm sure it will be much fun to play it.

 

[deepstrasz]

You forgot the #reforged hashtag. I recommend to add it.

I disagree. It's not Reforged graphics mandatory. It's for the Classic version.

 

[HuanJuan]

I disagree. It's not Reforged graphics mandatory. It's for the Classic version.

I think it's not about Graphics. If you want to play some reforge (game) edited maps, you don't have any other option to play: just Reforged(game). No matter the graphics, if something is reforged edited(game), than it's need reforged. No matter is SD or not SD, you need to have the Reforged version of the game. Just try Mustering Lore Mire: it's SD graphics, but you can't play on a normal 1.31,1.30, 1.29 etc. version of the game. SevenBloods Curse of the Bloodelfs Revamp is the same: YOU NEED a REFORGED GAME, no matter is SD graphics.

 

[deepstrasz]

I think it's not about Graphics. If you want to play some reforge (game) edited maps, you don't have any other option to play: just Reforged(game). No matter the graphics, if something is reforged edited(game), than it's need reforged. No matter is SD or not SD, you need to have the Reforged version of the game. Just try Mustering Lore Mire: it's SD graphics, but you can't play on a normal 1.31,1.30, 1.29 etc. version of the game. SevenBloods Curse of the Bloodelfs Revamp is the same: YOU NEED a REFORGED GAME, no matter is SD graphics.

I disagree again. If you play on 1.27 or 1.26 for example, you won't be able to play maps made on 1.29, 1.30 etc. So, no, Reforged does not mean anything past 1.31 (unless you are referring to custom campaigns since they don't work anymore on 1.32+) but only the so-called HD part. There's a reason why in the video game options you have Reforged and Classic.

 

[Maxwell]

I disagree again. If you play on 1.27 or 1.26 for example, you won't be able to play maps made on 1.29, 1.30 etc. So, no, Reforged does not mean anything past 1.31 (unless you are referring to custom campaigns since they don't work anymore on 1.32+) but only the so-called HD part. There's a reason why in the video game options you have Reforged and Classic.

I agree with you, Deepstrasz. So no tags for Reforged. I guess we can end it here.
(P.S: also btw - even if Alexen already reserved a review, I would still love to know what you think of it. If you have some spare time, for sure.)

 

[Deleted member 247165]

I'll start by saying that it's really nice that I can choose the race I wanna play in game and not actually pregame from the menu. I played it two times vs orcs then vs undead. I just wanna say that I literally have nothing to complain. Despite my usual small approach to altered melees, I can spot the amount of work and dedication and ironically, how balanced the race is. Usually custom races tend to be superior to the default ones but this one has both advantages and disadvantages, and is really balanced. The troops are spawned from eggs (Kerrigan would be so proud of you for this). The structures, the icons, the techtree overall is just amazing. I'm curious where did you find such amazing buildings? Or I suppose you edited them to fit the race. They are so HQ and colorful, especially the Tomb of Relics (Underground Temple), not to mention every detail on their masonry and so on. Art, that's how I would define it. My favorite hero is the prophet so far. Teamed up with some Ambushers and Flyers, she rocks. I love it ! Since you made that system to choose the race once the game loads, you should totally go for additional custom races in the same map. Would love to see a real custom race related to Wood Elves or something like that, just amazing!


Approved!

 

[Maxwell]

I'll start by saying that it's really nice that I can choose the race I wanna play in game and not actually pregame from the menu. I played it two times vs orcs then vs undead. I just wanna say that I literally have nothing to complain. Despite my usual small approach to altered melees, I can spot the amount of work and dedication and ironically, how balanced the race is. Usually custom races tend to be superior to the default ones but this one has both advantages and disadvantages, and is really balanced. The troops are spawned from eggs (Kerrigan would be so proud of you for this). The structures, the icons, the techtree overall is just amazing. I'm curious where did you find such amazing buildings? Or I suppose you edited them to fit the race. They are so HQ and colorful, especially the Tomb of Relics (Underground Temple), not to mention every detail on their masonry and so on. Art, that's how I would define it. My favorite hero is the prophet so far. Teamed up with some Ambushers and Flyers, she rocks. I love it ! Since you made that system to choose the race once the game loads, you should totally go for additional custom races in the same map. Would love to see a real custom race related to Wood Elves or something like that, just amazing!


Approved!

Thank you a lot for your time, Alexen!
I din't expect such results but hey, I believe it's good news.

This buildings are standart Wc3 buildings just with some edits and handmade textures to look colorful and rich as Nerubian should be. Thank you for appreciating my work. I will go with additional races for sure, but when I will be done with this one. In my plans are replacing some buildings and effects to get rid of all standart Wc3 elements.

 

[The Nightmare Book]

Played it as Nerubian Queen/Hero-with-Nerubian Eggs and defeated my humble enemy orc without any issues, even without T2 tech:

• I think that should be some way to add button to "Spawnining Grounds" like "Select Hatched Eggs". Because I liked that using waypoint will be destination for selected eggs from selected "spawning ground", but it still needs to manually re-select all eggs. Just like SC-Zerg micromanagment - quickly select eggs from selected spawning ground;
• Models are really nice! They fit for selected atmosphere of map and their building effect insane. Is it self-made or it was borrowed from somewhere? It would be nice to hear
• I don't understand why my Nerubian Queen "Royal Guard" is undead. 'Cause all nerubians we play are considered as alive nerubians, I thought that was a bug;

From balance perspective - strat like zerg rush works like clock.
Bot cannot quickly oriente on map and when you build at least 7-8 spawning grounds and have second base, you can just spam him with broodlings and with upgrade "Accelerate Something" and Nerubian Queen with first maxed spell…
You can create eggs from nothing and potentially breed broodlings during battle both from train and losing eggs.

Even with those listed complains/notes, I admit that you've done a lot of work to do that race and I like it to play and defeat with them my Orc foe.
Was fun!

 

[Maxwell]

Played it as Nerubian Queen/Hero-with-Nerubian Eggs and defeated my humble enemy orc without any issues, even without T2 tech:

• I think that should be some way to add button to "Spawnining Grounds" like "Select Hatched Eggs". Because I liked that using waypoint will be destination for selected eggs from selected "spawning ground", but it still needs to manually re-select all eggs. Just like SC-Zerg micromanagment - quickly select eggs from selected spawning ground;
• Models are really nice! They fit for selected atmosphere of map and their building effect insane. Is it self-made or it was borrowed from somewhere? It would be nice to hear
• I don't understand why my Nerubian Queen "Royal Guard" is undead. 'Cause all nerubians we play are considered as alive nerubians, I thought that was a bug;

From balance perspective - strat like zerg rush works like clock.
Bot cannot quickly oriente on map and when you build at least 7-8 spawning grounds and have second base, you can just spam him with broodlings and with upgrade "Accelerate Something" and Nerubian Queen with first maxed spell…
You can create eggs from nothing and potentially breed broodlings during battle both from train and losing eggs.

Even with those listed complains/notes, I admit that you've done a lot of work to do that race and I like it to play and defeat with them my Orc foe.
Was fun!

Thank you a lot for playing!

I consider making hotkey button for selection of all avaliable Nerubian Eggs of Spawning Ground that are not hatching. It's coming in the new patch.

Buildings are rewraped with custom drawn textures. Most of buildings where optimizated by Ujimasa.
Birth model are complex. I cant animate, so I use dummy abilities, triggers and even locust ability to make it pop. Also it is based on edited version of Nerubian Birth by MatiS.

About Royal Guard - my bad, it is bug and will be fixed in the next update.

Thank you again for your review, your notes are appreciated

 

[Wazzz]

This is a nicely designed faction, utilizing Zerg mechanics and tying them in with the Food Production structure adds a nice overarching gimmick to the faction that doesn't feel too overbearing. I believe it has been mentioned above, but I would like individual rally points for cocoons - ones that default to the Spawning Pool's rally point would be ideal, especially seeing as I have played as the Nerubian Queen so far and it could be a bit annoying at times needing to backtrack to where I spawned a unit at a stray cocoon I spawned using her unique take on Storm Bolt.

With a focus on the Nerubian Queen so far, I found the hero abilities to be interesting, some of them sporting alternative effects of ingame abilities, although I am somewhat skeptical towards her Ultimate. From what I can gather, it is effectively Big Bad Voodoo, but instead of units it targets structures. I am not too sure how many scenarios this would be useful in, for an ultimate ability (which is also, hilariously enough, pretty on brand for ingame heroes seeing as there are some cases where ultimates aren't worth getting and you would rather get level 3 of their basic abilities, such as the Far Seer with Earthquake VS level 3 Chain Lightning & Feral Spirit).

I think what I like most about this faction is the simple yet innovative concepts regarding unit upgrades and abilities. Broodlings having basic ingame stats as a Spiderling (very nice callback, I like this style and used a similar design approach myself) with upgrades allowing them to deal extra damage to slowed units is great fun, especially in combination with all the Spider Webbing you can lay down between Ambushers and your structures. Design concepts like these are what can make or break a faction - special attention to individual units, even ones as basic (and expendable) as the Broodlings, with a complimentary design towards the overarching style of the faction.

I also just saw your above comment about birth animations, and these are surprisingly easy to edit for models using Shared Birth animations - if you are able to, you can save the .mdx files in the .mdl format (there is a converter specially made for this, but you can also use most other model editing programs uploaded on the hive, such as Retera's Model Studio or Magos). If you open the .mdl model in Notepad, and it uses the SharedBirthModel path (like Undead, Night Elf and Naga structures), you can change the path to be a custom model path of your choosing. From there, you can use whatever approach you used to convert the .mdl file back to .mdx. That being said, I would not have picked that you did not know how to do this, since it looks fine as it is ingame and performs well.

I think I'll be looking deeper into this faction and seeing what other references there are (such as the Ambusher's attack being suspiciously reminiscent of RoC Crypt Fiends which is a reference I love, and funnily enough ending up with the same health value as the current Huntress after their Heavy Armor upgrade - so far, this has been my favourite unit to abuse). There's a great attention to detail so far, and the design already feels very solid.

 

[Maxwell]

First of all - thank you a lot for cheking out, hope it was fun experience and you will stick around.

This is a nicely designed faction, utilizing Zerg mechanics and tying them in with the Food Production structure adds a nice overarching gimmick to the faction that doesn't feel too overbearing. I believe it has been mentioned above, but I would like individual rally points for cocoons - ones that default to the Spawning Pool's rally point would be ideal, especially seeing as I have played as the Nerubian Queen so far and it could be a bit annoying at times needing to backtrack to where I spawned a unit at a stray cocoon I spawned using her unique take on Storm Bolt.

Let me specifie how Rally Points work right now:
If Nerubian Egg was spawned by Spawning Lair - it will inherit its Rally Point.
If Nerubian Egg was moved by Brood Guardian or was created by Nerubian Queen - the egg dont have a rally point, but when you decide to hatch it into something you can RMB and set it's own Rally Point as usual. So 1. Start hatching 2. Set rally point.
I know it is kinda not obvious, but that's how it works. Rally point button is just hidden.

With a focus on the Nerubian Queen so far, I found the hero abilities to be interesting, some of them sporting alternative effects of ingame abilities, although I am somewhat skeptical towards her Ultimate. From what I can gather, it is effectively Big Bad Voodoo, but instead of units it targets structures. I am not too sure how many scenarios this would be useful in, for an ultimate ability (which is also, hilariously enough, pretty on brand for ingame heroes seeing as there are some cases where ultimates aren't worth getting and you would rather get level 3 of their basic abilities, such as the Far Seer with Earthquake VS level 3 Chain Lightning & Feral Spirit).

Nerubian Queen ultimate - basically yeah, Bad Voodoo, but you don't need to channel it. It just buffs sctructures around.
Is it useful? It matters from situation. Yeah, I wanted to have some ultimates that would be ignored, ironically, because each race have some of that, just like you said.
Tho why this ultimate exist:
1. Lore reason - Nerubian empire where attacked by Undeads and Faceless ones, so there are some bit of 'defend the city' experience.
2. The main weakness of troop production system - it can spam units without queue, but Nerubian Eggs are too vulnerable. So maybe if you are attacked you can defend your buildings, towers and eggs to help you fight back.

I also just saw your above comment about birth animations, and these are surprisingly easy to edit for models using Shared Birth animations - if you are able to, you can save the .mdx files in the .mdl format (there is a converter specially made for this, but you can also use most other model editing programs uploaded on the hive, such as Retera's Model Studio or Magos). If you open the .mdl model in Notepad, and it uses the SharedBirthModel path (like Undead, Night Elf and Naga structures), you can change the path to be a custom model path of your choosing. From there, you can use whatever approach you used to convert the .mdl file back to .mdx. That being said, I would not have picked that you did not know how to do this, since it looks fine as it is ingame and performs well.

Yeah, thank you but it is exactly what I have done. What I meant there was that NerubianBirth.mdx are just base of birth animation. Since I can't edit (don't know how to) model itself I use additional abilities with effects and triggers with timers to enchance the whole Birth experience. And, well, it turned out interesting.

I think I'll be looking deeper into this faction and seeing what other references there are (such as the Ambusher's attack being suspiciously reminiscent of RoC Crypt Fiends which is a reference I love, and funnily enough ending up with the same health value as the current Huntress after their Heavy Armor upgrade - so far, this has been my favourite unit to abuse). There's a great attention to detail so far, and the design already feels very solid.

Thank you again sir, It's a pleasure for me.

 

[Wazzz]

First of all - thank you a lot for cheking out, hope it was fun experience and you will stick around.

Let me specifie how Rally Points work right now:
If Nerubian Egg waw spawned by Spawning Lair - it will inherit its Rally Point.
If Nerubian Egg was moved by Brood Guardian or was created by Nerubian Queen - the egg dont have a rally point, but when you decide to hatch it into something you can RMB and set it's own Rally Point as usual. So 1. Start hatching 2. Set rally point.
I know it is kinda not obvious, but that's how it works. Rally point button is just hidden.

Nerubian Queen ultimate - basically yeah, Bad Voodoo, but you don't need to channel it. It just buffs sctructures around.
Is it useful? It matters from situation. Yeah, I wanted to have some ultimates that would be ignored, ironically, because each race have some of that, just like you said.
Tho why this ultimate exist:
1. Lore reason - Nerubian empire where attacked by Undeads and Faceless ones, so there are some bit of 'defend the city' experience.
2. The main weakness of troop production system - it can spam units without queue, but Nerubian Eggs are too vulnerable. So maybe if you are attacked you can defend your buildings, towers and eggs to help you fight back.

Yeah, thank you but it is exactly what I have done. What I meant there was that NerubianBirth.mdx are just base of birth animation. Since I can't edit (don't know how to) model itself I use additional abilities with effects and triggers with timers to enchance the whole Birth experience. And, well, it turned out interesting.

Thank you again sir, It's a pleasure for me.

Ah, I think in the version I played around with there might not have been Rally Points, and I see this has been updated so I am going to need to stay on top of this

I also love the attention to lore with this faction's design, I'm curious to see what other goodies I might uncover in subsequent playthroughs

 

[Wa666r]

Awesome! Another Nerubian race!

I played around with your race and I overall think its a great high quality faction; however I have a few points and things I disliked or think you can better optimize.

Things I Disliked/Other:

• Firstly, my biggest issue are the "Trap" abilities on your structures. Moreso with the fact when you obtain those upgrades the icons for them push around existing icons and make the other icons for researches, heroes, and items go all around the place. I'd suggest having a clickable spellbook at the 0,3 position and have those building trap abilities stay neatly in there. You already have all the icons for them anyways.
• You put so much work into the everything else that when I looked at the items list I was disappointed. The two new you items you have in there are nice and they synergize with the faction which is great, but they don't even have a custom icon. And the lack of a unique custom orb and another unique T1 item also left me disappointed.
• Burrowed units don't have any team color indication. This was part of the reason I omitted to go deeply into with my race. Maybe it's a personal reason.
• No AoE Dispel.
• No team color on you Nerubian Eggs.
• Personal gripe: I just hate the vanilla style hotkeys.
• Typo on the Underground Temple. you spelled it "Undeground"
• Underground Tunnel also has the "Undeground" typo.
• No unique icon for Underground Tunnel.
• Ambusher has no portrait when burrowed.
• Spider Lord tooltip reads "Impaling Attack," upgrade reads "Impaling Attack," ability name "Impaling Strike."
• Nerubian Flyer projectile is just a vanilla firebolt, seems unfitting.
• Librarians Erudite Aura becomes useless late game when all heroes are maxed. I'd add a 2nd effect that buffs maxed heroes.
• Both siege units are flyers. Granted one is short ranged while other is long. Would prefer a ground siege unit for balance.

Things I Liked:

• All the custom buildings textures and especially the birth animation.
• Amazing and cohesive icons for the units, structures, and heroes.
• I loved pretty much every unit.
• The Spider Nest ability looks and works very fitting to Nerubians.
• A lot of synergy with the all the units.
• The training system with the eggs.
• Upgrade icons are great as well.
• Great job on all the heroes and their synergies.
• Loved the varied use of hero ults. Some defensive. Some utility. Some setting up traps.
• Loved the custom textures on a lot of the units.
• The wiki you made. Shows a lot of love and care.
• Overall care and quality.

Additionally, looking through I noticed that your Nerubians cant be Charmed or Possessed, which is well and good from the lore aspect but I dont think it's a great idea from a gameplay standpoint. In vanilla you can charm and hire Nerubian creeps. You also negate Undead's counter play against high value target strats just by playing Nerubians. I don't know how I feel about it.

 

[Kyrbi0]

Awesome! Another Nerubian race!

I played around with your race and I overall think its a great high quality faction; however I have a few points and things I disliked or think you can better optimize.

Things I Disliked/Other:

• Firstly, my biggest issue are the "Trap" abilities on your structures. Moreso with the fact when you obtain those upgrades the icons for them push around existing icons and make the other icons for researches, heroes, and items go all around the place. I'd suggest having a clickable spellbook at the 0,3 position and have those building trap abilities stay neatly in there. You already have all the icons for them anyways.
• You put so much work into the everything else that when I looked at the items list I was disappointed. The two new you items you have in there are nice and they synergize with the faction which is great, but they don't even have a custom icon. And the lack of a unique custom orb and another unique T1 item also left me disappointed.
• Burrowed units don't have any team color indication. This was part of the reason I omitted to go deeply into with my race. Maybe it's a personal reason.
• No AoE Dispel.
• No team color on you Nerubian Eggs.
• Personal gripe: I just hate the vanilla style hotkeys.
• Typo on the Underground Temple. you spelled it "Undeground"
• Underground Tunnel also has the "Undeground" typo.
• No unique icon for Underground Tunnel.
• Ambusher has no portrait when burrowed.
• Spider Lord tooltip reads "Impaling Attack," upgrade reads "Impaling Attack," ability name "Impaling Strike."
• Nerubian Flyer projectile is just a vanilla firebolt, seems unfitting.
• Librarians Erudite Aura becomes useless late game when all heroes are maxed. I'd add a 2nd effect that buffs maxed heroes.
• Both siege units are flyers. Granted one is short ranged while other is long. Would prefer a ground siege unit for balance.

Things I Liked:

• All the custom buildings textures and especially the birth animation.
• Amazing and cohesive icons for the units, structures, and heroes.
• I loved pretty much every unit.
• The Spider Nest ability looks and works very fitting to Nerubians.
• A lot of synergy with the all the units.
• The training system with the eggs.
• Upgrade icons are great as well.
• Great job on all the heroes and their synergies.
• Loved the varied use of hero ults. Some defensive. Some utility. Some setting up traps.
• Loved the custom textures on a lot of the units.
• The wiki you made. Shows a lot of love and care.
• Overall care and quality.

Good review, just a quick note: technically his faction does have an AoE Dispel; it's "Usurp Magic" on the Prophet hero. Fairly unorthodox but...

 

[Maxwell]

Firstly, thank you a lot for a long post and your time playing. Your feedback is appreciated.

Firstly, my biggest issue are the "Trap" abilities on your structures. Moreso with the fact when you obtain those upgrades the icons for them push around existing icons and make the other icons for researches, heroes, and items go all around the place. I'd suggest having a clickable spellbook at the 0,3 position and have those building trap abilities stay neatly in there. You already have all the icons for them anyways.

There are no need in spell book since you can have only 1 trap at a time. I was not experiencing such an issue, but technically it can be present. I will look into it and fix this issue if it is bothering. Coming in the next patch.

You put so much work into the everything else that when I looked at the items list I was disappointed. The two new you items you have in there are nice and they synergize with the faction which is great, but they don't even have a custom icon. And the lack of a unique custom orb and another unique T1 item also left me disappointed.

Custom Icons - this will occur several times in your review, so I explain myself here. As I said before there are things that are going to be changed and replaced. For example some units like Broodlings or Brood Guards do not have proper burrow animation, that can be solved only in case if some nice modeling guy will be interested in the project and would like to help. Same goes for custom Icons - they will be made. I just didn't feel it was right to delay the release of the map, just because I'm missing 2-3 icons that are not as important as balance are. I better run the reviews going to be able fix balance issues while I am thinking about those Icons and how I want them to look like.

Burrowed units don't have any team color indication. This was part of the reason I omitted to go deeply into with my race. Maybe it's a personal reason.

I know about this issue and it bother me too. But still I dont want to go with Hero Glow "patch on a knee", feels to me like not an elegant solution. I will try to read in how to make a Team Colored burrow texture.

No AoE Dispel.

As Kyrbi0 said - there is, in the Propthet of Unseen Hero abilities. Why so?
In classic races we have different approaches to this ability and its availability.
Human - adept caster ability.
Orc - special caster ability.
Undead - kind of late game uber unit ability.
Night elf - worker unit ability right from the start.
So for Nerubians, lacking the place where to put mass dispell, was decided to make in unique too and give ability to the Hero.

No team color for Nerubian Egg.

Same as for burrow. It will be there later.

Personal gripe: I just hate the vanilla style hotkeys.

Same, actually. But I am trying to make it as Blizardish as I can, so.. and also there are things that experienced Wc3 players would expect to see when they press hotkey button.

Typo on the Underground Temple. you spelled it "Undeground"
Underground Tunnel also has the "Undeground" typo.

Embarrassed but fixed, thanks.

• Ambusher has no portrait when burrowed.

It's a model issue. Same goes for Nerubian Eggs, they dont have a proper portrait. Will be fixed when I will know how to do it.

• Spider Lord tooltip reads "Impaling Attack," upgrade reads "Impaling Attack," ability name "Impaling Strike."

Changed.

• Nerubian Flyer projectile is just a vanilla firebolt, seems unfitting.

Yes, it's vanilla dragon breath missile, that are not used in any of classic races.
Why I use it? The first time you can meet Nerubian Flyer in Wow, where it came from, is in location called borean tundra. There are a lot of them attacking the walls of Alliance stronghold with fire. Actually they are called Scourged Flamespitter, and yes, they are undead, but necromancy is not a type of power that will enchance someone with the fire magic or abilities. So in fact - those Nerubian flyers spitting fire are the only one "documented" example of a nerubian siege attack.
So that is why they are attacking with "firebolt" model and have siege attack.

• Librarians Erudite Aura becomes useless late game when all heroes are maxed. I'd add a 2nd effect that buffs maxed heroes.

Yes, but I doubt there will be moment in the game, when you will have 3 lvl10 heroes. Also the idea behind this spell was to max it, benefit from it and than anyway buy a Foliant that allow you to re-learn your abilities or how this thing is called anyway.
I just feel that this aura is already way to strong in fact to buff it with additional effects. But if there will be need in it I probably will go with "exchance oferflowing experience into mana restoration" or something.. I will think about it.

• Both siege units are flyers. Granted one is short ranged while other is long. Would prefer a ground siege unit for balance.

Yea, thats bother me too. But for now I dont have a better idea how to build units tech-tree.

As i said Nerubian flyer must be siege.
Swarmer are the only one long ranged attacker that can count as "catapult".
Maybe Spider Lord will have special siege attack against buildings while burrowed even without upgrade.

Additionally, looking through I noticed that your Nerubians cant be Charmed or Possessed, which is well and good from the lore aspect but I dont think it's a great idea from a gameplay standpoint. In vanilla you can charm and hire Nerubian creeps. You also negate Undead's counter play against high value target strats just by playing Nerubians. I don't know how I feel about it.

Well I dont agree with it.
Firstly - not all nerubians are protected from such spells. 'Nerubians' are only units affected by Nerubian Carapace or Nerubian Weaponry, casters and Heroes. Yes, it's a majority as you would expect it from Nerubian race. But still there are units that can be stolen via mind control.
Aslo we have a racist ability called Holy Light, that can damage only Undead units. But they still are kinda strongest classic race in my opinion.
Disease Cloud and Possession are not the most essential factors that make them strong tho. So I believe Undeads can live with it.

-------
And again thank you for an elaborated review! You really dig in each and every detail of it and I appreciate it. The things you pointed that I can change already will be uploaded later in the new patch.

 

[Wazzz]

One thing I noticed with your immunity to Possession and Charm is, at present, it doesn't determine if the target is Nerubian - so at the moment, these spells are not allowed to target anybody.

I also love the added detail of Nerubians being immune to Disease Cloud, I'm sensing you are no stranger to WoWpedia and WoWhead

 

[Maxwell]

One thing I noticed with your immunity to Possession and Charm is, at present, it doesn't determine if the target is Nerubian - so at the moment, these spells are not allowed to target anybody.

Shit, thank you for that! I was testing the best way to prevent mind control and forgot to remove the trigger. Well, you have summoned a hot fix :|

And the lack of a unique custom orb and another unique T1 item also left me disappointed.

Also about that - there no need in unique orb if we have unused one, that perfectly suits Nerubians. The slow it gives are essential to Broodlings and allow to benefit from feast all the time, since if you think about it there are not many slow abilities avaliable native to Nerubians.

And web at the shop are just nice touch that add ani air ability, and kinda are different thing that straight forward crypt fiend web ability for one of units.

 

[Kyrbi0]

Update day woo!

 

[stan0033]

nice job

 

[Raytheon Thunder]

Was interested in this initially then saw the maps were only for the reforged versions of the game. Which is a shame.

 

[Maxwell]

Was interested in this initially then saw the maps were only for the reforged versions of the game. Which is a shame.

The map uses latest patch, so yeah, you need updated Wc3.
The maps dont support Reforget HD graphic tho, SD only.
I dont own "Reforged" version of the game, only classic license so I got latest updates too.
If you cant play this maps it means you dont have Reforged version nor Classic license.
The shame is using pirated Wc3.

 

[Raytheon Thunder]

If you cant play this maps it means you dont have Reforged version nor Classic license.
The shame is using pirated Wc3.

The shame is not wanting to keep a bloated, oversized, buggy version of the game on PC and keep using the old versions. But good gaslighting, man.

 

[Bleeq]

Hey Maxwell, after seeing your custom race featured on Grubby's Youtube channel I was inspired to actually start working on my kobold custom race idea that I developed during lockdown boredom. I originally wrote out a bunch of design in spreadsheets but decided it was a waste of time to try to develop it. Plus Reforged was a bit of a downer.

There's a bit of conceptual overlap between our visions, in particular: very weak T1 melee, expanded burrowing, fast tunnel movement a la Nydus Worm, a way to disable detection abilities. There might be some others but they were all unintended, I promise .

I guess this post was supposed to be asking permission to reuse some of your triggers, so how about it? Mainly the race selection mechanism and I also saw you had a deprecated Heroic Leap ability, which I'd like to look at and maybe reuse. I was also going to give feedback but I should load up your map and refresh my memory before going into details.

My general feedback from memory is the aesthetics were very polished, the general design was good and there are some very interesting and novel abilities or approaches. However I think there are some (mostly minor) balance problems or strange unit counter considerations.

I'd be interested in your opinions on my kobolds when I have an alpha ready.
There's also 2 hero Ultimates that I'm not completely happy with and a caster's third spell which I have 2 ideas for, but neither are very good. The spell archetype is a hard disable used against high pop/value units, which is filled in the other races by Polymorph, Cripple/Possession, Whirlwind and Devour. The caster's theme is diseases.

p.s. I might have come up with another way to make nydus work but I'll have to get back to you after testing.

 

[Maxwell]

@Bleeq
You can find Heroic Leap and Custom Race Select on Hive, it's not mine systems.
Nydus and pretty much everything else are mine, and I would like it to not be extracted from the map.

 

[Bleeq]

Okay no worries.

Were there specific reasons you absolutely needed the damage engine or did you include it mostly by default and then used it here or there because it was available (e.g. with the Underlord's aura)?
I've been avoiding using it because I'm still getting a handle on the basics but I don't think it would have solved any of the problems I've come across anyway.

 

[Maxwell]

Hi all.

The project has been expanded with another new custom race - Naga. It also follows the same high quality design philosophy of the old Blizzards.
In the future there will be the last one custom race included, and other additional content to the game.

I would also like to ask you, the players, and the Hiveworkshop reviewers to revisit this thread in the maps section - I could upload this race as a separate map, but I want them all in one place, in one resource, in one world for players.

So I am waiting for your feedback.
Thank you for attention.

 

[BABA]

Great and amazing job. Nerubians are undead or live creatures ?

 

[Maxwell]

Great and amazing job. Nerubians are undead or live creatures ?

Thanks. Live and furious to fight undead.

 

[BABA]

Thanks. Live and furious to fight undead.

Like Old Nerubian Empire

 

[Kyrbi0]

Woah! What an update; really going all out, turning this into a project with a much larger scope! Your Nerubians were quite cool & beautiful, so I can't wait to meet the rest.

 

[The Nightmare Book]

Here comes a new version, shall we?

Played as Naga against a normal computer enemy (it was Night Elf, heh). Got caught in a resource block due to an unsuccessful macro and failed.
However, I liked your implementation of this mostly created custom race - especially the idea about overseers and tidal guards.
Encountered small errors like:

• MurCloc Village;
• Both the spellcaster building and T3(?) building mention Naga Sirens - they are the same units from 2 different buildings or not?

Overall this race is good to play and possibly you can zerg-rush with Murlocs if you're fast enough, or go to macro and defeat with myrmidons.
Here is my try to do it, maybe I'll give it a shot for another map run!

 

[Maxwell]

Here comes a new version, shall we?

Played as Naga against a normal computer enemy (it was Night Elf, heh). Got caught in a resource block due to an unsuccessful macro and failed.
However, I liked your implementation of this mostly created custom race - especially the idea about overseers and tidal guards.
Encountered small errors like:

• MurCloc Village;
• Both the spellcaster building and T3(?) building mention Naga Sirens - they are the same units from 2 different buildings or not?

Overall this race is good to play and possibly you can zerg-rush with Murlocs if you're fast enough, or go to macro and defeat with myrmidons.
Here is my try to do it, maybe I'll give it a shot for another map run!

First of all - thank you for playing.

The economy part of Naga is specific so you should get used to it, it is true.
Thanks for found typos! They always slip from me..

FIXED

 

[puck]

Played as Naga，I must say it is a good diy race,overall,I feel interesting for it.I just need some time to adapt new units and heroes.
I think a bit unwell for the model of hight arcanist.Her hair looks strange.I think maybe you can just use the model of queen azshara, and even use the name of"naga queen".After all we have nerubian queen here.
And why naga cant swim on the sea?

 

[Maxwell]

Played as Naga，I must say it is a good diy race,overall,I feel interesting for it.I just need some time to adapt new units and heroes.
I think a bit unwell for the model of hight arcanist.Her hair looks strange.I think maybe you can just use the model of queen azshara, and even use the name of"naga queen".After all we have nerubian queen here.
And why naga cant swim on the sea?

Sadly, this mechanic is very dangerous and can be overhelming in some melee maps that have water. They where not designed to have units that can swim.

Played as Naga，I must say it is a good diy race,overall,I feel interesting for it.I just need some time to adapt new units and heroes.
I think a bit unwell for the model of hight arcanist.Her hair looks strange.I think maybe you can just use the model of queen azshara, and even use the name of"naga queen".After all we have nerubian queen here.
And why naga cant swim on the sea?

We don't have any better model for it.
And I don't use "Naga Queen" because there is some rules in Blizz hero naming - name represent same rare units, but never something specific that is unique and exist in 1 exemplar. So where there can be a few Nerubian Queens, Naga have only one Queen Azshara. And also it is confusing having both Naga Queen and Nerubian Queen in one map.

 

[KroLu]

Hey Max, do you use Discord? I would like to ask few questions about your project. Please join my discord channel so we can have a talk Join the KróLu Discord Server! or let me know on my twitch

 

[HKB]

Well done, bro

 

[puck]

Sadly, this mechanic is very dangerous and can be overhelming in some melee maps that have water. They where not designed to have units that can swim.

We don't have any better model for it.
And I don't use "Naga Queen" because there is some rules in Blizz hero naming - name represent same rare units, but never something specific that is unique and exist in 1 exemplar. So where there can be a few Nerubian Queens, Naga have only one Queen Azshara. And also it is confusing having both Naga Queen and Nerubian Queen in one map.

Emmm,yep,you are right.Azshara is unique,naga dont have other queen.But I just feel pity for no map use her new model.(she has 3 versions)
or maybe add her as Easter Eggs character?Naga player can use her somehow

 

[Bleeq]

So I'm gonna do my in-depth review of Nerubians, now that there's a recent update. I'll try to spoiler minute details/ranting and we'll see if I get through the whole thing, or finish it off in another post :/ I haven't played the Naga yet.
Had a pretty big think about them at work today so hopefully that's ~half the work done.
Also note I won't be holding back, though I'm not claiming my opinion/arguments as any sort of authority obv. If you disagree I'd be happy to hear your logic.

Generally I think the theme is cool, I don't know how many of the assets you made yourself but they look pretty cool. Personally I don't put a lot of weight into assets/art at least for hobby projects like this because it is a massive time sink and might require specific knowledge or skills, so I don't blame people for reusing other assets or reskinning etc. That said I think you did a good job matching colours and aesthetics, skill icons look nice and match thematically. I think the colours match well with the heroes or units: for example Widow's icons have a colour theme and Vizier's are all magic/arcane looking.

Similarly you obviously wanted proper burrow animations for a couple of units that don't have them, but whatever; if I figure out how to get rotations to work properly in Mdlvis I might even try to make some for you lol.
However, quite a few models have buggy/faulty extents which makes them hard to click. This can be changed in Magos. Retera's has a button to recalculate extents, but when I used it on one of my models it broke some particle emitters so be careful.

Buildings:

• -Many of the extents and collisions are off on these, especially when they are being built. There are some that are very hard to click while they are being built, the tower being a prime example. This should be fixable in Magos.
  • Also it's hard to see the workers after they finish a Spawning Lair.
• -They look cool, but I feel like they look samey and are kind of hard to tell apart, beside the obvious ones like spawning with the eggs etc. Maybe this isn't a massive problem because most are just enablers so the spawners should be the prime target, but then maybe it's the opposite and targeting an enabler would be better to block training of that type of unit?
• -The names aren't very descriptive and every time I try the map out I always forget which basic structure enables what. For example I don't really get why you need a 'temple' to train broodlings. Or why you build a 'Library' to drop off lumber and make ambushers? That name in particular really doesn't scream 'blacksmith' or whatever the standard is for that archetype. I suppose Graveyarddoesn't scream blacksmith either, but at least it has the secondary function of spawning corpses. Plus I found that name confusing ~20 years ago when I first played..
  • Swapping that with the Council of Secrets would almost make more sense because then the upgrades are secrets, and the library is where casters study. Though they are thematically extremely similar.
• -You made a post earlier about not wanting to name some Naga Hero 'Queen' because that is "unique and exists in one exemplar", but the naming convention of Nerub townhall seems the same. I always got the impression the "Old Kingdom" was a specific place in WC lore. I don't think it makes sense that the first tier is 'Ruined Kingdom' implying it is broken down or destroyed already, then tier 2 is "Upper Kingdom" which I think if anything refers to a section of a larger kingdom, like a district (or perhaps larger than a district).
• +I think the egg system is very creative and works reasonably well. I think you mentioned before they can get supply blocked by people popping their eggs, which I suppose is fair enough. It's annoying though.
  • The wand that heals your units by sacrificing eggs is a good idea. The colour theme between egg, wand and everything is well designed.

Everfrost Tower

• -I think this needs more thought. The cost, ease of building it and damage type make for some weird combos, being UP in some ways and probably OP in others.
  Spoiler

  The cost is similar to ancient protectors, but it is a bit tougher due to higher armour. Spirit tower is the same strength, but it is harder to place, and more expensive, so the tower would be good for rushing. The damage type makes it good against Heroes, and less bad against buildings. This probably helps rushes and really wards off Hero harass early, which normal towers are less effective at. This could really change Hero viability. At the same time it makes the EF towers much less effective as air defense. This will be a theme and an issue IMO, unless I'm missing something.
• -It feels very weird for it to be a frost tower but not slow the enemy. Especially because the UD tower they stole from the Nerubs DOES slow enemies. But then workers already slow enemies, so that niche is kinda already taken? Tough situation.

Units:

Gatherer

• -The name is a bit lame
• +The poison glands is really interesting on a worker, both as a defensive ability, but also you might take a couple with you into battle for the snare, which tbh might even be a touch OP in the early game >_>. This is also a cool way to pair them with broodlings and their snare+damage ability. So awesome work on that design.
• +The Invis near buildings thing is very interesting, but might be a bit overkill? Does this kinda mean you need detection just to raid Nerubs? Another reason it might be overkill is they already get the poison defensive ability.

Broodling

• -I have big issues with this unit.
• +the Feast ability is really interesting and creative, the fast growth one.. not too bad, but I also think it might just help feed the opponent if they raid your base and they keep popping eggs into broodlings and then farming xp out of them. Similar issue if you leave eggs around the map.
• -I think the armor type on these is a very bad idea.
• Spoiler

  For one, it changes their counter dynamics so some units that normally counter melee might not counter them the same way (not a deal breaker on its own if this is by design) but more importantly it makes them too weak against ranged, and makes them bad for creeping if they are supposed to take any damage at all. Troll axe-throwers etc shred them, and it makes them hard countered by tier 1 ranged right out of the gate. Also towers. This was witnessed in a later game with Grubby versus a decent opponent where they both went Nerub. Grubby's ambushers utterly slaughtered the broodlings, and his ranged stomps massacred everything lol.
• +Feast + Poison glands on enemy hero seems like a nice combo. Didn't try it out with web trap.

Ambusher

• -Their stats seem like a gimped Crypt Fiend for the same price
  • That said, I think crypt fiends do too much, have too much utility for a single unit.
• I didn't try the trap tbh
• -The armour upgrade flips their counters and so on around, and because it is irreversible you might break the unit mid game and never get that counter type back.
• Spoiler

  Importantly, medium is probably a better armour type in most regards, especially in the later game with higher unit counts because people tend toward ranged unit comps, and medium armour is only countered by normal/hack damage on melee units. It reduces pierce, siege and I think even magic damage, giving the unit a decent survivability boost. Heavy armour doesn't reduce anything, but is hard countered by magic damage. Giving ambushers this armour type ends up flipping them from a counter to Gryphons, Wyrms, Chims, to probably being soft countered by them instead. This especially leaves me wondering how you are supposed to counter those units at all? Note that Nerub towers don't counter them either. Maybe Arachnathids?

Flyer

• -Name's not ideal, but meh
• Does the siege damage make them toxic like bat riders? not sure...
• -Even after they get the upgrade to attack air, they don't put up a fight against dedicated anti-air like gargs or hippos. This kinda leaves them without a dedicated air option... right?
  • Maybe with help they could do this, like with strings of fate to spread damage.
• Flyers also have Light Armour, which takes more damage from pierce damage than Unarmoured (which gargs and hippos have, so they are countered less hard by pierce).
• -Beside being annoying like bats or a gimped garg vs air, I don't see them filling much of a role.

Arachnathid

• -A bit like above, I don't really understand what niche they are filling
• +I guess the moving burrow is cool. I was gonna add this to melee units on my project but I've decided against it atm.
  • As mentioned above they have some minor issues with extents or collision while burrowed. Also the way they burrow so fast and can move does make them annoying as a skirmisher. I guess that's their niche?
• The poison upgrade.. the damage is pretty weak, so I guess the utility is the healing nerf? It seems like a very niche ability though. Hard counter lich+DK for 45 seconds? Also use against pally... and yeah.
  • +You know this might be more useful than I'm giving it credit for, if you had a couple of arachnathids then you could get out >4 poison shots which would at least cripple a few units' ability to run home and heal. VERY niche though
• Over all they're a weird unit, but more useful than faerie dragons. So I think that's pretty good.

Swarmer

• Not much to say here, I think it has a defined role it fills well enough
• It's weird to have two flying units that counter buildings though, and those are the ONLY flying units.
• -Does their upgrade still disable repairs on target buildings? I really don't like that idea if so. The spawned units are cute, probably have about as much effect as intended. They really mess with the AI though lol. Just keep spawning them near their gold mine and they'll never leave the base.
  • Hope they don't feed xp. I think I tested this out a while back and they didn't.

Brood Guardian

• He doesn't seem terribly frightening. He's a bit cheaper than average but very fragile.
• -The little critters are supposed to buff him up a bit in theory, but in practice you can't control them, so no focus fire, and they can run around doing not much a lot of the time.
• -His extents or clickbox feels off.
• His other gimmick is he carries eggs. This is an interesting mechanic, but the main reason seems to be to use the healing rod on them.
  • Otherwise I guess you could get the growth upgrade, and hope the enemy pops the eggs for more broodlings in combat?
  • dropping the eggs might provide some meat shields, especially against players or w/e that don't focus fire, but it also messes with pathing, which is detrimental to the guardian himself, being melee.
  • but the critters ignore pathing I'm pretty sure :/
    • either way it seems like a lot of bother and micro management.

~~~Casters~~~

Widow

• +First buff seems alright. It's ~10% buff for knights etc, but a big buff for broodlings. There's a lot of stuff focused around broodlings already though.
  • Is it an Orb effect? if so it might conflict with other orbs, and arrow abilities. But maybe the damage is passed along either way, just the secondary effects conflict.
• +Infestation: Pretty cool. The thing that make this interesting is the spawns are legit broodlings in all ways, so they get feast and damage upgrades and stuff. I think this adds good synergy. But damn are there a lot of Broodling mechanics.
• +Blinding Cloud: This is a good spell, however I think the range needs an increase. Maybe the cost too? Like 150 mana instead of 100. The counter is to move out of it, but if the same caster can cast it 4 times in total you can just keep recasting it every time they move :/
  • 50% miss is a lot, but then you can just move out of it... unless you're also slowed by a trap (theoretically). This sounds like really good synergy.
• +Over all I think this Caster is really good, certainly better than the average vanilla caster, considering all the abilities are useful and they even show synergy with other mechanics.

Vizier

• -I don't think this guy is very good, though.
• -The first buff isn't very interesting, and all it does is provide true sight. So you just throw it on your hero, and... that's in. Boring.
  • Plus at least you can spam the map with sentry wards for scouting.
  • Training this guy and only getting a very niche truesight ability just feels like wasted potential. I think some people would feel like that with Orc shamans before getting to Blood Lust, but at least Purge also snares targets, which is almost always useful for hero surrounds and stuff. I can't think of any other casters that feel like dead weight without any upgrades.
• -The second ability is another spell you kinda just cast on your hero, when you need a mana pot that is. Does the damage buff work? Maybe you could put this on lich/DK for even more annoying nukes. With both these spells this caster mostly feels like a minion of you hero(es). A pocket buffer/walking mana pot.
• -The dispel feels a bit wonky, and I think becoming magic immune is a bit much. Does that include all magic damage, even gryphons? Making a BM magic immune could be OP vs banshees for curse or cyclone to mitigate him.
  • I also noticed that successfully casting it on my unit deleted all their mana. I don't think this is mentioned anywhere. Maybe it's an old mechanic, or just supposed to happen to enemies? If intended, that's a pretty big trade off to become magic immune vs losing all your mana.
• -This dude feels like he gets lumped with overlooked mechanics. You need truesight? better build one just for that single buff. Need dispel? Probably need this guy just for that single inefficient option. Though at tier 3 that's a long way to go for the dispel.

Web Spinner

• +The corpse ability that gives you pop supply is very left field. It's kinda cool, if only for that reason.
• +Retreat, the healing ability, I think this is great. It has a tradeoff, achieves what it's designed to do, and looks really cool while doing it. The only issue I have with it is can't target air units, so makes healing them tougher. But then you don't have big flyers with big hp pools anyway.
• Spell shield web? why not lol. Maybe you could make this castable on allies instead as a form of anti-magic?

That's about it from me atm. I'll come back and do the Heroes another day.
Truthfully I'm not sure how well this post will go down, but oh well yolo.

What is the intended counter to gryphons? Just mass Flyers and hope the human doesn't have decent anti-air of their own?

 

[Maxwell]

So I'm gonna do my in-depth review of Nerubians, now that there's a recent update. I'll try to spoiler minute details/ranting and we'll see if I get through the whole thing, or finish it off in another post :/ I haven't played the Naga yet.
Had a pretty big think about them at work today so hopefully that's ~half the work done.
Also note I won't be holding back, though I'm not claiming my opinion/arguments as any sort of authority obv. If you disagree I'd be happy to hear your logic.

Generally I think the theme is cool, I don't know how many of the assets you made yourself but they look pretty cool. Personally I don't put a lot of weight into assets/art at least for hobby projects like this because it is a massive time sink and might require specific knowledge or skills, so I don't blame people for reusing other assets or reskinning etc. That said I think you did a good job matching colours and aesthetics, skill icons look nice and match thematically. I think the colours match well with the heroes or units: for example Widow's icons have a colour theme and Vizier's are all magic/arcane looking.

Similarly you obviously wanted proper burrow animations for a couple of units that don't have them, but whatever; if I figure out how to get rotations to work properly in Mdlvis I might even try to make some for you lol.
However, quite a few models have buggy/faulty extents which makes them hard to click. This can be changed in Magos. Retera's has a button to recalculate extents, but when I used it on one of my models it broke some particle emitters so be careful.

Buildings:

• -Many of the extents and collisions are off on these, especially when they are being built. There are some that are very hard to click while they are being built, the tower being a prime example. This should be fixable in Magos.
  • Also it's hard to see the workers after they finish a Spawning Lair.
• -They look cool, but I feel like they look samey and are kind of hard to tell apart, beside the obvious ones like spawning with the eggs etc. Maybe this isn't a massive problem because most are just enablers so the spawners should be the prime target, but then maybe it's the opposite and targeting an enabler would be better to block training of that type of unit?
• -The names aren't very descriptive and every time I try the map out I always forget which basic structure enables what. For example I don't really get why you need a 'temple' to train broodlings. Or why you build a 'Library' to drop off lumber and make ambushers? That name in particular really doesn't scream 'blacksmith' or whatever the standard is for that archetype. I suppose Graveyarddoesn't scream blacksmith either, but at least it has the secondary function of spawning corpses. Plus I found that name confusing ~20 years ago when I first played..
  • Swapping that with the Council of Secrets would almost make more sense because then the upgrades are secrets, and the library is where casters study. Though they are thematically extremely similar.
• -You made a post earlier about not wanting to name some Naga Hero 'Queen' because that is "unique and exists in one exemplar", but the naming convention of Nerub townhall seems the same. I always got the impression the "Old Kingdom" was a specific place in WC lore. I don't think it makes sense that the first tier is 'Ruined Kingdom' implying it is broken down or destroyed already, then tier 2 is "Upper Kingdom" which I think if anything refers to a section of a larger kingdom, like a district (or perhaps larger than a district).
• +I think the egg system is very creative and works reasonably well. I think you mentioned before they can get supply blocked by people popping their eggs, which I suppose is fair enough. It's annoying though.
  • The wand that heals your units by sacrificing eggs is a good idea. The colour theme between egg, wand and everything is well designed.

Everfrost Tower

• -I think this needs more thought. The cost, ease of building it and damage type make for some weird combos, being UP in some ways and probably OP in others.
  Spoiler

  The cost is similar to ancient protectors, but it is a bit tougher due to higher armour. Spirit tower is the same strength, but it is harder to place, and more expensive, so the tower would be good for rushing. The damage type makes it good against Heroes, and less bad against buildings. This probably helps rushes and really wards off Hero harass early, which normal towers are less effective at. This could really change Hero viability. At the same time it makes the EF towers much less effective as air defense. This will be a theme and an issue IMO, unless I'm missing something.
• -It feels very weird for it to be a frost tower but not slow the enemy. Especially because the UD tower they stole from the Nerubs DOES slow enemies. But then workers already slow enemies, so that niche is kinda already taken? Tough situation.

Units:

Gatherer

• -The name is a bit lame
• +The poison glands is really interesting on a worker, both as a defensive ability, but also you might take a couple with you into battle for the snare, which tbh might even be a touch OP in the early game >_>. This is also a cool way to pair them with broodlings and their snare+damage ability. So awesome work on that design.
• +The Invis near buildings thing is very interesting, but might be a bit overkill? Does this kinda mean you need detection just to raid Nerubs? Another reason it might be overkill is they already get the poison defensive ability.

Broodling

• -I have big issues with this unit.
• +the Feast ability is really interesting and creative, the fast growth one.. not too bad, but I also think it might just help feed the opponent if they raid your base and they keep popping eggs into broodlings and then farming xp out of them. Similar issue if you leave eggs around the map.
• -I think the armor type on these is a very bad idea.
• Spoiler

  For one, it changes their counter dynamics so some units that normally counter melee might not counter them the same way (not a deal breaker on its own if this is by design) but more importantly it makes them too weak against ranged, and makes them bad for creeping if they are supposed to take any damage at all. Troll axe-throwers etc shred them, and it makes them hard countered by tier 1 ranged right out of the gate. Also towers. This was witnessed in a later game with Grubby versus a decent opponent where they both went Nerub. Grubby's ambushers utterly slaughtered the broodlings, and his ranged stomps massacred everything lol.
• +Feast + Poison glands on enemy hero seems like a nice combo. Didn't try it out with web trap.

Ambusher

• -Their stats seem like a gimped Crypt Fiend for the same price
  • That said, I think crypt fiends do too much, have too much utility for a single unit.
• I didn't try the trap tbh
• -The armour upgrade flips their counters and so on around, and because it is irreversible you might break the unit mid game and never get that counter type back.
• Spoiler

  Importantly, medium is probably a better armour type in most regards, especially in the later game with higher unit counts because people tend toward ranged unit comps, and medium armour is only countered by normal/hack damage on melee units. It reduces pierce, siege and I think even magic damage, giving the unit a decent survivability boost. Heavy armour doesn't reduce anything, but is hard countered by magic damage. Giving ambushers this armour type ends up flipping them from a counter to Gryphons, Wyrms, Chims, to probably being soft countered by them instead. This especially leaves me wondering how you are supposed to counter those units at all? Note that Nerub towers don't counter them either. Maybe Arachnathids?

Flyer

• -Name's not ideal, but meh
• Does the siege damage make them toxic like bat riders? not sure...
• -Even after they get the upgrade to attack air, they don't put up a fight against dedicated anti-air like gargs or hippos. This kinda leaves them without a dedicated air option... right?
  • Maybe with help they could do this, like with strings of fate to spread damage.
• Flyers also have Light Armour, which takes more damage from pierce damage than Unarmoured (which gargs and hippos have, so they are countered less hard by pierce).
• -Beside being annoying like bats or a gimped garg vs air, I don't see them filling much of a role.

Arachnathid

• -A bit like above, I don't really understand what niche they are filling
• +I guess the moving burrow is cool. I was gonna add this to melee units on my project but I've decided against it atm.
  • As mentioned above they have some minor issues with extents or collision while burrowed. Also the way they burrow so fast and can move does make them annoying as a skirmisher. I guess that's their niche?
• The poison upgrade.. the damage is pretty weak, so I guess the utility is the healing nerf? It seems like a very niche ability though. Hard counter lich+DK for 45 seconds? Also use against pally... and yeah.
  • +You know this might be more useful than I'm giving it credit for, if you had a couple of arachnathids then you could get out >4 poison shots which would at least cripple a few units' ability to run home and heal. VERY niche though
• Over all they're a weird unit, but more useful than faerie dragons. So I think that's pretty good.

Swarmer

• Not much to say here, I think it has a defined role it fills well enough
• It's weird to have two flying units that counter buildings though, and those are the ONLY flying units.
• -Does their upgrade still disable repairs on target buildings? I really don't like that idea if so. The spawned units are cute, probably have about as much effect as intended. They really mess with the AI though lol. Just keep spawning them near their gold mine and they'll never leave the base.
  • Hope they don't feed xp. I think I tested this out a while back and they didn't.

Brood Guardian

• He doesn't seem terribly frightening. He's a bit cheaper than average but very fragile.
• -The little critters are supposed to buff him up a bit in theory, but in practice you can't control them, so no focus fire, and they can run around doing not much a lot of the time.
• -His extents or clickbox feels off.
• His other gimmick is he carries eggs. This is an interesting mechanic, but the main reason seems to be to use the healing rod on them.
  • Otherwise I guess you could get the growth upgrade, and hope the enemy pops the eggs for more broodlings in combat?
  • dropping the eggs might provide some meat shields, especially against players or w/e that don't focus fire, but it also messes with pathing, which is detrimental to the guardian himself, being melee.
  • but the critters ignore pathing I'm pretty sure :/
    • either way it seems like a lot of bother and micro management.

~~~Casters~~~

Widow

• +First buff seems alright. It's ~10% buff for knights etc, but a big buff for broodlings. There's a lot of stuff focused around broodlings already though.
  • Is it an Orb effect? if so it might conflict with other orbs, and arrow abilities. But maybe the damage is passed along either way, just the secondary effects conflict.
• +Infestation: Pretty cool. The thing that make this interesting is the spawns are legit broodlings in all ways, so they get feast and damage upgrades and stuff. I think this adds good synergy. But damn are there a lot of Broodling mechanics.
• +Blinding Cloud: This is a good spell, however I think the range needs an increase. Maybe the cost too? Like 150 mana instead of 100. The counter is to move out of it, but if the same caster can cast it 4 times in total you can just keep recasting it every time they move :/
  • 50% miss is a lot, but then you can just move out of it... unless you're also slowed by a trap (theoretically). This sounds like really good synergy.
• +Over all I think this Caster is really good, certainly better than the average vanilla caster, considering all the abilities are useful and they even show synergy with other mechanics.

Vizier

• -I don't think this guy is very good, though.
• -The first buff isn't very interesting, and all it does is provide true sight. So you just throw it on your hero, and... that's in. Boring.
  • Plus at least you can spam the map with sentry wards for scouting.
  • Training this guy and only getting a very niche truesight ability just feels like wasted potential. I think some people would feel like that with Orc shamans before getting to Blood Lust, but at least Purge also snares targets, which is almost always useful for hero surrounds and stuff. I can't think of any other casters that feel like dead weight without any upgrades.
• -The second ability is another spell you kinda just cast on your hero, when you need a mana pot that is. Does the damage buff work? Maybe you could put this on lich/DK for even more annoying nukes. With both these spells this caster mostly feels like a minion of you hero(es). A pocket buffer/walking mana pot.
• -The dispel feels a bit wonky, and I think becoming magic immune is a bit much. Does that include all magic damage, even gryphons? Making a BM magic immune could be OP vs banshees for curse or cyclone to mitigate him.
  • I also noticed that successfully casting it on my unit deleted all their mana. I don't think this is mentioned anywhere. Maybe it's an old mechanic, or just supposed to happen to enemies? If intended, that's a pretty big trade off to become magic immune vs losing all your mana.
• -This dude feels like he gets lumped with overlooked mechanics. You need truesight? better build one just for that single buff. Need dispel? Probably need this guy just for that single inefficient option. Though at tier 3 that's a long way to go for the dispel.

Web Spinner

• +The corpse ability that gives you pop supply is very left field. It's kinda cool, if only for that reason.
• +Retreat, the healing ability, I think this is great. It has a tradeoff, achieves what it's designed to do, and looks really cool while doing it. The only issue I have with it is can't target air units, so makes healing them tougher. But then you don't have big flyers with big hp pools anyway.
• Spell shield web? why not lol. Maybe you could make this castable on allies instead as a form of anti-magic?

That's about it from me atm. I'll come back and do the Heroes another day.
Truthfully I'm not sure how well this post will go down, but oh well yolo.

What is the intended counter to gryphons? Just mass Flyers and hope the human doesn't have decent anti-air of their own?

Reserved for answer for @Bleeq. For now - thank you a lot for your time spent!

 

[Bleeq]

Did a quick look at Naga. I think the quality is improved over Nerubians, but didn't play them much just jumped in, cheated to see the units, etc.

Quick things:

-collisions are off again with 'summoning' structures.
-Naga Royal Guard is melee but has medium armor, making it countered by most melee. By design? Royal Guard is supposed to counter rifles/HH/archers?
-worker unit being unarmored makes them countered hard by the basic ranged units. Maybe intended again? does make them less countered by melee though, which normal workers are.
-Cleanse on siren is probably OP.
-Flying Ray thing becomes a total beast when it lands, because it's a 2 food unit that does ~40 melee damage with a fast attack.

The hero abilities I looked at I thought were good in design, though the leashing stone might be op when it pops. Victory Blow was a cool play on Bash.
Turtle Caravan is great idea. I had this weird idea for goblins that the pocket factory could act as a drop off point, and the clockwork gobs as harvesters, so an alternate use for the spell was to mine gold briefly in your down-time.

***Edit P.s. it's kinda weird both these races worship old gods

 

[rexxarking1991]

Hey great work, I wanted to provide some content you can apply to your map. I used ElevenLabs to create these custom voice lines. Here is an example of one the Naga sea witch but with unique voice lines and different use of dialogue. Anyway, I wanted to share this because I like where this map is working. if you would like to know more about these voice lines you can DM me on B.net OO7#1552

Below is the sound file attached, check it out

 

[Kadel]

I accidentally came across a video from Grubby, I’m very proud that people from my country are capable of such cool creations.

 

[Maxwell]

I accidentally came across a video from Grubby, I’m very proud that people from my country are capable of such cool creations.

Thanks mate. That is only a beginning!
Stay safe.