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[Mapping] Top 10 Most Common Mistakes Done By Mapmakers

Level 6
Joined
May 26, 2012
Messages
177
Along my 4-year old experience playing Warcraft 3,I found many mistakes and leaks by many map makers.Today I will introduce you to some of those mistakes.

Top 10 Most Common Mistakes Done By Mapmakers



Number 10 : Smilies in Texts/Cinematics

One of the most disturbing mistakes done by map makers. It literally makes the map looks childish and bad looking. For example ; "To war men! :p", that's what I am talking about. See what I mean!


Number 9 : Grammatical Mistakes

Another very common problem is the several grammatical/spelling mistakes done with people whose their first language isn't English. PLEASE use a translator,thus you will write in your own language and receive fixed sentences with better and more heavy and emphasizing words.



Number 8 : Trolling The Import Manager

As I checked some of those over-sized maps I found out that 60% of the stuff imported are not even used. This is critical, I for example when i see a map with a bad terrain from the screenshots and a large overall size, I don't download it and just ignore it.



Number 7 : Spamming WoW models

WoW models are always great and much better than Warcraft 3 models. Yet both of those model(Warcraft 3 and WoW) is very bad and unprofessional. As it looks like a HQ model binded with a Low quality one and a special animated style with a regular realist one, thus the map loses quality.


Number 6 : Units/Buildings with no Portrait

Another mistake I hate having in any map, no portrait units and buildings. This could really decrease a map rating by both the moderator and the users.



Number 5 : No Cameras movement in Cinematics

It is really not that attractive to have a well made cinematic with a few cameras which change in 0.00 seconds. I always like to see the cinematic camera moving just a little so with every camera you make, duplicate it and move it a little in the Angle Of Attack or Rotation and make it move to the new duplicated camera over a large amount of time like 25 or 30 seconds. This is a lot better and more efficient way of making cinematics.


Number 4 : Bad Triggered Spawns

I hate having bad triggered spawns of units. For example ;

  • Bad Triggered Spawn
    • Events
      • Time - Every 10.00 seconds of game time
    • Conditions
    • Actions
      • Unit - Create 3 Footman for Player 1 (Red) at (Center of (Playable map area)) facing Default building facing degrees
this is an example of a bad triggering. A much better way would be either ordering buildings and using Unit Groups and Hashtables or another way would be using the AI Editor and creating good AI scripts.



Number 3 : Bad Map Description

A bad map description looks to be very famous these days. Many maps are great however they receive a lower rating because of that and less downloads. Thus this is a list on what a GOOD description should look like :

1)Map Info Tab, describing the map type and idea generally
2)Main Features
3)Screenshots and maybe if you would like a video and a trailer
4)Full credits to all who helped and the names to the people who you used their resources(models,skins,items)




Number 2 : No Custom Spells

Now this is critical probably any campaign, RPG and Multiplayer map should contain a good amount of cool, leakless and exciting spells. As having custom spells allows the user to enjoy a whole new experience while playing the map.



Number 1 : Most Common Mistake : A Bad Terrain


A bad terrain is a problem which almost 80% of maps have. I can't blame someone if he cannot use the WE right.Although I blame him of not reading tutorials and not trying to become a better terrainer. There are a huge amount of tutorials in here and they are all great. Thus read some tutorials and ask some people for help in the Chat Room.




This is it, one of the most common mistakes by map makers. I hope I have been clear and thanks for reading.

Usfshihy out! :p
 
Last edited:
Level 33
Joined
Apr 24, 2012
Messages
5,113
Please,add spaces before or after ":"
You can also add a mistake about Not importing the triggers properly where they import it without checking File > Preferences > Create unknown variables while pasting trigger data and also about not cleaning the leaks.

The description could be improved much better, simply add some colors to the title.
 

fladdermasken

Off-Topic Moderator
Level 39
Joined
Dec 27, 2006
Messages
3,688
Another very common problem is the several grammatical/spelling mistakes done with people whose their first language isn't English. PLEASE use a translator,thus you will write in your own language and receive fixed sentences with better and more heavy and emphasizing words.
Yes, definitely a translator help would no mistakes make translate good emphasizing failure really easy understand and readable is not difficult no. Courtesy of google translator and team google hugs and fladdermasken. Thanks.
 
Level 6
Joined
May 26, 2012
Messages
177
Well just try to see a bad terrained map(which is a lot of maps these days) and put a WoW model with like the footman model and make them talk with each other.Then tell me what do you think.BUT with the right weather effects,skies and a better portrait for the models you can form an awesome map with both kinds of models.So it really depend on the skill of the map maker to make it look real.
 
The issue with this tutorial is that it has such a broad topic. You chose 10 things to choose but you really could've chosen 10,000. I think this might be a nice little checklist before publishing a map, but I don't know if it suits as much of a "tutorial" on anything.

I think a lot of these are valid (to an extent), don't get me wrong, but it is a strange premise for a tutorial.

As for the tutorial itself, you shouldn't use really bright colored text. It is blinding. You should use the normal text for the actual content, but you can make the headers colored if you like (assuming that the color is not too bright), see:
http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/...t-tutorial-please-read-before-posting-119320/
At the bottom it'll give recommended colors.
 
Level 29
Joined
Oct 24, 2012
Messages
6,543
this is nice except for the spells. also u should elaborate. if wow models r made only for bosses i think its perfectly fine. but if ur mismatching other things its just weird looking.

also like purge said im not sure how this can be considered a tutorial. mybe if u give a short description on how to fix the things. u should also not limit this to 10 as i can see a ton of things u missed.

i personally hate bad coding in maps. seeing units bug up and having to manually click them is pretty sad to do. ( td map)
 
Level 30
Joined
Jul 31, 2010
Messages
5,246
I kinda agree about the map maker's issue in these days.

Number 10: This depends if the cinematic is going be a comedy (*cough* I'm making a new batch for it), or something that would not reflect a very serious scene.

Number 8: Define Trolling first before subtitling it, We have maps called UTM's, and yes not all of it are used for mapping. Deleting huge piles of it is very time consuming, so most users just use them as base work and leave the rest.

Number 6: I have to disagree. Heck even our WE has stuff like this.


Lastly,
The biggest mistake is to start too big project.
 
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