Water over my head or a good start?

[Tochvi]

Hello Hive community! I wanna start of by saying i have never tried making a map or editing a map in wc3 before in my life but would like to give it a try to (in my mind) perfect something good.

I really enjoy the "Pyro TD" map that has you build towers to buff a wave of footmen that then gets pitted against the enemies wave of footmen. But i see alot of aspects that could make the game alot more fun in my mind and i would like to give it a try to edit it in a way of my liking...

Is this generally accepted? To in essence "steal" someone elses map and edit it into something els?
I have tried to open the version i have in my map folder and the version avaliable for download in map editor without any success. Map protection?
The edits i would like to start of with are along the lines of making a x2 mode where the income is doubled up for a faster gamepace. I would also like to edit some values on some towers for example the gold income from goldmine tower (To keep it relevant in faster gamemodes etc) and pretty much do small tweaks etc.

Is this something to advanced for a beginner? Is this even acceptable? Should i make a similar gamemode myself from scratch? Is that even possible for a beginner?

Thanks in advance for any help in this issue.

 

[Pyrogasm]

Welcome!

Is this generally accepted? To in essence "steal" someone elses map and edit it into something els?

It used to not be, but most people don't care any more. The best course of action would be to attempt to contact the map developer and either get their blessing or perhaps get an unprotected copy of their map for your personal use.

Map protection?

Yes. The only real way around this is to nuke all the triggers from the map with an MPQ/CASC program, which would then make it openable in the WE but without any triggers. With sufficient gumption it's probably also possible to modify the compiled war3map.j file to make the tweaks you desire. It all depends on how it was protected. Others here might have more information.

Should i make a similar gamemode myself from scratch? Is that even possible for a beginner?

Yes and yes! The forum is here to help you in this endeavor. Edit if you wish, but this is what I would urge you to do.

 

[Ralle]

A good place to start would be to ask for help in reaching the original author and ask for permission and possibly the unprotected map. If it's hosted here we have a few ways to reach the author.

Other than that, I feel like deprotecting a map goes against the author's wishes and sort of breaks an implied license. But I did it myself to fix Tree Tag, so I dunno. Give good credit and keep the map spirit up and if the old author comes back and yells at you we have to take it from there.