[Campaign] Wc2 Remake: concept and ideas

[LordPerenolde II]

Hello. As some of you know, last 14 may i have finalized and released a remake of Wc1 on the Wc3 engine. The trailer on youtube had a huge success and many people in the past already asked me if I ever had the idea of(or was) remaking wc2. Well, i say, i do have ideas, but this time i can't simply start alone the way I did 10 years ago.

First of all there is a CONCEPT and is the remake of 2 campaigns: ToD Humans and BTDP Orcs.
The reason of skipping ToD Orcs and BTDP Humans is because the first is not a canon campaign and the second has tooooo much naval content.
BTDP Orcs has a glorious plot which implies orcs vs orcs maps, a re-visit of Azeroth's most iconic places, FEW forced naval usage and the implication of many factions, including my fav Alterac. Last but not least many playable heroes but this also happens in BTDP humans, so it's not quite a solid point.

Speaking about what comes next, my IDEAS would be a different kind of remake, this time:
Speaking of ToD Humans, I'd like to have the possibility for the player to select between 4 nations to play, with their unique stats and sub-units, like sub-factions over a core-faction:
Azeroth: for balance; with their wc1 units and structure(going against what the wc2 plot said about their units change)
Stromgarde: for offense.
Lordaeron: for defense.
Dalaran: for magic.

The only problem regards their first missions, where you have to build farms and stuff, but i thought about semi-sub plots cinematics to explain their reason to be in the front line rather than Lothar & co.

As for BTDP Orcs, apart from missions where you have to command heroes, you would be able to actually select a hero from the start of the campaign, whose options are Hellscream/Bladefist(for balance), Dentarg(for power), Zul'Jin(just for the ranged option). Each hero would give the player's army a different bonus, plus their abilities to be used in battle(not to mention a whole theme-colored faction according to the selection made). Each mission the hero gains a level(you know, with 12 missions to play) and in some maps some other heroes will be playable in an All-stars fashion(like the final map).

As for the oil system, which has always resulted to be buggy quite everywhere, i was thinking about getting rid of it entirely and replacing it with a plus of resources income from oil platforms instead. Something like additional gold income per cargo extraction, thus increasing the required amout of resources to build ships.

So far this is what i'd like to make happen, but it won't be easy, nor i can do it alone.....

 

[Anaxie]

[Campaign] - The Second War

Might want to talk to him for your Human ToD campaign and Hero concept.

Maybe you could join up. His maps and concept isn't half bad. From the looks of it his campaign is probably going to end up floating dead in water without a partner.

 

[cleavinghammer]

Sounds interesting, though as I recall from other maps the gold mine/oil patch tends to be buggy as well.

 

[Mechanical Man]

[Campaign] - The Second War

Might want to talk to him for your Human ToD campaign and Hero concept.

Maybe you could join up. His maps and concept isn't half bad. From the looks of it his campaign is probably going to end up floating dead in water without a partner.

That guy is absent for already for half of year and the project seems quite dead. OP would be rather compete with this Warcraft II: Human Campaign and this Warcraft II: Orc Campaign

 

[LordPerenolde II]

I forgot to mention some other ideas regarding ToD humans(first post updated):
I'd like to have the possibility for the player to select between 4 nations to play, with their unique stats and sub-units, like sub-factions over a core-faction:
Azeroth: for balance; with their wc1 units and structure(going against what the wc2 plot said about their units change)
Stromgarde: for offense.
Lordaeron: for defense.
Dalaran: for magic.

The only problem regards their first missions, where you have to build farms and stuff, but i thought about semi-sub plots cinematics to explain their reason to be in the front line rather than Lothar & co.

 

[cleavinghammer]

Same for the orcs?

 

[LordPerenolde II]

As i said, Orc campaign will have >heroes< thing, humans' >subfactions<

 

[Mechanical Man]

The maps and missions will be the same as in the original?

 

[LordPerenolde II]

The maps and missions will be the same as in the original?

Yes but i think i'll make an exception for the First One or the First three regarding which faction you choose.

 

[cleavinghammer]

Most remakes I've seen try to make every map different from the original in some way (sidequests, extra requirements...), maybe you look into that.

 

[Anaxie]

That guy is absent for already for half of year and the project seems quite dead. OP would be rather compete with this Warcraft II: Human Campaign and this Warcraft II: Orc Campaign

I know.... im the one who inspired perenold to take up the idea in our correspondence the other day in PMs.

 

[LordPerenolde II]

I just got a reply from helldoom. The man is still interested in co-working for this potential remake, but he's not sure of his spare time in the upcoming months.

 

[Anaxie]

That would be awesome to have a definitive WC2 edition. His work was good just not polished combined i would be eager to see what you both could achieve

 

[Kyrbi0]

Way cool. I don't mind throwing around sub-faction ideas (even though it's only for Humans? Sad panda). Good luck!

 

[LordPerenolde II]

Thank you guys. Motivation really helps and pushes me forward. I have some more to show. Probably orcs will have their custom tech-tree as well, even though unplayable(as i mentioned for the ToD campaign).

 

[Luffy]

Hello. As some of you know, last 14 may i have finalized and released a remake of Wc1 on the Wc3 engine. The trailer on youtube had a huge success and many people in the past already asked me if I ever had the idea of(or was) remaking wc2. Well, i say, i do have ideas, but this time i can't simply start alone the way I did 10 years ago.

First of all there is a CONCEPT and is the remake of 2 campaigns: ToD Humans and BTDP Orcs.
The reason of skipping ToD Orcs and BTDP Humans is because the first is not a canon campaign and the second has tooooo much naval content.
BTDP Orcs has a glorious plot which implies orcs vs orcs maps, a re-visit of Azeroth's most iconic places, FEW forced naval usage and the implication of many factions, including my fav Alterac. Last but not least many playable heroes but this also happens in BTDP humans, so it's not quite a solid point.

Speaking about what comes next, my IDEAS would be a different kind of remake, this time:
Speaking of ToD Humans, I'd like to have the possibility for the player to select between 4 nations to play, with their unique stats and sub-units, like sub-factions over a core-faction:
Azeroth: for balance; with their wc1 units and structure(going against what the wc2 plot said about their units change)
Stromgarde: for offense.
Lordaeron: for defense.
Dalaran: for magic.

The only problem regards their first missions, where you have to build farms and stuff, but i thought about semi-sub plots cinematics to explain their reason to be in the front line rather than Lothar & co.

As for BTDP Orcs, apart from missions where you have to command heroes, you would be able to actually select a hero from the start of the campaign, whose options are Hellscream/Bladefist(for balance), Dentarg(for power), Zul'Jin(just for the ranged option). Each hero would give the player's army a different bonus, plus their abilities to be used in battle(not to mention a whole theme-colored faction according to the selection made). Each mission the hero gains a level(you know, with 12 missions to play) and in some maps some other heroes will be playable in an All-stars fashion(like the final map).

As for the oil system, which has always resulted to be buggy quite everywhere, i was thinking about getting rid of it entirely and replacing it with a plus of resources income from oil platforms instead. Something like additional gold income per cargo extraction, thus increasing the required amout of resources to build ships.

So far this is what i'd like to make happen, but it won't be easy, nor i can do it alone.....

Tbh, I don't agree with a lot of ideas you have there. I for one, would prefer a remake that is much more faithful to the original (some tweaks here and there can be accepted for balance issues, or gameplay improvement, or making certain campaign levels more interesting). The experience of the original is the thing that makes us wish to play a remake over wc3 anyways, at least that's how I feel like. But the majority of things you suggested in your first post didn't click with me, for example the unique units per factions idea, intruducing wc1 units for azeroth and whatnot. The diversity looks good on paper, but that kind of feature would go better on a map project that is completely unrelated to a remake of warcraft 2. For example, that idea would go well for a faction wars/altered melee/conquer azeroth kind of map.
Plus presenting the choice of choosing your faction could create plotholes for a campaign type of project, I think. (Plotholes, like controlling a faction forces on azeroth where they originally didn't take part of, Dalaran forces defending Hillsbrad, Stromgarde destroying Dark Portal, etc.)

As for the heroes idea for BTDP orcs, I don't agree with that neither. I think the "Heroes" should just be special units like they were in warcraft 2, free of experience or leveling or spell system. (maybe some unique unit spells one for each Hero could be fine), and Zuljin only belonged to ToD campaign.
Also if I were you, I would definitely consider making BtDP for humans as well, without a doubt BtDP human campaign had very high quality and memorable missions that may as well be the iconic memories when you talk about that campaign. I would even suggest scrapping ToD human for the favor of BtDP human, as ToD campaigns for both races were comparably more boring and more streamlined/repetitive.

As for the oil, I would still highly suggest creating an Oil system. The thing that needs to be done is proper analysis of why those bugs existed in the previous oil systems that are buggy. If we find out what these bugs are, and what causes them, we could have a proper idea of what could be done about it. I really wouldn't like the idea of oil system to be scrapped altogether, as that would make the naval missions very unbalanced and far from the original concept.

 

[Luffy]

Btw, do you know about Wargus?

 

[LordPerenolde II]

Tbh, I don't agree with a lot of ideas you have there. I for one, would prefer a remake that is much more faithful to the original (some tweaks here and there can be accepted for balance issues, or gameplay improvement, or making certain campaign levels more interesting). The experience of the original is the thing that makes us wish to play a remake over wc3 anyways, at least that's how I feel like. But the majority of things you suggested in your first post didn't click with me, for example the unique units per factions idea, intruducing wc1 units for azeroth and whatnot. The diversity looks good on paper, but that kind of feature would go better on a map project that is completely unrelated to a remake of warcraft 2. For example, that idea would go well for a faction wars/altered melee/conquer azeroth kind of map.
Plus presenting the choice of choosing your faction could create plotholes for a campaign type of project, I think. (Plotholes, like controlling a faction forces on azeroth where they originally didn't take part of, Dalaran forces defending Hillsbrad, Stromgarde destroying Dark Portal, etc.)

As for the heroes idea for BTDP orcs, I don't agree with that neither. I think the "Heroes" should just be special units like they were in warcraft 2, free of experience or leveling or spell system. (maybe some unique unit spells one for each Hero could be fine), and Zuljin only belonged to ToD campaign.
Also if I were you, I would definitely consider making BtDP for humans as well, without a doubt BtDP human campaign had very high quality and memorable missions that may as well be the iconic memories when you talk about that campaign. I would even suggest scrapping ToD human for the favor of BtDP human, as ToD campaigns for both races were comparably more boring and more streamlined/repetitive.

As for the oil, I would still highly suggest creating an Oil system. The thing that needs to be done is proper analysis of why those bugs existed in the previous oil systems that are buggy. If we find out what these bugs are, and what causes them, we could have a proper idea of what could be done about it. I really wouldn't like the idea of oil system to be scrapped altogether, as that would make the naval missions very unbalanced and far from the original concept.

i'm trying, i'm trying, i'm trying.....wait! i'm trying.....no, there is no chance I could manage to agree with even one of all of the rows you just wrote down. Anyway, that's your opinion, and i respect it.

I thought also about using terrain from ToD orcs and some BtDP humans in order to create side-campaign missions for the other sub-factions(but that would be a mess because of creating brand new scenarios from scratch, which i suck at), even if i think i would stick to the idea of selecting one faction that would go for the entire campaign, with a bit of modification at the beginning, just for the sake of the plot(different locations for 4 farm mission toward "hillsbrad" mission, for example), before being put in charge of moving to Khaz Modan.
I HATE BtDP humans!!!!! with the majority of their missions being sea-focused, and no, i won't put in oil system first because it is not stable, and then because i'm not a jass programmer, so i can't ever succeed where everyone who tried to create it(and i'm talking about lots of people) failed.
The hero system i have in mind for BtDP orcs would do nothing but adding exp and custom abilities to heroes. Zul'jin it's just a ranged options(to go for Agility) because i have no other choice if i had to make an orcish mirror of Alleria.

 

[LordPerenolde II]

Btw, do you know about Wargus?

I know, i played it all. Insanely hard(obviously not tested) at the max diff level.

 

[Anaxie]

just wanted to continue my support for this project. your Wc1 remakes and hard modes are a masterpiece. Warcraft 3 is the game that keeps in giving over a decade later thanks to hive and passionate creators.

 

[LordPerenolde II]

just wanted to continue my support for this project. your Wc1 remakes and hard modes are a masterpiece. Warcraft 3 is the game that keeps in giving over a decade later thanks to hive and passionate creators.

I surely do appreciate, thank you! Another problem is that i fear that working for this new project may take way too long. I don't know for how long the wc3 community will still be this consistent in the future.

 

[Anaxie]

Malfurions Quest is still keeping strong as an anticipated full release.

Your Warcraft 2 Saga would be a monumental greatest of all time anticipation.

Path of the Damned Enhanced Edition is is being worked on.

RazorclawX is making more Wanderers of Sorceria campaigns

OutsiderEX might make something eventually again.

Tomoraider may make something.

Legends of Arkain 2nd series is being worked on.


ect.

you could say that 7 years ago "will it still be strong"

since then we got Curse of Forsaken, Rise of Blood Elves, All of Turnos campaigns Rowan / ect

OutsiderEX just recently updated his decade old campaigns.
and it just keeps going.

Frankly this game is too timeless and unique to die. Absolutely go for it.

Even if you just only finish ToD Humans before it crashes.... A POLISHED Warcraft 2 campaign is something we desperately need.

 

[Luffy]

i'm trying, i'm trying, i'm trying.....wait! i'm trying.....no, there is no chance I could manage to agree with even one of all of the rows you just wrote down. Anyway, that's your opinion, and i respect it.

I thought also about using terrain from ToD orcs and some BtDP humans in order to create side-campaign missions for the other sub-factions(but that would be a mess because of creating brand new scenarios from scratch, which i suck at), even if i think i would stick to the idea of selecting one faction that would go for the entire campaign, with a bit of modification at the beginning, just for the sake of the plot(different locations for 4 farm mission toward "hillsbrad" mission, for example), before being put in charge of moving to Khaz Modan.
I HATE BtDP humans!!!!! with the majority of their missions being sea-focused, and no, i won't put in oil system first because it is not stable, and then because i'm not a jass programmer, so i can't ever succeed where everyone who tried to create it(and i'm talking about lots of people) failed.
The hero system i have in mind for BtDP orcs would do nothing but adding exp and custom abilities to heroes. Zul'jin it's just a ranged options(to go for Agility) because i have no other choice if i had to make an orcish mirror of Alleria.

Okay when I think about it, adding faction choices don't look like that terrible of an idea for the sake of diversity and replay value. BUT. There must be a few compromises to your original idea still. And those compromises are: there shouldn't be any new/extra units for any of the particular factions. That's just not like warcraft 2 at all. What I'm proposing is just giving all of them minor passive unique statistics, like for example: lordaeron paladin's have +1 / +2 armor , stromgarde pre-keep tier units have better damage and armor (footman, archer and ballista), dalaran mages and paladins regenerate mana more quickly, azeroth knights gain more armor when there are more enemy units nearby, kul tiras naval units have better attack damage, or even throw quel'thalas to the bunch; archers and rangers have better attack speed, etc. These are just examples. But it shouldn't be anything drastic like adding new units to factions that doesn't belong to warcraft 2 or whatnot.

Also you are wrong about BtDP humans. Majority of their levels aren't about naval combat at all, it has roughly the same amount of levels as the orc campaign when it comes to naval fight. They are pretty balanced in that aspect afterall, except the difference of their difficulty in their last missions.

And when I think about an oil system, I don't think jass could be necessary at all. I can kinda imagine a GUI code for it. We can even make simplifications about that oil system for the sake of keeping it less buggy or troublesome. For example: we can make it so that the oil tankers don't do gathering, and you just gain an income of oil per existing platforms (and the income rate could be improved with the refinery building), and since this would make the tanker units unnecessary, we could remove the resource and food costs of the oil tanker, and turn them into summoned units that disappear after a while. This way, they just go around and install that one or two oil platforms, and then disappear. This feels like a more stable system while keeping relatively faithful to the original. Just scrapping the whole oil system just doesn't work, we can as well just scrap all of the naval aspect and turn it into reign of chaos #2 or something, I think. Also I really liked the naval aspect of the second game, it actually adds more strategic depth to wc2.

On second thought, choosing a different hero for each level doesn't sound bad, again for diversity's sake, but again, I strictly don't want and despise a wc3-like heroes system for a remake, that just doesn't capture the true feeling of the original. We can just as well add altars and scrap all "heroes must survive" defeat conditions after that as well. That doesn't belong in wc2. Also zuljin can be easily replaced by a hero that is actually canon to the original BtDP orcs, like Teron.



-----------------



About wargus, I've made my own personal modifications on the campaign levels on that game, and made them way more interesting while keeping very loyal to the original premise and feeling of the original.

The changes include but are not limited to: in certain ToD human missions, added "civilian" farm buildings that provide you with gold income as long as they are not destroyed, in certain ToD orc missions made it so that orcs gain small amounts of gold if they hunt down critters on map, added the ToD heroes to the more missions so they don't feel boring compared to beyond the dark portal (ofcourse added defeat conditions too), also buffed the ToD heroes so that they don't feel pathetic compared to BtDP heroes in general (but didn't overdo it), added secondary options to win a scenario in certain missions, like destroying Alterac vs. bribing Alterac into joining forces with you; or -in siege of Vanguard- destroying all enemy units vs. waiting until there are no gold mines left on the map. In certain BtDP missions, created an RNG that gives you a different hero each time you play it, added heavy scenario-specific triggers/scripts on missions that make them way more interesting and dangerous; like adding waves of daemons on missions where you have to destroy the dark portal, etc. (don't want to spoil much) In certain missions, added an allied force with custom AI that you can work with to destroy the enemy. (their AI is not as good as enemy's so your participation will obviously be needed), added lorefriendly music from warcraft related media on top of existing warcraft 2 music, so it doesn't feel as boring to listen to them. There are obviously way more changes than what I've listed here so far, but you can find them out by yourself if you want.

I've spent considerable amount of time and thought into polishing and making the game more interesting while keeping it faithful to the original. If you are interested in that, I can send you my files and you can play them and even review them, and maybe take some ideas or two. I daresay that I've made a lot of those missions more interesting. What do you say?

 

[LordPerenolde II]

In standard BtDP orcs heroes just come in certain missions. Teron does for most of them because he can regenerate lost health with life drain. Humans do not have this necessity because they can heal magically. My idea was to choose a hero at the beginning(so that the player maybe motivated to play the campaign all over again with different feats), to be flanked to Teron and other heroes later on, with his feats applying to the whole army as well. For example if you chose Korgath Bladefist the color of your army would be white, with Shattered Hand themed Grunts; if you chose Hellscream the army would be red, etc.
The mission won't fail if hero gets killed, but can be resurrected for a price wc3 style(altar-like probably). I thought about going this way so that enemies in each mission would attack your base with their local hero(for example the Bonechewer captain wearing the Skull of Gul'dan). Lots of beef on fire, to say it all.
Quel'thalas doesn't regard the alliance as a nation, like Khaz Modan. They just supply the alliance with their single units and that's it. I do not consider them optable choice.
Lordaeron and Stromgarde may have dwarves, elves and stuff.
Azeroth all of the wc1 techtree in order to give the player the option to play wc2 with wc1 units, just for the fun of it.
Lordaeron all wc2 techtree with a tuning on defense(maybe more base armor or a third def upgrade with just 1 attack upgrade, or both, or i'll see), with Mages only having 4 out of 6 spells.
Stromgarde opposite of Lordaeron, having no paladins at all and mages with just the basic spells(maybe just fire-based, like fireball and fire shield or Slow). Also faster military units speed too.
For Dalaran i was thinking about a drastic change:
- Magic ranged units instead of elven archers, or elven archers that can be magically enhanced further on(like the rest of the army). No knights/paladins but mounted(by upgrade, on foot first) mages with increased magic attributes. Full spell arsenal, and i'll see what else.
I'll probably do something with Alterac(my favourite nation) as well. I used to work on a campaign for them in the past, but heck, it got lost in a hdisk format.

 

[Luffy]

Nope, generally speaking, none of that sounds like a good representation of warcraft 2.

 

[LordPerenolde II]

I'm pretty sure you will like it(if it ever comes out).

 

[Kyrbi0]

@Luffy , feel free to share your opinions about how this thing should go, but label them as such a little more clearly if you please; you're coming off as telling him what to do or how to do it.

I'm sure he's got a fine idea of where he wants to go with this. If you don't like it, feel free to make your own, or inspire someone else.

~~~

Your idea with the Oil resource is fine, as long as he doesn't mind diverging from the original inspiration; i.e. "how it's done in Wc2". Adding another resource in will require some serious coding, AFAIK. But, as you've said, if you don't mind just having it 'look' like Oil collection or be 'similar' to it, then ostensibly there are several good options. Making the Tanker's summons, making the Oil Rigs continuously supply a certain resource, or making the Tanker's actually supply it by existing (so each one "brings back resources" but really just automatically provides it), or triggering the resource drops so that they get turned into something else (i.e. Oil)... Lots of options.

 

[LordPerenolde II]

I was eventually talking with @r_alexgaby over some of the sub-factions aspects. Here's some which struck me the most:
-----
Dalaran Purple has Sorceress instead of mages (have briliance aura, doesn't stack, but can help paladins, blizzard can destroy trees), towers are Arcance Towers by default (with feedback), can't be upgraded and Spell Breakers instead of Footmen (ranged, can use magic defense to move slower but become immune to magic), can't build Gnomish Inventor.
-----
As for this, i'd still prefer mages over sorceress. Will see if i can find human looking spellbreakers. Also 1 upgrade for attack and defense only. As i said, most of their gameplay will have to focus on magic enhancements. Not sure about paladins here either. Almost considering them an option for Lordaeron only, because they have the Silver Hand.

 

[Krogoth]

For the oil, I think you can make it with the gold mining ability, but you shall need to give shipyard and platforms to another player (with shared control) once they are built so that it will not interfere with the actual gold, and the tankers will not seek for a ground resource base (town halls).
However, you will need the actual gold resource for a sub-player, so that once a tanker brings gold, it must be converted into food for that particular sub-player, that shall be used as oil. You make tanker bring 1000000 gold per once, detect such delivery via trigger and transform into food. Then you periodically synchronize gold and lumber of sub-player with the player and temporarily remove all the food from sub-player when there is no food for the player (oil amount must be temporarily put into variable), so that food meets both oil and player's actual food requirement.
Then display oil with small multiboard.
You do it with no JASS.

 

[LordPerenolde II]

For the oil, I think you can make it with the gold mining ability, but you shall need to give shipyard and platforms to another player (with shared control) once they are built so that it will not interfere with the actual gold, and the tankers will not seek for a ground resource base (town halls).
However, you will need the actual gold resource for a sub-player, so that once a tanker brings gold, it must be converted into food for that particular sub-player, that shall be used as oil. You make tanker bring 1000000 gold per once, detect such delivery via trigger and transform into food. Then you periodically synchronize gold and lumber of sub-player with the player and temporarily remove all the food from sub-player when there is no food for the player (oil amount must be temporarily put into variable), so that food meets both oil and player's actual food requirement.
Then display oil with small multiboard.
You do it with no JASS.

I already have a system in place with GUI from @Stormshock maps. Helldoom's one was causing crashes, as far as i know.

 

[Anaxie]

Whats the progress looking like?

 

[LordPerenolde II]

Whats the progress looking like?

Aye, the progress..... i have been doing polishing work for the models in the game. Found out there were a few malfunctioning, so i had to dig for replacements, which i easily found. What i did lately was adjusting the size of each as they look in the game to be proportional(even with buildings); was then compiling the stats, and that took a while, and was not easy. I still have to check if the whole damage system i replicated(or tried to) is comparable to wc2. Spells are not done yet, but i'm planning on going over that sector later, when i'll be on the campaign part that starts to implement them.
A separate map for a briefing cinematic only is what i'm developing also. I'm starting with the human plot. Placing everything around is ok, but building the cinematic itself is demanding(even though i can copy the triggers from the wc1 remake). I will need feedbacks about this method and as such i'm developing a ToD 4 maps demo campaign(humans only) which will be hopefully released next month. I'm being very busy on other things so that's why the whole project it's going so slow, and i once again apologize for it.

 

[Anaxie]

Yes. ! Yes!

At least its being worked on was afraid it was abandoned.

Look forward to it

And i know why its slow. Mr champion

 

[LordPerenolde II]

Yes. ! Yes!

At least its being worked on was afraid it was abandoned.

Look forward to it

And i know why its slow. Mr champion

I know that many people tried the attempt of remaking Warcraft 2 and either abandoned or left a not-so-good work done, but i shall not do that. I just wish i could solely dedicate myself to this. It's hard to find time. Anyway i'm here. Until there is life there is hope.
Once again I appreciate and thank you for your dedicated support.

 

[SgtWinter]

Definitely looking forward to this! Hopefully the terrain will look better than your Warcraft 1 campaigns. No offense, but I'm just not a fan of super flat and plain terrains even if the gameplay is enjoyable. The subfactions will definitely be a fun addition, but try not to make them too different. Most people prefer to have a sense of familiarity when playing a custom faction. Factions that are too unique tends to leave players confused.

 

[MasterBlaster]

Definitely looking forward to this! Hopefully the terrain will look better than your Warcraft 1 campaigns

I agree that the terrain didn't look pretty, but then again... It was fairly representative of how the maps looked in WC1.

 

[SgtWinter]

I agree that the terrain didn't look pretty, but then again... It was fairly representative of how the maps looked in WC1.

But the map terrain in Warcraft 1 was pretty nice to look at because of the color scheme. The standard Lordaeron Summer tileset in LordPerenolde's campaigns was way too bright and cheerful for me to look at. Although the gameplay made up for it and I finished the whole thing on Hard.

 

[Anaxie]

Definitely looking forward to this! Hopefully the terrain will look better than your Warcraft 1 campaigns. No offense, but I'm just not a fan of super flat and plain terrains even if the gameplay is enjoyable. The subfactions will definitely be a fun addition, but try not to make them too different. Most people prefer to have a sense of familiarity when playing a custom faction. Factions that are too unique tends to leave players confused.

......

You do understand the maps are literally identical to wc1 right?

Thats the point.

 

[LordPerenolde II]

Definitely looking forward to this! Hopefully the terrain will look better than your Warcraft 1 campaigns. No offense, but I'm just not a fan of super flat and plain terrains even if the gameplay is enjoyable. The subfactions will definitely be a fun addition, but try not to make them too different. Most people prefer to have a sense of familiarity when playing a custom faction. Factions that are too unique tends to leave players confused.

......

You do understand the maps are literally identical to wc1 right?

Thats the point.

Exactly, and i agree with you sgtwinter. No offense taken, don't worry. I replicated mostly wc1 to the letter because of its simplicity. I tried to fancy around with flowers and some landscape minor details, like brushes and stuff, because i thought the maps would have been otherwise too much barren and plain, thus ruining the gameplay fun, annoying the player. I know nowadays players(or the majority of them, which i feel part of) feel like testers and developers(in some sort of way) themselves because of how quickly their eye can catch up aesthetic details. That's the reason why i did put some effort in, but didn't want to upset the whole geographical concept too much so that i could keep the "retro" aspect and at the same time use the excuse "Don't look at me, Blizzard did it like that" Same thing with the exagerated damage of the catapults(which put @Jayborino on the cross for the majority of his longplay videos).

Anyway, thank you soo much for the expectation feedback. People like you are what gives me inspiration and positivity.
As i said in a separate thread, i will first focus on the plain remake itself, then put the subfactions in at its completion.

 

[Annegus]

While I agree with @Luffy that keeping true to the Warcraft 2 spirit would be preferrable, I do kind of like @LordPerenoldeII ideas of making each of the human "factions" more true to the lore through their very units. For example - in the original Warcraft II - it always struck me as weird that Alterac had access to elvish, dwarven and gnomish tech considering they were just a bunch of human traitors.

This is especially considering that LPII did such a good job of adding small little details to his W1 campaign that didn't detract from the whole spirit of the original - quite the contrary! Giving footmen the defend ability so you wouldn't be able to just churn out spearmen for instawin, adding a stealthy mission for Garona... Things like this actually enhanced the overall experience for me, even if they weren't canon(!!!1).

Oh and @LordPerenoldeII - if you're going through with this project PLEASE don't give up on the "non-canonical" campaigns, or on others because they have "too much naval combat" DDDDDD Especially if you want to put your faction idea into practice! I for one greatly enjoyed the naval combat in Warcraft 2 (especially flying Zeppelins or Flying Machines over Destroyers and watching them blow each-other up lol). Maybe tone them down a bit, but it really wouldn't be nice to just get Reign of Chaos #2 as someone said in this thread

Just my 2 cents. Keep up the great work!

Edit: Oh, and the choosing heroes for each mission idea - while I like it in theory, you should at least give the players only choices that make sense in the context of the story. For example, not allowing people to choose heroes/clans you should be enemies with in the Orc campaign lol. Or not allowing them to choose a hero that should actually be somewhere else, fighting on some other far away front. I hope I'm making sense.

 

[LordPerenolde II]

While I agree with @Luffy that keeping true to the Warcraft 2 spirit would be preferrable, I do kind of like @LordPerenoldeII ideas of making each of the human "factions" more true to the lore through their very units. For example - in the original Warcraft II - it always struck me as weird that Alterac had access to elvish, dwarven and gnomish tech considering they were just a bunch of human traitors.

This is especially considering that LPII did such a good job of adding small little details to his W1 campaign that didn't detract from the whole spirit of the original - quite the contrary! Giving footmen the defend ability so you wouldn't be able to just churn out spearmen for instawin, adding a stealthy mission for Garona... Things like this actually enhanced the overall experience for me, even if they weren't canon(!!!1).

Oh and @LordPerenoldeII - if you're going through with this project PLEASE don't give up on the "non-canonical" campaigns, or on others because they have "too much naval combat" DDDDDD Especially if you want to put your faction idea into practice! I for one greatly enjoyed the naval combat in Warcraft 2 (especially flying Zeppelins or Flying Machines over Destroyers and watching them blow each-other up lol). Maybe tone them down a bit, but it really wouldn't be nice to just get Reign of Chaos #2 as someone said in this thread

Just my 2 cents. Keep up the great work!

Edit: Oh, and the choosing heroes for each mission idea - while I like it in theory, you should at least give the players only choices that make sense in the context of the story. For example, not allowing people to choose heroes/clans you should be enemies with in the Orc campaign lol. Or not allowing them to choose a hero that should actually be somewhere else, fighting on some other far away front. I hope I'm making sense.

Thanks for your feedback about my thoughts!
I think i've already stated that i'm going to remake the WHOLE wc2(>sigh<)+expansion. Perhaps i didn't state it in this thread but i have thought furtherly through about the whole concept of selectable heroes(expansion only) and optable subfactions(standard wc2 only).
Thank you again for your opinion. i'll keep everybody updated.

 

[Annegus]

already stated

Yeah sorry, after I wrote that long-a** reply I found out about the other thread haha

 

[deadmaniac]

@LordPerenoldeII A few weeks ago, I replayed WarCraft II when I saw a modded version of the game that made the campaign way more difficult. Inspired by that I was thinking about a project very similar to yours with unique factions for the Alliance and the Horde, respectively. It's very nice to see that such is project is actually in the works by people who are probably way, way better than me at mapping.

Reading some comments here, I want to give you my opinion, however. Many WC2 mods failed in WC3, and I think this was not just due to the oil mechanic, which is of course, a real pain in the butt. The problem, most of those campaigns had, were being way too buggy overall in addition to their feeling clumsy and not very well done, as mapmakers needed to find many compromises to fit WC2 into WC3 mechanics. Whenever I've tried a WC2 campaign in WC3, I was actually rather disappointed as the customs never met the incredibly high expectations I had, thanks to the nostalgia I feel when playing the original. So, I thought, when I want to feel nostalgic, I reinstall WarCraft 2, and play. As a consequence, WarCraft 2 campaigns have to do things differently, and do both, keep the WC2 feel kind of alive but also allow for changes in the gameplay that make use of WarCraft III's unique and awesome mechanics.

And here, I think, comes your approach into play. Making different factions, paying more attention to terrain and design, and giving the levels a new feel without altering them too much, is the right choice. For this reason, I also like your approach to focus on heroes (expansion) and factions (standard), as you enhance the mechanics which Blizzard implemented in WarCraft 2, and at the same time make use of WarCraft III's powerful mechanics. I actually had the idea that, since standard does not feature many heroes, the player actually earns experience by fulfilling missions (and maybe side quests, if this does not the WC2 too much), killing enemies, and master challenges. As a reward, the player rises in their rank in accordance to the ones in WarCraft 2 (maybe start as a grunt or sergeant, why would anyone give the command over a base to a slave or peasant?). Gaining ranks unlocks higher tier units, and could give passive bonus to your army, such as more life, cheaper units, extra units at the start of the level and so on. In BtDP, this mechanic would largely overlap with hero development, so maybe you need to do something else, or employ heroes as commander units, I don't know.

In regards to the oil system, I feel you have to make a change, as it seems pretty much impossible to implement it perfectly working. What I did in a very early draft of my own WarCraft 2 mod (back in the 2000s or so), was that oil tankers actually worked like wisp-like oil platform builders that disappeared from the game after finishing the construction. Every 5 seconds while the oil platform (haunted sea gold mine) was up, the player got 100 oil, without needing a tanker to mine it.

The last thing, I want to mention in this post seems very minor, but it's a huge part of the WC2: the camera perspective. All the mods I've played so far feature the WarCraft 3 camera position which works fine for WC3 but does not fit the WC2 style. The game was zoomed out slightly more, and I think this would benefit the general clarity of your mod and add to the 'commanding view' effect of the original.

I hope this was helping.

 

[LordPerenolde II]

A few weeks ago, I replayed WarCraft II when I saw a modded version of the game that made the campaign way more difficult. Inspired by that I was thinking about a project very similar to yours with unique factions for the Alliance and the Horde, respectively. It's very nice to see that such is project is actually in the works by people who are probably way, way better than me at mapping.

Reading some comments here, I want to give you my opinion, however. Many WC2 mods failed in WC3, and I think this was not just due to the oil mechanic, which is of course, a real pain in the butt. The problem, most of those campaigns had, were being way too buggy overall in addition to their feeling clumsy and not very well done, as mapmakers needed to find many compromises to fit WC2 into WC3 mechanics. Whenever I've tried a WC2 campaign in WC3, I was actually rather disappointed as the customs never met the incredibly high expectations I had, thanks to the nostalgia I feel when playing the original. So, I thought, when I want to feel nostalgic, I reinstall WarCraft 2, and play. As a consequence, WarCraft 2 campaigns have to do things differently, and do both, keep the WC2 feel kind of alive but also allow for changes in the gameplay that make use of WarCraft III's unique and awesome mechanics.

I played some myself, and trust me, i got this.

And here, I think, comes your approach into play. Making different factions, paying more attention to terrain and design, and giving the levels a new feel without altering them too much, is the right choice. For this reason, I also like your approach to focus on heroes (expansion) and factions (standard), as you enhance the mechanics which Blizzard implemented in WarCraft 2, and at the same time make use of WarCraft III's powerful mechanics. I actually had the idea that, since standard does not feature many heroes, the player actually earns experience by fulfilling missions (and maybe side quests, if this does not the WC2 too much), killing enemies, and master challenges. As a reward, the player rises in their rank in accordance to the ones in WarCraft 2 (maybe start as a grunt or sergeant, why would anyone give the command over a base to a slave or peasant?). Gaining ranks unlocks higher tier units, and could give passive bonus to your army, such as more life, cheaper units, extra units at the start of the level and so on. In BtDP, this mechanic would largely overlap with hero development, so maybe you need to do something else, or employ heroes as commander units, I don't know.

Interesting stuff. I was going to do the way you mentioned for the standard game, but i'm saving that, or kind of, for the expansion because in the original wc2 there were no heroes yet, and they just came out with the expansion.
But hey, trust me, if everything goes as i plan, and it will most likely be, you will build a statue in my honor.

In regards to the oil system, I feel you have to make a change, as it seems pretty much impossible to implement it perfectly working. What I did in a very early draft of my own WarCraft 2 mod (back in the 2000s or so), was that oil tankers actually worked like wisp-like oil platform builders that disappeared from the game after finishing the construction. Every 5 seconds while the oil platform (haunted sea gold mine) was up, the player got 100 oil, without needing a tanker to mine it.

I thought about wisps system too, but the thing is it was cool to keep the oil train back and forth of your base so you could use that naval power to safeguard your supply queue from being raided by enemy ships, expecially if the platform is far away.

The last thing, I want to mention in this post seems very minor, but it's a huge part of the WC2: the camera perspective. All the mods I've played so far feature the WarCraft 3 camera position which works fine for WC3 but does not fit the WC2 style. The game was zoomed out slightly more, and I think this would benefit the general clarity of your mod and add to the 'commanding view' effect of the original.

I hope this was helping.

I thought this too for wc1, but the perfectly perpendicular camera angle would denaturalize the aspect of the wc3 engine, where everything is made to be "looked from that angle". Lots, if not all, of the models may look just mere polygon shapes. Let us not forget: before 3d cameras were a standard, 2d RTS games had sprites that looked like seen from kind of that angle, and not entirely from above.

 

[deadmaniac]

I hope you can keep your word, maybe I will erect a statue in your honor in one of my maps that will hopefully see the light of the day some time

the wisp system is a compromise I was willing to take, but yes, you are right, it feels pretty wrong without the routes one has to protect. While I agree on most of your points, I'm relatively sure there can be something done about the camera angle. While I did not like the angle they introduced in the 1.29 PTR for WC3 too much, I could imagine it fits a WC2 style of map. I was not suggesting a straight top-down angle but an angle that is a little more zoomed out.

 

[LordPerenolde II]

Ok so you're talking about the latest patch camera angle. I still have to update, and i won't probably do it within few months. I saw, however, a 24 ffa map footage and the new camera angle didn't seem bad at all.

 

[Ababil88]

Great job. Hope you can make Beyond the Dark Portal in WC3.