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Errant Flux
Published on HOTS Beta NA
By Namrufus
v0.1
Don't spin out of control!
+ Show Spoiler [old versions] +
+ Show Spoiler [beauty shots] +
Stats
dimensions = 148x148
14 total bases:
---8m 2g bases: 11
---6m 1hyg bases: 3
3 watchtowers
6 d-rocks
1 c-rock
tileset = korhal platform
doodad count = 390
Description
This is a 2 player diagonally reflective map, the air/cliff walker distance is much shorter than the ground distance (I might get rid of the reaper backdoors actually). It has a fairly standardish close main->nat->third. There is a watchtower on the high ground pod next to the third (I might get rid of this). The 4th's mineral lines are mineral walls that lead to the back of another 4th and another semi island base. The town hall of the island between can be blocked by a collapsible rock.
One of my concerns are the mineral walls. It is possible that P could have the advantage here as it is so easy to warp/blink over the mineral walls compared to the other races, my fear is that it might be too easy to completely deny the opponent (especially vs Z) from ever taking that base as a fourth. Then again, any unit warped into that area for harassment is effectively trapped and useless for anything else until the mineral walls are breached or you get transports (maybe this will counterbalance it, if it turns out to be unacceptable, then I could probably deny warp-ins with LOS blockers or building blocker terrain near the mineral walls).
Anyway, if you have any feedback, comment or suggestions, please post if you want to.
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Love how it looks! Reminds me of the sc1 space terrain I think that the mineral block expansions won't really be a big issue since they are so far away from the first few bases you'll take, but I am definitely not a fan of the island base between the mains on this map, feels terran favored. I also think the watch towers at the 3rd bases aren't very necessary, and if anything they just promote you to be more turtlish. Vision with that and the middle watch tower would make it very easy to see anything coming in from far away with minimal effort on the player. Other then that I'd play around with putting destructible rocks or collapsible rocks at the potential 4th bases under the main/nats of each main so players are encouraged to use the expos that can be attacked from behind.
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Scrap station v2? Theres alot of people that will hate you for that close air 
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On November 23 2012 17:40 ihasaKAROT wrote:Scrap station v2? Theres alot of people that will hate you for that close air
To be fair, if people haven't figured out how to deal with air play in the early game but now that's not a map fault - it's ours.
Overall I like the layout of the map, the only thing of concern from a quick glance is the 8ish base in the middle. I feel the distance between the players will be way too short once the various rocks are taken out.
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There are a few common problems when making diagonal mirror 2p maps, but you have found a pretty good solution it seems.
I have a suggestion/idea, though. How about making the 3 top right corner bases mid ground and the top right center base lowground? Anway, still a pretty cool map!
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Are you not afraid that Terrans will just expand to the island?
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just some nitpicks,
the way the terrain goes right to the border, and the other two watchtowers, kind of makes drop play next to impossible, aside from going main-to-main. id like to remove the towers altogether, and give a bit more airspace around the borders.
also, instead of completely blocking the middle ramps, just have it semi blocked ala CC? (just the middle rocks, not the one leading into the nat)
and lastly, make the island a half base, or something to not reward terran fast cc
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On November 23 2012 21:44 Aunvilgod wrote:
Are you not afraid that Terrans will just expand to the island?
With the new airplay available in HOTS I don't think it will be a problem at all. Furthermore -- zerg could be encouraged to play a ling/muta style opener on this map in order to compensate for the island/semi-island expansions. I like this one.
Dangit I gotta get my first HOTS map done already! You work too fast! 
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Right intresting map but i too have some nitpicks.
I am not entirely sure what the point of the fourth bases being blockages like it currently is. As you said it would be very easy for Protoss to blink across and terran could just load a dropship, and Zerg would have really limited options to deal with that. LOS blockers are only going to do something to protoss.
I think good old destructable debris would be the order of the day if you want to keep up the blockade like that. Never liked alternative blocking anyway but that is my personal opinion. Also if you insist on keeping the upper right base blocked off like that, then at least make some reward out of taking it. Maybe a high yield base even if it is taboo.
The island is another thing i don't get. What is reason for the collabsable rocks? Why would anyone who got acces to the island use said access to collabse the rocks? Be it through drops or Air play anyone who got the means to take down those rocks would rather use those means to secure the island and its reassources. Again normal destructable debris is your order of the day. Also keeps those terrans from doing 3 CC with lifting unto the island without any need for preperation.
If you wanna make use of collabsable rocks then i think the place to go would be in place of the debris next to the half bases that act as fourths. Make the half bases full bases in the proces. This would mean there would be just as big a reward as expanding up but you would need some army dedication to truly secure it.
That is all i got to say for now.
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Ok this SERIOUSLY reminds me of the BW space tileset, NICE job on that <3.
I also love that you're experimenting with the 4ths, and while it may not work it's a nice idea.
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I like it but I would like to see the scrap debri actually blocking the island expo. I like this map 
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My critiques would be:
- collapsible rocks don't really make sense on the island as they are currently implemented, as some other people have mentioned
- there probably shouldn't be destructible debris on the ramps past the middle XNT (to the east and north of it, to be precise). It just closes up the map unnecessarily, and makes the XNT a little too strong in the early game (imo).
I really really don't think close air will be balanced in HOTS (I think Protoss will shit on people, to be precise :-P), but it doesn't hurt to try. Pretty fun-looking map, hope you get some games on it.
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I like how the XNT's are set up. In the mid-game, when players are on 3 bases, they become quite powerful, encouraging use of either the backdoor paths, or of air units, which brings the island expansion, and it's rock tower, into play.
However, I don't like the mix of Korhal City tiles into this particular aesthetic, doesn't quite fit to me, I'd rather see the detail panels in there.
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This map seems a lot like Metropolis, only slightly more flawed. On this map, I would expect either a 4-base macro game or air-based cheese. The high ground vs. air distance differential is going to make early ground pressure incredibly risky. I'd recommend swapping the position of the two ramps at the natural; put the collapsible rocks on the backside, and the open ramp in the front. Then get rid of the collapsible rocks in the center.
On this map, I would expect players to take the base with one gas in front of their main as their 4th, and almost never take a 5th. The distance to the other one is simply too large for slower armies.
With the island base, how is Terran supposed to put pressure on it if they go mech? Protoss have Mothership Core, Warp Prisms, Phoenix, Void Rays, and Tempest. Zerg have Nydus Canal, Mutas, Overlord Drops and Brood Lords. Terran only has Starport units; Banshees, Medivacs, Vikings, BCs, and Ravens. And those aren't likely to be built until very late in the game with a mech ground army opening.
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On November 27 2012 04:44 FlyingBeer wrote:
With the island base, how is Terran supposed to put pressure on it if they go mech? Protoss have Mothership Core, Warp Prisms, Phoenix, Void Rays, and Tempest. Zerg have Nydus Canal, Mutas, Overlord Drops and Brood Lords. Terran only has Starport units; Banshees, Medivacs, Vikings, BCs, and Ravens.
Really? Pretty sure banshee openings are fairly common with mech, and you basically have to get vikings with it or air units will kill all your tanks. In fact, banshees and vikings are much more common than pheonixs, voids, mutas, overlord drops and nydus canals. Coupled with the fact that the expansion is easier for terrans to get and defend with missle turrets, I don't think this is bad for terran at all.
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There is a big burden on zerg because of the 4ths. It's sooo easy for one medivac to endlessly require attention and deny lots of mining, even do a lot of damage. Zerg might deal with this using nydus, which would be cool, oh wait HotS. =\
Possibly viper could deal with this (grab the medivac essentially shuts down the drop) but it's still a quite a bit more work than is usually required from zerg to get their 7th and 8th geysers.
Cool map though. Also a little uncomfortable for ZvT across the quad rocks series of bases, but that's probably not a dealbreaker. Very appealing in general.
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map looks way too terran favored to be balanced. bases super-close distance by air (drops, banshee play), island base that's not even blocked (float cc), plenty of high ground to siege expansions from (maybe, can't really tell).
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On November 27 2012 11:35 CycoDude wrote:
map looks way too terran favored to be balanced. bases super-close distance by air (drops, banshee play), island base that's not even blocked (float cc), plenty of high ground to siege expansions from (maybe, can't really tell).
Remember it's HotS, Terran wont be the only one to use their air units. Protoss have very strong air play now ( WP doesn't get fungaled + oracle + tempest+ mothership core+ VR + phoenix + mothership+ easy and fast scouting with obs damn ! )
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First of, thanks for all of the feedback, I appreciate it.
On November 23 2012 21:59 a176 wrote:
and lastly, make the island a half base, or something to not reward terran fast cc
On November 23 2012 21:44 Aunvilgod wrote:
Are you not afraid that Terrans will just expand to the island?
On November 24 2012 00:43 Sumadin wrote:
The island is another thing i don't get. What is reason for the collabsable rocks? Why would anyone who got acces to the island use said access to collabse the rocks? Be it through drops or Air play anyone who got the means to take down those rocks would rather use those means to secure the island and its reassources. Again normal destructable debris is your order of the day. Also keeps those terrans from doing 3 CC with lifting unto the island without any need for preperation.
yeah this might be a bit too strong for T, The collapsable rocks really don't do anything. I'll change this base into either a 6m1hyg base (or lower) or just block it with a normal rock (or both). I kinda wish that collapsable rocks did more damage so that they could be more of a threat to structures. maybe I could block it with a mineral patch ... but bliz decided that command centers need to be able to carry scvs for some reason (tho that still might be interesting, maybe have enough patches to take 2-3 trips to and from the geyser with the 5 SCvs a CC can carry?).
On November 23 2012 19:40 lost_artz wrote:
Overall I like the layout of the map, the only thing of concern from a quick glance is the 8ish base in the middle. I feel the distance between the players will be way too short once the various rocks are taken out.
The distance between the two nats (measured as if by the map analyzer) is, as far as i can tell, approximately 105-125 in editor units after the rocks go down. This is fairly small compared to other maps but I think it will be mostly OK, maybe I'll widen the double choke into the half-bases from the area outside the natural so the path isn't hard to attack into from that direction
On November 23 2012 16:22 Whiplash wrote:
Love how it looks! Reminds me of the sc1 space terrain
On November 24 2012 00:48 Qwyn wrote:
Ok this SERIOUSLY reminds me of the BW space tileset, NICE job on that <3.
tyty, I think this is more an effect of the Bliz's excellent new HOTS textures than any sort of artistic merit on my part :p.
On November 24 2012 12:32 NewSunshine wrote:
However, I don't like the mix of Korhal City tiles into this particular aesthetic, doesn't quite fit to me, I'd rather see the detail panels in there.
huh, just replacing the korhal city textures with the korhal platform detail actually looks really good. I was having trouble trying to fit that detail texture in. Though the korhal tiles really give the sc1 space feel I think. I think I'll switch it out next version actually.
On November 23 2012 16:22 Whiplash wrote:
but I am definitely not a fan of the island base between the mains on this map, feels terran favored.
On November 23 2012 21:59 a176 wrote:
just some nitpicks,
the way the terrain goes right to the border, and the other two watchtowers, kind of makes drop play next to impossible, aside from going main-to-main. id like to remove the towers altogether, and give a bit more airspace around the borders.
hmm, thats a good point. the watchtower radius near the third don't go quite to the edge of the map, but it's pretty close (5-6 editor squares) I want to keep the towers for now, but maybe I'll extend the borders out a bit, maybe add a droppable or condemned-ridge-type pod near the third or nat to reward drops more (though that might be too extreme)
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Regarding the min-block 4ths. I'm not sure what I want to do with them, I really want to use something like this, but I could always use a feature like that some other map later. you've given me a lot to think about/try out; might keep it the same...
On November 27 2012 11:32 EatThePath wrote:
Zerg might deal with this using nydus, which would be cool, oh wait HotS. =\
I'm fairly certain that nydus (nydii? nyduses?) are still in the hots beta... I think, unless that isn't what you are talking about.
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anyway sorry for this late post, I'll try to respond to more of you and elaborate more later.
thanks again.
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EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/STqZl.jpg)
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