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![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/OLE1MWzl.jpg)
- Published on HotS beta -
- 170, 140 playable bounds
- Kaldir Organic Cliffs, Zhakul Das manmade cliffs
- Kaldir: ice, cracked ice, rocks; Shakuras: bricks, hextiles; ulaan: dirt, cracked rock, grunge
- Cross only of course
- rush distance ~140 nat2nat on both spawn configurations
- 2 Xel'Naga Towers.
There are obviously 2 major twists on this map, one being that it's effectively two maps in one, both spawns are radically different and play out radically differently, one is more geared towards air play and has a backyard half natural but a forward full natural that is very hard to take to compensate. The other is more 'normal'.
The other twist is that the rocks are industructible and collapse on their own after a set amount of time, currently this is on 20 minutes but obviously this number is highly subject to balance changes and I already feel I might need to tone it closer to 15. I'd really like feedback on this.
You are expected to take a lot of half bases, this is just how the map works, this is a semi FRB map.
+ Show Spoiler [closeups] +
It's a hots map and highly experimental so balance is obviously hard to reason about and not guaranteed. It might be the most imbalanced p.o.s. ever but we'll never know until we try eh.
+ Show Spoiler [changes] +
1.1: Timed life on rocks changed to 15 minutes.
1.2: Times life on rocks changed to 10 minutes.
Edit: Some messy replays:
http://drop.sc/296912 (turns out tempests and multi pronged DT harass is a great way to salvage a game where you're far behind, lots of small BW like skirmishes, tempests are ace on this map)
http://drop.sc/296959 (phoenix play in PvT is pretty good on this map)
http://drop.sc/296958 (failed blink all in due to forgetting to take gas)
http://drop.sc/297026 (fav one because it's just silly)
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I'm really enjoying your takes on these. I think this is very interesting and cleanly executed.
This is the type of slightly different but better, and I like that you use rocks that open up to force more entries into a 3base player while still allowing them to get there. This makes the game just after both players establish thirds much more about angles of attack.
The cross positions 2 in 1 are a great form for a 4p map, since part of the point is to force a preparation of two strategies imo. The FRB in-base natural reinforces how crucial having two strategies is.
It would be hard to get somebody to play this 2-in-1 in a tournament setting, but I truly like the idea.
You've mentioned some issues with chance in previous posts, what if one position is better for a particular race or style or player? And a player did not get their preference. This doesn't bother me particularly much, but I thought it was worth bringing up.
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You've mentioned some issues with chance in previous posts, what if one position is better for a particular race or style or player? And a player did not get their preference. This doesn't bother me particularly much, but I thought it was worth bringing up. Well, it happens with maps with different spawns, on most maps Zerg likes to spawn cross so yeah, you always take that risk, it's unavoidable, I mean, even in TvT, everyone wants their add ons to be on the inside of their wall instead of the outside, it's unavoidable.
By the way, I wasn't the first to do this, I actually got inspired by Crux Deepholm:
![[image loading]](http://cfile26.uf.tistory.com/image/195AC1354FB92FA80B5CC4)
(these guys really don't want you to find the uri of their images wow, right click disabled and it's not in the source either, I actually had to trace the javascript console).
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I think multiple maps in 1 is pretty cool. I want to make one :-P
Aesthetics are pretty godly. I am slowly getting better at aesthetics but I think you are improving at a rate faster than anyone. Btw I would suggest putting a line of space inbetween each picture, just makes them not run together.
Balance is pretty impossible to read, but it has a nice variety of chokes and open areas so that is usually good. And the rocks are invincible before people cry about it being too hard to hold off things.
@ the rock destruction timer, I think 15 min or even 12 is probably fine.
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Most interesting map hands down i've ever seen i wish all maps were this diversified, where there is many ways to play on.
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On January 20 2013 22:24 Fatam wrote:
Aesthetics are pretty godly. I am slowly getting better at aesthetics but I think you are improving at a rate faster than anyone. Surely I am one of the slowest? This is the second map I made, while it doesn't look quite as good it still comes pretty close, I don't think my aesthetics improved all that much since the first map I made which admittedly has very nice aesthetics for a first map.
I've also updated the op with some replays of PvT games, I'll see if I can get some ZvT's and PvZ's in.
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pretty, looks funky too
wd
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I haven't seen a map with asymmetry like this before put into practice. I suppose as long as you've disabled close spawning (top left vs bottom left, etc) which Im sure you've done this map could be very balanced. Although I haven't played it, Id assume that as long as there are equally safe options for taking bases, each start location would be similar enough, balance wise. Im always intrigued by the manipulation of mineral/gas at each node (cant wait to see some games on icarus :D).
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United States10218 Posts
im not sure how you pulled this off... but you did. the map is freaking amazing. though the top left/bottom right bases look a bit choked up, i guess its how the map is gonna play out.
11/10 for creativity.
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Some things to consider from playtesting:
- close by air spawns are definitely my favourite to play on
- I will probably lower the timer on the rocks to 13, the last couple of playtests I did had them n 15.
- tempests are amazingly fun on this map
- the way the initial bases are laid out typically means that you can apply a lot of pressure but typically can't actually kill your opponent in the early game which is super fun.
- the lower area with the shrine is thusfar not used a lot, I wanted it to be an access way into the backyard when the rocks are down but the rocks that access the main directly also go down at that point which is a more convenient entry path. I might simply decide to put different rocks on a different timer and let those backyards collapse at 10 minutes to deal with this.
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Map looks pretty good, I like the variety in base layout and general layout where battles in certain areas will look very different from one another.
The style's not bad either. Feels like some things could use more dressing, but the green highlights stand out fantastically from the rest.
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After having a much better look at the map (from within the game, as opposed to here) and realizing how the rocks work, i actually want to say i hope this idea sticks. The layout felt odd until i realized that the rocks aren't killable, even. I also love the tile set, for some reason.
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Yeah, the map is mostly brilliant I think, I'd give it an 8 or 9 out of 10. The only feature I'm on the fence about is the bottom left / top right spawns have easily accessible highgrounds (for the attacker, that is) right above the naturals. You can do the same with the other spawns, but at least they have the free 1/2 base to make up for it.
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United States10218 Posts
On January 21 2013 07:20 SiskosGoatee wrote:
Some things to consider from playtesting:
- close by air spawns are definitely my favourite to play on
- I will probably lower the timer on the rocks to 13, the last couple of playtests I did had them n 15.
- tempests are amazingly fun on this map
- the way the initial bases are laid out typically means that you can apply a lot of pressure but typically can't actually kill your opponent in the early game which is super fun.
- the lower area with the shrine is thusfar not used a lot, I wanted it to be an access way into the backyard when the rocks are down but the rocks that access the main directly also go down at that point which is a more convenient entry path. I might simply decide to put different rocks on a different timer and let those backyards collapse at 10 minutes to deal with this.
how did u get it to be close by air? thought it was cross spawn only?
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On January 22 2013 15:37 Fatam wrote:
Yeah, the map is mostly brilliant I think, I'd give it an 8 or 9 out of 10. The only feature I'm on the fence about is the bottom left / top right spawns have easily accessible highgrounds (for the attacker, that is) right above the naturals. You can do the same with the other spawns, but at least they have the free 1/2 base to make up for it.
You can also very easily siege that base from the lowground, muta it to death, tempest it, apply seizable mothership/stalker pressure. I really wanted that base to be hard to take as your natural.
On January 22 2013 15:39 FlaShFTW wrote:Show nested quote +On January 21 2013 07:20 SiskosGoatee wrote:
Some things to consider from playtesting:
- close by air spawns are definitely my favourite to play on
- I will probably lower the timer on the rocks to 13, the last couple of playtests I did had them n 15.
- tempests are amazingly fun on this map
- the way the initial bases are laid out typically means that you can apply a lot of pressure but typically can't actually kill your opponent in the early game which is super fun.
- the lower area with the shrine is thusfar not used a lot, I wanted it to be an access way into the backyard when the rocks are down but the rocks that access the main directly also go down at that point which is a more convenient entry path. I might simply decide to put different rocks on a different timer and let those backyards collapse at 10 minutes to deal with this. how did u get it to be close by air? thought it was cross spawn only? Close by air is top/bottom spawn in this case, the map is very wide and not very high hence this is close by air.
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I love this idea for a map, with different spawns applying vastly different strategies.
One thing that might be worrying is that it seems relatively easy for a zerg to take 4 bases on the top right / bottom left spawns, while defending around the watchtower. But the rocks lowering earlier might compensate for this, 15 and definately 20 seem too late for this.
For the same reason, i'm not too worried about the highground above the natural, at least for zerg, bio terran and a gateway focussed protoss: your forces will typically be in front of the ramp anyway.
Bottom right / top left seems to play out a lot more like a 3-base scenario, untill the rocks go down and the base next to your main can be taken. Would make for a very interesting game, since you'd have two different fronts to worry about, instead of just 1 front getting wider.
I haven't playtested this map yet, so i don't know how these things will play out. But just the fact that i'm thinking about different spawns and changing scenario's halfway through the map makes me get exited about it  good job, and i hope you inspire a whole lot of other mapmakers to apply similar techniques!
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There are a lot of rocks, lots of constricted pathways, vulnerable bases, mains with backdoors, low resource expansions, 170x140 bounds, and a 2-in-1 map. All of these are controversial. Can't say much without playing on it, there's just so much going on.
You've got balls to make something like this though. Props to you! 
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I've learnt a couple of things from playing this map a lot:
- Making one unusual and one usual spawn, while not a balance mistake was a mistake. Everyone wants to play on the unusual spawn basically. Even though the usual spawn is slightly unusual, people still like the unusual spawn much more because it's more interesting.
- Rocks time has been drastically lowered to half its original time. It took too long I feel for the map to open up as well as the fact that it now opens after 10 minutes means that a fourth on the vertical spawns is more easy to secure which was a bit of a pain.
- The map is ridiculously fun to play on.
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The NE/SW spawn is plenty unusual for me. 
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Layout may be a bit unusual with the rocks but the interesting part about the vertical spawns is that the half base forces completely different builds.
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Thinking of upping it from 10 minutes to 12 or 13, thoughts?
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EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/PgHAlnql.jpg)
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