Description: Your main and natural are mostly typical. Your third, however, can only be accessed by ground through your natural. To balance this, its mineral line is up against an exposed cliff. To properly defend your third you need to defend from the cliff above it, this dynamic exposes your third to a variety of harassment opportunities, but on the whole isn't any more difficult to hold than most other WoL maps.
Your fourth is most likely going to be the base vertical of your third. This base is slightly exposed in the rear to air/ranged harassment. Further, it has a nearby high-ground which may be dropped on as well. Alternatively there is another base to take as your fourth vertical of your main. It is a much longer distance by ground, but is less exposed to harass.
The final base is dangerously placed in mid, but can easily be harassed by small hit squads. This allows for a player who might be behind in the late game to organize small tactical strikes against the opponent who might be on their sixth base.
The terrain varies from chokes to wide areas, and features a longer than average rush distance. The shape of the mid is such that, despite being a narrow map, it takes a long while to move units horizontally. This, combined with the lack of a Xel'Naga Tower, means that map awareness becomes vital to moving out on the map.
Race Specific Notes: Terran: The rush distance is substantial, so the lack of Terran speed becomes a major concern. The map is designed with drop play and using chokes to your advantage. Keep that in mind. Zerg: The third is nearly immune to zerglings provided your opponent has walled their natural, however later in the game zerglings will prove to be fantastic at using one of the map's many pathways for run-bys. Protoss: The map has many places to hide pylons, when your opponent is on two base you might want to put a pylon above their third to create a second attack path. The ramps are narrow and provide great opportunities for force field use.
The best compliment anyone can receive, the ragoo Seal of Approval:
Map is renamed from TPW Enigma, old thread can be found here.'
Changelog: 1.1 *Moved the mineral line of the third a few units off of the wall. Units with 6 or less range will no longer be able to reach the base from the above cliff, but units with 4+ range will still be able to reach miners. There is now room for a turret, cannon, crawler, etc. *Fixed an issue where people with OCD would complain about the third. *The ramp leading towards the natural has been moved a unit closer to the main, this should allow slightly quicker access to the base (numbered 5) vertical of the main. *The gas at the #5 base has been moved to one side, out of range of the high-ground pod. *Texture painting underneath decals has been cleaned up. Those running on low graphics settings shouldn't complain anymore about their sloppiness.
1.0 *Name changed to TPW Phantasm *Redesigned map borders. *There is now a high-ground pod above the base vertical to the main. *Corrected several graphical errors.
Im a bit iffy about the third. I love map layout and I think its really positionally great. The reason I dont like the third is because its a half base. I love having to defend above it, making dealing with drops usualy easier, but the other thirds are too far away. I think because of this, immortal sentry all ins on this map would be good, especialy since walls and corners are nearby. Overall, I love the layout and teh counterattack path.
Even though Zerg is definitely the strongest race right now, I feel you are hurting them waaay too much with this map. Every PvZ will be a 2 base because of how well it will work for you. If zerg takes the low ground 3rd protoss can warp in from above if needed, yet pushing their natural will be easy do to the amount of chokes. This means zergs will have to take their 3rd vertical from their main, but with the current layout that will be just about impossible to hold as well. It's farther away from your main/nat, and protoss will either attack from the highground with the choked off ramp, or attack from the low ground that is easily choked off as well as has protection with the LoSB. Take a look at this picture:
Get rid of the two bases in the middle. They will never get used. Ever. Maybe (just maybe) in TvT, but that'd be it. Next where those bases are, move it to the low ground. This makes that 3rd base vertical to your main a little more open, which means zergs will be more inclined to get it as their 3rd. It also makes 2 base pushes on that base much harder since it'll open the chokes up and protoss won't be able to fall back on the close high ground. The light green is empty space, so protoss/terran can still hide behind it if they want to push it, but it won't funnel the enemy up a small ramp. The brown is the LoSB. Add a new ramp (red) in to add more mobility and there ya go.
Get rid of the low ground outside the lowground 3rd. (The light grey) to open it up more. That 3rd base will already be a nightmare to hold, yet with how choked off it is above that 3rd base it'll be hard to push back a terran/protoss if they get set up back there. Getting rid of that small 4x4 square or w/e will open it up just enough to help that out.
I haven't tested it on this map yet, but that lowground 3rd might be a PITA for PvT as well. MMM or Hellions can fry probes on the minerals which will draw protoss out into engagements they most likely couldn't win. Or will lure them away to allow drops in the main easily. Why do all the minerals have to be up against the wall? Couldn't you turn the base 90 degrees clockwise so say only 1/2 the minerals can be shelled from the high ground? Now a handful of marines or 2 hellions won't be able to shut the whole base down. It also might make it a more viable 3rd for zergs.
I want to like this map and for the most part I do, but I just can't get behind that 1/2 base third. I think that alone really throws off the gameplay of the map and basically will force certain strategies because of it how it is laid out.
Have you thought about making it a full base but having the low ground swing all around the outside, past the 4th and connect to the lowground in the middle? You'd probably have to increase the map width a bit but it might be something to think about. Or what about changing the 1/2 base third to high ground instead of low ground maybe?
Aesthetics are amazing, always are when you make maps. (It looks much better then Enigma)
Hopefully I didn't rant too much here, lol. Keep up the good work bud!
1. Firstly the sixths are just that. Sixths. They will be taken if the game somehow stretches out to a stalemate, and a player wants to capitalize on their map control. They are intentionally very exposed so that a player on fewer bases has opportunities to punish the player attempting to take it. Will they get used often? Nope. Is there harm in their existence? Nope. Does it add more possibilities for the play-style of the map? Yep.
2. On the third. In general I disagree with how you are viewing the third, and I like to think I have a good idea of how it will work after designing around it for months. That said we haven't seen a map with a third like this, and it stands to reason that the typical metagame won't apply quite the same way.
Try to imagine that the third is actually located where the WRL logo is, that will make the concept of defending it make a bit more sense, and I think will make it apparent that it should be easy enough to defend as all races.
Here is what I mean:
Would a base in that location not be easy to defend? There are certainly differences, the base itself would be more exposed, but it would be easier to reinforce with units as zerg.
On January 30 2013 07:42 gCgCrypto wrote: the map looks great =) got some inspiration fro Tron? Can´t wait to have some of your maps on hots though, i cant stand wings anymore.
I think this is kind of boring for a HotS map, given some of the ideas I have for HotS, but I am currently trying to figure out how to publish it. It is giving me trouble.
Man, why would you put (formerly TPW enigma) in the title? Now nobody can think of it with its original name, like The Artist Formerly Known as Prince. You should have put it in the first line of the thread or something.
1. Firstly the sixths are just that. Sixths. They will be taken if the game somehow stretches out to a stalemate, and a player wants to capitalize on their map control. They are intentionally very exposed so that a player on fewer bases has opportunities to punish the player attempting to take it. Will they get used often? Nope. Is there harm in their existence? Nope. Does it add more possibilities for the play-style of the map? Yep.
2. On the third. In general I disagree with how you are viewing the third, and I like to think I have a good idea of how it will work after designing around it for months. That said we haven't seen a map with a third like this, and it stands to reason that the typical metagame won't apply quite the same way.
Try to imagine that the third is actually located where the WRL logo is, that will make the concept of defending it make a bit more sense, and I think will make it apparent that it should be easy enough to defend as all races.
Here is what I mean:
Would a base in that location not be easy to defend? There are certainly differences, the base itself would be more exposed, but it would be easier to reinforce with units as zerg.
1)Sure they are sixths so they'll rarely get used so it really doesn't harm any to have them. But if you can make the middle of the map better and not as choked off then maybe it's better to get rid of the 6ths, to make 95% of the other games have better flow through out the map. That's my thought process when I think about bases.
2)About the 1/2 base third, sure if the mineral line was only susceptible to harass units then I think it'd be great, but since it's so close to the cliff every ranged unit in the game can basically shut down that expansion, which means you have to take it after you get a big enough army to hold the high ground, which at that point it's still a 1/2 base so is it really worth it?
Think about the strats people use now. If terran does their normal marine/tank push against zerg, that base is as good as dead or useless when you think about tanks sitting on the high ground and elevatoring marines up and down between the two. Protoss could do their 2 base immortal sentry push, sit above the 3rd and elevator units down with the warp prism, hit the units with their stalkers/sentries, or just warp units in to pick off the base, while keeping the zerg choked. Zerg could roach-max, keep 3 or 4 roaches above the mineral line killing all probes constantly and just outlast the protoss.
To me, I look at the third and just find it as a giant trap. Not only is it a 1/2 base, but since every range unit can hit the workers, it allows the enemy to shut that base down. So, what's the point of taking it? Just 2 base all-in because if somebody does take that 1/2 third you can shut it down easily, thus most likely being able to win the game since you spent your resources on army, they spent it on economy, which means they won't be able to stop your all-in from decimating that base and more then likely winning the game.
Yes the white is recolored Valhalla. There are a few other color tweaks as well.
Sid. Originally the base was a full in early concepts, but the concern was that the base was too easy to hold. It really needs games from people who know how to play it.
I think one problem with making it a full base would be PvZ (unless you made the lowground wrap around and connect).
Protoss could have colossi on the lowground just out of roach range to prevent any roaches from firing on the mineral line, as long as they have an observer up on the highground to spot. It would probably shut down most infestor stuff too. And zergling runbys would be a non-issue. So basically P would have 3 easy bases with muta or nydus being the only ways to put on aggression at all. (it's still this way, but at least it's 2.75 bases not 3)
On January 30 2013 11:00 wrl wrote: Yes the white is recolored Valhalla. There are a few other color tweaks as well.
Sid. Originally the base was a full in early concepts, but the concern was that the base was too easy to hold. It really needs games from people who know how to play it.
I understand, I'm just theorycrafting how I'd play out the map. Hopefully you get some games on it so we can see how it turns out. As I've said I like the map as a whole and you've done a very nice job on it. Basically the only thing I dislike is the 3rds, otherwise it's a job well done! :D
You'll have to keep us updated if you get some great games on the map, I'd love to watch a couple replays of it. I do think the overall map right now benefits tank play, which makes it that much more enjoyable to watch. Everybody loves watching siege tank in action!
Great map. The critics here are quite harsh, I rather like the way the 3rd base is positioned. Everyone here argues as if the 3rd base on all maps should be alike. Heh, stupid people.
EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/P8VyM.jpg)
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