[M] (2) Trial by Ice

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Fatam

1986 Posts

February 05 2016 09:30 GMT

Trial by Ice
by Fatam

154x132
Published to All Regions
Version 0.2

Overview (XNTs highlighted for ease of understanding):
+ Show Spoiler +

Main concept is a laterally spread-out map but with lots of XNT to help you defend/see drops/etc. Yes there are tons of XNT, a few rocks, a dual entrance main and a gold base on each side and it's not a troll map.
.
There is a XNT right outside your main that the opponent can see your gases and a portion of the main with (and vice versa of course). You can't access the XNT on the edge of your main without going around or killing the rocks. There is no actual path into the main there, the XNT blocks it. There's some mind games that can be played with this, i.e. you can build or show something in the XNT's view when you're really doing something else.

Early game there's lots to consider: which way to expand, whether to split your army up to take multiple XNTs and get good map vision, whether to kill the rocks in your main so you can more quickly take your main's XNT rather than having to walk around (and deny your opponent having vision of your main), etc.

Late game the middle can get pretty crazy.

Main town hall to nat town hall is pretty standard, and main town hall to the 5/11 o'clock base is only 2-3 squares further. So it's definitely possible for zerg to expand there and then try for the gold as their 3rd, among other crazy things.

This is my YOLO map of the 5 so far, hope you like.

Close-ups:
+ Show Spoiler +

doodad count: 588

cash money :-P

Fatam

1986 Posts

February 08 2016 07:00 GMT

Anyone thoughts on this? If it's terrible I don't mind hearing it

Maybe I made a really shitty map, it wouldn't be the first time :-P but I'd like to hear something before it's time to submit so I don't waste one of my spots. If it's close to being decent and not a complete loss then any suggestions are welcome. Thx and happy hunting

Isarios

United States153 Posts

February 08 2016 07:55 GMT

I couldn't tell where the main even was at first:
First, cuz its so narrow and oddly shaped.
Its too shallow: leading to likely very abusable tank and blink use. Also very high amount of entrance area for aerial harassment.
It has rocks at the main ramp, which is interesting.
....
But it also splits the main from the nat, so if you lose that ramp, you're likely to lose the game, getting your bases split right in half.

Tons of towers haven't made for interesting game play before, because in Hots you'd simply macro to a deathball and push. In this map, i don't know what would happen. But it looks like its too unique for balanced play.

Avexyli

United States691 Posts

February 08 2016 18:38 GMT

Took me a sec to find the main too.

The map isn't terrible, don't worry. I would have to agree with Isarios, where it's terrain is really choked and congested. I feel like certain army compositions will have trouble moving around.

The rock path into the main is interesting as well. How many cells are under the rocks?

Fatam

1986 Posts

February 08 2016 20:43 GMT

I didn't even think about the main not being obvious. My bad on that. Sometimes you tunnel vision so hard you forget that things aren't obvious to someone just now looking at the map.

Interesting feedback, thanks! I was also a bit worried about tank/blink but wanted to hear thoughts first. The middle was intentionally chokey with large open pathways going around it. In the middle there are lots of small/medium openings/paths to the same place to encourage splitting and flanking. But maybe it's not well implemented or simply not open enough overall. I'll see what changes I can do and I'll update the OP pic with the starting locations so things make more sense. edit: here

The rock path into the main is interesting as well. How many cells are under the rocks?

if you mean the one with the XNT, it isn't pathable into the main at all (this is noted in the OP but I can't blame anyone for not reading the wall of text :-P). If you mean the one with the rock tower, it's a 1 FF only atm. Was strongly considering making it 2 FF (went back and forth on this) but not sure.

To further clarify, the idea behind the XNT on the edge of the main is early-mid game you can scout your opponent even after you've been locked out of their main by sending a worker/early unit there and the opponent can't stop you from seeing until they either kill the rocks so they can access it via the inside of their main, or if they send units there to kill your stuff. It gives vision of both gases which is fairly useful (can see when both geysers are taken, count how much gas is left, as well as seeing any buildings that they might put in the XNT range or maybe catching a glimpse of their army as it moves through). Also once you kill the rocks, the XNT vision can help the defender against tanks or blink or w/e (since the main is vulnerable to that). As mentioned in the OP there can be mindgames with this too (show one thing to your opponent in the XNT's vision, do another)

I was kind of proud of this idea since I think it's a more interesting version of the double sided XNT idea that hasn't really been done before.

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