Map of the Month's winter season begins now! Over the next two and a half months, we will seek out the best community maps to find which will be added to the next IEM event map pool. In January, the top five map submissions will be played in an open tournament hosted by the ESL. Another map contest and open tournament will follow in February. All prizes are sponsored by Intel!
Map submissions are open at this time and will close on January 10th. Any mapmaker may send a maximum of two melee map creations in to us to be judged. Email your map title, author, overview image, and .SC2Map file to submit.motm[at]gmail.com. Any submissions without this information may be excluded.
A panel of judges will select the top five map submissions in January to be played in the open tournament. No changes will be made to the maps without author permission, but keep in mind we may ask for minor changes to make the map playable by melee standards.
Submissions for the February tournament will open in mid-January.
Sponsored by Intel
ESL will be hosting and casting an open EU tournament during January using the top five community maps chosen by the judges panel. A second map contest and open tournament will be casted in February. More details on the tournament and player sign-ups will be released soon.
Sponsored by Intel
-The first place mapmakers for January and February will win Kingston packs with SSD, i7 Processor, RAM and USB Drive. -The other top four mapmakers each month will win Intel SSDs. -The tournament winners each month will receive i7 Processors and SSDs from Intel. -The grand-winning mapmaker for the two months will get his or her map to the next IEM map pool!
To keep up to date with all MotM events, follow MapOfTheMonth and ESVmonitor. We're looking forward to seeing all of the map submissions!
On December 17 2011 12:57 AdrianHealey wrote: Does aesthetics matter in the evaluation?
Maybe I want to fiddle a bit, but I do not have the skill set to make it aesthetically pleasing.
Aesthetics do matter (sorry to inform you). There are multiple judges that have different opinions on the matter, but aesthetics will count for something.
This is pretty sick cool for mapmakers, 2 tournaments, so many cool prizes and a guaranteed spot for IEM for the overall winner GL&HF to everyone participating.
On December 18 2011 07:05 ArtThouAngry wrote: Hopefully Blizzard would add the winning map to the ladder pool :D One can only hope
Check out the TL map contest, because Blizzard said they might add some of the winning maps to ladder: http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/blog/4103100 But I hope some of the MotM winners get added too
Been awhile since I've sat down and made a new map. Expect me to enter a new fresh map into this. I'm also glad you're giving people until a week or so into january because with Christmas & New years coming up many people might be busy, I know for sure I'll be.
On December 19 2011 15:44 SidianTheBard wrote: Been awhile since I've sat down and made a new map. Expect me to enter a new fresh map into this. I'm also glad you're giving people until a week or so into january because with Christmas & New years coming up many people might be busy, I know for sure I'll be.
I hope a week or two into January will be enough time, but thanks! Glad you're back
I really support this. A community made map in a big tournament like IEM is just what the map making community needs! GL to you all!
Edit: Small concern if there is a veto system during the tournament, if the players are introduced to a new map they don't recognize they might just thumb it down. I hope it gets some air time either way.
Any info on when the "final" deadline is? I just need to slowly work on Aesthetics when I get time, so honestly I'd like to submit it on one of the last days possible.
On January 02 2012 10:49 SidianTheBard wrote: Any info on when the "final" deadline is? I just need to slowly work on Aesthetics when I get time, so honestly I'd like to submit it on one of the last days possible.
The final date still isn't set, but it'll be between the 7th and 10th depending on how many submissions come in. We'll be lenient though.
I haven't really been able to make anything I'm proud of yet and I guess I won't have something ready, but I have some cool designs in the works and will make some cool maps for next month.
Are we allowed to have maps with triggers in them?
I've wanted to see island maps tried again for a while now, and I've been thinking of a map that starts out normal and then turns into an island thanks to water level rising (something like the campaign map The Devil's Playground, but only as a one-time thing, the point is to change the battlefield, not kill units out of position).
Eh, well I might enter one if I can finish it up on time. What time is the deadline exactly? Also, can we re-enter the same map again next month, or a newer version of it?
On January 09 2012 10:16 Fanatic-Templar wrote: Are we allowed to have maps with triggers in them?
I've wanted to see island maps tried again for a while now, and I've been thinking of a map that starts out normal and then turns into an island thanks to water level rising (something like the campaign map The Devil's Playground, but only as a one-time thing, the point is to change the battlefield, not kill units out of position).
We strongly dislike maps with triggers, as they usually introduce completely new game mechanics which will confuse players unless they have studied the map thoroughly before (everything existing, and some new mechanics like collapsible rocks, can be made using the data editor).
Usually players already know how Xel'Naga towers, LoS blockers and destructible rocks work from ladder maps and so on, and we do not want to increase the complexity more than necessary as that might make players avoid the maps. Of course creative usage of the above mentioned things is definitely allowed
Also changes using the data editor might be frowned upon, depending on their nature, as they too might greatly affect gameplay (completely aesthetic changes are allowed, provided they do not change playable units).
On January 09 2012 16:49 Gfire wrote: Eh, well I might enter one if I can finish it up on time. What time is the deadline exactly? Also, can we re-enter the same map again next month, or a newer version of it?
For now it is the 10th of January wherever you are, so until 23:59 on the 10th of January (your timezone) you will be able to send the email to us (as we have not decided on a timezone for this MotM).
You can also enter the same map next month, but ONLY if it has had several quite LARGE changes made to it (so it is essentially, a "new map"). You can also expect to have it judged a bit more harshly because we have already seen it and might expect more from it compared to the completely new maps. We might change this on a later date without warning, depending on the submissions we receive.
Reclamation is probably pretty rough. I've had a bit of a block lately and it was probably the only half way decent layout I've spit out in the last month.
Just to think of where MotM started.. wow! This is pretty incredible; just to see the words "sponsored by intel" and motm in the same thread is pretty incredible
With maps like Cloud Kingdom and Burning Altar I don't have any chance, but what would I expect with it being my first map. Great to see so many submissions, best get other maps finished for a future MotM.
Everyone has a chance. The Teamliquid mapping contest and the IPL mapping contest were run at the same time with the same maps but they didn't pick the same maps. It shows how random judging maps is. In the TL contest people voted for maps that judges dismissed (Ohana and Haven's Lagoon were 1st and 3rd by the public and 5th and 6th by the judges).
Also everyone (including me) thought the new Blizzard maps were bad but the GSL chose the 4 player map and it doesn't seem so abusable. At least it shows it's hard for a map to really break the game, and even if it did it could be fixed.
In the end judges just pick maps they like, and also probably have an idea of what they want. Everyone can win it's just a matter of taste.
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MapOfTheMonth and 
I already submitted my maps!
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