It's a pretty simple map. I didn't want to go too crazy. The most interesting bit is the center. I've been thinking and experimenting for a long time about creating areas which can break up large armies. This is the "anti-deathball" center. I'm interested to see how it will play out.
I thought I would enter MotM so I made this map over the last few days to get something together.
I can see sentries and tanks just killing everything in the centre here. There's no real way to engage a protoss there and because he can just stroll in from his third straight to the centre then straight in to your third or natural, there's never really a chance as zerg (but also as bio terran) to engage the army.
Well I knew it was inevitable, I just hoped I'd be the one to get it out there first. I've had an idea for doing a middle (or at least certain sections) like the middle of this map for some time now but I haven't even had the time to get my 3 other WIP's updated in the past two month (when will RL go away, you know?).
Anyway, in my experimentations with swiss cheese terrain, I learned a number of interesting things about unit sizes and what can/can't fit through certain spaces (that's part of what lead me to make Hardened Heart with so many wonky ramp configurations).
I really ought to make a thread about some of those findings because they are rather interesting (like only tanks and thors gettings stuck in some spaces but everything else, including Ultras, Archons, and Colossus fitting through).
Anyway, I think the middle area, if it is played through, will yield some very interesting micro decisions. Forcefields, fungalfields, building blocks, maybe even a greater emphasis on air units. I don't really have much to say about the rest of the map -- it's somewhat standard, but then I can understand doing that to counteract the snap revulsion people might have with the less standard middle area. All in all, pretty neat.
I think the best anti-deathball center would be perfectly wide open. The way you have it here makes the protoss in me salivate in anticipation of forcefield abuse.
On April 17 2012 15:37 IronManSC wrote: The center of this map scares the living bricks out of me as a Zerg player
In what type of engagement? So far I haven't found anything that would be an issue. Marine stutter step in small engagements against lings would be a little better than in a completely open field, but of course a completely open field of this size would be heavily Zerg favored. I don't think you're really forced to engage a marine force with only lings in the center of the map very often, anyway. It seems pretty easy to get surrounds with anything ranged. Baneling's radius is smaller than the space between unpathable areas so the more spread units should affect both sides of Baneling battles pretty much equally.
There's actually a lot of open space and the holes are very small, so it isn't as bad as one might think at a glance.
On April 17 2012 17:11 Yonnua wrote: I can see sentries and tanks just killing everything in the centre here. There's no real way to engage a protoss there and because he can just stroll in from his third straight to the centre then straight in to your third or natural, there's never really a chance as zerg (but also as bio terran) to engage the army.
It's possible. Most the spaces are something like 1.5 FFs wide so you'll actually still have to use a ton to fully walloff an area despite it already being partially closed off. You can easily attack from all sides so getting a surround isn't too hard, against either sentries or tanks. In TvT I might imagine tanks being a little strong against marines, compared to an open field, but it's TvT so both sides always get tanks anyway. In TvP I can't say, since tanks aren't really used. Against Zerg, Roaches might have a hard time against tanks, and Ultras might suck, but we generally see ling/bling/muta, and lings are so small and fast that they aren't affected much at all, other than being able to put your tank up against an edge to reduce surface area, which probably won't make a difference since lings can kill tanks quite fast once their up close anyway. It might be a little hard to engage marine/tank with ling/bling, but mutas should be stronger so hopefully it's balanced.
As far as Protoss goes, I'm not sure the issue. SC2 pathing is really good, so it's really easy to get a surround in a huge battlefield like this. Zealots are weakened the most probably of any unit, and I'm actually worried TvP will be terran favored, especially since Colossi have to walk around stuff but vikings dont, and stalkers would have a hard time killing the vikings because they are spread so much. ZvP might be a concern, because roaches are a little weak and blink stalkers are probably pretty good. Roaches don't get a real advantage vs stalkers from being in open areas, at least off creep, so the Blink stalkers would likely be strong there. Pure Blink Stalkers are pushed back as the battle goes, though, so you can wait to engage until they are really close by and then engage in the area between the middle and your bases while they can get pushed into the center.
On April 17 2012 19:00 Aunvilgod wrote: I can´t see anyone going into the center ever.
Yeah, my biggest concern with this map was that players would just walk around the edges with their deathballs and ruin the entire thing. If I must, I will choke up the sides so that's not really possible, and it would be more like Shakuras where the center is the only real attack path.
On April 17 2012 22:35 HypertonicHydroponic wrote: Well I knew it was inevitable, I just hoped I'd be the one to get it out there first. I've had an idea for doing a middle (or at least certain sections) like the middle of this map for some time now but I haven't even had the time to get my 3 other WIP's updated in the past two month (when will RL go away, you know?).
Anyway, in my experimentations with swiss cheese terrain, I learned a number of interesting things about unit sizes and what can/can't fit through certain spaces (that's part of what lead me to make Hardened Heart with so many wonky ramp configurations).
I really ought to make a thread about some of those findings because they are rather interesting (like only tanks and thors gettings stuck in some spaces but everything else, including Ultras, Archons, and Colossus fitting through).
Anyway, I think the middle area, if it is played through, will yield some very interesting micro decisions. Forcefields, fungalfields, building blocks, maybe even a greater emphasis on air units. I don't really have much to say about the rest of the map -- it's somewhat standard, but then I can understand doing that to counteract the snap revulsion people might have with the less standard middle area. All in all, pretty neat.
Ah... I had no idea someone else had been thinking about it. Great to hear that. Sorry I got it out first, I totally rushed this map just to get the idea out. The main reason I did it was because I feared no one else had the same idea, and never would, in which case I feel obligated to share it. I'm really glad you've already thought about it, though. I feel a lot less pressure.
I'm not the best map maker, but I mostly get some cool ideas and like to share them, so that's mostly what keeps me making maps. I spend a stupid amount of time in the editor, though, and maybe I can retire if this idea is picked up by others. Mapmaking kinda consumes my life for days at a time and I've been trying to quit for months, and spend more time playing the game, but having cool ideas and the fear that no one else would ever think of them is too much for me. That, and it's highly addictive. Mostly I have a hard time seeing flaws in my own maps so I spend too much time on ones I should have scrapped, as well.
I'd like to mention that at first I was just using a grid layout for the middle. A side affect of that is that there were a lot of straight lines of pathability through the middle, so a group of units could walk through at certain angles without being affected. To get the best results, I've rearranged the layout to be in this circular format, which doesn't allow any reasonably sized group of units to walk right between stuff in a straight line. This layout allows it to be highly effective at breaking up deathballs while not over-saturating it with holes.
As a side note, a Thor or Tank can fit through even the smallest areas on this center with easy. Even a Thor and Tank side-by-side could almost fit.
Thank you for your comments, and it's very nice to have some support. Someone else having thought about this was really the last thing I had expected.
On April 17 2012 23:11 Gl!tch wrote: I think the best anti-deathball center would be perfectly wide open. The way you have it here makes the protoss in me salivate in anticipation of forcefield abuse.
It's not designed to make deathballs easier to kill than normal, so much as it is to make deathballs spread out to make the engagements interesting and more micro intensive even with maxed armies. I think it does a great job of this for the Protoss Deathball. It also affects large Terran Bio balls of course. Brood Lord+Infestor could be a little strong, though.
Entombed Valley does a good job with the open center. It helps make up for the easy three-base to deathball issue with that map. In GSL I've seen the best long games on Entombed. I'm all for super wide open areas for deathballs as well, but it usually ends up with a deathballing player getting surrounded more easily by the other player, or both players knocking balls together like usual. It doesn't cause both armies to spread out, and it doesn't require much micro, even if it allows for more micro. TvP with Templar is really interesting because the storms give incentive for the terran to really use the open space to spread out, and Zealot-Templar-Archon of course wants to surround bio and not stay in a ball like Colossus-Stalker armies, so that can be great in an open field. Blink Stalker armies are also great with the wide open.
If it's open enough that players start to realize Deathballing is just bad (though spreading units out in the open field doesn't help your effectiveness too much,) then maybe they'll go with other styles of play that excell in open fields or do more harassment and less engaging head on or something. In this case having just an open field would act as a fine anti-deathball, but what I'm going for here is to still allow for huge battles, but make them not ball-on-ball so much. So far it feels really good.
Thanks everyone for the comments, much appreciated.
The middle won't work. The positioning for tanks/FF is too strong.
And saying that a particular area is 1.5 FF wide serves to only make toss happy, as they are rejoiced by 3FF wide ramps. It's not a question of how many sentries they'll bring- the answer is ALL THE SENTRIES.
I don't feel that the centre will work well, also because micro will be... interesting in it- it seems that marine/baneling battles will be in part player control, and in part random pathing decisions made by the map.
I could be wrong, because while an interesting central concept, I find the majority of the map rather plain, and so would like to see something like this work. I don't know if this does, however
On April 18 2012 04:05 virgol wrote: Loving the middle, nice and interesting approach to it! Nice texture work as well.
Thanks. Hopefully it works.
On April 18 2012 04:19 DYEAlabaster wrote: The middle won't work. The positioning for tanks/FF is too strong.
And saying that a particular area is 1.5 FF wide serves to only make toss happy, as they are rejoiced by 3FF wide ramps. It's not a question of how many sentries they'll bring- the answer is ALL THE SENTRIES.
I don't feel that the centre will work well, also because micro will be... interesting in it- it seems that marine/baneling battles will be in part player control, and in part random pathing decisions made by the map.
I could be wrong, because while an interesting central concept, I find the majority of the map rather plain, and so would like to see something like this work. I don't know if this does, however
What I meant was that with 1.5ish FF wide spaces, it takes 2 to block it, which is essentially the same amount as if the battle were completely open. If you want to throw down a wall of 6 FFs, it will pretty much cover the same amount of space here as on an entirely open battlefield.
As far as tanks go, it might take a few milliseconds longer to get in range to hit one than in an open area, but tanks have a 3 second attack period so that won't make a difference. It is possible for units to choke up a bit in larger battles, but with a little micro and positioning a player can have as good of a shot as any other map. I don't think encouraging micro is a bad thing.
It does seem like, maybe, the Terran players would be the ones who don't need to micro their units that much more than usual. I guess that's because they already do micro their bio in open fields (due to low damage points and backlashes on their weapons.)
It is possible that the movements become too "random" as in unpredictable. Obviously it's systematic and there's no randomness, it just increases the learning curve and/or skillcap for moving units through. It's possible it's too unpredictable to the point that it doesn't let players play well. The pathing in SC2 is so smooth, though, that it really doesn't seem like a problem. The unit movements through the middle feel completely natural to me. Generally micro movements are so short that you won't be passing around an obstacle at all so it wouldn't make any difference. I think the argument of randomness applies 10x more to BW's pathing, and that's worked out just fine. Of course I could be wrong, though, as well.
A couple thoughts: 1) Too many loooong straight lines in the manmade sections.
2) I know you say the Aesthetics are a WIP but yeah the manmade texturing looks sloppy. Honestly the rocky/dirt part looks fine imo, but the manmade sections, /barf (<3)
3) The little pieces of highground outside the 4th that are close to the middle just feel unless.
4) I think the middle could be very interesting if you maybe cut the number of holes in half. Right now it does feel like it is almost just too cluttered.
5) The places that the bases are set up are fine. I think the extra ramp that is blocked by rocks at the natural is just kind of overkill, especially with another unblocked ramped right next to it.
About all I can think of at the moment. Good luck as you continue to edit and texture the map and I’ll be looking forward to the next update!
EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/yBuRq.jpg)
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