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![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/9EHlJ.jpg)
The smells of the Swamp
Servers [NA] [HotS]
Info about the map:
Xel'nagas: 0
Number of bases per player: 5
Size of the map:162x108
Well, this is my very first map thread and i hope i don't fuck something up, this is the fastest map i have ever made, and it's mostly to test the viability of lowground main bases and encourage other mapmakers to play with them.
One of the problems that we have had since almost always as mapmakers is that we are not allowed to play with the hight of the main bases, since if we dare to play with it the map becomes instabroken in PvP and since the only strategy that can be developed in the match up in these conditions is the 4gate, this is one of the main problems of maps like Tal'darim altar with his flat main base in level 2, the same as his natural.
What i'm trying to present here it's an alternative to NEEDING to have a high ground main base and that way allowing for a more diverse pool of maps that can be considered balanced.
To accomplish this i have come with this idea that if a low ground main base is sorrounded by LoS blockers except in the ramp, then the only place that the 4gate can be done is in the ramp of the main, and since one can no longer warp-in units in ramps then the 4gate can be beaten by other defensive or more economic builds.
Now days the 4gate isn't as prominent in PvP as it used to be, but his ghost continues to haunt the map design hoping that the map don't become a 4gate shitfest as tal'darim is, what i would like more than just have lots of feedback on the map is that you guys experiment more with this concept, since it could really help to add a wider variety to the maps now days.
Changelog:
+ Show Spoiler +
§ Reduced the size of the farther away ramps leading to the third base
§ Added a round of doodads at the external side of the wall of the main base, not pylons don't get enough area to warp in units inside of the main.
§ Added a small place of highground in the plateaus.
§ Rotated the third bases -90º or 90º clockwise (wherever you prefer) as lorestarcraft "suggested" and Antares said.
§ Moved the ground of the third base a bit closer to the natural, i moved the ramp leading to the third from the natural too
[I'm scared of this last change since siege tanks can now hit both geisers in the natural...]
New Overview
+ Show Spoiler +
70º Overview
+ Show Spoiler +
Shiny 56º Overview (as it would look on your player camera)
+ Show Spoiler +
Miscelaneous:
+ Show Spoiler +New Third base![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/IXO8g.jpg) Natural:![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/8Th3x.jpg) The new highground:![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/dtp1X.jpg)
+ Show Spoiler +
Old version:
+ Show Spoiler +
i hope you guys think about it, give me some feedback about your idea of this layout could work and try your own lowground main base maps!
I have played/observed several games in this map on HotS and WoL and it has worked like a charm, the 4gate continues to be a viable strategy, but is not dominant in PvP, and the LoS blockers for what i have seen didn't affected the other match ups (the lack of xel'nagas affected more than the lack of a highground main base).
Yeah, english is a hard languaje.
+ Show Spoiler +nah just kidding, i haven't practiced it enough  i hope i didn't break too many laws with my grammar
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It's a very interesting idea and it could no doubt be applied well on future maps, but it isn't even actually necessary on this one since you only used 2 cliff levels. I look forward to seeing a map that uses the low main but raised 1 level, so the natural is at the highest cliff level and the rest of the terrain can progress downward from there.
Other than that, the 3rd looks rather difficult for P since to access it you need to walk through that completely open high-ground area.
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Wow, it's so cool to see something new for once! Great work!
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Optional 3rds is always a nice feature. Pathable water in the middle is cute.
(by the way, 56 degrees is the isometric view as you see it in-game, not 70)
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I like the idea but i fear this is not goint to work out in pvp.
My idea would be to make the Main some sort of semi-island that you can only reach via the ramp, meaning that everywhere where you can possibly warpin from the highground should be dead space. Right now i fear that it's way to easy so get vision to the lowground. (If i place a dtalker right outside of vision of the main, can it see the lowground? I m from EU so unfortunatly i cant test it) But if lowground warpin just isnt possible because of lack of space i could see this working.
I'd also recommend to make the 3rd a little easier to defend, maybe put it on a Highground instead of a lowground?
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100th + birthday post. Mega post. lolers.
I love you for making the main a low ground. I hate you for making the third to hard. This mistake is too common. =(
IDK if you can warp/blink in from behind the wall between the main and horizontal third. That's important for PvP in both HotS.
Another thing is that your anti 4 gate might not work. I know that you can sit your unit as close to the edge of the cliff and it can see past the LOS blockers. You would have to add blockers to the edge of the cliff. Invis blockers would look nicer.
Cheers!
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On December 23 2012 05:47 NewEyes wrote:
I like the idea but i fear this is not goint to work out in pvp.
My idea would be to make the Main some sort of semi-island that you can only reach via the ramp, meaning that everywhere where you can possibly warpin from the highground should be dead space. Right now i fear that it's way to easy so get vision to the lowground. (If i place a dtalker right outside of vision of the main, can it see the lowground? I m from EU so unfortunatly i cant test it) But if lowground warpin just isnt possible because of lack of space i could see this working.
I'd also recommend to make the 3rd a little easier to defend, maybe put it on a Highground instead of a lowground?
What you said it's something that worries me since i did the map, because as you said it's almost deadspace, especialy in the early game and right below the cliff, but otherwise it works really well, or as you say making the main a semi-island but i would add a bridge to allow reaper/blinkstalker harass and i think that would work really well too.
The lowground main can only be seen if one places a unit near the ramp, and even if you do you won't get enough space to warp in units.
@NegativeZero Yeah, in the test games it didn't proved to be a horrid 3rd base, but in some moments it seemed like that, if in the next test games the third looks difficult for P i will change it without a doubt to a highground and easier to hold one.
In in the 2 levels thing, at the start the map was bigger and the expansion layout was different, but for me it seemed to be too big for a 2 player map so i reduced the map but when i did that i removed the 3 cliff levels, and since the idea of the map was mostly to test if it was posible to do a map with a lowground main i kept the lowground main anyways even if i could have done a highground main.
@Fatam, thanks fatam i didn't know which was the slope of the players camera, so i put 70º and that seemed close enough, and yeah, since i wanted to do a swamp map it needed the water, even if the swamp theme didn't turn as good as expected
i almost get sniped by you @Drake, thanks for the post, happy 100! and in you birthday!
In the LoS Blockers i already placed the pathing blockers so passing them isn't a problem, and i agree it would be nicer to have placed invisible sight blockers instead of those gigantic bushes, but i didn't wanted to confuse the players even more (WTF why can't i see pass this cliff? stupid mapmaker and his fucking bugs!!, etc), since this is an experimental map after all i don't see it like such a big problem, what i really want to see is what will the other mapmakers do with this idea, and how they will make it work (it this idea proves to work at the end)
And the idea of the wall is to allow to some degree the warp ins/blink stalkers attacks in the main base, just like it would happen in a normal main base, i have done a couple and it didn't proved to be broken (the biggest problem as i said it's the lack of xel'nagas, that really fuck up the players and their usual scouting)
@Quakecomm thanks alot man, it means alot to me!
srry if i went apeshit with my grammar, i will fix the most i can!
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Two Issues:
I'm not a mapmaker, but I'm afraid the low ground main base can be a target for, say, 2 (it might be 3 buildings, cant tell) barracks stuck together in between the main and a natural. That might just be instant GG for the zerg. If you make it harder for a terran to wall off the entrance, I think it should be ok.
And as all maps go, the third base is too hard to take for a protoss player. I haven't played HOTS yet, maybe it's easier to take a 3rd in HOTS because of the mothership core :\
But I really like the middle.
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The third is impossible, you need to make the ground distance closer or drops and such will be too punishing.
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@iMrising I think it would be really funny to see a terran block a zerg that way, but it just isn't possible since the zerg's creep cover the base of the ramp, but if the terran covers the top of the ramp it may be a different story, i will need to re-check that.
And in part in HotS it is easier, because of the MsC as you say and that extremely long range cannon that you can attach to you nexus. But in WoL.... Yeah, now i'm trying to see how hard is to take the third as toss against a roach attack, it's hard yes, but it's not THAT hard. (For now, i have tested it with high diamond players, i need to see if i can manage to get master level players to play on the map, it shouldn't be too hard, since i know quite a few)
@lorestarcraft can you upload a picture of the modifications you suggest? i'm thinking to mean to turn around the minerals of the 3rd -90º and put it closer to the natural, but idk how to make it in such a way that the siege tanks don't shell the mineral line or the geysers, so a picture would be helpfull.
Thanks alot for your comments guys, the 3rd is under heavy scrutiny.
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The third is comparable to many currently used maps; it's fine.
The LosB doesn't actually block sight unless the attacker is lazy/has poor control. If you walk to the very edge of the cliff, a unit can still see down onto the low ground. As far as I know there's no way to effectively cliff-edge LosB. However, since I last tested this, they came out with the "cliff level" adjustment option in the doodad properties box. This might allow you to place LosB on the low ground side of the cliff but set its cliff level to match the upper cliff. No idea if this works though.
Instead of using different cliff levels you might as well use same cliff level and a high ground wall, like some BW maps have. Then you just have to design your main/natural choke properly so it's not too easy/too hard to wall.
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Personally, I dislike low ground mains like this, but I'll try to help out the idea if I can. You will need to have a lowered Supply Depot somewhere at the top of the ramp so that you cannot be contained in your main by buildings. A Bunker with Marines in it would be kind of deadly. With a high ground main, units in your base can attack things on the low ground without being harmed (unless the enemy has sight into your base). On Fotra Kepuka, you do not have that luxury and would be forced to engage any units directly. A Supply Depot somewhat in the middle of the top of the ramp would be best to deter strategies involving hostile Photon Cannons and Bunkers.
The boundary between the fourths and mains is going to be an easy spot for proxy Pylons and warp-ins, along with Blink Stalkers. Blink Stalkers aren't so bad because once they blink into the main they will have a difficult time getting out, so it balances out. Warp-ins could be problematic. You could create a gap between the mains and fourths wide enough so that Pylon range does not connect both sections with some space management.
While the thirds on this map are comparable to current competitive maps, I am also a bit concerned that they are a bit too difficult. I think that if the minerals and gas are rotated 90 degrees clockwise, you could push that whole segment of land closer to the natural and move the ramp closer to the natural too. In my opinion, this would make the third slightly easier to expand to and keep.
The other entrance to the thirds strikes me as odd. It seems like an alternate/harassment route for sneaking into the third, but the ramp that goes from that area to the middle of the map is huge. I think it should be made much smaller, by at least two ramp sizes in my opinion. This will make that entrance more enticing for smaller armies and not deathballs, which would promote harassment/sneak attacks into the third. The deathball would want to take the main plateau anyway, so the large ramp size is rather unnecessary.
I think some sort of obstruction is needed in the main plateaus, where those doodads are. Those areas are too open because they are areas that the defending player would want to place their army once they have three bases, and forcing a defending Protoss player to defend from that open location would make the thirds even more difficult to adequately keep for a Protoss. Terran as well, to some extent. I think a little high ground spot would be best because during the early to mid game Overlords can sit there unperturbed and scout.
In general the map seems a bit open. I'd scrape some bits of land off here and there, but otherwise, this map is pretty solid.  Good luck making the low ground main balanced! Even if it doesn't work out, you can just raise the mains and it'll be fine.
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Well, that's really top notch feedback right there thanks alot Antares, you put many of my concerns about the map since the very beggining, the problem with having a lowground main and the opponent having the highground advantaje something really hard to deal with, i will add a supply depot there that's for sure, (i'll add it tomorrow)
i'm really tired so i will skip most of what Antares said, but no after saying that it seems that he found the way to place himself on my mind.
Changelog:
+ Show Spoiler +
§Reduced the size of the farther away ramps leading to the third base
§Added a round of doodads at the external side of the wall of the main base, not pylons don't get enough area to warp in units inside of the main.
§Added a small place of highground in the plateaus.
§Rotated the third bases -90º or 90º clockwise (wherever you prefer) as lorestarcraft "suggested" and Antares said.
§Moved the ground of the third base a bit closer to the natural, i moved the ramp leading to the third from the natural too
[I'm scared of this last change since siege tanks can now hit both geisers in the natural...]
New Overview
+ Show Spoiler +
70º Overview
+ Show Spoiler +
Shiny 56º Overview (as it would look on your player camera)
+ Show Spoiler +
Miscelaneous:
+ Show Spoiler +New Third baseNatural:The new highground:
+ Show Spoiler +
The map is already published, i only need to put the supply depot/flat rock, i will do it ~tomorrow night.
Really thanks for your feedback guys, btw in the last 2 tests games (PvZ) at master level the third base actually proved to be really freaking hard to hold, i hope these changes makes the third hold-able. ^^
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Did you accidentally post the wrong pictures? Cause i see no difference between new and old version...
Btw i just realised this is on Hots as well so if you are still looking for master players to play on this map just tell me ( I'm Toss)
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United Kingdom14103 Posts
On December 23 2012 20:42 NewEyes wrote:
Did you accidentally post the wrong pictures? Cause i see no difference between new and old version...
Btw i just realised this is on Hots as well so if you are still looking for master players to play on this map just tell me ( I'm Toss)
The third has been rotated and the map has been made wider.
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On December 23 2012 20:42 NewEyes wrote:
Did you accidentally post the wrong pictures? Cause i see no difference between new and old version...
Btw i just realised this is on Hots as well so if you are still looking for master players to play on this map just tell me ( I'm Toss)
Open both tabs and switch between them, saying anyithing else would be a waste of time, since switching the tabs with the images will say more than i with my poor english can. btw there's a changelog in the OP anyways.
Thanks! i will pm you in the case i need to do more high level testing with a more variety of players and styles (be sure that i will in the next days ;D)
//EDIT//
Forgot about putting the links to the both images:
New version:
http://i.imgur.com/wKMlr.jpg
Old one:
http://i.imgur.com/KSL7y.jpg
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