| Posted By WhatUrMuva on 7/01/04 @ 3:16:00 PM |
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I decided to write this because I have seen alot of unplanned maps on battle.net. This tutorial inculdes things to think about before you create a map and while your creating it. This is only for unexperienced map makers, due to the fact that experienced map makers already know all this. When placing your environment, don't stuff an area full of rocks unless you want to make a dam in a river or something, because otherwise it'll look unnatural. -Place a few rocks, some cattails, a few river rushes, maybe some flowers along the sides, etc... -If you are making a river with some rocks, place the rocks along the sides, so they're in sight. -You could also make small shallow water locations along the sides of the river, but only about three squares of it (smallest terrain placing size). -When making bridges, try to make sure the land and the bridge are completely intersecting eachother; meaning, move the World Editor camera around to where the bridge touches the land, and make sure there aren't any gaps inbetween the bridge and the ground. -If there are gaps, it looks odd when your units get on the bridge, because they jump up a few feet once they touch the bridge. Once again, it doesn't look natural. -If you need to look at any of the items contained so far, just take a look at one of Blizzard's maps. That could help you with a lot of placing issues you may be having. Now, onto waterfalls: -When placing waterfalls, make a river like you normally would. Make sure that it has an area that it ends where there's room to lower the terrain and create another waterfall, because the next step is to lower the terrain one level at the edge of where you ended the water. -Then, in the little area you just made the terrain lowering, start another river. -Once you're done with that river, go back to where you had lowered the terrain from the first river. -Go up to Advanced at the top, and go to the bottom of the menu. You should see an option that's checked that says "Enforce Water Height Limits". Uncheck this option. -Once unchecked, go to the area where the first river and the second river are meeting. -Go to the Water Tool, and place the water; it's probably best you use a size less than or equal to the size of the rivers you already placed; and place the water where the two rivers connect. It should make a little cliff water area, where the water is going along down the cliff and connecting the two rivers. -Go back to Advanced, and check "Enforce Water Height Limits" to put the option back on. Make sure there's cliffs along the rivers edges. -Then, go to the Doodad Palette, go to Water, and choose waterfalls. -Place one waterfall, then, what I like to do, is copy and paste that same waterfall so it's all the same sizes of waterfalls. -Then align them all so they all look as if they're under the water, but still going over the side of the cliff. A good example of waterfall placement is the first level of Night Elf on The Frozen Throne. There's a little area where there's a huge area of waterfalls. Placing units, now: -When placing buildings, don't make the buildings organized, unless you're making a village of Humans or something. Orc, Undead, and Night Elf, on the otherhand, you shouldn't make organized NO MATTER WHAT! -For units, all races should have random placements of units. Don't make a group of units all together unless it's the start of the map. -For critters, just put 10-20 in your map at different locations. -For creeps, you should organize a little bit. Put the strongest creeps at the back of the group, medium strength creeps in middle, and weakest in front. Make the creeps in the back drop the items. This way, the weaker die first from enemies, and the strongest last longer, allowing the to kill more, and it makes it look as if the weaker protect the stronger. Terraining Now: -When terraining, put rock doodads on rock terrains, and go to the Raise tool in the Terrain Palette and raise the rocks higher than the rest of the ground, but not super high. -For dirt paths, make small scattered areas of rough dirt throughout the trail. Then lower the dirt lower than the rest of the ground, but not super low. -Once you've done all of that stuff, click on the noise tool, make areas of noise throughout the entire map (best to do one section at a time). -Then, once all the noise you want is on, go to the Smooth Tool, and smooth it all so it looks like small little bumps in the ground. If you smoothed too much, just go back to the dirt and rocks and lower\raise them again. Creating a New Map: - Think about the type of map your making, If your making a RPG map, then you don't want it to be to small, on the other hand if your making a Zone Control type map, you don't want it to Huge. Think about the type of game play before you choose the size. (Remember you can change the size of your map in the Scenario -> Map size and camera bounds on the top toolbar) - Tileset, this is very important, especially if your not using a WE enhancer. Plan out the location of your map, if its going to consist of mostly a city, then choose cityscape, if its a jungle choose sunken ruins, and so on. If you do have a WE enhancer, then you can add tiles and cliffs if you need them - Doodads, make games look good, and can effect game play, try to only use the doodads that come with the tileset you used, doodads from outland in a cityscape tileset look very bad and out of place. But if your making a map that will take place in different regions of a world, then using the doodads for each region is obvious. - To much in a map, I see this happen often, people try to cram everything they can into their map, Space is important, not only for troop movement but for looks oh yeah, and not to mention lag! If your making an AOS type map, you want the paths to be clear and easily accesible(you don't want troops to get stuck on things) So if you do want to add lots of doodads, put then on the sides of the paths. Gameplay: - After your finished your terraining, you need to think about units and heros and their abilitys. DO NOT over power heros or units, balancing is important, However, do not make every unit have equal stats, Look at Blizzards units, they balance magnificently. - Heros change the tides of battle and are usually the center of a map's focus, Heros are very important. Its very easy to make a hero unbalanced. Balance a heros abilitys, try to have atleast 1 passive spell, 1 or 2 assualt spell, and one other spell(summoning, troop enhance, sheilds) for the hero's Ultimate, if the hero has 2 assualt spells make its ultimate not an assualt spell, instead make it a defensive or passive spell, such as an Avatar type ability or Reincarnation. - Length of a game, do not over do the length of a game, don't make a base so hard to destory that is takes 2 hours, or the capture the flag number 50, a good game usually ranges from 30 mins to 1 and half hours long. Most people don't have time to play a 2-3 hour games, and either wouldn't finish or wouldn't play your game. Just don't over do the length! - Winning, the condtions of winning depends on the type of game you are making, AoS types could have more than 1 objective. RPGs should definantly have more than 1 objective. A modern war/battle type map should have more than 1, such as kill so and so, and take control of this persons base. Don't make winning so complicated though that no one knows how to win. - Quest menu, You can put tons of stuff here, from objectives to credits. This is a good place to tell newbies whats going on in your map and what they need to do. *Note* good maps don't happen overnight, they need lots of work and planning. |
| Posted By UwantSum on 7/01/04 @ 6:33:35 PM |
| Wow! Thanks matt this will reallly help me on my game im making that is kind of a spin off of archer wars... it doesnt help that im inexpierienced but i hope i can pull off a good map... been working on it for a week or so now. |
| Posted By WhatUrMuva on 7/01/04 @ 6:43:37 PM |
| If you need help with anything feel free to ask, I'll take a look and let my experience with the World Editor do the talking |
| Posted By UwantSum on 7/01/04 @ 6:48:42 PM |
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haha sure thing man... im gonna make hidden items in tree's like we use to do remember? haha |
| Posted By WhatUrMuva on 7/01/04 @ 6:52:27 PM |
| lmao that was funy as shit, we would vs noobs and just know where the gosu Items where. Remember the ultimate PD item that gave you every aura and super attack speed. lmao those were the days |
| Posted By UwantSum on 7/01/04 @ 11:26:53 PM |
| And the choppy choppys... great stuff... the good ole days where we massed wisps. |
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