Monday
Tuesday
(Published as [MLT] Pools of Mars on EU)
EDIT:Updated.
Thursday
(Published as [MLT] Eastwatch on EU)
Monday week 2
Wednesday week2
Forum Index > SC2 Maps & Custom Games |
Keep our forum clean! PLEASE post your WIP melee maps in this thread for initial feedback. -Barrin | ||
Meltage
Germany613 Posts
Monday Tuesday (Published as [MLT] Pools of Mars on EU) EDIT:Updated. Thursday (Published as [MLT] Eastwatch on EU) Monday week 2 Wednesday week2 | ||
Aquila Magna
Germany38 Posts
this summer's tlmc really motivated me to have a go with the editor myself. I hope I'll be able to share my first map here soon. But who expects feedback should also give, so I thought. Thus here are my thoughts on the first map posted by Meltage. I'll try to cover other maps if I find the time and don't make a fool of myself in this holy thread with my following comments. Disclaimer: I follow pro matches frequently, but am only mid/upper diamond (with t) and don't get to play that often right now. So take my opinion with a grain of salt. + Show Spoiler + On "Monday": The underlying idea seems to be to have the players either clashing on one side of the map or moving their armies from left to right and back, depending on their chosen expansion routes. The middle of the map is unusually irrelevant. It would be nice to have some words on this from you, Meltage. Though I find the general layout interesting, I feel there might be some issues and I'd be interested if the seasoned mappers here would agree or disagree. For a start, I can't make sense of the usage of rocks on the map: The gold bases are very exposed to mineral line harassment from the middle. If they had no rocks there would be a risk/reward-decision available to the players in the early/mid game. With the rocks I think it is likely that they will only get taken pretty late if one player is dominant enough to secure the middle, benefitting only the one who is already ahead. The rocks in front of the third are a gift to terran and especially protoss, which is not really necessary due to the proximity of main/nat and 3rd anyway. Also they might be exploited by sieging tanks at he fourth and dropping marines in the wide space around the 3rd. (Of course Protoss needs a single choke to safely wall, but that could be handled by altering the natural and main ramp?) Generally i feel the fourth bases are a bit too strong from a defenders perspective, especially in ZvT. I'd suggest getting rid of the rocks at 8 and 2 o'clock and making two routes available at the hole in front of the other fourth base option. The expansions at 7:30 and 1:30 feel a bit like a failed try to mask a lot of empty space in the respective corners. I don't think the outermost paths would ever be used under any circumstance. I'd suggest to move the 12 o'clock and 1:30 bases to the right to adress this, also serving two other purposes: Firstly increasing the distance between the 12 o'clock base and the 4th on the neighboring high ground. Secondly (along with removing the rocks on the side) making both the 1:30 and 7:30 base an equal option for both players and thus possible conflict area. Oh, and lastly I feel like the l-shaped blockers at 9/3 o'clock should shrink a bit in size, to give more room for army movement and fights in front of the base. Well, that's it from me for now. Please let me know about flaws in my critique - the way I think about maps will surely translate to enhance or worsen maps i'll make. | ||
The_Templar
your Country52796 Posts
Size is 188x168, although air blockers in the corners will shave a lot off of that. The in-base third is blocked off by the rocks covering the ramp, but I might just make it into a "free" harassable third and change the rocks from diagonal to normal ones. | ||
Aquila Magna
Germany38 Posts
Here is an angled view - and sry for the missing skybox, haven't figured that out yet. + Show Spoiler + Currently, i refer to this map as "end of pride". It's playable size is 140x128. The general idea was to create a map with an interesting middle and a choice of expansion patterns without using ramps too much to define battlefields. There is a total of 16 bases available, symmetry is rotational. Main ramp to main ramp is ~50s on faster (is that the right measure?). I'ill go into detail on different features in the following spoiler sections. But first, i want to mention some reasons for the general layout of bases: I intended to create a map that promotes macro play without making turtle play too easy. Thus i choose to give players a semi-pocked third with a ramp blocked by rocks. As the comfortable high ground slowly runs out of resources, they can choose to take either take the expansion close to their third, or go for the one on the natural side, which is farther away from the main but fairly close to the possible 5th (disregarding the gold, which I'll get too later). Natural rocks and choke: + Show Spoiler + Two entrances to the natural are never a good idea, though some Zergs would probably disagree. Thus i placed some rocks in the side choke. Once destroyed, they shorten the way to the 4th/5th expansion, but of course they can also be targeted by an attacker. The choke on top of the large ramp can be closed by the standard Protoss wall. Outer middle path: + Show Spoiler + This image shows how i tried to define the middle battleground without using elevation changes. The cliffs are of course not pathable. The collapsible rocks can be used to close the center routes that are out of sight from the Xel'Naga watchtower. This makes the standard expansion farther from the main cluster easier to defend. Gold and watchtower: + Show Spoiler + This is maybe the key idea which started my work on this map. So let's try to come up with some justification for it. The general problem with gold expansions is that they can unfairly benefit the player who is already ahead, making life even harder for the opponent trying to catch up. My attempted solution for this is firstly to make them very vulnerable to harassment. The watchtower can see if the patches are mined but not if a hatch/cc/nexus is being built. Though vulnerable due to its positioning, the mineral line's LOS curtain requires the attacker to either get close, on the high ground or to have control of the watchtower (the point is really to at least force one or two more clicks from the harasser). I have deliberately chosen not to put rocks on the golds. I want the player's to have a high risk/high reward option available from the early game, maybe even as alternative to the pocket third. Once mined out, a new direct path to the middle opens and the base can serve as a bridgehead to permanently claim the map's center. Blocked edge route: + Show Spoiler + The paths along the northern and southern edge of the map connect the standard late game base option with the ground right outside the opponents pocket third. They are too narrow to be used by maxed armies and are blocked by rocks to prevent all too easy ling runbys. In the late game I hope they would prevent firm map splits. Lastly, a word on the islands. I'd like to try out air blockers to make them just a little safer and to indicate that the south base is intended to be taken by the player in the southeast and vice versa. I just have no idea how to. Would be nice of someone could point me in the right direction. Thanks for reading! | ||
The_Templar
your Country52796 Posts
I think there's a problem with movement through the center. With the gold bases blocking a path for what's often going to be the whole game, the narrow high ground corridors, and the high ground pods (which I'm assuming are going to be unpathable), it looks like the only ways through the center pass through long and narrow chokes. Alternatively you could try going around the corners, but the problem there is even worse. I'll get to that in a minute. This is certainly a macro map as you described, but it doesn't support late-game armies very well. I would try tweaking the center so that it remains interesting, but is in some way opened up a bit more. Part of what's causing this problem, I believe, is that you don't give this concept of a center enough space. This is where the island bases come in. There's nothing inherently wrong with them, but they're creating a lot of empty space with the unpathable terrain surrounding them. This causes two problems — the widest parts of the center route become more narrow, as I mentioned before, and the alternate path leading out of the corner base becomes hilariously long and narrow. Even if the rocks were removed, there wouldn't be any more activity in that pretty significant area other than light harassment. Battle on the Boardwalk, on the other hand, uses this concept of really long and narrow pathways well by making them into significant attack paths — the upper middle path into the naturals and the lower corner pathways intersect gold bases on their way directly to the main. However, I'm not sure what I'd do with the island bases here - you'll need to figure out whether they can work. Maybe making them high ground, filling in the area around them with pathable terrain, and pushing the 6 and 12 o'clock bases back could help the flow of the map. I would also work on cliff shapes, particularly in the main base and the center. They look kind of off. | ||
Aquila Magna
Germany38 Posts
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Erotesn
27 Posts
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PheonixC
4 Posts
Biosphere Alpha At the start, it is a very short rush map with a relatively easy to defend natural at the start. Once the 1:30/4:30/7:30/10:30 rocks are broken down, the game quickly expands into a macro map taking place on the outer ring. Key Features: -Similar to Arch of Janus, the center octagon is completely enclosed in a no-fly zone, the only way out is to break through the corner rocks (2 layers, 2000 hp each) and go on the ground. -Before corner rocks are broken, it is a small 8 base map. The 3rd/4th base for each player only has 7m to encourage going outside of the center after the early game. -Initially, there are 2 paths into the natural, the fast route that leads to a small ramp, or a much longer backdoor that can be sealed off. -Outside of the center, the bases are very spread out and most have an exploitable weakness if harassment units can make it there. Strategy: -The early game is mainly about rush defense and terrain manipulation to set up the mid game. The primary fast attack path is relatively easy to defend against, and if the initial rush is survived, the next decision for the player is how they want to use their troops to set up for the midgame. If they are aggressive, they can go for the rocks to expose the inner 12' / 6' base and another entrance into the natural. If they are defensive, they can go for the collapsible rocks to seal off the wide entrance to the 4' / 10'. If neither of those options, they can always go for the rocks behind their natural and open up the outside ring. -Once the outside is open, players will have access to an easy 5 more bases each with much more room to build out their production. Getting control on the outside ring will mostly rely on their ability to fortify both sides of the map, a large distance the attacker can take advantage of. The cliffs and narrow pathways give a lot of room for flanking and advantage to air units, even if they can't enter or leave the center. Control of the initial center area will still be very important since it gives access to some very fast attack paths to surprise an opponent on the ground. Possible Changes already in mind: -Lowering the mineral count of the internal bases even more to further push players to the outside ring, possibly converting them into a small number of gold minerals to give the same income, but significantly less capacity. -Lowering the triangle jutting out from the main into the 3rd to the second floor, to allow reapers a way in. -Cleaning up and streamlining the outside ring's design a bit more (it used to be a lot worse) -More destructible terrain on the outside, there's literally none. Thank you for looking and I hope to get some feedback. edit: Forgot to mention, it is up on the America server if anyone wants to test it for themselves. | ||
ZigguratOfUr
Iraq16955 Posts
On October 18 2017 19:20 PheonixC wrote: Got inspired and decided to try my hand at making a map, still pretty new to all of this so any help is appreciated. Biosphere Alpha At the start, it is a very short rush map with a relatively easy to defend natural at the start. Once the 1:30/4:30/7:30/10:30 rocks are broken down, the game quickly expands into a macro map taking place on the outer ring. Key Features: -Similar to Arch of Janus, the center octagon is completely enclosed in a no-fly zone, the only way out is to break through the corner rocks (2 layers, 2000 hp each) and go on the ground. -Before corner rocks are broken, it is a small 8 base map. The 3rd/4th base for each player only has 7m to encourage going outside of the center after the early game. -Initially, there are 2 paths into the natural, the fast route that leads to a small ramp, or a much longer backdoor that can be sealed off. -Outside of the center, the bases are very spread out and most have an exploitable weakness if harassment units can make it there. Strategy: -The early game is mainly about rush defense and terrain manipulation to set up the mid game. The primary fast attack path is relatively easy to defend against, and if the initial rush is survived, the next decision for the player is how they want to use their troops to set up for the midgame. If they are aggressive, they can go for the rocks to expose the inner 12' / 6' base and another entrance into the natural. If they are defensive, they can go for the collapsible rocks to seal off the wide entrance to the 4' / 10'. If neither of those options, they can always go for the rocks behind their natural and open up the outside ring. -Once the outside is open, players will have access to an easy 5 more bases each with much more room to build out their production. Getting control on the outside ring will mostly rely on their ability to fortify both sides of the map, a large distance the attacker can take advantage of. The cliffs and narrow pathways give a lot of room for flanking and advantage to air units, even if they can't enter or leave the center. Control of the initial center area will still be very important since it gives access to some very fast attack paths to surprise an opponent on the ground. Possible Changes already in mind: -Lowering the mineral count of the internal bases even more to further push players to the outside ring, possibly converting them into a small number of gold minerals to give the same income, but significantly less capacity. -Lowering the triangle jutting out from the main into the 3rd to the second floor, to allow reapers a way in. -Cleaning up and streamlining the outside ring's design a bit more (it used to be a lot worse) -More destructible terrain on the outside, there's literally none. Thank you for looking and I hope to get some feedback. edit: Forgot to mention, it is up on the America server if anyone wants to test it for themselves. I don't see the outside circle of the map being used very often due to how small and rushy the middle of the map is. All the paths are really narrow too which means that if the players survive the rushing phase you end up with pushes such as siege tank pushes that are essentially impossible to hold--all the paths are narrow, siege tank can siege the thirds from across the rocks, rush distances are minuscule, and from the low ground tanks can lay waste to the entire main. Apart from that, in general, air blockers like this in the middle of the map are discouraged since they can easily cause units to derp out against them leading to unpleasant gameplay. The use of space on this map isn't great either--you should try to avoid having large gaps all over the space. | ||
PheonixC
4 Posts
Thank you for the feedback and I shall return in a while with an improved version. Edit / Followup: It's still very much a work in progress, but I implemented most of the changes, the middle has been opened up significantly with some new rocks to slow down the initial rush timing, this was helped out significantly when I pushed the sides of the center area out to fill in the dead space. I also went back over the bases to make sure the CC/Hatch/Nexus couldn't be hit by siege units outside of the base for the main, natural, and center 3rd and 4th. Many of the paths and ramps have been made significantly wider to allow better flanking to stifle those siege pushes you mentioned. I'll post the next version once I'm satisfied with the current changes to go for another round of feedback and revision. Still trying to figure out how to let air units out since the entire point of the map was to have the isolated center at the start, and letting air units out too soon will lead to unstoppable drops on the outer ring that can hit the main without punishment. | ||
Samro225am
Germany982 Posts
On September 13 2017 22:19 Meltage wrote: Made a concept monday and one yesterday and finished it up today. Wednesday week2 There are two big issues: 1. It looks like the third is just barely closer to the map's center than to the natural. 2. Movement is very restricted. Flow is not bad per se, but as there are limited options how to move from one place to another it is very easy to get caught up, especially in the important central area and in the low ground areas that interconnect the main/nat/third area with your opponent's late bases. It is very much a point-to-point movement with paths in-between the bases instead of ares that could be contested from various angles. Also i think that you could have a much higher efficiency regarding the use of open space. Right now a flyer could get behind third easily and alternate harassment strikes at third and main base. What I suggest is to test if it would help if you switch main and nat and have third closely connected to the nat, but on low ground, potentially with a good ramp/blocker idea. that would give you much more space to work with. While it opens up the main for harassment, it is much easier to defend attacks by air while you are on three bases. | ||
Meltage
Germany613 Posts
--- Ive made a new layout today: | ||
themusic246
United States201 Posts
Intro aside.. This is a pretty cool concept. Confined center that expands size in all directions late game. I think having the air blockers is an interesting concept. I haven't tested the range, but i can see liberators being abused pretty hard with the dead air space at the main/nat... and just drops/oracles in general with that space between main/nat to hide. Tank pushes will also be pretty hard to stop with the narrow paths/chokes. The xel'naga tower also might be a bit OP, as it grants vision to every possible early-game ground path. It's nice to have some hidden flanking paths if you know the enemy has control of it, unless you were going for a king of the hill early game Not saying it's a better option, but it would be cool to see this map with the mains on the perimeter, leaving the middle opened up with only 1 set of rocks designed for interesting mid game engagements. Basically inverting it so it's a ring early and the middle opens up mid/late. Maybe even lose the air blockers at that point. I'd keep playing with it though looks fun and has potential. | ||
IronManSC
United States2119 Posts
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ZigguratOfUr
Iraq16955 Posts
Looking at the top half of the map, both possible thirds are right at the bottom of ramps coming straight from the direction of the opponent which is sure to be unpleasant to defend. The top right quadrant feels rather disconnected from the top left--expanding clockwise and trying to take the 12:30 base as a fifth is problematic since grounds units take so long to go from the natural to the 12:30 base whereas harassment by air it takes no time at all. Additionally there's no path of retreat for that base--an attack will often come from the ramp next to the watchtower, which completely cuts off the 12:30 base. So the most natural expansion pattern for the player spawning top is counterclockwise. For the player in the bottom half the expansion pattern is clearly clockwise which means both players will often end up expanding straight towards each other which is less than ideal. I'm not a fan of all the super-narrow passages in the bottom half either. They're basically invitations for liberators or forcefields to abuse them to death. The middle-ish base has lots of potential for being abused from the weird super-narrow high ground or low ground, and the 4:00 o'clock base is too far away by ground as well as behind the narrow passage to be a reasonable expansion. Frankly overall I don't particularly like the top half of the map, dislike the bottom half and all the narrow passages, and don't think the two halves mesh particularly well together. | ||
PheonixC
4 Posts
Some of the major changes include opening up much of the map from both the inside and outside areas, closing up a lot of the dead space inside, mostly around the main, and some adjustments with the terrain to remove siege tanks' ability to hit the main and natural mineral line from the low ground. I also added another set of rocks to close up the fastest attack path at the start. I also reduced the interior 3rd/4th to 6m1g to encourage faster work on the rocks. Lastly, I added a few pillars around the center to use as LOS blockers and early overlord hiding. To respond to some of themusic's comments: Liberators, oracles, and drops should be a bit more manageable now with the shrinkage of the dead space around the bases. I opened up a lot of the chokes to help deter tank pushes in the mid/late game. Also, about the center Xel'Naga tower, I initially had it there as a way to offset the short rush distance, the original design philosophy I had for the center area was "Very short rush distance, but give the defending player every opportunity to see and stop it if they have been playing proactively" (ie: scout, xel'naga control, setting up basic defenses) which was also part of the reason the map was so choked up initially. The rocks to open up the chokes into wider paths should help to alleviate this. Thank you for the feedback, and I may toy with the idea of reversing it in the future, with the main on the outside to expand to the center. Though looking it over, it may actually be possible to do that now by swapping spawns to the 11:30/8:30 bases. progression would totally be weird, but those are just aside thoughts for now. This version is currently up on NA if anyone wants to test it. | ||
NukeOfficial
23 Posts
I only recently started working with the Editor and got some good feedback on my first ever map (which had horrendous mistakes xD), so I started working on my 2nd map. This is what I got so far: I'm unsure about the areas marked in red, but feedback on everything is welcome EDIT: I just thought about making the gold a main level highground with 2 big ramps kinda like this thoughts? | ||
PheonixC
4 Posts
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ZigguratOfUr
Iraq16955 Posts
On December 06 2017 19:56 NukeOfficial wrote: Hello, I only recently started working with the Editor and got some good feedback on my first ever map (which had horrendous mistakes xD), so I started working on my 2nd map. This is what I got so far: + Show Spoiler + I'm unsure about the areas marked in red, but feedback on everything is welcome EDIT: I just thought about making the gold a main level highground with 2 big ramps kinda like this + Show Spoiler + thoughts? The big thing is of course the two openings to the main. Backdoors are problematic at the best of times, and in this case there isn't even any compensation to mitigate abuse. | ||
NukeOfficial
23 Posts
Worked a bit around that, feels much better now: + Show Spoiler + I'll probably want to make access to the gold from the attackers side a bit harder, but I'm not sure if adding a ramp down would negatively affect the normal base infront (to the right/left) of the gold. Also I'm not sure if I should add things on the middle highground, and if so, how much.. | ||
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