RPG Planes of Ancient Legend

[Crosus]

I've been rolling this idea around in my mind for a few months, and now I've decided to see if there would be any interest among the community for it. The project I am proposing would be rather formidible. So please, read on and tell me what you think of the idea.

Concept:
Build an RPG on a massive scale for Warcraft 3: TFT
The RPG will span multiple max size maps. If interest is shown, custom models, interface art, and complex spells will be utilized.
Players will be able to level up a hero to a very large level cap (say 50 or 60). The XP table will be modified so that leveling will be more on the scale of a traditional RPG and will allow for long lasting entertainment value.

How:
Players can traverse between maps using a single character savecode that will be valid in each map that is part of the project.
Each map will represent a different area of the rpg's world, and will share a single set of data for items, spells, and heroes. The game experience will be the same, but it will be as if you traversing into new lands with your hero as you progress to max level.

Zones / Quests:
Each zone map will be custom terrained to fit the theme of its area. Custom creeps unique to each zone will be present at unique difficulty levels.
Some possibilities are:
1. Zones are tuned to cater to specific hero level ranges, i.e. 25-35, any player below this level will proably be dying a lot without help.
-or-
2. Zones might have areas for different level ranges within them. For instance a player might journey to a swamp at level 15, but their level 50 friend can also join in, and go to a much higher level section of the map with tougher enemies and better loot. (I prefer this idea better myself)

Each zone will also have scripted story line events that may follow a single, linear story line. Progressing in the story would be optional (and possibly repeatable, if you just wished to load up an earlier zone and re-experience it)
In addition, there would be multiple optional side quests that are completely independent of the story at large and service to merely tell the tales of a particular zone.

Heroes:
I would like to have maybe 6-9 unique and well designed class choices for players, with a larger than average amount of spells and abilities (6+), perhaps even the ability to choose or specialize in certain ones.

Some heroes might have the option of controlling a pet in addition that can be saved/loaded with a separate pet code.

A possibility:
I like the idea of hero classes being divided into factions of a sort, with "Good", "Neutral", and "Evil". Each faction will have their own towns, and "Good" towns would be hostile to "evil" players and vice versa. (Separate story for good and evil would be neat, but sounds like too much work in addition to what is already immense, so that would have to be somewhat neutral)


Items:
A very large variety of items would have to be included, and standard in each map. Some items may be unique to quests or certain bosses found only on certain zone maps (but because of the universal item data, can be used in any project zone).

Also a crafting system with recipes. (Unique set of crafted items for each level range, 1-10, 11-20, etc. all the way to max)

Equipping an item might have requirements, such as level or class, or already having one. Players could equip like for instance,
1 Weapon (Sword, Staff, Wand etc.)
2 Accessories (Shield, magic amulet)
2 Items of Clothing
The last slot would be a backpack for common items and consumables.

PvP:
The project is already designed to be modular with maps so it wouldn't be hard to make PvP based maps where the player can utilize their hero.
Certain restrictions might have to be placed on levels and powerful items, however.
Possibilities:
1. Level range restricted

End-game play (max level):
1.It would be really interesting to have particularly tough bosses tuned for groups at max level, dropping more powerful items perhaps.

2.Lots of secrets to explore!
3.Uhh, okay I need more ideas

Closing Notes:
I have had experience in the past with world editor and made some decent enough maps, however I am far from an expert. My delvings into jass are minimal at best (although I really should learn, it doesn't seem that hard). I'm no modeller or artist, either.

This project would need:
Zone designers (terrain and feel)
Quest/Story writers
Creep / Item designers and balancing
Spell design / scripting (in jass)
Modellers / Icon artists

If you need to contact me:
AIM: EJtoastman
E-mail: 7thnation AT gmail
Battlenet: Vibrator on US-WEST (dont ask)

Feedback/ideas greatly appreciated. This took like 2 hours to write up!

 

[Ninva]

Sounds pretty neat. I really want to be a story writer, but currently I'm in the process of writing the story to my own ORPG. Once I finish making the layout of the story I may just pop in again to see if you need a writer still.

Anyways, good luck.

 

[thewrongvine]

I second with Ninva... and I could help with the "feel" P) for terraining and such. I'm a bit, not exactly busy since it's the summer, but let's say lazy from other work, so if no one else wants to help with the terraining, I could do it.

Good luck with this, I'll look more into it later when I'm not that tired. :thup:

 

[WolSHaman]

This won't work because you can't have multiple maps on a multiplayer game, because anytime someone tries to change maps a disconnect happens. However, I could help design heroes and abilities if you wanted if you decide to work on this, so give me a PM some time.

 

[Crosus]

This won't work because you can't have multiple maps on a multiplayer game, because anytime someone tries to change maps a disconnect happens. However, I could help design heroes and abilities if you wanted if you decide to work on this, so give me a PM some time.

Please reread the thread. You transition between areas by saving and loading your hero. Meaning you can jump into anyone else's game on battle.net or host the new zone yourself.

Thanks for the feedback, and your interest guys.

 

[WolSHaman]

Please reread the thread. You transition between areas by saving and loading your hero. Meaning you can jump into anyone else's game on battle.net or host the new zone yourself.

Thanks for the feedback, and your interest guys.

Oh sorry I misunderstood what you meant when you talked of going between maps. And I'd still be willing to help if you'd like.

 

[emootootoo]

You seem to have a good foundation of what you want to do with this map. However I have a few opinions.

I personally think a barbarian using a wand to kill things is awesome, so I'm against class restrictions, maybe elaborate on how they are going to work?

Also, the whole 6 slots thing is a real drag. In a map I saw, you can actually buy potions from a spellbook on your hero. They have cooldowns and cost gold. It saves having to waste inventory slots with potions. Also any quest items can be in powerup form. (possibly use an inventory system so you can have 5 slots for armor/weapons and when you switch you have 5 for misc items)

And lastly, dungeons. You are having dungeons right? They are the best part of any RPG imo.

Other than that, seems pretty solid. I guess once you get into it a lot more youll have original ideas spewing from your brain.

 

[Crosus]

You seem to have a good foundation of what you want to do with this map. However I have a few opinions.

I personally think a barbarian using a wand to kill things is awesome, so I'm against class restrictions, maybe elaborate on how they are going to work?

Also, the whole 6 slots thing is a real drag. In a map I saw, you can actually buy potions from a spellbook on your hero. They have cooldowns and cost gold. It saves having to waste inventory slots with potions. Also any quest items can be in powerup form. (possibly use an inventory system so you can have 5 slots for armor/weapons and when you switch you have 5 for misc items)

And lastly, dungeons. You are having dungeons right? They are the best part of any RPG imo.

Other than that, seems pretty solid. I guess once you get into it a lot more youll have original ideas spewing from your brain.

Class restrictions does not necessarily mean that classes will only be able to use certain types of weapons or armor, meaning a caster wouldn't be restricted to only using say staves and wands.

What I meant is that certain specific items might be restricted to a class. As an example, lets say there is a certain high level quest. When you complete this quest, it rewards you with an item depending on your character class that has a powerful passive or active effect and is designed to work with only that class as a high end reward. You are a caster, and it gives you something called say, Archmage's Focus, which is a staff. This item in the hands of another class might be too powerful, or utterly useless depending on the design, so it is restricted to just your class. This is not to say only casters could use a staff or that they couldn't use anything else, but this item in particular is not meant to be used by anyone else.

It would be the same for an item level restriction, low level heroes could not use very powerful items they should not normally have access to.

Inventory system?
Well I admit the idea of buying potions directly on the character is interesting. I have already provided a solution for item space however, in the original post. The last item slot is taken up by a "backpack" type item that allows you to swap through additional inventory pages. I have seen these systems in use before (particularily, resident evil maps) and they do work well.

The only foreseeable problem is something that may be possible in jass but of which I don't know without more jass know-how. Essentially, a backpack stores your items in memory and just swaps which ones are in the hero item slots when you change pages, however this means only the items that are currently displayed effect your character with stats and such. Basically, while browsing through consumables, your character will lose the benefits of their equipment. (And if you're reaching for a consumable for a quick heal, losing stats would proably be a bad thing!)

edit:
Dungeons
There would be dungeons of course! Present both as smaller areas within zone maps, and as stand alone zone maps of their own. Sorry for not clarifying this.

 

[emootootoo]

So buying potions straight off your character would eliminate any backpack swapping problems mid fight right?

Another interesting approach could be the D3 approach of healing items that drop and just heal party members in an area when it is picked up. In boss fights potions wouldn't really matter if you had sufficient healers. However that approach might not be in the best interest of the wc3 map since there aren't enemies zerging you constantly (and in turn constantly dropping healing items).

And yeah, unless you want to code all the items attributes you wont be getting item effects from items not in your inventory.

 

[Flare]

Sounds like a neat idea, but... sounds like something of insanely epic proportions. Would be cool if it was completed, but I won't be getting my hopes up.

Good luck with it though

The project I am proposing would be rather formidible, a lot more so than DoTA I would even argue

Don't bring DotA into the thread, or you're likely to start an argument (even though RPG vs AoS isn't really comparable)

 

[Crosus]

Sounds like a neat idea, but... sounds like something of insanely epic proportions. Would be cool if it was completed, but I won't be getting my hopes up.

Good luck with it though



Don't bring the D word into the thread, or you're likely to start an argument (even though RPG vs AoS isn't really comparable)

And thats why I'm merely using this post as a launchpad for feedback and ideas. I know its big, it would take a rather dedicated team. But it would be cool to see too, wouldn't it?

As for that other thing, I wouldn't be the one starting the argument, it would be a mouthbreathing troll. But I see your point I did make a point not to draw too many direct comparisons (some things can't be helped).

 

[the2875]

I would definitely like to help with this, even though I am currently working on my own ORPG. However, I have come up with a few systems of my own that adjust the difficulty of play and they experience rates according to how many players there are and the level of their hero. I would really like to help with this even if it is epic. The only thing I am not familiar with is JASS and Modelling/Art-Related topics. If you need help let me know!