Untitled Project (brainstorm with me!)

Steve

Member
Reaction score
3
After a several year hiatus im looking to occupy my time with a new map idea. After several days of bouncing things around in my head, I have a somewhat solid idea of what I want the map to be. Im tired of seeing only DOTA games and few foot games in the pool and I feel bringing a nice team strategy type game to the mix would help to open up some options. Am I looking to make the next DOTA? hell no, I have nowhere near the time for that. What I am looking to make is a fun yet challenging team based strategy game that focuses not on what items the hero has, but how you and your team mates combine abilities of each hero to achieve your goals.

Players: 10 (1 commander each side, 4 heroes)
Type: Team Strategy
Victory Condition: Unknown/Undecided
Races: Multiple (Design/Type Undecided)
Heroes: Set Skills/Multiple Types/Offense/Defense/Support
Map Style: Similar "feel" to a DOTA map Light/Dark sides to differentiate teams (Perhaps Grass/Snow combo)

Now in the the meat of things, game mechanics. Back in the day when I used to play a lot of custom games, it seemed the focus has always been how can I get the best items for my hero and or best stats. While this formula clearly worked for the style of maps out there, I feel its too simplistic sometimes (exception DOTA, that game confuses me lol). I enjoy playing games where one wrong or right move for that matter can change the game drastically. Meaningful engagements between sides promotes tactical choices and overall more fun. The issue with implementing things that are too complicated however, is a steep learning curve and people getting frustrated because they have no idea what to do. The end goal of this map will to have a simple, yet fun and exciting game to play that will hopefully spice up the game pool a bit for custom games.

Both teams will have 1 commander who is in charge of building support buildings such as towers, unit producing buildings, healing pools ect. They will not however have a total defensive role. Commanders will be able to unleash powerful spells and support abilities from the HQ building. These could range from a hail of arrows to a mass heal. I want the spells to be significant in nature but not overpowered. Gold will be used to produce units to aid the heroes in battle, while wood will be used for constructing buildings. Building options will not be extensive, instead keeping it to a FOB(forward operating base), Some type of healing building heroes can retreat to, a melee and ranged unit production buildings and a few towers that can help fortify key areas.

The other 4 people on the team will provide support to the commander by using heroes to assist units in destroying the opposing team. If possible I would like to do a zoomed in camera style for these players to give a more "direct feel" to the hero role. As stated before the heroes will be divided into 3 areas: Offense, Defense and Support. As their titles reflect offensive heroes will be designed to shut down enemy units and buildings with AoE spells and other abilities. Defensive heroes will have the ability to create defensive barriers and mobility impairing effects to units and heroes; while the support heroes will have the focus of buffing nearby units and providing healing/nuke spells.

Items will be available for heroes to buy but the game will not focus on them as a "must have". Most items will offer utility bonuses such as blink, a quick health or mana heal, a portal to the main base ect. More important items may be added later but again I dont want it to be a main game focus.

Each side will start with an HQ type building which will produce workers to harvest wood only, gold will be obtained on a timed basis, receiving more per minute as you kill more enemy units. I feel this will promote the team based style I want by focusing on killing enemies as efficiently as possible. As for units that will aid the heroes I am not sure if I want a timed spawn out of the producing buildings or a manual style for the commander, as he will have control of all units made. If he does have control it may be overwhelming for newer players to manage such large numbers, while trying to build up bases and such(comments/ideas here would be nice).

Other buildings will include the FOB which can spawn workers to aid in resource gathering and construction as well as having reduced power spells compared to the HQ. Difference being HQ spells have a map wide range and FOB spells have significantly shorter range. Because spells need to be cast where you have vision(if I remember correctly) the only way offensive spells could be cast against an enemy HQ is if you had units in the area.

Towers will also play a key role in defending your bases. Keeping towers to a observation/offense/defense theme will provide options but keep complexity down. Observation towers will only provide vision and nothing else. Offense towers will have some sort of splash attack, while defensive towers will have high health and armor while taunting units to attack it. Tower cost will be high to prevent spamming as there will be a worker limit to prevent the flood of resources. By keeping the cost high the towers will need to be significant in "presence" when one is placed I want it to affect how players approach a base.

The last but not least in the idea farm is upgrades for buildings and units. Some games have 10-20 levels of upgrades, that will not happen here. The game will be designed to be short in length (30 mins or so) with fast paced action. There will be 3-5 levels of upgrades each one providing a significant boost in unit performance, giving your team a significant advantage.



That is all I have for now, to anyone who reads this entire post I thank you for your time. Please anyone with ideas that you feel would be a neat addition I would love to hear them.
 

Conor

Active Member
Reaction score
3
A good idea for a game. It hasnt been done in Warcraft 3 (that I have heard of) but it has surfaced in the FPS genre before now. Empires mod for Half Life 2 is basically what you described, and Nuclear Dawn was a full release FPS based on the same concept if you're interested.

Overall, if done well, it would definitely be fun. It might be best to have a mix of manual and automatic creeps so that your side is always pushing/defending but you can decide where to concentrate your efforts specifically with picked units, or having specific upgrades for each 'lane.'
 

Steve

Member
Reaction score
3
I actually got the main idea from Nuclear Dawn although I have never played it. As for the manual/auto creeps I though of giving every hero an ability to rally 5 creeps within a small radius to follow them around for a short time, then return to normal "duties". This way if someone wanted to push in a certain area they rally some creeps and move in.
 

Conor

Active Member
Reaction score
3
That should definitely be possible I believe, using triggered spells. Overall many of the building blocks outside of the commander mode wouldnt take too long to put together really
 

Steve

Member
Reaction score
3
The part I will struggle with the most for sure is the terraining, but thats a long way off before I need to worry about that. For now its getting all the buildings and units made and functioning properly.
 
General chit-chat
Help Users
  • No one is chatting at the moment.

      The Helper Discord

      Members online

      No members online now.

      Affiliates

      Hive Workshop NUON Dome World Editor Tutorials

      Network Sponsors

      Apex Steel Pipe - Buys and sells Steel Pipe.
      Top