Duel - The RPG (concept map)

[atrocity3010]

This is a single player map that I've been working on for the past few days. It's based on the idea that you're a newcomer duelist that has entered a dueling guild, and must prove his worth by defeating other duelists. The duels play out like trigger-based boss battles, each boss having different methods of attacking you. It basically took me all this week to create 5 boss battles, so they're pretty time-consuming and elaborate. In the end I'm hoping to put in 30 to 35 unique duels.

Anyway, here is the map. It's too large to attach, but it's really not that big (2 MB). As with my other map (Sector 16), this one has music. Please disregard the crude terraining and no briefing/objectives. After all, this is a concept map.

(Removed, use the link below)


I would appreciate any feedback you guys have. Would there be interest in a map of this type? It's technically an RPG, but there's no leveling up or anything like that. What about the difficulty? The 5 duels in the map right now are all designed to be in the easiest (green) tier, although in different rankings in the tier, so they're not supposed to be the same difficulty.

Note: I have yet to implement this, but if you die, you will be revived back at the duel select area.

Edit:

Updated map: http://files.filefront.com/Duel+The+RPGscx/;10671131;/fileinfo.html

[ForTheSwarm]

Ah, so this is the map for which you needed nuke help with. It appears that trigger is disabled. Maybe thats the reason it hasn't been working?
Will the duels be in order, or will you let the player choose which duel they want to do?

[atrocity3010]

It's disabled because it was preventing the corsair from casting Disruption Web in the Water Acolyte duel, even though the corsair is owned by a different computer player. Makes no sense at all to me, but yes, I did have the trigger enabled when I was testing the nukes.

The layout will be that the first tier (green) will be accessible to the player. The first tier consists of 10 duels, and the player can choose any one he wants. Once you beat 5 duels, the yellow tier will be unlocked, also comprised of 10 duels. Same for the other tiers.

There will also be rematches as well. For example, in the full version, Little Meanie will challenge you to a rematch after you defeat him. The rematch will be a separate, harder version of the original duel.

[Ling666]

I like the map atrocity, it's very fun. I can't wait to get more opponents to duel against.
The Water Acolyte was such a pain to kill. It took so long, curse disruption webs. Ah well, I liked him better than those two units who went together. One hit kill =( Thankfully they're avoidable.

[atrocity3010]

I'm glad you found it fun. Actually, out of those five opponents, I think Meditance (the probe) takes the longest to kill (and is the hardest), mainly because his third stage leaves very little time to attack him in between rages. He's designed to be the #1 seed/highest-ranked opponent in the green tier, hence the toughness.

There will also be many duels with enemies that have one-hit kill attacks, but most of the deadlier ones will be later on in the yellow/red/special tiers. Smith/Wesson will be the exception (along with the coming Wind Acolyte...think vortexes) because they're really not that hard once you have a game plan and know their special moves. Also, I forgot to mention this, but I color-coded enemies and missiles to make things easier. Yellow = invincible, orange = not invincible.

Any other comments? I wasn't sure if people would like the idea considering you don't get a choice of protagonists to pick from and you don't have any spells. The thing about giving the player a choice of duelists is it makes balancing a pain and you pretty much have to make all of them ranged, ground-based, and able to hit air, which kind of boils down to Marine/Hydra/Goon, making them fairly pointless to choose from. Spells in RPG UMS maps always kind of bugged me. They were mostly inconvenient, slow, sometimes gimmicky, and mana was a pain. I personally prefer the enemies having spells instead.

[ForTheSwarm]

While fighting the Water Acolyte, after killing him the 3rd time, I couldn't move at all, even when I wasn't frozen.

[atrocity3010]

Do you mean after you had won the duel three times, or on his third form? Was your character given to another player?

[ForTheSwarm]

Third form. I was under a disruption web, and I couldn't move. I was NOT frozen.

[atrocity3010]

Did you still have control of the player (was he red)? Did you kill him just as you were being frozen?

Edit: Are you sure it wasn't his tidal wave attack? It's supposed to push you back to the other side of the arena, and he uses it against you often in his third form.

[ForTheSwarm]

I had control of the Duelist, and I did not kill him as I was being frozen. He did use his tidal wave attack often, but I couldn't move at all.

[atrocity3010]

Hmm, that's really strange. I know there aren't any move commands issued to player 1 during the fight (or even afterwards), so that can't be it. I really don't know what the bug could be, other than just a rare occurrence of a unit being stuck, which I think is a bug with Starcraft in general. I saw a video of a guy who had his dragoon stuck in a melee game and it wouldn't respond to his commands at all, even though there were no obstacles in sight.

[ForTheSwarm]

All the duels were kind of hard for me. The only one I managed to beat was the Little Meanie. :(

[atrocity3010]

Yeah, some of them are fairly difficult, although I'm sure you could get them if you tried again. To encourage that, I implemented respawning after losing a duel.

I might consider moving some of them (like Smith/Wesson and the Water Acolyte) to the yellow tier if the general consensus is that they're hard enough. I need more easy enemies like Little Meanie, but it's hard to make them easy and at the same time add an element of strategy to the battle.

[ForTheSwarm]

Respawning? I've never respawned yet. I thought you just hadn't added that yet.

[atrocity3010]

I hadn't, but I just did. That's what I meant.

[ForTheSwarm]

Oh, I see. So, when should it be done? I can't wait to try it out.

[atrocity3010]

At 1 new duel per day, it would take me about a month to finish. That's not considering any extra time I would need to come up with ideas for new duels and such, not to mention extra time that will be spent on the more elaborate duels later on. Here are the ideas currently on the table:

Little Meanie rematch
Big Meanie (Ultralisk) - Little Meanie's brother who challenges you when you beat Little Meanie's rematch
Wind, Earth, and Fire Acolytes
Possibly a Darkness Acolyte as well (the idea being that your marine is blinded before the battle)
A tank that tries to beat you at your own game (i.e. it has smart AI and it micros well)
Magician - an adaptation of Magician from House of the Dead 2. He will be fought in a rail-shooter style (i.e. you can't move and you must manually target him). If I can get the triggers working on this one (and it'll need a lot of them), this fight is going to be pretty damn epic.
Giga Walker - tough Goliath that shoots homing missiles and takes refuge in his ship
Alpha 19 - top secret stealth fighter inspired by Black Heart (best shmup boss ever) from Battle Garegga
Kukulza - it'll have similar AI to Kukulza in my Sector 16 map
Uranium Death - Science Vessel with a very high amount of HP. It will try to nuke you, and the idea is to survive and make him take damage from the nukes.

So...yeah. That's only 17 duels so far (16 considering I can't get nukes working).

[atrocity3010]

I hate to double post, but I implemented the Magician battle and it went a lot better than I thought it was going to. I uploaded a sample of the fight to YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=feZEtfajdXc

Check it out, you might find it pretty interesting.

[ForTheSwarm]

Will you be able to replay a match, or will it mess up the triggers?

[Loser]

I might consider moving some of them (like Smith/Wesson and the Water Acolyte) to the yellow tier if the general consensus is that they're hard enough. I need more easy enemies like Little Meanie, but it's hard to make them easy and at the same time add an element of strategy to the battle.

Actually, they aren't much harder than the others on the first tier. In fact, the water acolyte is the only one other than little meanie that I've never lost to so far =P.

[atrocity3010]

Will you be able to replay a match

Yep. Even if you win the match, you can still replay it (although it won't count towards your score if you win it again). I'm trying to make the map as convenient as possible.

Actually, they aren't much harder than the others on the first tier. In fact, the water acolyte is the only one other than little meanie that I've never lost to so far =P.

Hmm, maybe I'll just have to finish all (or at least most) of the duels, then figure out which tier they belong in. Although I'm pretty sure I'll be putting that Magician fight in the special tier. Even I lose to him sometimes.

[Polkaman]

Will you be able to replay a match

Yep. Even if you win the match, you can still replay it (although it won't count towards your score if you win it again). I'm trying to make the map as convenient as possible.

Actually, they aren't much harder than the others on the first tier. In fact, the water acolyte is the only one other than little meanie that I've never lost to so far =P.

Hmm, maybe I'll just have to finish all (or at least most) of the duels, then figure out which tier they belong in. Although I'm pretty sure I'll be putting that Magician fight in the special tier. Even I lose to him sometimes.
Ever heard of quotes?:P

WHICH IS THE FIRST CHARACTER?????????????????????
I phail on all of them :'(

[atrocity3010]

Ever heard of quotes?:P

Yeah, I just prefer not to use them.

WHICH IS THE FIRST CHARACTER?????????????????????
I phail on all of them :'(

Little Meanie is about as easy as they're going to get. It's understandable if you die against him once because you didn't know what to expect. His third form can be a little tricky if you don't try your best to gun him down immediately.

[Polkaman]

Okay, thx. This map is sweet, i have a small suggestion that could change the gameplay quite a lot.

Since the post said RPG, you could make the duel guy weaker, but eacvh duel u win u get money for upgrades, or use that money to recruit some units :)

Just a thought =]

[atrocity3010]

I had originally thought about upgrades, but decided against them on the grounds that they would make balancing a pain and I would have to beef up the later bosses to keep them hard, making the upgrades fairly pointless except to make the easy duels even easier.

Technically this is a role-playing game (putting you in the role of the duelist who wants to make a name for himself), although some of the traditional RPG elements are missing. I also tagged RPG onto the name because if you search SC.org you can find many maps just named Duel (in fact, there's Duel 1-9).

[Polkaman]

o.o Like the map you made? Care to link?:P

[atrocity3010]

Most of them are just melee maps, actually. For the others, I couldn't find one that had a similar concept to this map.

[atrocity3010]

I hate to double-post, but I thought I'd update you guys on the situation. Progress has been slower than expected due to summer school and some of the duels being quite elaborate. So far I've completed 12 duels, and for the sake of one day actually finishing this map I've lowered the grand total to 29 duels. Even with that however, I still only have 24 potential duels lined up, and that's assuming that each duel turns out good and doesn't get cut (I had to remove one already due to nukes not cooperating). It's not easy to come up with almost 30 unique battles that all require a different element of strategy to win.

So if you guys have any ideas for duels you'd like to see, particularly ones which require strategy to win, I'm open to suggestions. Even if it's just an abstract idea for an enemy attack, lay it on me. Again, anything you'd like to see. If I use your idea, your name will of course be added to the credits.

Also, here's the updated map if you're interested (12 duels complete):

http://files.filefront.com/Duel+The+RPGscx/;10671131;/fileinfo.html

Note that the two opponents at the brown beacons are insanely hard, as they're designed to be in the Shrine of Glory, the last 5 duels of the game which are only accessible by beating all the other 24 duels. Also note that Alpha X appears twice because the brown beacon is his rematch.

[DarkMirror]

Wormholes/push-pull attacks.

[atrocity3010]

That's already been covered in the Wind Apprentice duel, which is included in the updated map. I had originally thought of having the wind try to blow you off the edge of the arena, but opted for the simpler vortex of death.

[DarkMirror]

What I was more thinking would be something that would move you around the map, probobly out of range. Like, vortex created, sucks you in, you hit the center you get teleported to the edge of the map.

Hmm... Any other ideas? What about moving walls? Barriers?

[ForTheSwarm]

Necromancer? Has a lot of really weak servants (undead).

[atrocity3010]

Actually, I had an idea similar to that where there were 4 vortices on the edges of the arena and each one would teleport you to the opposite side. You would use them to avoid being hit by your opponent (a reaver). Unfortunately I had to scrap that idea because it didn't work out so well in execution.

Moving walls sound like they would require too many locations. I'm already in trouble with locations so far, as the map has 160 of them. That's almost 2/3 the max number of locations with less than half the duels finished. Pretty funny considering the map is only 64x64.


Barriers could possibly work, but I can't think of a practical way to use them that isn't gimmicky. The two scenarios I can think of are creating a barrier around the opponent until you destroy whatever supplies it, or fighting the opponent in an invisible maze.

Necromancer? Has a lot of really weak servants (undead).

That would play out a lot like the Fire Initiate duel that's in the updated map. He's very powerful by himself (requiring you to micro) but his helpers (fire spirits) are extremely weak in comparison. This leads to the interesting situation of using his fire spirits to crowd you and keep him from attacking.


Also, here are a few other ideas on the table already:

Giant robotic foe which must be destroyed piece by piece
Opponent who supremely overpowers you, so you must run from him and outsmart him by locking him behind doors, etc.
Leading missiles (scouts) into an enemy's ship to damage it
Enemy who burrows and comes after you (Earth Elemental)
Attack in which the enemy cages you in a small area and launches various attacks from there
Enemy who replenishes his shields via containers that can be destroyed
Enemy who leaves traps in his footsteps (most likely a vulture + mines)

etc.

[DarkMirror]

Something I tried a long time ago, but never worked out due to me being lazy...
I made a massive figure out of terrain tiles. I made it so that there were a few paths of walkable tiles you could use to move around it in different places.

You killed zerglings, or some other unit, and it would take you to the next part of the body. You had a time limit though. It was based off of Shadow of the Colossus. Probobly wouldnt work for your map, but hey, its an idea.

[atrocity3010]

Yeah, that's kind of the direction I want to take with the large robotic battle, but it won't be big enough for you to enter it and destroy it internally. I was thinking more along the lines of having it be constructed of various buildings/units which act as the parts, and having it launch multiple attacks at you at once. The nature of the attacks will depend on which parts are still alive.

[DarkMirror]

Cool. I advise you to have shoulder-mounted Siege tank turrets as the easiest to destroy and most basic component. Or not. Up to you. Oh, and one last idea: What about something with an air enemy, and if you can kill some ground defense or something it launches, a few scourge appear on the battlefield and do extra damage to it?

[atrocity3010]

Now that you mention it, I had thought of using a bunch of sieged tanks stored in its main body as a charge attack for when you've destroyed quite a few main parts. It would charge for a few seconds, then attempt to fire at you with the group of siege tanks. Think final boss from Sonic 3 & Knuckles (that's where I got some of the inspiration for this idea from). It would also have things like eye lasers (cloaked wraiths) and dumbfire/homing missile volleys.

[DarkMirror]

Cool. I still think walls of some sort could be cool.
Oooh! What about this: A "wall" of dark templars that patrols from one side of the field to the other? Maybe up and down? Thus obstructing your movement. Maybe make the enemy an air type?

[atrocity3010]

That wouldn't work because it would be way too easy to make them break formation.

Do you have any comments on the updated map? In the end, the map won't be designed to be beatable by just anyone. In fact, only the most godlike players will be able to beat every single duel. The objective is more along the lines of seeing how far you can go and what ranking you get (there are 10 total).

[DarkMirror]

They wouldn't stay in formation, thats the whole idea! They would begin to break apart and clutter the battlefield, making it harder and harder to move around!

[atrocity3010]

That would make the difficulty of the battle pretty random, and I want to avoid random difficulty if possible.

[DarkMirror]

Meh. If you dislike that idea, I still think my one where you have a way of sending scourge after the enemy is a good one.

[Polkaman]

I know! You place a buncha seige tanks for a computer, and they all attack an enemy thats owned by another computer. That unit is Roaming aruond in the duel spot, so the splash from the tanks would kill the duelist. The "fireball" from the blasts would just attack the roaming unit, making it random. Then just give tanks to neural.

[atrocity3010]

That could possibly work, although I think a more interesting solution would be an enemy that shoots deadly scourge at you, and if you kill them, they home in on their master. But the catch is, if he shoots them, they go back to homing on you. Hell, you could probably make a whole battle based on that. A deadly version of Pong.

I know! You place a buncha seige tanks for a computer, and they all attack an enemy thats owned by another computer. That unit is Roaming aruond in the duel spot, so the splash from the tanks would kill the duelist. The "fireball" from the blasts would just attack the roaming unit, making it random. Then just give tanks to neural.

Yeah, my plan is to do something similar to that for the Earth Elemental duel (with lurkers in a stationary spot, marked by an "earth statue").

[Loser]

Hey, uh, remember the Smith and Wesson fight? I remember that one of them had an observer that created spider mines and killed them rapidly, creating a tornado-like effect. I'm trying to do that for my maps as a cyclone spell, but the spider mines don't spawn fast enough. Is there a way to make them spawn and die as fast as you did without hyper triggers (since a hypertrigger would speed up the rest of my triggers, which I don't want)?

[Polkaman]

No. But instead if you want something rapid use arbiters and recall.

[Fiendwurm]

I haven't played the map yet so I apologize if you have already dun this.

Around the edge of the arena there are a few crystals (maybe one in each corner). The bad guy casts a spell (or something) and you have a few seconds to run to a crystal or you will die. Also the bad guy could create barriers around the crystals that you have to destroy to get to!

[atrocity3010]

Hey, uh, remember the Smith and Wesson fight? I remember that one of them had an observer that created spider mines and killed them rapidly, creating a tornado-like effect.

Tornado? I thought it resembled a minigun being fired, but ok.

I'm trying to do that for my maps as a cyclone spell, but the spider mines don't spawn fast enough. Is there a way to make them spawn and die as fast as you did without hyper triggers (since a hypertrigger would speed up the rest of my triggers, which I don't want)?

The only way I can think of is the extremely tedious way (create spider mine, kill it, wait x milliseconds, create another spider mine, etc.).

Around the edge of the arena there are a few crystals (maybe one in each corner). The bad guy casts a spell (or something) and you have a few seconds to run to a crystal or you will die. Also the bad guy could create barriers around the crystals that you have to destroy to get to!

That could work, although I made a duel similar in concept already (the General Carnage duel). Basically, during his second form he goes into seige mode and begins teleporting around the map, and you have to stay in his blind spot to survive. Then in his third form he teleports to one of two possible locations marked by recalls, and they're placed in a way that you can get in both locations' blind spots, or in one location's blind spot and out of range of the other.

[Polkaman]

Damn, you've thought of everything have you?

[Fiendwurm]

oh! oh! more ideas!!!!

K you would have to dodge something(like the alpha X's rockets)or have to attack click something (like in the magician), but the screen shakes! By making a bunch of center view triggers.

Another idea is that you have to run away from a unit (like with the infested kerrigan) but in its third form you have a bunch of hallucination death smoke so its harder to see every thing.


666th post!!!!!!!

[Loser]

Ok this doesn't make sense... I've got the cyclone animation to work now, but the spider mines don't do any damage when they die =/. How do I fix that?

[DarkMirror]

Spider mines don't do damage when their killed, only when they attack.

[Loser]

Arg, this is going to be harder than I thought... this would be so much easier if there was a "Subtract unit hp" trigger as well as a "set unit hp" trigger...
Is there any way I can simulate the spider mines doing damage without using a "set unit hp" trigger or a kill unit trigger?

[ForTheSwarm]

Yes, but it's kinda complicated. First, you need to have a location follow the person.

Conditions:
Enemy brings at least 1 Spider Mine to (location).
Actions:
Set unit HP to (a percent). (let's say it's 75%)
Set Switch Mine 1.

Conditions:
Switch Mine 1 is set.
Enemy brings at least 1 Spider Mine to (location).
Actions:
Set unit HP to 50%.
Set Switch Mine 2.
etc.

It'll only work if no other enemies attack your guy during this battle and if your hero has 100% HP right before it starts.

[Loser]

That makes sense, but there's a couple problems with that theory:

Like you said, a unit has to have 100% hp for it to work right.

And it would also do different amounts of damage to each unit depending on how much hp they have. It wouldn't stand up right to have a powerful hero and a little zealot die in the same amount of time.

Hmm. I suppose I'll have to dispose of the cyclone hand ability, unless there's another unit that does do damage when it dies. I'll just make Da Wurm lay mines or something instead =/.

EDIT: I know, instead of making it do damage, I'll have it drag units to wherever Da Wurm desires, which would usually be near his carnivorous spider buddies (spider mines), which have a taste for anything that lives and will happily chew on it until it dies of overfeeding (when it blows up) =D.

[ForTheSwarm]

And it would also do different amounts of damage to each unit depending on how much hp they have. It wouldn't stand up right to have a powerful hero and a little zealot die in the same amount of time.

Easy/boring to fix. You'd have to make several copies of the trigger substituting different percentages for each unit and adding the condition "Player commands exactly 1 (unit). "

[Loser]

Hmm, suppose so (dang, I always forget the simple solutions lol). But I also like my other idea for what cyclone could do =D. Problem with both of them is that I just found, the spell doesn't stop properly. To cast the cyclone spell, you use a gateway in a little corner of the map to build a zealot. While this zealot lives, the cyclone spell is cast. The zealot is supposed to die after a few seconds, but it isn't working right. I find that when I use no wait commands, it works, but I don't want him to die instantly. Wierd =/.

[ForTheSwarm]

What was the trigger? Can you post it?

Oh, and I thought of a duel idea. Have your guy get a shield, and you have to block the enemy attacks with it, and then you attack while the enemy gets a shield.

[Loser]

Player1 brings at least 1 Lil' Lightup (zealot) to "Tunnel"

Wait for 5000 milliseconds.

Kill 1 Lil' Lightup for All Players at "Tunnel"

Preserve Trigger.

It pretty much goes like that.

EDIT: Another question: when Blademaster said I should have 6 heroes, does that include the two random things that a player can become (I plan to include a feature where players can randomly be polymorphed by Baron von Pokeybeast or enslaved by Mollie The Moloch upon attempting to select a hero).

[atrocity3010]

Damn, you've thought of everything have you?

Sometimes it feels like I have. It's not easy coming up with battles that are interesting but don't rely too heavily on insta-kill attacks (with the exception of the Alpha X fights, but you get 5 lives for those), swarms of minions, or unnecessary/clunky gimmicks.

K you would have to dodge something(like the alpha X's rockets)or have to attack click something (like in the magician), but the screen shakes! By making a bunch of center view triggers.

That would be a good idea if it only made it harder to control your character. The problem is it makes it near impossible to control your character. All you can really do is order him to the center of the earthquake.

Another idea is that you have to run away from a unit (like with the infested kerrigan) but in its third form you have a bunch of hallucination death smoke so its harder to see every thing.

That would require a lot of "Create units with properties" triggers, and there is an artificial limit as to how many times you can call that trigger in the whole map (it's a pretty low number, actually). I had to find that out the hard way when I was working on my Sector 16 map.

Oh, and I thought of a duel idea. Have your guy get a shield, and you have to block the enemy attacks with it, and then you attack while the enemy gets a shield.

That could work, it makes me think of a turret-based battle where you man a missile turret and the enemy shoots missiles at you, and you have to manually shoot them down with the turret. Then at the same time you have a target reticule (like an overlord or something) and when you unload it, it shoots a missile in that direction. The idea would be to balance offense and defense to beat the enemy without having your turret destroyed.

Edit: Or I guess I could just simplify that by having the enemy be an air unit that's in range of the turret.