I'm getting back into Starcraft mapping after 10 years away, and it seems that I am most interested in RPGs. My question is, what makes a good starcraft RPG? What makes you want to play and keep playing? What should be avoided?

That's not an easy question to answer, since what makes a good RPG can mean different things to different people.

Check out the RPG I'm working on:
The Architect RPG

I think what separates RPGs from other genres is a strong focus on storyline. Having quests that the characters have to set out to conquer. Another important aspect is character customisation, whether this be in equipping certain items, spending your attribute points, or choosing certain spells to use. My own RPG basically emulates how a game like Diablo would work.

Here are some other RPGs you can check out to get inspiration:
Middle of the Ocean
Morrowind RPG and Oblivion RPG
Tower of Dream
Fallen Memories
Essence
So It Begins
Legacy of Haean
Spellsword
Labyrinthos RPG
Deep Blue (incomplete, but still an impressive look at what SC RPGs can be)

Thank you for the suggestions. I've been looking at The Architect. I'll be doenloading it when I get some time.

IMO a good RPG has multiplayer, some kind of story, a fun way to fight that isn't too grindy, some kind of items system (open to interpretation here! can be implemented as extremely simple system, or something complicated, just needs to support fighting with your friends or support trading items with your friends or both). Some nice terrain really helps! And of course, the map needs to be finished.

Balancing all these things while actually finishing the map is very difficult, since the features pull away at the release date, and the release date pulls away at the features.

Good luck with the map dude! If you get something playable I'd be down to check it out

Don't add overly complicated systems just because you can, the more seamless and easy to use your systems are, the more approachable your map will be to new players. Not saying avoid complicated systems, just make sure if you have 5 different transport unit menu systems, they are introduced in a way that can be remembered and organized.

Fun gameplay. If it's just normal SC attacking, that will be boring.

The gameplay should also require skill from the player somehow. A lot of RPG's are too simple to be able to reward more skilled players. At the same time, it shouldn't be overly complex ofc.

Basically a good RPG has these things

1. Fun and satisfying combat/gameplay that doesn't get boring.
2. Well balanced progression/pacing.
3. Relevant features.
4. A nice solid sense of reward. Like doing things actually matters.

That's my opinion at least.

Being a mapping site you naturally got a lot of technical advice, but there's no motivator to play a map like solid rewards.

Give the player the player time to enjoy his new toy before you ramp up the challenge:

Combine that with

Butch knows what people want.

There's also Recursion RPG which is like Majora's Mask! Pretty much the one map I actually finished completely.

aha hint hint...

Honestly, no Starcraft RPG is going to be actually good. It's a game simply not meant for that style. You can do it well and everything, but in my opinion, the number 1 indicator to me of a good RPG is its replayability value, and I have never played an RPG in Starcraft that I wanted to play a second time. A lot of these things that people have suggested aren't realistically feasible to do in Starcraft. You can't really make the combat all that unique or anything. A good story is important, but I've literally never played a map that had a story I cared about.

I'm not saying you shouldn't make an RPG, but I don't really think there are any actual things you can do to the map to make it good, so to speak. As a map, you can make something impressive, but as an RPG, you'll probably always fall short.

I played spellsword a few times, and would play it again! It's long enough and the interesting part for me was getting good items and trading them with friends. Since this is mostly some RNG and requires players to interact, it becomes replayable! Humans are good at keeping each other entertained

So it definitely is possible to get in some replayability into a SC map. I think the hard part is designing a system simple enough to fit into a SC map, but well designed to support people entertaining each other. I think the term here is autotelic experience.

I've thought about this a lot and I agree with you to an extent. I think the map can be fun and replayable but a lot of people don't know how or care about making a map like that. They just think tons of massive systems and cool features are what makes a map fun. The most fun I've had in a starcraft RPG is in some of the simplest maps I have ever played where all you did was slowly work through a bunch of enemies, no abilities, no items, no nothing. Like Cecil said it was just made with enough loopholes for people to create their own enjoyment. Which I think is a huge part of a good SC map and I definitely think is possible in the RPG genre, just is not done very often because people have the wrong idea of what makes a map "good".

Being finished.

I disagree but probably because we have different ideas of what an RPG is. If you are comparing to first person RPGs like Skyrim or Fallout or Witcher then yes I agree with you.

But I disagree with you in comparisons to ARPGs like Diablo and Path of Exile. You can make similar games because they both use that same top down style gameplay.

I think we can all agree the main thing that stops SC RPGs from ever competing with other RPGs is the string limit. No SC map can hope to reach the sheer scope of storytelling due to this limit. And storytelling itself becomes exceedingly difficult when you have to measure every word.

Wow. Lots of good input here. I'm not aiming to make anything really complicated like a full blown cRPG (hell, I own RPG Maker and Game Maker studio if I want to do that) but I really like starcraft and want to do what I can with it.

Do it. Usually a good test of whether a map is "good" or not is if you find yourself in-game testing for longer than you expected just out of sheer enjoyment of the systems you've already made.