Whoo. Where to begin? Oh, that's right, at the beginning.

A few weeks ago, Cecil started a new SC2 Beta Key Contest. The theme was supposed to be The Ocean. That was awfully open-ended, but I figured I could at least start something, so I decided to make an AoS. Of course, the map itself is suffering from a lack of terrain (who does Twilight tileset underwater-themed terrain anyway?), but my imagination has no such impediments - I went and started coming up with heroes for Oceanus, which is a tentative title. It's so generic that it's probably been taken already.

Anyway, that's where you guys come in. I've come up with four some heroes that I'd like you all to comment on and point out difficulties with. To preempt questions, here are a few facts about how my AoS will work:

1. Protoss shields will normally regenerate at a normal pace, but certain effects - such as Furilus' Truesteel Armor Raemus' Elemental Shield - constantly set the shield percentage higher (erm, just realized Zerglings don't have shields... ). Happening every trigger cycle, this will filter out a significant portion of damage done to a unit, more or less based on when attacks hit and how much damage attacks do. Average shielding on a unit will be ten - essentially, this will act like ten armor, more if I choose to add protoss shields as a viable upgrade. And if I use a larger number of shields, say 100, I can have specific percents for higher level spells that use shielding mechanics.

2. I will be using a scarab direct damage system that is not owned by the players themselves (that would take up too many weapons - correct me if I'm wrong). Ergo, players can take damage from their own directly damaging magical effects.

3. If it makes any difference, I'll be using Kills to Cash Perfect.

4. The spells will be cast with a gateway system, so the lower ones on the list will be unavailable until researched. Yeah, this is a takeoff of Norm's HS and UU's TS, but whatever. Uniqueness can't be accomplished everywhere, though I try.

5. Any number values currently filled in with 'x' are values that I haven't decided yet. Feel free to make suggestions.

6. I have added a new mechanic called flinching. The way it works is simply by giving your hero to a computer and back again instantaneously. This simply breaks the selection, or makes you 'flinch'.

7. The entire game is set underwater.

So, without further ado, here are the heroes, in nifty little collapse boxes for your viewing pleasure.

















That's it for now. I will be adding more heroes as my imagination continues to run wild. I expect that you guys will find lots of problems in here, so I'm ready and willing to make changes.

It's unlikely that this AoS will ever see the light of Bnet. If it isn't out before SC2, however, it may be out as a .s2ma, so keep an eye out.

Post has been edited 12 time(s), last time on Apr 27 2010, 10:58 pm by ImagoDeo.

Wow... It looks like you're going for even more spells than me I used. Major props on your ideas so far. (I totally see Samurai and Serpent influence!!!!!)

EDIT: I'm having to use this post as an extension of the OP. Ran out of characters.





Post has been edited 2 time(s), last time on Apr 27 2010, 10:57 pm by ImagoDeo. Reason: Added Mimic

Not sure... It may be overcomplicated with so many different spell sets.

I was thinking of a hero somewhat like Harvester.

Pretty good spells tho

I'll be the first to take a crack at it. It looks like you need a lot of feedback, so prepare to read... lol












Post has been edited 5 time(s), last time on Apr 19 2010, 1:17 am by atto.

Glad you like this hero. I'll try to answer your questions about things. Since there's so much info here, I'll have to reply to one hero at a time.

I originally intended for Aschalon to be much more reliant on his spell orb than he currently is. I think I've gotten too far off of that, though. I may change some things to return him to that path. For example, I think I'll take out the capability to regenerate the Spell Orb simply by returning to base.

Spell Orb Alive:
•Unburrowed Spells:

◦Pressure - No, the entire game is set underwater. I'm actually intending to use pylon aura sprites over the whole map. That is, if the terrain is ever completed.

◦Blink - I was intending to use a regular queen, and the Matriarch as an upgrade or some kind of temporary thing - maybe just for the energy bonus.

◦White Inscription - My intent with this was to cause Aschalon to have a reason to move further from base. The White Inscription was designed to aid in combat even if Aschalon couldn't be there himself - send the queen and give your allies a bonus, essentially. If you read my later edits, I believe I restricted it to healing only when there were no foes in the location. Either way, Aschalon couldn't summon another Spell Orb by any means until he returned to the mark. I'm thinking of redesigning this, because as it is the spawn is going to be at full health already and it would only be of major use to other heroes. Perhaps it'll be consumed when an enemy steps on it, and deal damage over time or something. I'll rethink it and get back to you.

•Burrowed Spells (Unleashes Spell Orb):

◦Tunnel Warp - This spell creates an observer and sends it to the queen. While it travels, a death counter counts up. When it reaches the queen, Aschalon is immediately teleported there. The problem is that neither Aschalon or the queen can move until the spell is complete, and any effect that stuns or interrupts spellcasting will destroy the observer and waste the mana used to cast the spell initially. In the future I'll try to clarify the mechanics of my spells. Thanks for pointing that out.

◦Mirror Image - Another spawn spell. Deals damage and then the copies are removed. Pretty simple.

◦Black Inscription - Yes, you're right - this does need some kind of penalty for using it. Probably a stun effect that lasts a while. We'll see.


Spell Orb Gone (Either under the effects of a mark or killed):
•Unburrowed Spells:

◦Doom - Doom is merely a death counter that counts down by detecting when an opponent moves (inverted locations ftw). If it hits 0, the DDS is used to deal tons of damage. It has a variety of uses, but one that springs instantly to mind is forcing an opponent to return to base by the shortest route. I'll fine tune it so that if you're more than half the map away, it'll probably kill you before you get home. Or it could be used as an 'I'm-taking-you-down-with-me' spell. As in, your foe has followed you all the way over here and isn't going to give up till you die - well, hit him with Doom and he'll pay for it, even if you die.


•Burrowed Spells:

◦Regeneration - Keyword here - 'a small amount.' Also, Black Inscription - which will be redesigned - isn't intended to be used for casual heals. This would be something to aid Aschalon's basic Zerg regeneration somewhat. Medic spawns for a few seconds - you know the whole deal.

◦Farsight - I'll remove this. Not sure what I was thinking. It'll be replaced with something more useful.

◦Blessed Recall - I forgot to add cooldowns. At any rate, this spell would have a very high mana cost and a rather lengthy cooldown. Not the kind of repeatedly castable heal/recall spell.


Zealot Spells:

•Mana Boost - Well, the idea here was to have Morphis be a regular Zealot, and Mana Boost would replace it with the Fenix Zealot temporarily. If the Fenix Zealot is killed, Morphis just reverts to normal. The Fenix Zealot would have a very low health pool, possibly only 50-100. Not hard to kill, but not so squishy that the effect is useless.

•Mana Blaze - Intended as a PKing spell more than anything. Morphis as a zealot is fast enough to keep up with most foes - ergo, an explosive spell like WoW warlocks' Hellfire should be useful in many situations. You'll notice Morphis has no healing spells of his own, so this would only be feasible if you had more health than your foe. Of course, Morphis having two forms means that he gets a heal when he switches forms (unless his other form is already damaged). This has to be incorporated into any strategy that you may be thinking of.


Tassadar Spells:

•Drain Mana - 'Drains' means 'Takes'. Not 'Takes all'.

•Mana Barrier - Yes. I may replace this with a minor healing spell or perhaps a major healing spell with a long cooldown. Or I may leave it as is - we'll see. I need more feedback.

•Mana Storm - Haven't decided how much damage storm will do. Given my planned hitpoint levels, I'll probably double its damage and leave it at that. You have to understand that Morphis won't be able to cast any other spells while this is active. And he can't cast hallu.

•Ignite Mana - Yeah, this is Morphis' main PKing spell. It'll force some kind of defensive action unless the enemy intends to bring Morphis down with him.


Spells:

•Change Stance - Yes. I hate the zergling stereotype of them being a berzerker unit that dies to anything stronger than they are unless there are a billion of them.


Offensive Spells:

•Fury - Probably just a spawn spell. However, there is the possibility that I'll be able to use stacked cloaked zerglings for this. Pretty cool, huh?

•Berserk - You mean make him a broodling temporarily? That's a possibility, I'll think about it.

•Maelstrom - Inorite? I personally love this spell - it has huge benefits, but huge dangers with using it. All your foes have to do is focus down one ling to kill you. Intense micro required to get the best benefit out of it. Not sure if that's a good thing...


Defensive Spells:

•Truesteel Armor - Crap. Just realized... I can't give zerg units shields! Well... I'll have to think of something.

•Ravenous Void - Eh, yeah. The idea was that it wouldn't last long and would be a spell to silence spellcasters temporarily. I mean, they can still cast stuff like self-buffs and self-heals, but offensive magic would be consumed.

•Steelskin - Ok, ok, I get the point. Needs a nerf. Ok.


Glad you like all the demon stuff. I had fun with it without making it too powerful.


Elemental Spells:

•Elemental Shield - No, didn't you read my intro? Shields regen naturally without an effect like this. The effect just sets the shields to 100% constantly.

•Flame Link - Not neccessarily a straight line. My intent was to use observers moving between both the elemental and Raemus until the spell ended, and cycling through all observers and dropping a scarab under each. I do need to add a note, though: Cannot be used if the Elemental is too far from Raemus. - to prevent my triggers from breaking when the elemental is half a map away.


Channeling Sphere Spells:

•Magic Bomb - As it is, this spell functions exactly like Aschalon's 'Pressure' spell.

•Silence - Since this is an L4, it's intended to be rather powerful. The silence effect could be up to 15 seconds or so. Depends on balancing. Could be adjusted.

Well, I suppose I'm good at creating summoners.

Post has been edited 3 time(s), last time on Apr 19 2010, 2:33 am by ImagoDeo.

Spells:

•0-49 Souls:

◦Phase Shift - Hostile meaning he's over unplaceable terrain.

◦Consume Soul - As in 1 second of spawned medic with 0 energy. Pretty small amount of health, but if he keeps casting it it'll add up.

◦Soul Fountain - Just creates a location that is constantly hit by the DDS. Probably will also have some cool shiny hallu puff death observer underwater visual effect.

◦Soul Tether - The Soul Tether mechanics are kind of odd. Basically, it spawns an observer for the Harvester and he has to center it on an enemy unit before the precast time ends or before he recasts which also ends the precast time. It can affect base spawn units, so technically it can 'miss' and hit an unintended target. Might be hard to use for newbies, of course.


•50-99 Souls:

◦Phase Warp - Er, yeah... I guess so.

◦Absorb Soul - Totally different from Consume Soul. Absorb Soul clears stuff like stuns and Aschalon's Doom (although that may not be cleared, might make this spell OP).

◦Soulshatter - This spawns a few infested terrans. They're auto-killed after a few seconds. Whaddya mean 'error spell'?

◦Soul Beacon/Dark Recall - Glad you like it so much.


•100+ Souls:

◦Devour Soul - I might consider reworking this. The thing is that you can't really dump souls like Morphis can dump mana, so you wouldn't have access to Consume/Absorb Soul if you currently had access to Devour Soul. This would also have a greater effect than both of them combined.

◦Dark Emissary - I agree. Something this powerful needs some kind of penalty... I'll see what I can think of.

◦Soul Bargain - PKing spell. No dur. I didn't actually come up with it myself. It was from this guy, although I changed it to affect enemies instead of the hero that cast it. He called it 'Satanic Ritual'.

Hrm. That appears to be it. Lemme know if you have additional questions or comments. I have some things to revamp and rethink.

Yeah your summoners were pretty darn good. The zergling on the other hand (Furilus)... *sigh* could use some work. No worries though, you'll think of something. Either that, or we'll pressure you into something haha!

•Mana Boost - Well, the idea here was to have Morphis be a regular Zealot, and Mana Boost would replace it with the Fenix Zealot temporarily. If the Fenix Zealot is killed, Morphis just reverts to normal. The Fenix Zealot would have a very low health pool, possibly only 50-100. Not hard to kill, but not so squishy that the effect is useless. > If the map has upgrades, this becomes a major problem. It sounds good from the start, but as time moves on, you may have to have it somehow modify itself. Lets say, more fenix's with more time/levels (however it works). That way you'll have X fenix's X minutes into the game (they must all be killed before switching back).

Here are the answers to some of the questions you posted (hope I got them all):

Fury - Probably just a spawn spell. However, there is the possibility that I'll be able to use stacked cloaked zerglings for this. Pretty cool, huh? > Very cool.

Berserk - You mean make him a broodling temporarily? That's a possibility, I'll think about it. > Yup temporarily. Just to make something that's very similar to the zerling itself already in size and speed. To me, it makes sense rather than just turning invincible.

•Maelstrom - Inorite? I personally love this spell - it has huge benefits, but huge dangers with using it. All your foes have to do is focus down one ling to kill you. Intense micro required to get the best benefit out of it. Not sure if that's a good thing... > Personally, I think it'll add character to the game. What's stopping someone from just highlighting all of them and moving them all at once at a group? I think it's fine... Adds character and a difference no one has ever seen.

•Steelskin - Ok, ok, I get the point. Needs a nerf. Ok. > Take what I said with a grain of salt. Don't nerf until you get more feedback. I was just rambling haha.

•Elemental Shield - No, didn't you read my intro? Shields regen naturally without an effect like this. The effect just sets the shields to 100% constantly. > To be honest, I did read it, but it wasn't as interesting as your character ideas. Once I read over everything and took like a 1/2 hour to make my reply, I had forgotten what the intro had said haha. I think it might be better to have shields constantly at zero and just HP for the unit. Once the spell activates, set shields at 100% (something different for the player using the character) for a short period of time. Once it turns off, set back to zero... slowly? lol. Not sure about the after effect. Going straight to zero might suck haha. (Shields going down?!!? S**T!!!!!! Boom! Dead...)

◦Soulshatter - This spawns a few infested terrans. They're auto-killed after a few seconds. Whaddya mean 'error spell'? > Lol, here.. Ill show you.. And I got owned.. I call you on a "spelling" error (is what i meant to say) and I made one myself "spell error" hahaha!
"Soul Shards deal heavy damage if they hit." There is an error in this sentence haha.


Everything else you wrote about sounds excellent. Nice job at explaining the characters and what happens. To give a bit of advice, I'd take the explanations you gave me and put them in the original post (reword them to fit the way it's written though) to get different feedback from other users. Otherwise, you might get another "atto" (someone as confused as I was) asking the same questions, just in a different way, which you've already answered.




Edit: I just thought of something. Most games that have anything to do with water have a character of some sort called an "amphibian" which can go on both land and water. You could work the name "amphibian" into your next hero and have some air spells because it's "above the water" technically or "on land" haha. I think you could make it work.

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Apr 19 2010, 3:13 am by atto.

Made a lot of changes. OP updated quite a bit.

Comments always welcome.

Added Siliqas.

EDIT: 4/22/10 - Added Ereos.
Still waiting for more input.

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Apr 22 2010, 7:08 pm by ImagoDeo.

Boost. Added Mimic.
I'd still like feedback on this.

Looks like everyone is more interested in Starcraft II right now... I mean, it looks awesome, but I'm guessing that nothing should have been released until it was all fully completed. Looking at the posts of all the SC II forums, there is lots of complaining already lol! Good luck with your map tho man. If you need more suggestions or comments because others just aren't doing their part, give me a message.

Edit: I'm always willing to help someone who appreciates it; Especially when others just play the whole *look, see.... ignore...*.

At this point I am planning to do it in StarCraft II. Some of the things I was intending to trigger for this would've been glitchy and some probably would've been impossible, so I don't really regret it.

Not sure what to do with the thread, though. I doubt it should be moved...