StarCraft II Official! (Pictures)

[Legion]

I just hope that StarEdit2 is not going to require users to have sublime understanding of triggering and shit. I mean, moddability usually comes with a lot of confusion on my part.

[Marco]

I just hope that StarEdit2 is not going to require users to have sublime understanding of triggering and shit. I mean, moddability usually comes with a lot of confusion on my part.

How much more basic can you get though?  If you just want to make maps that you can play a regular game of StarCraft on, you don't need to know anything.  But if you want to do anything that involves making a custom map, you are definitely going to have to learn to use conditions and actions (triggers).  Modding on the other hand won't require triggers if all you are doing is modifying the look and abilities of units, although custom abilities will definitely be a different kind of animal to tackle.

[UntamedLoli]

Chat with Devs: Between adding new unit models and sliming up the zerg buildings, the StarCraft II art team has also spent some time on some little details that make the game come alive, such as new unit death animations. Featured below, we have a protoss carrier being blown out of the sky by a squad of terran marines, as well as several zerg units falling to their fates.
http://www.starcraft2.com/features/misc/deathanimations.xml

As always, feel free to give the Devs and I a w00t if you're enjoying these Q&As!

---StarCraft II Q&A Batch 51 ---

1. Add an option in the menu to disable the windows key, and same thing goes for ALT-TAB?
And add an EASY way to squelch your opponent. When their name “IllIIlIIlIIlIIlllI” (L & i), it's a little difficult.

While we are not considering disabling the windows key and Alt+Tab, we are looking into the naming policy to prevent problems like the one you described.

2. StarCraft 2's terrain properties such as Xel'Naga towers, destroyable barriers and Brush have a significant effect on gameplay and appear to create specific points of interest/advantage on the map. Are there plans to introduce additional terrain buffs/effect to the battlefield?

The current terrain features are not finalized. We still have these three map features in the game and we plan to keep them during the beta, but it is always possible to add more features if we find something that’s balanced and encourages exciting game play.

3. Since there are/were plans to integrate voice communications into multiplayer, will StarCraft 2 replays be able to include Audio, as well as chat?

Replay files do not include audio. However you will be able to see all text chats while you are watching replay.

4. You have talked a bit about replay functions lately and since patches will come up definitely former replays won’t work if the system sticks with SC1 or W3. Do you plan on making changes here so that players can view older replays ever after patches occur?

Yes, even as the game gets patched, you will be able to watch replays of matches played on older versions.

5. The interface we see in Battle Reports – is this interface available for Observers during a live game (in real time), or only while viewing replays, or both?

The interface you’ve seen in Battle Reports will be available in observer mode as well as in replays during beta.

6. StarCraft II is a package consisting of single player/campaign, multiplayer (+replay viewer), map editor and Battle.net. All four are complex and without a doubt require testing and patching. Has it been decided which of the above components are planned to be included in public beta testing?

You can have multiplayer game access through Battle.net during the beta and you can watch the replays as well. There will also be access to the Map Editor during the beta process but not necessarily from the start. Single player campaign will not be included in the beta.

---End of Transmission---

http://forums.battle.net/thread.html?topicId=17367809543&postId=173662574250&sid=3000#0

[Legion]

I just hope that StarEdit2 is not going to require users to have sublime understanding of triggering and shit. I mean, moddability usually comes with a lot of confusion on my part.

How much more basic can you get though?  If you just want to make maps that you can play a regular game of StarCraft on, you don't need to know anything.  But if you want to do anything that involves making a custom map, you are definitely going to have to learn to use conditions and actions (triggers).  Modding on the other hand won't require triggers if all you are doing is modifying the look and abilities of units, although custom abilities will definitely be a different kind of animal to tackle.

Yeah. I meant that StarEdit 1 was good enough for me. I understand all the triggering there. WorldEdit was a world of difference. I hope StarEdit2 won't be.

And yeah2, I used the term mod incorrectly.

[Mucky]

SC2 is going to use LUA for its editor, which is even more open-ended and more powerful than JASS, so it's only going to get harder. Really though, it all comes down to being able to learn a language, or the GUI of said language. Personally, I hope Blizzard doesn't dumb down the options we get for the sake of people who can't keep up.

[Lavarinth]

Where'd you hear it was going to use Lua?

EDIT: (From lua.org) What's in a name?
"Lua" (pronounced LOO-ah) means "Moon" in Portuguese. As such, it is neither an acronym nor an abbreviation, but a noun. More specifically, "Lua" is a name, the name of the Earth's moon and the name of the language. Like most names, it should be written in lower case with an initial capital, that is, "Lua". Please do not write it as "LUA", which is both ugly and confusing, because then it becomes an acronym with different meanings for different people. So, please, write "Lua" right!

[Maglok]

Worldedit you could make as complicated as you wanted. If you just wanted the functionality that Staredit had, no prob, if you open up advanced stuff and your not a programmer you were gonna be ... overwhelmed. Same with Scumedit I am thinking.

[tipereth]

Blizzard's JASS GUI was pretty straightforward, and fairly powerful. You can accomplish almost anything you need to without resorting to custom scripts. (The exceptions are obvious but are also more or less unnecessary for most people. And if you're ambitious/arrogant enough that your map absolutely NEEDS Wild Axes or whatever, then you might as well learn the language.) As for the people who whine about how difficult and unwieldy it is for a beginner to use, I don't know what to say. Cowboy up.

I imagine (and hope) that Blizzard's LUA GUI is going to be very similar to the previous incarnation. It would be really freaking cool if you could make trigger templates for things you constantly reuse, or edit nested variables, but beyond that, I don't expect anything radically different.

[UntamedLoli]

Maybe pre-gen triggers that don't leak.

[Mucky]

Where'd you hear it was going to use Lua?

I thought it was from the Q&A. Maybe it was just an unconfirmed rumor. But isn't it the most logical step for Blizzard to take? WoW uses Lua for its UI add-ons, and there are some pretty advanced stuff that's been developed.

[Lavarinth]

It's logical, yes, that's for sure. But I'm sure Blizzard thought Jass was "logical" as well. Hah.

[IskatuMesk]

They're not using LUA. They're using a bastardized version of C. They've already said that.

I hope the triggers are nothing like wc3's. Wc3's were a bloody disaster and you had to jump through flaming hoops of shit to do the simplest things. Half of them didn't work or do what they were supposed to do and a lot of the JASS functionality was made possible by a bug of all things.

I just hope that StarEdit2 is not going to require users to have sublime understanding of triggering and shit. I mean, moddability usually comes with a lot of confusion on my part. Cheesy

You can bet that just like in wc3 you'll need to have a very strong understanding of triggering to do anything unique or decent.

An actual mod will probably require programming knowledge, also just like wc3.

[Mucky]

They're not using LUA. They're using a bastardized version of C. They've already said that.

Ugh. That's exactly what JASS is.

I wouldn't say the return bug is what characterizes JASS's fuctionality. It's just used for certain typecasting and gamecache functions. vJass removed the need for the return bug, although some people still use Tables, which uses the bug.

I will agree that JASS is a mess, though. There's so many functions that do nothing but call another function, and some functions that do the opposite of what you'd expect them to. Though you're probably referring to GUI, which is even more of a mess.

I hope SC2 will allow us to create our own GUI, or at least redefine some aspects.

[IskatuMesk]

JASS is based on lua, not C.

C is a compiled language. Like NWNscript, Uscript, ect.

While I'd hope the menus would be neat and open source like WoW's, I suspect that Blizzard will hardcode them simply to avoid people messing with them in "hacks".

[Maglok]

Bitch bitch whine whine. They are doing their best and the fact they will even ship such a huge complicated editor is an absolute marvel these days. Let's just give them the benefit of the doubt and wait until it releases.