Campaign Creations

Because I hate advert-filled file hosting sites, here's a mirror:
http://www.samods.org/staff/magic/Survi ... 08upd).zip

GnaReffotsirk wrote: Noted. I'll start creating a compendium of "Things to watch out for" that we can have access to. Stuff we can choose to utilize like a check-list or the likes.

For reference, I did an article entitled "Tips for New Modders" once:
http://samods.org/articles/tips_for_new_modders

It's not specific for StarCraft level design, however, instead being for planning and production. Use it for your own knowledge or as reference for your own list\article, whichever.

Thanks for this one Magic. Main post has been updated with the link.

The article is great!

Assimilating in progress...

I've played the first map and it's pretty good. I'll state my thoughts on the various aspects of the map - SPOILERS for those haven't played it yet:

Good stuff:
+ The story was interesting and well written.
+ Dialogue was also good and the timing of the transmissions was appropriate.
+ Gameplay was interesting and unique, being given control of a large amount of Zealots. Objectives were clear enough and the beacons were easy to find.
+ The battles between the Zerg broods were enjoyable and gave a good feel of the despairing situation on Aiur.
+ Difficulty was on the right spot: it grew more difficult later on as I kept losing troops, but overall it's perfectly balanced imo. I only had a few Zealots in the last few moments before capturing the Fleet Beacon and my base was under attack by Mutalisks, but I didn't need to load the game once. With a few more mistakes, it'd have been much harder for me.
+ The map was very straightforward and tactical.

Bad stuff:
- The terrain lacked detail. More doodads and different layers would be good.
- No ambience at all, other than the cinematics showing the battles: few sound effects, no custom music and, as I mentioned above, terrain was less than immersive.
- Although the mission objectives were clear, they should be displayed on screen as well. Also, as someone said, point out that we can't build air defenses.
- A few grammar mistakes, like "perimiter" and "Auir".

Overall:
The map is pretty good and the campaign has a lot of potential if the following maps keep up with it. I find custom music to be vital for a good map - it does much toward setting the mood, so it should feature some of it IMO. I have a reasonably big library of sfx and music here, so if you're interested, PM me.

Going to play the rest later today or tomorrow.

It doesn't even have to be custom music in all honesty, you can even use an ambiance to set the mood.

Meta, those are very insightful. I'll keep tagging along, adding to the list as we go.

Guide for Chapter 2, Seeds of Chaos is now available at the first post.

Have fun, and good luck!

Chapter 3, Return to Scion video/spoiler at YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGzDa6pbnQA

Also, Mission 1 of mini-campaign is underway.

Awesome report, Krazy!

This map pack is undergoing iterations as input come in. Keep them coming guys!

As for Mission 4:

Spoiler

The beacon at the lower left actually gives the Executor vision of the broods. You have to rush and cripple the Zerg guarding it, or concentrate operations at the Blue Protoss base and take them on later. You can take control of that huge base by sending your carrier over. This info is given to the player from within the mission.

If the player doesn't rush that base, there's gonna be some serious rampage! On the other hand, you can take the initial base and supplement it with Vicerators from the blue base.

I won't say more, so you can experiment with the mission. It was actually designed to allow the player different approaches to beating the mission.

Again, thanks for this awesome review!

The second map is very very good, I can recommend nothing other than what's been suggested already: one more Hydra den, more hit points for Overlords and voilá. 

I died like 6 times (well, gave up) due to the seemingly unstoppable Dragoon attack, but Dark Swarm owns it so hard it almost feels like exploiting.

Btw GnaR, I recommend that you play my own campaigns (Flame Knives and Aeon of the Hawk) if you want a challenge

Yeah, well, I listen to background music as well during my melee games/pro replays. I find industrial music, metal, hard rock and fast-paced, epic orchestrated pieces to work very well. Campaigns need something more accurate though IMO, as in dark/sad/action/epic/futuristic music depending on the occasion. Later AotH maps will most certainly prove my point, I hope.

Unfortunately both Taeradun and I were unable to get a non-1.10 version of AotH and FK to work properly. By the way, both campaigns are indirectly related to each other, the Umojan Protectorate being the common denominator. There are other similarities and plot events as well, but these should be adressed... elsewhere. In a hopefully not so far future. So, be sure to play both. 

To prevent this from going off-topic, as this is GnaR's thread, I'll post my review of maps 3 and 4 soon.

Awesome, Meta! 

About the music thing, I've come to ponder on it for a time now. From Omega's thread, there were suggestions not to include them. However, if the writers find our maps to be a venue for advertising, I'm sure they'd appreciate it. Do you guys think the owners would mind us using their stuff in our maps?

For an update, the next mission is going pretty well. I'm holding my breath, though, and with fingers crossed. The mission still has that onslaught theme to it, and I'm still not satisfied enough regarding how it proceeds. There's something missing I just can't take a hold of. Could be the utter lack of available strategies and tactics, the overall map design, or something entirely different?

I'm certain you guys have experienced these moments, as well. 

Rest assured though, the campaign pushes on.

Thanks again for the more or less 70 downloads, and the brilliant reviews and comments you guys have posted. And as always, bring them on!  

Meta, you know that's likely possible now with PyMS