SC2Mapster

Hey all,

You may have seen my campaign in the CCI or the Maps pages, but I have good news! Mission 1, Boots on the Ground, is now available on the StarCraft 2 arcade! It is a co-op campaign, so play with a friend. It can also be played single player, however. (Insert Forever Alone Meme here) I would really love your feedback on your overall impressions of the mission. I also would like tips on how to make the map look prettier, how to make the voice overs better, and anything else you can give me tips on.

If you want to find the map, go to the Arcade and search "Boots on the Ground"

GLHF, folks!

@SaintsWarcry: Go

Right let's start with what I like:

I think that the enemy army composition is designed well (even if attack waves are fairly weak in general).

Attack waves are constant enough so that you don't want both players leaving the base (not even bunkers will protect you).

And now for general comments/criticism

Was able to beat the map (and destroyed all structures) solo. 2 players shouldn't have much of a problem because 1 can defend while the other attacks.

(made an hour after the first paragraph) Yeah I played this 2-player and practically carried my teammate to victory.* Could use a difficulty upgrade imo.

One thing that should be changed is the top waves imo. Right now they have to go around the sides of the hill, and that leaves them open to a player standing on a higher level of elevation.

The zealots had a tendency to charge around the sides of my army then die before they hit something. I guess this is SCII AI trying to hit medics in the centre.

One thing that I disliked (map wise) was that near the right edge of the map you can't center on your army. It's just personal preference but I like keeping my army in the center of the screen.

If anyone needs a "temporary friend" to test the map, it's TChosen1#1560

\*Unimportant details of carrying but useful as a testament to how little imput is required from one player: Guy didn't build a combat unit until 2 minutes in, and more than 1 barracks until 12 minutes (as a comparison, I was operating off of 5 racks at that time) and was operating off of 7 or so SCV's on minerals, 6 on gas (20,6 for me) for the longest time. I solo'd the expansion defences, the big defence in the center-right, and 3-4 attack waves

@TChosenOne: Go

Thanks for the feedback! I will make sure to touch up the AI and bump up the difficulty. Also, may I ask what you thought of the voice over?

@SaintsWarcry: Go

I do like the voiceover for the scientist and the Protoss commander, but as for Valerian, he seems a bit bored, if not monotonous. It just might be me reading his lines in Valerians voice and comparing his condescending, accented tone to your current voiceover. You may want to get a second opinion.

Removing the mic buzz (or whatever) on sharp/loud sounds ex: "ta", while optional, might allow a more realistic sound.

The random I was with for the 2-man says that your voice was "sexy" so if not sarcasm, is a point 100% in your favour.

Also, I had a look at the zealot targeting weirdness. They tend to prioritize medics/Dr.Munro a lot higher, so they'll charge towards one even if they are blocked by a few rines or if it's a quarter way around the army.

I played this solo last night so I'm not sure if you had updated map or not since TChosenOne played it. The attack waves were no joke. I had 2 planetary fortresses with bunker support on each side and turrets on the top and bottom (which were needed for the amount of units pushing through). I'm not saying that it was too difficult or too easy - you really have to play the map yourself and decide. Do you want the maps to get progressively harder as the campaign goes on or do you want a consistent difficulty across all maps?

One thing I would change is the spawning of enemy units. Try to make it so the enemy actually builds units from structures and not spawned instantly in the middle of their base. Or at least have the units spawned somewhere off screen. It's quite demoralizing when you are breaking into an enemy base only to have 20 or so units spawn right on top of you. I noticed someone else had left a comment on the Arcade page pertaining to this as well.

Add a hero health bar for the doctor/scientist so it's easier to see if he is getting low on health. You could even copy what Mass Recall does with their audible notification when a hero's health dips below a certain percentage. I feel like this is especially important on the arcade where you cannot save. Maybe think about using fail safes in future missions (similar to what OutsiderXE did with Shadow of the Xel'Naga).

The voice overs need to be louder in my opinion. Try to match the volume levels in a Blizzard map. I could barely here the Protoss voice over. Valerian's vioce over should be stronger. He doesn't sound like someone who is in charge.

@deltronLive: Go

Map looks like the same version, 2.2

I had only built 2 sacrificial bunkers at each entrance, and when they were destroyed I kited the units in them across the base while my main army returned home. With the short distance between most things and your base this works (unless you're at the right side going for the beacon, but then you can just push to win).

Also, I had probably gotten pretty lucky when going around taking everything down, intercepted a number of attack waves before they hit my base.

The attack waves seem to be heavily anti-structure (check the immortal count on them, it's pretty high). Hmm, perhaps adding colossi to mid-late game attack waves would be a quick way to boost difficulty.

Keep in mind with 2 players you have a 400 supply cap too, and are unlikely to attack together. 1 player defending currently makes attack waves trivial (I mean, once they have a good sized bio-ball), and 2 players with decent macro should cross the 200 combined supply pretty early.

Another co-op campaign on the arcade? Have to check it out! (making a sticky of this thread now)

Heads up looks like there's a new update: 2.3 of this is out.  Can we please get a changelog on the project page?

@TChosenOne: Go

I got it up! Thanks for the continued feedback.

Also someone plz add me I can't be host for this.  Keep forgetting to move Munro to the back of my army and then he gets stormed/ranged attacked to death when I am about to win.  plz help. (this isn't a complaint, this is an expression of failure).  Edit: watched the replay: he stood in 3 storms. RIP Mr. 150 HP.

Looks good, haven't played since 2.2 so here's more feedback.

Much harder to snipe entire waves now.  I havn't been able to get a single wave by waiting by the ledge on the top level of elevation.

Also liking that some waves split and you have to defend both sides of the base.

A note: it seems that the 2nd mineral patch right of the top geyser cannot be mined from the front.  SCV's have to go around and mine it from the back.

I've recently found that marauder-heavy strategies are pretty good on this map.  They counter colossi (they hit fewer targets with the beams) and stalkers, zealots will be the only thing your units in the back will target, trade well with the small number of immortals, and can be used to aggro HT than withdraw when storm hits without worrying about them dying.  Of course you take around 12-16 marines minimum to deal with air units, and your comp will be rine heavy before you can get your gas production at max.

More units and HT have made defences have gotten harder to crack.  However, if you withdraw your units every time a storm hits you, you can still get through without losing many units.  The damage I've taken from HT has been light b/c of marauder-heavy comp, but many of he randoms I've played with havn't made such good decisions.

Edit: attack waves past 20 minutes seem really weak.

TL;DR: No free waves, tougher defences, HT very inconsistent defenders, marauders really good.

Mission 2: Catacombs us available! Search "Cerberus Files: Catacombs". Let me know what you think.

Can anyone see the map on the arcade? I can't seem to find it with any of the search terms.

The second mission doesn't show up for me, either.

It took me a little bit to figure out, but if you search "Cerberus: Catacombs" now, it will show up. Heads up, micro is very important in this mission.

Attempted the 2nd map on solo once. Wasn't able to get past the 2nd beacon. I also didn't use the flashbang though which probably would have helped. Some notes:

- Engineer - still has the Herc tooltip.

- Dr Munro - no portrait

- The repair drone didn't seem to be healing anything. I could be wrong but I didn't see any healing animations coming from it.

- I think Dr. Munro becomes neutral and invulnerable during the holdout portions. Not a huge deal, but after losing my entire army, I had to sit around until the timer expired for the Dr to become allied again and die. Have him remain stationary, keep him allied, but not vulnerable. The enemy should still prioritize your units with an attack.

- The voice acting has definitely improved since I played the first map.

- I like the addition of the different abilities throughout the mission.

- Adding doodads, foliage, etc. to these maps would help a great bit for the overall feel. As of now they look a bit plain.

Did the map on solo, flashbang micro is necessary as Deltron points out. Turret placement is way more important and cheaper though, the main use for flashbang will be on the second beacon.

Decent map with a good solo difficulty level, a few things:

- medics/engineers have 0 armor upgrades, despite the upgrade level on your attack units being 1/1.

- Nydus worms do the spawn animation twice.

- Repair drone doesn't work because the heal costs energy, and the drone has no energy.

- Engineers cannot attack-move like medics for some reason

Have you considered replacing Valerian with a "Valerian's representative" or "Dominion mercenary liason" or something? Get around the issue of not sounding like Valerian at all.

Thanks for the feedback! It's nice having more testers than just myself haha. I've had to work through a lot of bugs with this map. One thing I've noticed is that Dr. Munro's portrait doesn't work when it's set to 3D portraits. I'll get working on the other things. Would you prefer to have the engineers follow the group like medics or keep them out front to tank damage?

@Knallertton: Go

Thanks for the feedback! I was planning on testing the whole campaign on the Americas' server before releasing the campaign on EU or other regions.

I posted the new version of both missions!

Cerberus Files page