My Humble Suggestions

THIS ISN'T VERY ORGANIZED AND I'M SORRY

Preface: Lets take a look at the most played, most balanced and most competitive custom map on war craft 3. The game of course is DotA, so why do people play DotA as opposed to Custom Hero Arena? Because the heroes are balanced, the skills are more fun and the gameplay is infinitely better. In this post you will see a lot of suggestions that help refine CHA into a game which has a lot psuedo-dota like parts. CHA has been around for years yet none of the map editors have really done anything radical with it and it is really unfortunate because the game has a lot of potential for competitive play.

My first bone to pick is with the map itself. The map is FAR to big, with a smaller map you achieve better, more coordinated gameplay, less farming for 40 minutes without seeing an enemy player and slower game load time. It would also make the game end faster which is key to creating a good game. Nobody likes sitting in a game for an hour and a half and unfortunately this is very common for CHA games. Games that last over 40 minutes are usually riddled with leavers.


GENERAL MAP:
1) Taverns – For some reason there is a massive amount of room in the section where you choose your hero model and spell abilities. This can be reduced.

2) The Terrain - The map is basically a MASSIVE open plain, which is honestly plain boring and makes actual maneuvering useless, there are no fog spots or juke points if you are attempting to evade a gank. As of now you simply click your base and it runs in a straight line there. There is no water or bridges or any peninsula type enclosures. THIS IS especially needed within the Dueling Arena, their should be high ground, low ground 3 side encased areas, walls etc…

3) The Bases – The bases like everything else in the game are far to massive and need to shrunk down.

**Note: I think one of the major downfalls of this map is that it is too large, if it was a smaller map it would make game play a lot more competitive because as it is now aside from in high tier games the game is basically a farm fest which is NOT what you want in a team arena style game. The sad truth is in most games if you put an uncross-able wall down the middle of the map it honestly wouldn’t effect game play much which is really quite sad.
Personally I believe the game scales much to fast. There must be a reduction in all things damage wise. When an item does +450 damage it creates a massive divide between the use of basic spells which maybe fun to use and boring passives. Heroes should not be able to crit above 1.5k damage and should not be able to get above 8k hp. Everything in the game needs to be reduced heavily to make the game more balanced and easier to balance in the future. In theory heroes at their peak (level 40) should NOT be able to crit above 1,500 damage and should not be able to achieve over 6,000 hit points. A hero should not be able to get over 60 armor nor should they be able to get over 50% magic reduction as any more than that lets say the (75% from blacknights mail) completely nullifies ½ the abilities in the game which is ridiculous.

DARK MODE NEEDS TO BE A CONSTANT THROUGH OUT EVERY GAME – Without fog of war the game is completely dumb, you should NOT need to get windwalk in order to sneak up on an enemy. However I would love to see the incorporation of Observer and Sentry wards (yes like dota) with dark mode. This creates another level to the game, which makes map control necessary and removes the focus on farming which is one of the games major downfalls


HEROES:

As of now the current hero selection is very drab. You can pick from a wide variety of models with a low variety of actual differences. It would be really nice for certain models to have innate abilities or attributes that are unique to them. This could replace the "innate ability" tree.

For example:

Sniper: Innate ability *each level this hero gains +10 bonus range on his attack

Tuaren Chieftan: Innate ability *50% of this heroes strength is dealt as bonus magic damage on each attack

Priest: Innate ability *aura that provides 1 hp and mana regeneration * ur current level

ABILITIES:

Currently most of the abilities are simply not fun to use, you click the hotkey and the spell goes. Take for example: Chain Lightning And Frost Fall

both deal around the same damage and both have around the same Cooldown, neither do any special effect like slow the enemy so really what is the difference?

It would be a lot cooler in my opinion of Chain Lightning did a lot less damage but had a lot shorter cooldown. Frostfall does damage yet doesn't slow the enemy, seems unlikely for a frost ability.

There are a lot of great ladder abilities that should be incorporated into the map,

War Stomp
Blink
Fan of Knives
Tornado
Cleave
Divine Shield
Vampiric Aura

I am to lazy to go through every ability in this post but I assure you I can find a way to enhance every single one.

Currently their are only 3-5 types of builds in a CUSTOM ARENA does anyone else not see the problem with this? Their is DPS/Summoner/Support/Nuker/Tank.

There are alot more roles for heroes out their, ganker, initiator, chaser, aura master, buffer, debuffer.

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Here is the basic idea:

Rescale the Map down

Rescale hero stats to be 65 Base stats + 6.5 stats gained per level

Give each hero a unique innate ability

Put a cap on movement speed and give a command that shows how much movement speed you have.

Remove boring spells and add fun spells which create defined roles.

Lower the cost of items, lower the gold got from spawns, as spawns strength
grows their gold shouldn't grow, they should give the same approximate amount no matter what. Heroes should give approximately gold equivalent to killing 10-15 creeps to make it actually viable to gank without ruining your farm.

The save/load system should NOT be solely based on kill/death ratio because it makes the game about the individual, please add on an assist ratio so that getting the kill isn't so important. I don't know how many times players in my games have used a 400 mana 900 damage nova on a 50 hit point hero simply to take the kill so their stats would get better.

**MORE TO COME**

I heartily that the game has got too big of a range, and that hero's get to strong end game, which is one of the things that makes the things that makes the game hard to balance, because abilities have to be balaced the same at lvl 23 as 40, where at 40 heros have 15k+ hp making almost every non passive skill useless late game.

i am going to oppose a lot of your thoughts here, as most of them have been suggested; though I agree with some of it.

This map is never going to be like DOTA. DOTA is not balanced, it is a series of OP heroes with a low learning curve. you can learn to use a hero, always use him, and call yourself a pro. That is the problem with preset abilities on a hero; there is no such thing as countering after heroes have been picked.

Agreed, the map is too large for the 3v3 games that the map is set up as on the bots. Howeever, I created this map intending for it to be a 4v4-6v6 game. It is far too large for a 3v3, and when I play on the bot, I turn it to a 5v5 or 6v6 game. They are much more entertaining; and they fit the map size quite well.

The taverns area is large intentionally; I have a plan for that area, but am in no hurry to add more to the map before working some bugs out of the system. (I assume you are arguing that removing this extra space will allow for the map size to be made smaller)

The terrain is theme based; it is an icy wasteland. I change the map on occasion, and try to keep it to a theme. If you are good, you can learn how to "juke" without just 300 trees to run around, making ranged more OP. And seriously, the amount of kiting that can be done in BOTH arenas is already painful for any melee player. A ranged hero, on an island, with a bone wall in front of them, makes them unkillable. sit there all duel, forcing your opponent to die trying to get to you.

The bases are large, also because of something I have not yet added. I am adding... eventually... a 4 team mode, intended for larger games; the bases will be split in half, each containing two teams.

What the entire game is balanced around; is progression. There are 3 parts of the game... Early, Mid, and Late. The reason games last so long, is because people play other games, where passives are OP. So, they all start a game with 3-4 passives, and auto attack until level 40; where they are strong. However, as most clan members know, late game is nothing. I can't force pubs to play the game the way it is intended to be played. If I did, then good players wouldn't be "good" at it. this game takes quite a bit of learning if you wanna not suck.

You argue that spells become useless with the addition of spell reduction; however, you have obviously never witnessed a spell damage build. When done properly, a player can deal 35,000 damage in 1 second, with spell damage. you have to base a build around that idea though; you cant random and do well against a well thought out build. Spell damage exists, to counter spells. Unlike DOTA, CHA is a lot about items. Items are as important as skills; you need to learn which of the 200 items you need to counter your opponent.

I love dark mode... I wish it was always on. However, I like to sneak around in the dark killing people. Pubs dont like this. This is why it is simply a game mode. If you want to pick it, then you can pick it. This goes for the lack of pvp also... People pick extreme creeps for a 3v3. There are too many creeps for a player to fight. I guess I could make the creep spawn a static, based on the number of players, that could help the situation. But, allowing pubs to do what they want, they all pick late game builds, with far too many creeps for anyone to kill them plus another player.

Heroes are intended to be.. "drab" why? they are mostly a skin. This is a CUSTOM HERO ARENA. Innate skills used to be on heroes. However, in a custom game, you should be able to customize everything; this includes innates. Heroes are a skin; and some base stats, for figuring out what will work with your choice of skills.

The things you suggest, I hope are jokes... 400 extra range on the sniper? He could KS bosses through walls. 50% magic damage on attack? (based on str) If the hero had zero skills and started with -20 damage, he would still be insanely OP by mid game.

chain light and frost fall are very different skills. Anyone who plays CHA a lot will tell you that. I dont think pretty graphics can make the gameplay very amazing. gameplay is still gameplay; even if chain light looks like chain light, rather than jesus cumming on your screen with rainbows. (which i would actually use, if you got the model)

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There are a lot of great ladder abilities that should be incorporated into the map,

War Stomp
Blink
Fan of Knives
Tornado
Cleave
Divine Shield
Vampiric Aura

War Stomp? hmm, isnt war stomp like, thunderclap? or stun field?
Blink will never be in the game in any way/shape/form
Magic barrage IS fan of knives; simply with a different animation art.
Tornado, good suggestion, throws them up, making them immune. Seems like a single target impale though...
Cleave is OP. Are you serious? do you know game mechanics? Cleave damage is pure. 10% cleave at max level still makes for a nastily OP skill; going through all armor on the cleaved unit. Seriously, in games with cleave, I attack my ally directly, so the cleave kills anything nearby.
Divine Shield, I also like this skill, however, I feel it would either become OP, or useless. Such a hard skill to balance properly. Maybe if I made it so your movespeed is reduced a lot, or something...
Vamp aura is also insanely OP. the best weapon type in the game, is a scepter of the primarch. 10% lifesteal is just... damn strong; especially as damage and armor increase. An aura, that gives that to everyone, while allowing you to grab another orb type, or even stack another 10% with it... is stupidly OP. you want lifesteal, get vamp soul and hope your opponents dont get a light orb.

is there more than summoner, DPS, tank, healer, support in any game? You can go spell DPS, you can mix and match all of the above half and half. What more would you need?

vortex is a buffer/debuffer, ganker? have you seen siren, ever? timmy? runner? same as chaser, AURAS should be divided up amongst the team, not a single player getting all auras, that is stupid...

On the EXP system, try playing team based game modes, doing the rag quest, or winning games. The EXP given to you from kills is really low. Ask people who make it to level 16-17. They dont get it from killing pubs... I know 1 guy who did... he had 2600 kills to get 18. Playing team games, I was 18 with only 1500 kills. Teamwork will always get you farther than trying to solo. Someday, I intend to add assist points, however, you would seriously get maybe... 1 point for an assist; which is nothing compared to the 30,000 you need for level 20.

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I understand where your suggestions come from, being as you are a DOTA player, however, a lot of the things you suggest go against the ideas of CHA. To me, it seems like you need to learn how to play CHA for real. No offense meant by that... however, pubs dont play the game, they ruin it. I make this game for the community, for the people who come to the forums to learn to play and become better at a game with a very high player learning curve.

I do not want to game to be dulled down so that everyone is forced to play a specific way by limiting the freedom of choice. Freedom is an American thing, it is what we all live for. As an editor I want my players to be allowed all the freedoms they want; because this is... a free country... *waves american flag*

Lets see what the longer-standing members of the community think. Personally, I think larger games would be MUCH better than a smaller map...

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the gameplay is infinitely better.

Excuse me for saying this, but that lil phrase above makes me wanna tell u to fuck off lmao
Cha is infinitely better then dota any day.
In my oppinion the only reason dota is still #1 played game on wc3 is people are afraid or too lazy to try something new =/

As for the size of the map, u gotta count into the fact that this can also be a 6v6 game which the map size is perfect. >.>

Cha 4 Life

Shankz wrote:

Quote :

the gameplay is infinitely better.

Excuse me for saying this, but that lil phrase above makes me wanna tell u to fuck off lmao
Cha is infinitely better then dota any day.
In my oppinion the only reason dota is still #1 played game on wc3 is people are afraid or too lazy to try something new =/

As for the size of the map, u gotta count into the fact that this can also be a 6v6 game which the map size is perfect. >.>

Cha 4 Life

Go to gosugamers.net download a replay and watch -- by gameplay i mean the coordination required amongst teams in order to win,

its not even a competition dota is played more than ladder wc3 and has 2 privately made games derived from it outside the boundaries of wc3 (hon and lol). To compare the current cha and dota is a disgrace at best.



@Glorn

I understand that you don't want the game to become dota but it is hard to argue that certain aspects of dota such as the teamplay are a lot better and cha can definitely benefit from a lot the parts. Your hatred of dota doesn't mean your game should suffer because of it.

I don't know if you are familiar with the game HeroCraft Lite 2 but it is very similar to CHA with a much smaller map and more refined skills/items. It isn't very dota like but it has a lot higher emphasis on your skills/level/teamwork rather than how well you can farm immortals for 30 minutes

well, you have no conception of CHA if all you do is farm immortals for 30 minutes. If you knew as much about CHA as the people I talk to about game balancing, I would take your suggestions. However, you are talking from the standpoint of someone who plays a lot of DOTA, and has joined a few public CHA games, and has no conception of the teamwork required in team games, played by skilled players.

Again, in CHA, builds are always changing. Have you ever witnessed an assist build in a public game? I doubt anyone has. Teamwork always wins; however, if neither team has any teamwork, then they are still on equal grounds.

Pubs need to be better skilled, I think that is the baseline for CHA. Which is why many of us, refuse to play pub games... unless they random...

Hmm could always chose the modes dark and play without extreme creeps which will make the spells count for more. Unfortunately the public itself reacts badly to well cordinated teams and leaves too quickly. Really people there are a lot of synergies around teams I mean if you grab a group of 3 people talk it over you can easily wtf pawn even the greatest of pubstars out of the game.

Teamwork is just as essential in CHA as it is in DOTA. Any team based game were teamwork is a factor to winning needs teamwork. The coordination of your team in CHA can/be as important or more so over DOTA entirely. I hate DOTA, the learning curve is like climbling a 90 degree cliff with oven mitts on, but that doesn't conclude that teamwork isn't just as essential in CHA and DOTA respectively.

The problem is exclusively due to the populace that plays CHA. They play like idiots, and theres nothing we can do to change that. But there is something THEY can do, and that's to join the boards and learn their rights from their wrongs.

It is from my experience of my DOTA days that people would play it over, and over again. To them, why try something new, when they have a game they know and understand, grasp it's concept, and have nearly mastered it. It's not a question of CHA's complexity or even it's strategic value of a hardcore team based deathmatch, but more of Warcraft's population of individuals who have no interest of taking their skill to the next level or mastering their build. Maybe someday people will try out CHA and take it as seriously as they do with DOTA, but that day isn't today.

i can take the blame for that i play dota, and cha is just a chill game for most of us who don't wanna have to deal with massive micro or constant strategizing. Not that CHA doesn't require this, but how many people do u see canceling backswings when chasing or canceling animations? almost no one... Its not the quality of the game... i hesitate to say this cause ya'll are gonna jump down my throats... but the quality of the pla... the amount of effort many players put in

So cancelling backswings and cancelling animations makes DOTA superior to CHA? Seems a little messed if you ask me.

The amount of effort people put into DOTA is insane. But, to do so is the only way to achieve a win. So, that leads me to this; Do I really need to try that hard, to achieve the same satisfaction as I would from a more casual game of CHA? It would appear so.

Now, I have played DOTA a long time ago, and I didn't enjoy it. People were whippin around me like mad, and I got destroyed. To me, that wasn't fun. I couldn't even get my head past the amount of items (let alone the descriptions that went along with them) that they had. Sure, variety is great, but it can be a lot to take in for a nooblet who doesn't know wtf he's looking at, and to me is huge reason I play CHA in the first place.

Its hard to judge a game when you dont understand it.

This has probably already been said but I'm to lazy to read it all. But really, how much fun is using preset builds continuously. Being able to design and choose thousands upon thousands of different set-ups makes this a much more challenging, interesting and more enjoyable game. And well, I just noticed that Glorn wrote a bloody essay rebuttal so I guess I'll keep my mouth shut on the rest.

Actually on second thought I am going to rip this apart just a little bit.

Quote :

**Note: I think one of the major downfalls of this map is that it is too large, if it was a smaller map it would make game play a lot more competitive because as it is now aside from in high tier games the game is basically a farm fest which is NOT what you want in a team arena style game. The sad truth is in most games if you put an uncross-able wall down the middle of the map it honestly wouldn’t effect game play much which is really quite sad.
Personally I believe the game scales much to fast. There must be a reduction in all things damage wise. When an item does +450 damage it creates a massive divide between the use of basic spells which maybe fun to use and boring passives. Heroes should not be able to crit above 1.5k damage and should not be able to get above 8k hp. Everything in the game needs to be reduced heavily to make the game more balanced and easier to balance in the future. In theory heroes at their peak (level 40) should NOT be able to crit above 1,500 damage and should not be able to achieve over 6,000 hit points. A hero should not be able to get over 60 armor nor should they be able to get over 50% magic reduction as any more than that lets say the (75% from blacknights mail) completely nullifies ½ the abilities in the game which is ridiculous.

I) We had a small map before this, it was ridiculously easy. I could hit 4 spawns and get 2 ganks in less then 25 seconds. No Joke. Glorn actually has the best from 3.1 using that Siren bombs thing he did. Creeping was to easy, ganking was defiantly to easy.

II) This game isn't a farm fest, play with some skilled players and see how long your safe in the middle for. It's not our fault pubs make it this way. Have you ever tried playing pvp against 95% of bot players? You pull off 4-5 ganks within the first round or two and the entire opposing team leaves. Nothing is stopping you from playing "competitively" actually we @ BN heartily encourage and teach ganking to our new recruits. Actually this version was slightly designed to promote PVP play. Also if your sick of farm fest turn it on Capture the Flag, Gladiator, Plant the Bomb or Capture the Hill Mode. These are pure PVP modes. Happy?

III) Why the hell would you nerf everything like that. If you want to see what CHA is like to play completely nerfed like that, I'll send you some of the old versions where Sceptre of the Primarch and Pantheons Armour were your end game skills. It was fucking boring. It really isn't complicated, if your opponent has massive amounts of damage then get some wait for it ... Damage Reduction, Armour and Evasion. Their are a few items that offer evasion as a "buyable skill" And yes these can be used for all classes. Shroud for Intel, Ring and Shroud for Agi, and Ring is nice for strength for evasion and crits for lifesteal, but then again you should be getting evasion on strength as a skill regardless. Once you learn hpw to do item setups and progress through the game properly none of its OP, it may seem that way if you have no idea how to counter builds and item setups. But then again that isn't the maps fault is it.

IV) As for the Spell DMG reduc, ya your right it drastically lowers Intel builds capabilties end game. But if we didnt have it, Intel Gank builds would one hit everything late game. Further more if you really look at how everthing is set up Spell Damage is early game winners, you use this t get the game done quick through ganks. Everything has a time and a place to use it, if something seems useless or is countered in the end game that means its probably meant for early game. If something seems useless at the start but once you get it leveled up a bunch and it will rape, then its probably meant for late game. Use your bloody reason, this isn't a cookie cutter game. It takes a thought process and a little cognitive power to play this, and yes that was done on purpose. I've been playing this game for quite awhile, the beta testing aside, everything is fairly balanced. Yes some builds will just aboslutely mangle some of yours and there isn't anything you can do about it. But once you calm down after losing you begin to see the swiss cheese like holes in your build(s). Everything has a counter, everything has a rape.

Example)

Frost Nova + Banish + WC
This will one hit most intel/agi characters till mid-late game.

Counter? Anti Magic Shield/Avatar/AMS Pots/Spell Reduction/Item Immunities make this nearly useless.

Kiting Builds:

Slow Ward, Slow, Stone Orb, Bone Wall, Hex, Shadow Strike, Soul Burn, Darkness, Storm Bolt, Death Orb, ...

I can keep going but I think you have the pitcture..I hope. Im done.

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ather than jesus cumming on your screen with rainbows. (which i would actually use, if you got the model)

I am tempted to get my animation skills back up just so i can make that happen btw.