This guide will help you improve your designing skills, and get a 5.0 review in the Blacksmith. It's easy when you know how. This guide will cover all areas, including map design, triggers, balance, creativity and the Blacksmith description.
Map Design is often one of the most time consuming parts of making a scenario. However, it need not be!
One of the best kept secrets of the editor is the random map feature. With the press of a button the map is done for you, and the best part is no one will ever know the difference!
However, some designers choose to go the whole hog and make the map themselves. If you do this it's always important to remember the golden rule:
One of the most edgy and interesting approaches to map design is Minimalism. Just leave the map as pure grass1, as this unusual method will surely awe the player with your uncluttered and realistic map. Independent scientific studies have shown that grass1 is the prettiest of all the terrains.
Elevation is to be avoided, as it is ugly. On those rare occasions where you want to use cliffs however to really sell the illusion of height, lots and lots of elevation is a must. Just mix them together and admire the cool effect.
Map Design can also affect balance. One of the most amusing parts of designing is giving the player an exciting and unusual objective (eg bring unit to other side of the map) and then blocking the path with trees (tip: always map copy trees as this gives them a smart, uniform look. You'd be surprised how many otherwise good designers don't even know this trick, they never seem to use it). It's hilarious as the player thinks he's done something wrong and spends hours looking for the way through.
We all like a good challenge, and happily there are infinite possibilities for making your scenario challenging. Try having the player's single skirmisher against millions of war elephants, bombard towers and cobra cars (these cheat units are a must for all scenarios, as they are way cooler than normal units and add a modern day sense of realism). The possibilities really are endless.
Another way of increasing the challenge is to make your scenario name completely different from the name you put in the Blacksmith. This is a really creative way of making your scenario more difficult to play. It's even more fun when its name is just a meaningless jumble of letters and numbers. The player will be perplexed and wondering about the meaning of the name well into the third paragraph of the hate mail that will surely soon be cluttering up your email inbox. Hate mail is a good sign; jealousy is the fate of truly talented designers.
The most challenging of all is when you only give the player a load of flags and walls. The instant loss signal will impress even the most experienced of players, and make them try again and again.
However, there is another good approach. A good way of building tension in a scenario is to make a large map with no detail (as this may prove distracting) and force the player to walk across it. He will be expecting many enemies, and when he doesn't meet any he will be surprised and wary. This effect is best when continued over a large number of scenarios, until you suddenly ambush the player with loads of Cobra Cars. As a twist ending you could instead have no enemies in the entire campaign, that should really catch them off guard.
Alternatively, some players are afraid of losing. Simply give them millions of war elephants and cobra cars and give them the task of killing a single enemy militia. This even gives the effect of a cut-scene, as input from the player is not needed. The less experienced players will thank you for this and mark you high in Balance. Again, the opportunities are endless. Try experimenting by replacing the enemy militia with an enemy villager, or an enemy sheep.
Contrary to what many people say, the amount of triggers
With triggers, the mark of a good designer is that they no longer need to name their triggers. This is one of the quickest ways to impress people, as they can easily see that you have no need to find and fix any bugs.
On those occasions where triggers are necessary, here are some of the special effects you can use.
Non stop looping dialogue: Simply create a looping trigger with no timer, and one line of dialogue. This way you can make sure the player really gets the message, and the best bit is that it doesn't stop until the scenario ends! Other advantages include the exciting noise, and the added difficulty as important instructions are immediately covered up. One of the most impressive applications of this trick is to make the line of dialogue your name. Not only does this remind the player who you are, it makes it very difficult for people to steal your work (which is a real problem when you use high quality special effects such as this one).
Slow Motion Battle: A little known fact is that it is impossible to get a review score of higher than 2.6 without using this trick. The trick is simplicity itself. Just put down about four thousand units for each player in the same place, and you're done. When the player opens the scenario they will be startled by the extreme slow motion effect, which has the added effect of making the battle longer.
Midnight: What better way to convey a dark atmosphere than a realistic midnight effect? "Impossible!" I hear you cry. But no, there are many ways of achieving this effect. My personal favourite method is to change the ownership of at least three thousand objects all at once. Another bonus of this effect is that the player is given a chance to admire their Desktop half way through your scenario.
With campaigns, the more scenarios the better. Nothing fills the potential downloader with more anticipation than a 200 scenario campaign.
Some designers have experimented with the creative "No Description at all" look. You may wish to try this, especially for scenarios entitled something like "Bob's Quest" (always choose titles like this so that the player can instantly identify with the character, and knows from the start what the character will be doing. In this case, a quest).
If you do write a description though, remember that no one likes a humble designer. Always boast about your many new tricks and features. If you're good enough at doing this the player won't even notice that you've just made eighteen random maps. Good examples of impressive features include:
- Thrilling story
- STUNNING map design
- Better than Ulio!
- ES Quality! (Everyone knows that you can't be as good as ES, but it's a good idea to pretend you are)
- Gewd! Kool! (This always goes down well)
- Realistic space mission!
- FREE Ipod!
People of today are very busy, and will probably not notice these impressive features if they aren't followed with at least seven exclamation marks. When it comes to getting attention, the more the merrier as far as exclamation marks are concerned.
It is also recommended to include foreign accents and other arcane symbols from the dustier regions of the keyboard. Why spell it "scenario" when it could be "ŝ
Don't forget to indent your campaign with lots of spaces and squiggly lines. That way your campaign will always be on top, blotting out insignificant trash like Ulio that doesn't do this. Who needs alphabetical order anyway?
Play-testing is the sign of a weak designer. Good designers never make mistakes. Ever. Also, never admit that there is something wrong with your scenario. Remember, all criticism is a personal insult and should be sent back with interest.
Try out the post-modern method, and do away with proper spelling and grammar. AoK players don't like medieval scenarios and would rather play something written in gangster slang.
When writing a loss message, be sure to remind the player how inadequate they are. A torrent of personal abuse will make final victory more satisfying.
Using numbers instead of letters is
One final tip, have you noticed how many 5.0 scenarios there are already? Worried that, despite following all these tips, you might not get the recognition you deserve? If you give 1.2 reviews to all your rivals you're bound to be at the top! It's this sort of lateral thinking that makes a truly great designer. Don't be afraid to review your own scenario either, as the designer you know what it deserves, and modesty is for wimps.
I hope this guide has taught you how to improve your scenarios.
Apologies for this shoddy joke. My 'friends' at SWS encouraged me to post it here, so they deserve their fair share of the blame.
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Member of Stormwind Studios
[This message has been edited by Julius999 (edited 05-23-2008 @ 03:13 PM).]