Maniaplanet Forum

Hey all,

Since the release of my latest elite map (2 months ago), I am trying to create a new one unsuccessfully.
Day by day, it is going harder to build a creative map, with new/never-done parts which has not been used in other maps so far. Of course it isn't impossible to create whole new maps with new block-combinations etc, but I personally think that each map is almost similar to other ones...
This is the reason why I am severely frustrated because when I am going to create a new Elite map, I think ''Uhm, this part reminds of a other map''. It is nearly impossible for me to create a original, unique map by using the nadeo-provided-blocks. In fact, the concept or rather the whole idea of the map is from importance, but when you included some nice ideas, you have to fill the rest of the map. The 'rest' is mostly similar to other maps (castle blocks, fences-spots etc.) ... And there's is my issue, and maybe of the most map-builder as well.

One of my biggest challenges, is, to avoid fences when I am creating a hide-spot for a defender in Elite. At least, I am trying to discover some new block-combinations with fences, but it is very hard, that the spot is not too overpowered. In nearly EVERY map, you can see fence-spots (especially in Elite), build on some different blocks, such as walls (square walls, circular walls) or just on the ground of castle blocks, grass.
Fences became one of THE-must-used hide-spots for Shootmania, which makes me pretty sad. There aren't much alternatives, even if you are creative genius.
These fences are one of the reasons why the gameplay is always going to be the same ( fence fights in Elite ) - but this belongs to another topic.

Furthermore, the more maps are released in the past, the more block-combinations are discovered and used. It aren't really only ''block-combinations'', even concepts are going to be each similar.As a consequence, it is even harder to create an innovative, unique map, with not the same map-concept.


Now I've shown you my personal ( probably of other map-builders as well ) issue, that it is very hard to create an unique, original map. Let's go at searching the reason for this issue.

In my opinion, the amount of the blocks in Shootmania are okay, but the way how you can place them is too restricted. I know, this has been discussed in quite a lot topics so far, but it seems to be a considerable issue. More accuracy in blockplacement - maybe blocks are treaten as Objects ? - would might solve the problem, that the maps aren't going to be always the same.



What do you think? Are you such frustrated as me, that you can't create a very original map? Do you think more precision in blockplacement would solve the issue?

Greetings,
Soprah


Hopefully, the message of this post is clear.

Hey

I kind of agree with you, i would suggest too the 'free insert mode'. Like press esc in editor and select the mode and can insert blocks freely without grid. It would give so much more depth.
In TM when you drive a car its easier to settle down to the blockspace, but in SM its just a small human who is free to move and do things.

I guess many have thought "thats good place for grid, but i need it just bit on left so ppl can walk better from right" but if you move it to anywhere else, it dont anymore work for the idea and its in completely different place

I'd rather die than having all blocks being replaced by objects.
They are a pain in the butt to build with. I haven't even bothered to really try buildung something with them yet.

You cannot place them in the air, for they cannot be moved in z-direction (or y maniaplanet but whatever...).
You always grab them at an edge, so if you have the wrong edge of it totally sucks and it's half an odyssey to get to another edge of the object. Placement in general is hard.
There are no block combinations with objects. They can clip to one another so they are edge on edge. But when you think how blocks change form depending on if there a block next to them or underneath, you can't have that with objects. There's a list of of those combinations here in the forum.

An editor with objects only would be a pain to use and would remove a lot of features features that it has.


Also the whole editor would need to be redisigned almost from scratch because blocks just don't work like objects, they are treated so differently by the game because they are something totally different. They are not just a box you put on the grid. When you tell the editor to put a checkpoint on the grass, the ediotr will remove the grass a put a grassy CP on that spot. When you put castle walls somewhere, the ground is removed a a huge pillar will be there instead.
Castle walls wouldn't even work as an object, just like a lot of other things.


What I would wish for is just a smaller grid for the normal blocks. Half steps or maybe thirds.
Also more "hidden" block combinations or the ability to put more than one building block into one block of space, at least if they don't really overlap.

But I don't think that we'll find a lot of change in the mechanics of the editor.
Nadeo is putting little to no effort into it, they are even struggling to implement a few new blocks from time to time. The newest blocks still have combinations bugs, graphic bugs or are just poorly done in the first place.

edit: I delete

Hey.

Nice post Soprah, you raise some interesting points.

I mostly agree with you about the problems you mentioned, but I think the solutions may be elsewhere.

It's indeed hard to bring creative stuff on the maps, regardless of what has been done before. I noticed that most Elite mappers want to stay in a "confort building zone", so we tend to see the same things over again and again. Most Elite mappers are not after creativity, anyways, they just want to produce something that works fine.

I believe that it's possible to do both. Blocks knowledge is the key to produce good maps no matter what.

About the fences : not a big fan of them either, especially when you can achieve similar results without those blocks.
I used them a lot in the Alpha because there was not that many blocks to work with, and this evolved with time.
Fences appear as an obvious defending position. Maybe too obvious imo. I feel that they are 'disconnected" from the rest of the map and in many cases, the duels at the fences are kinda awkward gameplay-wise.
I'll provide examples of how to work without fences if needed.

About the solutions : Objects aren't the way to go in my opinion. ( I agree with UrinStein on this point.) The number of blocks in Storm is maybe even too high. In any case it's enough for our needs.
Objects can be placed in the air when you modify their properties, and "snapped" to the editor grid if needed.
However, I think a good step forward would be to use blockmixing (responsively) with the Nadeo blocks in order to increase drastically the depth of all the "micro zones" that makes a map.

Just my 2 cents.

Thanks for your comments, you all are right.

@Appor,
At first I would like to ask why you deleted your second post? It was a constructive, nice post with great suggestion about new 'tools' ( as in Painter ) which might be an additinal improvement for the map-editor.
I like the idea about a 'free-mode' where the grid is much smaller. I've been thinking about that as well, a more precisy block-placement would might solve the issue.

@UrinStein & Papychampy,
You are totally right as well, objects has a lot disadvantages, such as hard placement, no block-combinations with objects, redesign of editor etc.

When I thought about objects, I saw their huge amount of possibilites of how you can use them. I am still fascinated about the big variety of objects in the speedball Titlepack and I am working on a map for a couple of weeks now. You can build such great maps with objects, if you use them carefully. Of course, it was very hard to use them on your first time, but the more you train, the more you are better which will result in the maps as well. Objects give the maps more depth, which the maps makes more original, unique.

However, it would be utopistic to think that the blocks can be replaced by objects. I just thought about given the editor more opportunities, which objects could be.
Additional opportunities could be a more smaller grid, more tools for the editor or even block-mixing which has been discussed tough once in a topic. In this case, I would like to refer to the very nice suggestion of appor who has been thinking of implementing new tools/features for the editor. Here is the link. These suggestions deserve much respect

To conclude, more features/opportunities - such as new tools, smaller grid - for the map-editor would be very helpful for map-builders. It might prevent that maps become so similar. And we don't have to forget, more oppurtunities would increase the fun-factor of a mapper

@ New Tools

New tools always bring new possibilities which is what we all want.
Buuut, also a completely different tool has to be programmed from scratch. You will not get any big changes to the editor in the next months. I mean, we haven't seen any major changes to the editor SINCE TMN ESWC!

The editor in it's current state is rather simple. When you build a castle wall, the game will simply put a one-sided texture on the side of each coordinate the wall is in. The blocks aren't solid like stuff in RL is, so there is nothing between those textures.
I case that one of those texture-walls collides with another texture on the next coordinate, they are both removed.
So if you have one castle wall, it has 4 sides. If you place a second one next to it, the sides right next each other are eliminated and the new bigger wall ends up with 6 "sides", each the size of one x-coordinate and one z-coordinate (width x height).
There are only those two rules. It's like a binary code. Add one to one, you get to zero again.
The textures are huuge, so the grid is as huge. I'm no expert for computers, but I guess those facts make it very easy to compute the map since you don't need very much information.

The standard Castle Wall is SO SIMPLE, that Nadeo even included dozens of block combinations for it. Most blocks are even based on that one. Other blocks don't have many if any block combinations. It must be quite some work to make new block combinations so there are only a few.

A Trimmer Tool, like appor suggested would amplify those problem I bet. You'd need a small grid, more little combinations (a tiny wall on a big wall is a combination already), most combinations we have now would be too much to inculde in the game with a Trimmer Tool so the tool would be able to do a lot of stuff with castle walls, and nothing more than that. Just castle walls...


I'm quite sure Nadeo has it's own strange reason to have the editor based around castle blocks which cannot float.
For example this pic by appor. What you suggest there is a floating block. Many people have suggested that in the past.
But if Nadeo wanted, they would have added a simple cube block that can float from the beginning. We had it in TM Stadium, we have it as purple/brown blocks in SM. Nadeo simply doesn't want it as a stone block. Not even the gods know why.

Some things though they have been trying to make better with specific bocks.
This one for example you can easily build with normal blocks.


BUT those have still a lot of limitations.
What you can see there is the lowest you can build those Arch-blocks. Also you cannot build a bumper right next to a wall, like I'm trying there.

Which leads me to the next point.
@ Block Mixing

I've recently built a map with a lot of Mixing. It was terrifying.
I really like the tool by Mr. Phil, it's well done and I am very thankful for him releasing it publicly.
But the Editor can't handle that stuff.

There are some blocks like trees and sculptures which are very easy to mix, because they are static, they always look the same. But every block that is based around that Castle Wall priciple, being just a collection of huge flat textures will go absolutely nuts when confronted with blockmixing.
And yeah, that's almost the whole Editor.

For example I can unite the bumper with the wall from the previous pic and I can also lower the height of those archways. But oh look!
1. There is a hole in the Castle Wall block!
2. The clip is buggy now!

There are so many other flaws.
- some Mixes you have to build in a certain order or they won't work
- when you press "Undo" mixed blocks and textures will disappear randomly
- terraforming is absolutely incompatible with mixing
- etc.

If you have a lot of time, you can try to do some little things with Block Mixing, but as soon as you include a lot of walls, bridges and similiar stuff, get ready for a hard time.

Block Mixing is definitely not a replacement for an Editor that comes with a lot of possibilies, less restrictions and a big variety of block combinations. The Editor is capable of that already. No need to program a completely new tool or try things out and experimenting. Only the block creators would have to make some new block combinations, so I can place this next to a wall, and this other block on water instead of grass only.

Those are things that work pretty well already, but I have the feeling Nadeo doesn't care too much about improving the Editor in the first place.

Oh i forgot reply to this. Thank you very much Soprah for supporting

Urin, Yes i think some things might be too hard to execute, usually i only try to give suggestions with very open feel because i dont know exactly how things goes in coding. But my second suggestion for the blocks that you could use to create openings, similar like mountains are shaped inside, the suggestion inspired from the blocks that you can already use, those arched blocks you can cut openings to castle blocks. So same principle but 1 block high cuts or smaller cuts, just square flat cuts without any castle arch designs. I thought that could be very possible to do if its possible with arched ones. But i dont know

But, smaller grid option, cutted into 4ths or 6ths or even 8ths, and blocks that fits to those spaces. Like simple castle cube that is 4th of block space and you can place that to all 4 corners of that grid space would be one idea for the future

Soprah ur map exclusion is awesome!
I know this is off-topic, but u deserved the credit!

Exclusion & Tilt-Pro!! Really like them!

Big big thanks novationx! I really appreciate it
At first I thought the map might be too ''new'' but now I am glad that some people like my map ''Execution''
I like the map ''tilt pro'' as well, something new even if he mostly used castle blocks! Awesome map.

Anyways, back to the topic:

Np appor, you are a really genius with your fantastic ideas! I admire your creativity & fantasy.

I was thinking about such a ''gate'' as you mentioned too.
Principally, my idea is: You should be able to create different ''entrances'' in the mountains, for example something like in the picture below. A wood ladder which leads into the inside of a mountain. So the player would be able to use the ladder to go up or down.


It would be awesome if objectiv-creater would be able to create something like this. Not only creating objects.