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Author |
File Description |
The Groll |
Posted on 10/27/09 @ 01:40 PM
File Details |
Ruleset: |
AoW: SM - Unofficial Patch 1.4 |
Map Size: |
M |
Levels: |
3 |
Single Player?: |
Yes |
Co-Op vs. AI?: |
Yes |
PBEM/Hotseat?: |
Yes |
Multiplayer Online?: |
Yes |
# of Wizards: |
3 |
# of players: |
3 |
Skill Level: |
Any (depends on AI difficulty setting) |
Password Protected: |
No |
Surface Minimap:
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Cavern Minimap:
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Shadow Minimap:
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The Wilderness
AoWSM map and story
by
The Groll
Story:
The humans are afraid of the evil from the first days, but this days the evil becomes alive and ghosts and undead creatures roam the lands of the humans.
Dark tales and holy writings are nothing compared to the actual reality.
The undead creatures are not fairy tales anymore. They are active. Undead creatures that can be touched and they touch the living beings, only to drag them to themselves - into death.
The humans left their farms and cities on the surface to hide in some few secure caves under the earth, because they are in great panic. The humans hide in the areas where normally the deads are.
Many years have gone by, but now the Undead King Necromonger is starting a last and terrible march to the human lands. But where do the undead came from?
The leaders of the human´s can´t hide in their caves anymore and the only hope it to reach a far away land where they hope to find help or may find the key to help themselves.
The druids and wise men say this land is far away in the east, but it’s unknown if this is true.
The Undead are on the march to the last human caves and sitting in this caves will guarantee death.
Therefore some of the last warriors dare to explore the original seed lands of their fathers to find a way how to fight the undead. Meanwhile the common folk need to stay in the caves. The more they march to the east the more the land turns into a wild fantasy.
What will they find and is there really hope in the east?
The Kor Mountain shall be the place of destiny but where is this mountain? What will the humans be able to do, if they will really find this mystical mountain from the known old fairy tales?
But one thing is for sure: If the warriors are not successful the human race will die.
So why not risk the life if the family prospect is to become an undead being soon?
Take your sword and holy cross then marching to the far away east to find whatever may there.
There is no other hope to stay alive.
The Undead are coming.
Fatcs:
In “The Wilderness” I complied my wish to make a map where less is more.
I wanted to make a map where you have the feeling of the "dark age".
A land like England or Russia as they were in the dark age.
A medieval map, where you can feel the Middle Age.
A land of highlanders, wild, barren and empty where you can feel the wind.
A wild land without much more than a true wild nature.
A land without many big cities and without a large domain.
A land that can´t support or feed many people and where you have the feeling, that moving your units and armies are as it may have been in middle age.
You will have only few units and can´t produce endless armies of level 4 units.
Long ways to go, until you reach something and only a few creatures existing in it.
A land where you can´t see it all and without many watchtowers.
I wanted no flying transport in this map, because they destroy it and they are not medieval.
Only humans that move by feet and no other transport than ships.
Long marches around mountains and waters without endless view, if you haven’t spiritual seers among your peoples.
A map where the folk fears the unholy devil and this fear is stronger than anything else.
The humans must fear the Undead in this map, like it was in the middle age.
I want a map where flyers are rare and where you have to build ships to cross the ocean.
This was a major goal in this map.
To break the power of air galleys is very important in this map and so you won’t find such units in this map.
It is still a fantasy map, but with a more middle age feeling and with only a few fantasy flyers.
The AoWSM air units often ruin the funny game play and because of this I will not allow to use this units here.
This time I wanted a map where you need to move your few units through the land and don´t have a wide view.
Therefore you and your enemy will pass each other maybe only a few hexes nearby, but you won’t see each other.
Human Players and AI Players:
This is a three player map but I wanted a map where one player is a dark and terrible AI player and the other two human players need to play in a cooperative way, when they want to survive. It is also possible to play it as SP map. You can be sure your Nomad or Human neighbor will scare the undead and you may will fight in an alliance against the evil Undead Necromonger.
The three races are:
Humans (Human Player), Nomads (Human Player), Undead (AI Player).
As more powerful you set up the Undead Necromonger AI player, as more extra units he get and as stronger he will be.
I left all players possible to play as human player but to play the undead is maybe not a good idea.
Dedication:
This is my tenth AoWSM map. It is time to dedicate a map to three of my AoWSM friends. They are more than only AoWSM community friends. I did not meet anyone of them so far in RL but I know they are fine guys with an open heart and they are true friends.
This map is dedicated to Albaron, PawelS and Swolte.
This is an alphabetical order, not an order how much I like you, my friends.
You helped me a lot in hard times in my RL and we have talked a lot in messengers and emails. This map is for you and I hope I payed back all my bills with it.
This is a cooperative map, where two humans should try to wipe out the undead AI king. I wish you much fun playing this map. It may be my last map for AoWSM.
More Fatcs:
The Undead AI Player gets extra units and resources every day, but the number and quality depends on its difficulty level.
If the AI player is set to:
Peasant/Warrior - Normal number and quality of extra units
Knight/Lord - More and better quality of extra units
King/Emperor - Most and best quality of extra units
The map contains 110 Heroes.
I made 45 complete new heroes for this map. The other heroes were taken from my other maps.
All original heroes are removed from the map.
All original items are removed from the map too.
But I made more than 250 new items or copied items from my other maps.
How to play this map?
I recommend not to recruit, seduce, dominate or resurrect undead creatures and heroes.
This is against the spirit of this map and will take away the joy of playing this map.
Thanks for Betatesting:
Albaron, PawelS, Timelord, The Groll
Thank you for playing the beta versions in cooperative online sessions with me or in SP.
Thanks to Timelord for hints and error reports after play testing.
Special Thanks:
Many special thanks goes to Albaron for playing the beta map with me and for translating this document and four special heroes (Albaron, PawelS, Swolte & The Groll).
And a very special thanks to him for believing in me all the time and for being such a good friend. :-)
Specail Docfile included:
I made the story of the map in a picture story.
If you like to read this storybook of “The Wilderness” come closer and open the "The_Wilderness_Picturestory_v_1_k.mht" file that is includet in this zipfile.
It is a html based file and any internet browser can open it, so anyone even without MS word or open office can enjoy the picture story in the internet browser.
I wish you much fun playing it and enjoy the picture story of "The Wilderness" (hints included). ;-)
Up the irons!
Author, Date and Version:
The Groll, 27. Oktober 2009, v.1_k |
Author | Reviews ( All | Comments Only | Reviews Only ) |
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rat_peddler |
Posted on 11/20/09 @ 12:31 PM
Playability: 4
I docked this due to some issues with knowing what to do. Also some of the areas are unnecessarily brutually slow to move through. I had to keep frequent checkpoints because major strategy errors are very possible.
Balance: 5
The AI is given enough support to make progress grudging and difficult.
Creativity: 5
I liked the ability to play to cooperative players. Made the game richer in strategy, plus given advantages of the AI it was necessary for balance. Lots of creative scripts and approaches.
Map Design: 5
A very interesting map. Some ares it was hard to figure out how to navigate. See commments on playability.
Story/Instructions: 5
Good depth of story including supporting HTML file.
Additional Comments:
It took me 323 days to complete. This is probably longer then optimal play as I was wandering around lost in the wilderness a few times ;-) I played it without looking at the map once in the editor. [Edited on 11/20/09 @ 12:32 PM]
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Lord Mykola88 |
Posted on 12/11/09 @ 06:29 AM
Playability: 5
(Insert Playability analysis here)
Balance: 5
(Insert Balance analysis here)
Creativity: 5
(Insert Creativity analysis here)
Map Design: 5
(Insert Map Design analysis here)
Story/Instructions: 5
(Insert Story/Instructions analysis here)
Additional Comments:
Very nice map...I didn't finish it yet....it is so difficult and you must be very carefull during play...a lot of events..You are the best map maker of all..maybe one day one of my map became better than yours...maybe...So congratulation... |
Watschenbaum |
Posted on 01/10/10 @ 12:01 PM
Playability: 5
(Insert Playability analysis here)
Balance: 4
(Insert Balance analysis here)
Creativity: 5
(Insert Creativity analysis here)
Map Design: 4
(Insert Map Design analysis here)
Story/Instructions: 5
(Insert Story/Instructions analysis here)
Additional Comments:
I love games which stress the exploration of an unknown world, the built-up of an infra-structure, and challenging events more than epic battles. Therefore, this map perfectly matched my taste.
I chose nomads, however, which have flying units, such as Chinese Dragons at disposal. I am afraid I would not have enjoyed this map so much if I had been ruthlessly bound to the ground, such as the unfortunate humans do. Resorting to ships as the only means of transportation and exploration slows down progress significantly, doesn’t it?
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Der_Zorn_Gottes |
Posted on 02/15/10 @ 01:28 PM
Playability: 3
A hard map to play. It plays completely different from any other map I have played so far, and I doubt that many players can defeat it on the first try. You have to know the map in order to play it.
Balance: 5
Both human controled factions have roughly same chances. The Nomads have a much qucker and easier start, but receive 80% of the undeads love, so it equals out. No complaints.
Creativity: 5
Sheer brilliance. It is just incredible what The Groll got out of the engine - It felt much like a rpg in the end, and in very positive way so.
Map Design: 5
A bit boring compared to The Grolls other maps. On the other hand, you can`t see most of the map most of the time, so it is ok really. And what you see is, as usual, among the best map design out there.
Story/Instructions: 4
You are told what to do every time. Being able to do so is written on another paper. Also, some crucial terrain features (underground passages, teleporters) are very hard to spot.
Additional Comments:
A very nice map, which gives AOW a new touch. I reccomend to play as both wizards, or coop.
[Edited on 02/15/10 @ 01:30 PM]
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W4rb1rd |
Posted on 09/22/13 @ 08:05 PM
[Playability: 3]
Is OK. I didn't gave full score, 'cos probably I'm not too fond of straying too far from AoW's main story and lore. But what we have here it's all right.
[Balance: 3]
Balanced for "good" sides, but Necromancer seeing that he's placed at the centre of the map on some kind of shadow island doesn't have much to do honestly and if your playing him prepare to have eye problems after few minutes (excessive usage of FX's). Playing as Druid Druoar for example was quite a pleasant experience.
[Creativity: 5]
===AND===
[Map Design: 5]
These two are the main point why I'm writing this review. Simply: JESUS ****IN' CHRIST! It's so amazing! Especially that hill in south-east. It's just to beautiful too be real (as far as game reality is concerned :P). I've never though such as this is possible to in this engine. It had to take weeks to manualy craft and sculpt such terrain. Triumph's should have made a sort of template which you can use to paint that pre-made terrain. Simply beautiful. Other places were very cool too - very realistic and conving without excessive placement of magical stuff. Awesomeness.
[Story/Instructions: 2]
Well, story was just so-so, but I guess you focused your efforts more on terrain than this point, so it's understandable, but your intros are basically WALL OF TEXT. While I appreciate effort put into typing all of it, but in the same time fail to see it's attractiveness and overall presentation: -1
Hero descriptions are in the language I cannot conceive. Additionally some heroes have strange sounding names like "something something Todbringer"... DA FAQ?: -2
Score: 2
[Additional Comments:]
ITS A MAP HAVING BEST HAND-MADE TERRAIN EVER POSTED. PERIOD.[Edited on 09/23/13 @ 01:42 AM]
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HGDL v0.8.2 |
Rating |
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4.5 | Breakdown |
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Playability | 4.0 | Balance | 4.6 | Creativity | 5.0 | Map Design | 4.8 | Story/Instructions | 4.2 |
Statistics |
Downloads: | 2,921 |
Favorites: [] | 0 |
Size: | 11.94 MB |
Added: | 10/27/09 |
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