PUD Making Guidelines

Below is a detailed description of issues that should be considered when designing a PUD. There is also a Check List available for a final check to make sure the PUD is complete.

As an aid to PUD development, there are two example "Movies" showing the step by step process:

• LandSea Movie
• Canals Movie

Starting Position Location:

• The start position token should be placed in the direction most appropriate for a town hall and with exactly two or three tiles (a peon is one tile in size) between the start position and mine measured either horizontally or vertically.
• A tree should be within a three tile distance of the starting position.

Starting Position Order:

Making the assumption that the game will be fixed order, top vs bottom (TVB), and two teams - the two main ordering options are 'distributed' and 'adjacent'. The distributed scenario places allies opposite each other or in alternating player positions. The adjacent, or 'friends' scenario, places allies next to each other with teams opposite each other in four player games.

In the distributed scenario, the starting positions should be arranged so that adjacent player slots are opposite each other. This is to allow games started with fixed order to have allies opposite and have all players spread out when there are open positions with the open positions in between. The order would be (in either a clockwise or counter clockwise circular direction):

• 8 player - red, orange, green, white, blue, black, purple, yellow (15372648)
• 6 player - red, green, orange, blue, purple, black (135246)
• 4 player - red, green, blue, purple (1324)

• 8 player - red, blue, white, yellow, green, purple, orange, black (12783456)
• 6 player - red, blue, orange, purple, green, black (125436)
• 4 player - red, blue, green, purple (1234)

Trees, Mountains, and Coastlines:

Available Resource Amounts:

• Gold
  • Land maps: 40-60k This varies with the number of expansions - in maps with a few tiny expansions and a center full of gold (GOW), 55k-60k; in maps with a lot of expansions (NoWayMaze), 40k
  • Sea maps: 50-80k This varies with the number of expansions - in maps with some center islands for everyone to fight over, 60k; in maps with only one mine for each player, 75-80k
  • Land/Sea mixed maps: 50-55k This is what is needed to upgrade to fortress while still getting ships and encourages expansion.
• Oil
  • A good rule of thumb for oil patches is to have about a 4:1 ratio of gold to oil.
• Lumber
  • For sea maps, the ratio of gold to lumber should be about 3:1. For land maps, about 4:1 is sufficient.

As an aid to setting resource amounts, we have provided pages containing Human Building and Unit Costs and Orc Building and Unit Costs. In addition we have computed the total costs for an Example Orc Land Town and an Example Human Seaport.

Cosmetics:

• Add randomly shaped patches of dark ground to open areas.
• Add randomly shaped patches of dirt to open areas. Be aware here, that dirt is unbuildable, so don't add these at places that would inhibit a player from building unless that is the intent.
• Widen some coast lines with dirt.
• Add randomly placed 'fill' to grass and dirt patches.
• Add dirt roads to help navigation between key points.

Default Settings:

• Resources - minimum of 2000 Gold, 1000 Lumber, 1000 Oil. This assures that games started with default resources/one peon have enough resources to build a hall.
• Units - minimum of one peon, one farm, and a townhall. This is to pacify the people who are impatient and like to start on high resources while preventing the 'barracks first' disputes. If possible, set default units to something meaningful based on the map to give it an alternative playing scenario.
• Unit Properties - default values.
• Upgrade Properties - default values.
• Description - of the form 'Map Name by Author'. Since the file names are truncated, the complete map name should be used. If the author is known, the name or playing nickname (most common) should be included.
• Expansion Features - no expansion characters or features should be used.

Map Layout:

• Initial building clearings are of equal size and have equal wall-in ability.
• Start positions should have an equal proximity to expansion mines and other player positions.
• For maps where lumber is important, the amount of available lumber should be equal for all players. Running a chop test is a good way to verify that lumber is equal. See the LandSea Movie for an example. A chop test is set up as follows:
  • Make a copy of the map using the Warcraft Editor.
  • Isolate the starting positions with walls so that peons only chop their own lumber. This is not necessary for island maps.
  • Eliminate all the gold mines and set all default resources to 0.
  • Give each starting position about 10-15 peons and 1-3 town halls depending on the amount of lumber and size of areas.
  • Save the map under a different name using 'save as' so as not to destroy the original.
  • Play a single player game against computer players. They will chop all the lumber since they have nothing else to do.
  • Use 'hatchet' and 'on screen' cheats and turn speed up to maximum.
  • Once all trees are gone, surrender and get lumber amounts from summary screen.
  • If lumber amounts vary by more than 2-3%, make adjustments and repeat.
• For maps where building area is important (such as island maps) an area test can be performed to make sure all players have approximately equal building areas. See the Canals Movie for an example. An area test is set up as follows:
  • Make a copy of the map using the Warcraft Editor.
  • Delete all trees, mines, etc from the areas to be tested.
  • Fill the area with buildings (Town Halls, Barracks, Farms).
  • Fill in any gaps with Peons.
  • Save the map under a different name using 'save as' so as not to destroy the original.
  • Open the newly saved map in PUD Browser. The PUD Browser text pane gives the unit counts for each player.
  • Calculate areas using the formula 16x#TownHalls + 9x#Barracks + 4x#Farms + #Peons

Miscellaneous:

• Don't go to the extreme in any area.
• Avoid using critters - they are a real pain and if they are too many, slow down network games since their movements need to be tracked.
• Include a good text file which contains:
  • Name of the PUD
  • Author's name, nickname, and email
  • Brief description of the map and its intent
  • Explanation of any specific strategies required or suggested
  • Description of default units and any rescue computer players and how to set up games using these.
• Optionally, you could use PUD Browser to generate and include in the PUD's zip file, for people who want to add the PUD to a web page, the following:
  • A PUD Information (.pfo) File
  • GIF files of sizes 128x128 and 512x512

If you have questions about all this, email me and I will try to help.