Explodeathon Battlegrounds has been uploaded to Battle.net once again. I hope that the version I uploaded doesn't have any bugs... If you find any, let me know!
Explodeathon Battlegrounds Overview
Style of Gameplay
Explodeathon Battlegrounds is a fast paced, high skill cap Tug of War style game. It is designed to challenge players and make them think about what they should build, and where. The counter to a unit might not always be simply one unit, but instead a combination of units. In Explodeathon Battlegrounds, players are challenged to be quick on their feet, and keep track of what their army consists of.
Map Properties
Explodeathon Battlegrounds is a 1v1v1v1 free for all showdown. Each player has a building area and a lane that they are trying to defend. The map is as follows.
The small area at the top of each lane is your building area. This is where you will construct your buildings, which will automatically spawn your army in your lane, and at the base of an enemy lane.
Objective
The objective of Explodeathon Battlegrounds is to be the last Headquarters standing. Your Headquarters is located at the top of your lane. At the same time, you are trying to destroy the enemy Headquarters with your army.
Inspiration
The story of where I got my inspiration of Explodeathon Battlegrounds, and how/why the map is where it is today.
Kyle
I get asked a lot what inspired me to make Explodeathon. It varies so much from any other Tug of War. And I have one simple answer: Kyle. Who is Kyle, you may ask. Kyle is a good friend of mine. Before I even start my story, let me tell you the Kyle likes a competitive game. If it doesn't take skill, he doesn't want to be part of it. Anyways, to the story.
A couple years back we were playing Starcraft 2 together, and we were playing Desert Strike. It was his first time playing. I had told him about the game, and it had intrigued him. Building units that you don't have to control would allow for a countering/macro style game. He figured it would still be challenging, just different. He was utterly disgusted. He went on for an hour about how horrible the game was, and used a couple of choice words to describe the required intellect of an individual of someone who plays the game. When I proceeded to tell him that there is an entire community that revolves around that style of game, he laughed.
The Issues With Other Tug of War Games
So that got me thinking. I loved Desert Strike (still do), but he was right. There isn't really any skill involved in Desert Strike. You build a lot of units and hope for the best. There isn't really any countering involved, because smaller units get destroyed by AOE late game, rendering them useless.
So started to work on Explodeathon. I put all of his complaints about Desert Strike, and I tried to get rid of them. They were the following:
- Lag
- Slow gameplay
- Massive armies where anything but tier 3 units are essentially useless
- Pretty much everything you do up until the final battle is pointless
- The above makes it so when a teammate messes up, it doesn't matter. (Which is very bad)
- Wave stacking
- Random, unorganized blob of units that spawns and aimlessly runs across the map
- Absolutely no skill involved
How I Fixed It and Thought Process Behind It
The first thing I did was fix the "slow" aspect of the game. That was easy, all I did was increase the income rate. But that only makes Kyle's first point, the lag, even worse. So my solution was simple. Every 7 minutes, there is a reset. All of your buildings are destroyed, your minerals are reset, and you get set back to square 1.
But that created another problem. The resets are annoying as hell. It's essentially being forced to start over after only 7 minutes of gameplay, which sucks. So I added Mineral Processing Plants. They are buildings you can make that will permanently increase your income level for the rest of the game. But it wasn't enough.
So I added the rotations, and lanes. With the reset, you will change who you are attacking. It switches up the gameplay, and adds in new strategy. I was getting there.
The best part (in my opinion) of Explodeathon is the spawning system. Your army will spawn in the exact way as you build your buildings. Not only does this allow you to change where a unit spawns in the y direction, but you can also control where they spawn in the x direction. 2 dimensional control! That adds strategy and organization to your army.
The silo in Desert Strike is okay, but I came up with something better. In Explodeathon, when a defending unit reaches the end of your lane, it is sacrificed, awarding you with Vespene Gas. This takes out 2 birds with 1 stone. Firstly, it prevents unit stacking. Those units can't continue to fight, making it impossible to get to the enemy base. If you win a wave, you beat 1 wave of an enemy's army, not 1.5 or 2. Secondly, if you do well, it rewards you. Only building income isn't a good idea, because then your enemy will be acquiring Vespene Gas as they plow through your attacking army.
The last is teammates. Explodeathon is a ffa game. You have no teammate to mess you up. Is this good or bad? It's a toss up. However, this allows you to play by yourself, for yourself, without being destroyed by your teammate.
And lastly, the skill. Because of the rotations, your army is always on a smaller scale. You could maybe build 2 colossi in the later levels. But then you have to defend them. But you have to defend them, and because of the spawning system, you can place units in a position so they do just that.
Also, units all move at the same speed. This allows for your army to stay perfectly organized as it runs down the lane.
Ending Thought on That
Thank you Kyle.
Actual Ending Note
Explodeathon Battlegrounds was never meant to be a page 1, popular map. Arcade games are usually designed to be relaxing and laid back. However, those who want a high skill cap, challenging Tug of War game will enjoy this game greatly, and will (hopefully) form a small but competitive community.