Custom Map #1906: The primordial one. By: Tyler

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This topic is for discussion of map #1906: The primordial one


Author: Tyler
Size: 100x100

Desc:
Lightyears away from civilization, this jungle planet was long forgotten, along with its dark secret. Are you brave enough to face the mysterious One that lies deep within the vast jungle? -- Attention: gameplay might be different from what you are get used to, don't be surprised if something 'strange' happens. These are not bugs, everything happens for a reason. This map requires lot of thinking and expertise. Tips and hints are in the forum. -- #CRPL #Runner #FogOfWar #Explore

[Tyler21]

Additional info, hints and help for the map titled "The primordial One"

1. Screenshot /title
If you wonder why the regular screenshot /thumbnail is not available, it is for a reason: exploration is an essential part of the gameplay and I didn't want to spoil anything.



2. Difficulty
This map is relatively difficult (its completion rate is currently around 10%) and requires thorough attention and patience. It can be extremely difficult - if not impossible - if you don't have a good strategy or if you simply use brute force. However it can be solved quite easily in less than 60 minutes if you take the time and perceive every little detail in the modified game mechanics. And once you know how it works, and you give it a second run, you can make it in 30 minutes...

One important aspect of the game:

Spoiler

As most emitters are dynamic, you have to learn how and why they change their AMT or Interval, the interval of runner spawn or the health of runners. These things do not change randomly and they do not change only because more time has elapsed. Moreover, these effects are all related to your actions and strategy.

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3. Hints for the petrified totems / buildings
Try to solve the msytery of petrified units yourself. If you have really no clue, use the following hints.

Hint 1

Spoiler

Petrified buildings can take damage but regenerate health very quickly. To destroy them use the unit that deals the most damage in the shortest interval.

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Hint 2

Spoiler

The nullifier makes the most damage in the shortest interval.

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Hint 3

Spoiler

Petrified buildings of different kinds will require different number of nullifiers to be destroyed.

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Hint 4

Spoiler

You can synchronize your nullifiers' fire if you disarm them while building. Then if ready, pause the game and rearm them.

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4. Tips and tricks

Starting the map / exploring

Spoiler

Do not start to explore too early as it consumes a lot of energy. Build a reasonable capacity of energy first - about 10 collectors and 10 reactors will be enough for survival.

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Starting the map 2

Spoiler

Unlock the forge and the first totem as soon as possible. And of course, protect the forge at any cost as you can't build another one. Upgrades are essential to this map, it's impossible to make it without upgrades.

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Defense

Spoiler

Build pulsecannons and set all of them to 'digitalis first' mode. This will prevent the digitalis to spread over your base. About 5-6 pulsecannons can keep all the digitalis at bay.

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Expanding the base

Spoiler

The best thing to do after you have a nice defense is to seize the Berthas North and East from the initial landing position. After that you can start dealing with the emitters.

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Too many runners

Spoiler

Learn how and why runners' spawn interval changes and also learn what and how limits the total number and health of runners. If you learn these, runners will be much easier to handle.

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Too much creeper, too quickly

Spoiler

Learn how and why AMT and Interval changes. What did you do not long before you experienced a rapid change? If you learn why emitters change their AMT you will be able to handle them much easier.

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Digitalis flood "out of nowhere"

Spoiler

Sometimes digitalis can spread extremely quickly without any "apparent' reason. Actually, this happens only if a digi spawning emitter or a petrified building is connected to that digi. Observe the behavior of that emitter and you will be able to handle rapid digi spreading too.

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Digitalis

Spoiler

"Oh my god, is digitalis spreading?!" Yes. it is. But like anything else on this map, its rate is reacting to something what you did. Learn why digi spreads quicker and you will be able to stop it.

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How to deal with new Emitters?

Spoiler

The One will spawn new Emitters on a regular basis if there are too few Emitters on the map. However, you can influence this interval, and learn how and what can affect this...

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If you are really, really lost:

Too many runners 2 (ONLY if you are really desperate about the flood of runners)

Spoiler

The One will always try to counter your actions: if you build more snipers, it will spawn more runners. If you increase your firepower (all units that can damage runners), runners will be bigger and stronger...

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Too much creeper, too quickly 2 (ONLY if you are completely clueless how Emitters work)

Spoiler

Some emitters will increase AMT if you increase your total firepower - that includes all of your units that can damage creeper, weighted by their power which I obviously won't tell you here :)
Emitter will decrease interval if you increase your army size and increase the 'speed' or your army, especially if you build flying units or relays.

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Digitalis 2 (ONLY if you are REALLY desperate about digitalis spreading)

Spoiler

Digitalis spreads faster as build more Terps. As the primordial One can't change terrain levels directly, it tries to counterbalance your terraforming by growing new digi much faster.

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How to deal with new Emitters? 2 (ONLY if you don't know why new Emitters keep appear so quickly)

Spoiler

As in its every action, the One will try to counter your strategy. If you increase your energy production the One will also do so: however, instead of energy, it will spawn new emitters around itself more frequently.

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A note on Berthas (ONLY if you read all the above hints & tips and you still don't know what's missing in your strategy)

Spoiler

In short: Berthas on this map are nothing but bait. If you wonder why the ancient expeditionairy forces left so many Berthas in the jungle, they did it for a very good reason. Berthas on this map are good for only one thing: to notify the One of your presence, and to increase its strength, therefore they are rather useless. If you use them, it will lead to a vicious circle: the One will be stronger, then you will need more firepower, then it will be even more stronger and so on.

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+1, only for the very last case

Spoiler

1. Forge upgrades don't affect the One, not even the techs that increase your units' speed or fire rate. That's why it is essential to protect it and activate all petrified totems.

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[iwishforpie2]

This map doesn't seem to hard...

>50 minutes in the game

"hey mom, do you know where my pants are?"

[Tyler21]

Then, I guess, you haven't disturbed the One that much so far...

[Tyler21]

It seems that the One is still alive in the heart of the jungle...

Who will be the first who manages to annul its existence?



EDIT: congratulations to mikemech!

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Dear Diary,

At mission time 1:34:10.3 my forge was finally over-run and destroyed.

Maybe tomorrow we'll take another stab at this.

[D0m0nik]

Clever idea, I guess its all about finding the right balance. I have failed miserably today but having read your tips (thank you!) Ill have another pop.

Def a change from the usual max power max weps approach!

Dp

[Jerdog]

Or... I can just choose a different map.

[Gabe]

I FINALLY beat it!
I really like how just maximizing your stuff, which is the strategy for almost every other map, is one of the fastest ways to lose on this map. However, i don't like how near the end, there's nowhere to put your  Nullifiers except literally touching The One. What ends up happening is The One spams Runners, which have nowhere to go, so they all stack right on top of it, and the Runners then spamlock your maximum of four and probably around two nullifiers trying to eliminate The One. Then you spend half an hour trying and failing to eliminate the things that keep popping up to destroy your setup before you kill him, until eventually you just have to terraform massive tracks of land just to have the room to nullify enough things to be able to delete enough stuff in order to destroy him. By the time I'm literally touching The One, i've already won, so it was a bit annoying that he is so good at prolonging the game.

[Tyler21]

Hints for the end-game:

1.

Spoiler

You can easily shrink the One into a very harmless thing if you know how it works so you can nullify it without having to put the nullifiers right 'in it'.

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2.

Spoiler

Since the total number of runners that can be spawned is limited per emitter, do not kill most of the runners, let them wander instead on the irrelevant part of the map (for example North). If you destroy runners, they will keep spawning, right at the One which obviously makes your nullifiyng efforts desperate.

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3.

Spoiler

Remember that AC slows digitalis. Although each ore deposit will be around the One, seizing these deposits and deploying AC will drastically shorten the length of the end-game.

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[RrR]

I played it last night without reading the hints. I went for the max power approach - took me a while to work out how to get the forge, totems and bertha. It was hard, I was running out of space to build reactors to power weapons. Used the forge weapon to finish.

Tried again tonight with a minimal force. Much much easier - completed in less than half the time.

[Tyler21]

I'm glad that you took the time to try different strategies. Indeed, clever tactics and wise choice of units is much more efficient than brute force. This should be a lesson for all who try this map.

My main motive was to create a map with a unique gameplay that is different from the usual maps and a map that (hopefully) will motivate the players to play differently.

The usual (and well designed) maps all have the following phases in common:

1. struggle for survival / establish a minimal defense / obtain key defense points
2. space- and energy micromanagement
3. gradual expansion in carefully designed small steps and forge management
4. aggressive expansion, opening multiple fronts
5. endgame that might be difficult somewhat if you have to annul some real nasty emitter, let's say in the void, with lots of digi and runner, but usually, without tech and/or units limits you'll have a devastating arsenal by the endgame

My experience so far is that almost every custom map has a decreasing difficulty along these stages. So if you manage to survive the very first phase somehow, you'll gradually overwhelm the creeper and the map will be gradually less challenging, and for me, less exciting as well. There only very few maps that require constant concentration and micromanagement but usually those are very small with a special design (for example Simple Diode by warren which is among my favorites).

(I have too add that PAC maps are the good exception, for several reasons, for example because there are no upgrades available and because you don't have that many strategies to choose from. The best PAC maps involve digitalis and/or sporetower micromanagement throughout the whole time).

[Karsten75]

This map is relatively difficult (its completion rate is currently around 8%) and requires thorough attention and patience. It can be extremely difficult - if not impossible - if you don't have a good strategy or if you simply use brute force. However it can be solved quite easily in less than 60 minutes if you take the time and perceive every little detail in the modified game mechanics. And once you know how it works, and you give it a second run, you can make it in 30 minutes...

One important aspect of the game:

Spoiler

As most emitters are dynamic, you have to learn how and why they change their AMT or Interval, the interval of runner spawn or the health of runners. These things do not change randomly and they do not change only because more time has elapsed. Moreover, these effects are all related to your actions and strategy.

[close]

This right there is my main issue with this map. It seems a fun map, but playing by backwards observation isn't much fun. In my opinion it's annoying and boring. I can see you spent an inordinate amount of time on the making of this map, and I have some great fun playing it, but then I get overwhelmed and I have to fall back on a save, but I am not always sure how many actions.and what are influencing the events I observe - for instance, I wonder if some of the actions do not originate in me clearing the FoW? The terrain colors are also particularly hard on my eyes, but that's just a quibble. When I used to play DOOM/Quake I always had to turn the Gamma way up.

Or... I can just choose a different map.

I'm with you on this idea. :)

[D0m0nik]

Totally stuck and totally frustrated with this level, I just cant get the balance right to be ale to get close to the centre. After 1.5 hrs i was fully upgraded and had just 3 blasters and a couple of reactors, one on nearest PZ but no chance of getting close enough to nullify the middle.
I didn't bother with the top half of the map, do you need to defeat it to take the centre?

[stdout]

My score was around 2.5 hours and I did take the entire map before attempting the center. I'd suggest you do the same. That way you're not being bothered with extra stuff coming at you from the north. The center takes some doing and you'll need all hands on deck for that part of the mission.