build 0866 - January 17, 2018

Finally a build that is quite polished and less buggy.  I have made some big changes under the hood, but it should work the same way overall.

So what's new in this build?  Cat will now receive some free spells randomly after 6 minutes, give me feedback on this please.  Thanks as always.

Build 0866 Change log:

Cool! Can't wait to try this out.

Before having played with the random spell mechanic, these thoughts come to mind:
1) Deepens tactical skill in the game because you have to handle all spells well, not just play/counter a single minded strategy.
2) Introduces a more significant random element into the game. Competitively minded people may not necessarily like it, but games like Hearthstone seem to do very well with it, and it might add fun and variety to the game.
3) Might reduce cat strategic skill depth if you're just waiting for the random spells rather than having to make a tough decision between upgrades and spells.

Your probabilities seem to add up to 64/64, so you're guaranteed something. What is the probability of nothing? Or do you mean the spell that is supposed to help you out doesn't fire because (say) you'd get a tweety but you already have a tweety?

The probability of nothing is 192/256, I have added 2 more switches to decrease all random chances by 8 times.

I have an idea that I'd like to run by you. What would the game feel like if we had cat compensation (with the squaring per player based on their income) control the frequency and quality of random spells?

One thing that bugged me about cat compensation is that it kind of devalues the game of getting kills to improve your income to get upgrades. In vT and vM it somtimes feels like the overwhelming majority of cat's income comes from compensation so we lost an important game mechanic. It's no longer as important to make sure you don't feed the cat and for cat to stay active - since the income is coming from compensation anyway.

If compensation was in the form of spells, we would have - through spells - the control on difficulty to balance the game. At the same time, it keeps staying active as cat and not feeding cat as important as it was before. In my opinion a huge improvement on the compensation idea.

If I code something up based on this, what would the chances be of making it into the official version? What do you think of the idea of having the randomness be still random, but guided a little by mice income?

Yeah I was thinking something similar and it all goes down to the question, how prosper Mice r in the game.

Regarding to cat compensation, I guess we r still figuring out how cat should be rewarded. Right now we have :
1. Mice death in proportion to Mice vs Cat skills
2. Cat killing units n buildings in proportion to Mice vs Cat skills
3. Mice income rate in inverse proportion to Mice vs Cat skills
4. Random cat spell, mostly random

Although I like how the randomness help freshening up the game, but it doesn't help the core issue where we r still looking for the delegate of how cat income should be based/governed.

Clearly, on one hand we have the argument that Cat should be compensated based on the skillset and effort that carry had in a particular game. On the other hand cat needs to receive some help when Mice is to powerful. These two aspects don't really agree w each other and I'm not sure if they r compliment to each other... But if they r complimenting then u guys we can find a balance.

That got me into thinking how Mice is quite balanced in the map... Mice income is derived based on 3 factors:
1. How good and how fast the Mice player is
2. How well other Mice players are doing, in terms of occupying the Cat
3. How well Cat is occupying this particular Mice player

Being a pro for #1 is directly reflected in how well Mice player can build up economy and evade deaths, which economy allows better upgrades, better walls (thus even better economy if bases are available nearby), which in turns better units to combat Cat's invasion and eventually leads to Cat's death.

#2 only contributes into how prosper Cat is. This is part of the balancing we're focusing on from the Cat's perspective.

#3 is the area where I feel we should focus more on. Cat's ability to occupy as many players as possible is quite limited, given there can only be 1 Cat (without deaths) and the need to harass more players at the same time increases as time goes on. StupidFred reminded me of the Mouse Poison spell, which would certainly harass players. Also, the newly introduced Random Cat spell also contributes to this area as well.


Back to #2, I think with more balancing and changes we're putting into how Cat is played, #3 affects #2 in terms of deaths. For every change we introduced into the map, Mice needs to have a counter that they can buy with economy, which is attainable by being good at building up economy. Currently, attack units (especially Hero attack units) with moderate upgrades, with storm from Jason and high HP of Devin, these are our counters for Cat's attack units.


Which leads back to #1, how Mice uses their money. Currently, Shield upgrade is more expensive but faster. This serves pretty well imho that, Mice with better economy (especially since there is a finite number of bases) can afford putting top dollar on high upgrades while spending $ to fend off/kill Cat. Since the upgrades and units are used to serve as a deterrence to Cat's attack units, Cat's attack units should be relatively cheap, quite readily available (though not as affordable as expendable), and will need comparable upgrades.


Combining all 3 will lead to the direction where, Cat attack units should be cheap with relatively low HP (not too low that storm can 1-hit kill the unit), Cat spells are used to keep Mice busy but shouldn't kill Mice directly, Cat upgrades be available, and income looks like it should be based on how well Cat occupies Mice and how badly Mice keep Cat at bay. What's your thoughts?

Ultimately the compensation system in vMx and vT1 is an attempt to make games less one-sided and feel meaningful even if there's a large skill differential between the players. Or say if specifically there is one mouse player that is really good and just defends everyone else. I don't like to describe it as a handicap system but that's essentially what it is. Like a single player game might increase the difficulty and spawn more monsters if you were doing too well, cat n mouse jungle can spawn more random cat spells if mice are doing very well.

Too much to take in for me right now. I'll dissect later, but I'm just happy that I'm in the forum and Random CnM Jungle lives on! Keep up the builds!

Excuse me, Classic CnM Jungle. Hehe... Good ol days of Random CnM Jungle...

Hey beBoy. Made any progress or been busy outside of SC? I haven't really had too much time for games with finals coming up, but I have found Fortnite to be fun because of the buliding aspect reminding me of CnM. Hopefully you've been doing well

Hey WhySoSerious, I have been in and out of SC2 lately, sometimes with SimonOrJ to play some KerriganSurvival2, a somewhat CatNMouse type map. I have signed onto BW sometimes, only to see that it's nearly a ghost town (especially U.S. East), makes me sad.

Yeah, I heard many good things about Fortnite, is it free to play?

Yeah BW is still dead even after the release of Remastered, which is really sad. It's even more sad when the game is free to play (considering you don't need to actually get Remastered) and still nobody plays it.

It is free to play! I love the building aspect to defend as well as go on the offensive to get the high ground and the drop on your enemy. That aspect reminds me of CnM the most, but it is obviously a bit different being a third person shooter lol. You can play in squads (4 players) or duos with friends, or you can play singles where it is a battle royale, so the last man/team standing wins.

There should be a way for auto-saved mice to save other mice... maybe after a time limit or if the auto-saved mouse is the last one standing.

Interesting scenario. Yes, it would suck not being able to save an army of dead mice when you're the only one left...

I think switching it to be time-limit would fix that.