Today we have a special feature: an interview with Rising_Dusk! Dusk is a veteran Warcraft modder, known particularly for his two AoS projects: Advent of the Zenith (AotZ) and Desert of Exile (DoE), as well as his infamously difficult dungeon crawler Obsidian Depths.

His maps have had a dedicated following over the years in the form of Clan VZ, and are easily some of the most polished AoS around. Below we discuss some of his design influences and goals, as well as his perspective on the genre today.

Risin

Battle for Icecrown is another "old school" classic. It was notably selected by Blizzard as one of their spotlight maps, and is the only AoS I'm aware of to date which explored implementing a dynamic terrain.

Rather than the usual river and pair of opposing towers, the middle lane in Icecrown sports six large platforms which periodically raise and lower, changing the layout of the lane. Despite sounding complicated, it's really just switching between two configurations every minute, but this has some interesting consequences for gameplay.

Enmity Campaign is a classic example of the "old school" style of AoS seen around 2004-2006. Hero design was just blooming into a worthwhile pursuit, and most modders were anxious to try new things. Enmity certainly went the distance, with adjustments to the usual formula on almost every front.

Aeon of Strife is the original Starcraft map which inspired the lane-pushing game genre. Feast your eyes on the battleground where it all began.

A consistent favourite of public players, Age of Myths is a 6v6 AoS with a central focus on hero versus hero combat. It is notable for having heavily scripted custom heroes, along with some of the flashiest spell effects in the genre.  

Land of Legends is an AoS most notable for its innovative hero classification system. Each hero in LoL has a class (Melee/Ranger/Caster) which restricts the items they can buy. Items sell for 100% of their cost, which makes switching item build or 'upgrading' items easy to do at any point in the game. The four main item groups are below:

Note: a more refined version of this system is used in Age of Myths. This older implementation is written up for historical accuracy.

• Misc: These items can be picked up by any hero class.
  • Basic stat increases like agi/int/str, regeneration, movement

Hands of Sorrow Knight took a very liberal approach to hero customisation. This is the primary feature of the game, and the procedure for picking and customising a hero is quite elaborate.

I'll describe each step in full below:

1. Choose one of 50 basic heroes. Each hero comes with a unique innate ability. In some game modes, duplicate heroes are allowed.
2. Choose one of 36 offensive active abilities. They are not removed from the pool after selection.
3. Choose one of 36 supportive active abilities.They are not removed from the pool after selection.
4. Choose two of 8 hero powers. The 8

This article is about ability resources: a type of mechanic which a moba designer can use to direct when a player should use their hero's abilities.

If an ability is free, a player will use it in every situation where it is beneficial (or at least, more beneficial than attacking, which is also free). It is usually more elegant to make this kind of ability passive or toggled.

Active abilities on the other hand should have some kind of cost. Cooldowns create what's called an opportunity cost: the cost of using an ability now is that it can't be used later. Cooldowns are widespread and with

The Great Strategy was one of the first AoS maps to take a hands-off approach to hero design. The premise was that heroes start with a single innate ability, and players can buy and upgrade the rest of their kit by spending a special resource called Ability Points, gained primarily by leveling up, but also by killing enemy players.

Abilities are divided into four types:

• Innate abilities come with your hero, and have no leveling or interaction with the AP system.
• Standard abilities cost 2 AP per level (max of 10 levels), and heroes can have at most three.
• Special abilities cost 5 AP (only

Now is a really nice time to be reviewing Megalith, because development was recently picked up again. Megalith's landscape is intricate and lovingly detailed, partly because the game was designed to be played with a third-person camera, making it the first third-person moba!

Unfortunately, Warcraft as a game engine offers very limited support for alternative camera modes, so often players would switch back to the standard overhead camera after the game started, but third-person was the default option for new players.

In support of a realistic third-person view, the buildings and