Against the Darkness: 2.8a Final - Today's Pick

Full List of Updates:

1. Iced arrow no longer freezes the target unit every time but has a 15/30/45/60% chance to freeze it.
2. Iced arrow's freeze and Reversed Vampirism are now correctly blocked by Warriors Bracer's spell shield.
3. Reversed Vampirism duration reduced to 10/13/16/19 seconds and cooldown increased to 35/38/41/44 seconds.
4. Correct amount of HP healed showed with Reversed Vampirism.
5. Drop rates have been lowered for Deathly Hand of Shadows, Dagger of Unholy Lust, and Sky-Iron Helm.
6. DM: Hero count fixed in All Random.
7. DM: Battle Arena victory fixed (no idea how it became disabled).
8. DM: Carrion Lord now removed after his quest has been completed.

Contents:

I.About the Game
II. Doom
III. Influences
IV. Game Systems
V. Heroes
VI. Shops
VII. Quests
VIII. Game Modes
IX. Items

I. About the Game: Against the Darkness is a Hunter vs. Hunted Survival game, but with a rather original twist. In the beginning of the game, the Death Knight is stronger than any single Death Hunter, or all of them put together for that matter. He can easily eradicate any Hunter that crosses his path, and will do so without remorse. However, as time progresses the Death Knight soon becomes the hunted as the Death Hunters become more powerful. If the Death Hunters kill the Death Knight, they win the game. If the Death Knight kills all of the Death Hunters, he wins the game.

In a Nutshell: The objective of the Death Hunters is to band together to defeat the Death Knight by growing stronger together through creeping and buying items. The objective of the Death Knight is to kill all of the Death Hunters before they become strong enough to defeat him.

II. Doom At the end of the 23 minutes normal game time, if the Death Knight is still alive, and he has not killed all the Hunters thus far, Doom will initiate. If you have ever played Darwin's Island, Doom may look familiar to you in a way. This phase of the game provides the Death Knight several armies of Necrofiends and Nether Walkers spread throughout the map, aiding him further in finally defeating the Hunters once and for all. Though this will give the Death Knight an heavy advantage, it does not guarantee victory.


Doom, though tough, can be fought through by the Death Hunters if they have leveled sufficiently and collected/bought the correct items to aid them in battle. One strategy for Doom is to continuously run around the map, escaping the fiends, walkers, and the Death Knight... but this is very hard to do unless you are skilled enough to find short-opened paths. A second strategy is to one by one take out each army of fiends and walkers before the Death Knight has time to set them in motion, for the less armies he has, the better chance you have of outlasting the 7 minute Doom timer. A good strategy for the Death Knight to defeat the Death Hunters is to quickly corner them with mass units, giving them no chance of escape.

If any one Death Hunter outlasts the additional 7 minutes of Doom or destroys the Nether Portal, the entire force of Death Hunters win the game. At any time in the game the Death Knight is defeated, the Death Hunters win the game. At any time in the game there are no Death Hunters left alive, the Death Knight wins the game.

III. Influences The game is influenced by several styles of maps, one being the RPG. There are a few areas of the map where your Hero must be a certain level to enter. These areas have higher level creeps that drop better treasures and give more expensive bounties but in turn are very powerful. One of these areas is the Forest of Deception which requires your hero to be at least level 4 and another is the Sunchief's Camp which includes the heaviest creep camp in the game. You must be level 7 or higher to enter here, but the reward beyond this Razormane creep camp is far beyond worth the risk of getting there. Alas, most players will never make it this far, and it will serve as almost like a bonus area for intermediate level players.

Other types of maps that Against the Darkness draws influences from are Hunter vs. Hunted type maps such as Vampirism and Island Defense. Whereas the "Vampire" or the "Titan" are the ultimate evil force in these two types of maps, the Death Knight is the evil force that players must go up against in Against the Darkness. He is very powerful and can withstand dozens upon dozens of attacks from ill-equipped or low-level Death Hunters. As in the two previously mentioned maps there is a team that is devoted to stopping this ultimate evil Hero from his destiny, be it the Death Hunters in Against the Darkness. This team of professionally trained Hunters have been dispatched to a small village to prevent the Death Knight from opening a demonic portal and will do so at any cost, even if it means sacrificing themselves to ensure their victory.

IV. Game Systems Introduced in Version 2.67 is a Spectator System that allows for players who's Hero has been defeated in Death Match mode to continue to watch the rest of the game. The system does not allow the Observer to type, but does allow them to scroll through living Heroes by pressing the right arrow key. This system was designed to provide a way for defeated Players to be able to view the game without cheating through whispers or chat messages while waiting for a remake.



Respawn System: If you die during the first 8 minutes of the game to the Neutral Hostile creeps, you will respawn at 3/4 health after a 30 second wait. This applies for both the Death Knight and Death Hunters. If you die to your opposing team, however, you are dead for the entire game.

Votekick System: This system was developed specifically for AtD which allows for any player to initiate a votekick against another player whom they think is deserving of being removed from the game. If a player decides to launch this vote, every player aside from the player being kicked will be asked if that person should be kicked. If the number of "Yes" votes exceeds the number of "Required" votes, the player will be removed from the game.

Creep Respawning: An older system that has been around for a while in Against the Darkness is a creep respawn system, which respawns creeps across the map at pre-determined time intervals. This system is 100% leakless and lagless, efficiently redistributing creeps into the game without causing any disruptions to the gameplay.

V. Heroes At the beginning of the game, the Death Hunters are able to choose from 7 Heroes, while the Death Knight is, by default, given to the Death Knight. The Death Hunter Heroes include an Architect, Nature Mage, Frozen Archer, Scientist, Medicine Doctor, Battle Mage, and Hunter, each having their own set of specific abilities and traits. The maximum level for Heroes in the game is level 13, and only the Death Knight has 2 Ultimate Abilities. Each Player controls one (1) Hero for the entire game, but is also able to buy mercenaries and Architects can even train units to fight for them. If the Player's Hero is killed outside of the 8 minute respawn time window, or by the opposing team, the game is over for them and they are only able to stay and watch the rest of the game.

VI. Shops There are various shops for the Death Hunters in different locations around the map, one being the Dragon Merchant in the swamps, and another is the Totem of Riches which also regenerates mana. A Mercenary Chapel can be found in the middle of the town center which can be used by both sides, and also gives off a healing aura. The Death Knight's shop is the Obelisk of the Damned at the top left of the town center, and is invisible to all but the Death Knight. There are also two other shops located in other positions in the map that can be used by both sides as well--the Deceiver Shop of Commons and the Merchant Ship of Treasures (Ultimate and Elite items only.)

VII. Quests Ranging from an Elder Orc Farseer trying to find his lost wolf, to an Ancient Mariner who had his boat key stolen by a little runt of a kid, there are a few quests to be found in Against the Darkness. Each one is not something that will jump out at you, and instead you will have to find them on your own by walking up to them. Each quest, upon completion, will give due experience and gold as a reward, which can be very helpful to both the Death Hunters and Death Knight. There is one quest that can only be performed by Death Hunters, two that can only be performed by the Death Knight, and two that can be completed by either side.

VIII. Game Modes In Version 2.5, Against the Darkness branched out and implemented two new types of game modes, All Random (AR) and Death Match (DM), on top of the already popular Players Choose Heroes (PCH) mode. In All Random mode, the gameplay is exactly the same as in PCH spare the fact that Death Hunters will not get to choose their Heroes but instead will be randomly assigned them. Death Match mode on the other hand is not quite as simple.

In DM mode the Death Hunters have been called to the village to hunt the Death Knight, only to find out that the call was a fake. The Hunters soon suspect that one of them must have been behind the false alarm. No one can be trusted. Death Hunters have to fight in a Free For All battle against one another for 27 minutes of game play, being able to choose to have either a Half-Game or Full-Game respawn time for dying to another Death Hunter. At the end of the 27 minutes game time, the Death Hunters are all transported into a Battle Arena where they must fight each other to the death. There can be only one victor.

Report any bugs to 1)ark_NiTe@USEast or to the Against the Darkness forums at www.hiveworkshop.com.


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