Warcraft III Map Tools

What Warcraft III Map Tools does

The Warcraft III Map Tools MCP server gives AI applications structured access to Warcraft III map archives in .w3x and .w3m formats. It supports read-only inspection, behavioral audits, comparisons, and selected edits. The implementation is designed to preserve the bytes of files that are not changed.

Use it to inspect internal archive entries, read text files, check import-table consistency, list forces and cameras, examine hero registrations, and review World Editor catalog data. Audit tools cover map object data, hero ability wiring, deeper ability runtime chains, readiness, and fidelity of ported objects. Other tools compare maps, recover names from protected archives, and report differences between map versions.

Write operations can add, remove, or update cameras; change force flags; install hero definitions; replace an internal file from disk; and save the result to a separate output path. Reforged doctor tools inspect compatibility and can repair a copy of a map for Reforged 3.0.

How it works

The Warcraft III Map Tools MCP server runs as a standard stdio MCP process. An MCP client starts wc3-mcp.exe without arguments and sends tool calls over the MCP connection. Each map-editing operation takes an input map and an out_path for the edited result where applicable, rather than requiring an in-place modification.

The server is based on the wc3ctl project and exposes the same MCP server available through wc3ctl mcp serve. Its release includes the required .NET runtime. Base-game asset and catalog operations can use Warcraft III Reforged data; ordinary map operations do not require the game to be installed.

Setup and configuration

The supported runtime is 64-bit Windows. The installer can download the latest release, verify its SHA-256 checksum, place it under %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\wc3-mcp, add the directory to the user PATH, and configure supported AI applications. A manual ZIP installation can be completed with wc3-mcp.exe install --all. The same commands can update or remove the setup.

The Warcraft III directory is searched automatically through the Windows registry and several standard installation paths. Set WC3_GAME_DIR during client setup when the game is installed elsewhere, or pass game_dir to an individual tool call. A per-call game_dir takes precedence over the environment setting and automatic detection.

Claude Desktop users can install the Windows .mcpb package. Other supported setup commands configure Claude Code, Cursor, VS Code, Windsurf, Gemini CLI, Codex CLI, Cline, LM Studio, and Zed. Other MCP applications can start the executable directly as a stdio server.

Tools and capabilities

The available tools include:

• Inspecting archive entries, internal text files, imports, forces, cameras, hero rosters, and World Editor catalogs.
• Listing valid icon and model asset paths from imported map files and base-game data.
• Auditing object data, hero wiring, ability chains, runtime readiness, and port fidelity.
• Comparing maps or map versions, including added, removed, and changed internal files.
• Listing or bundling unit dependencies for porting work.
• Adding, removing, or modifying cameras and force alliance or sharing flags.
• Installing and linting hero definitions.
• Replacing internal file bytes and repairing a copy for Reforged 3.0.

Limitations and notes

The Warcraft III Map Tools MCP server requires 64-bit Windows because its game-data reader uses a Windows library. Reforged is required for operations that read base-game data, such as some asset or catalog lookups; map tools can run without it.

The supplied material describes 105 tools, but the available listing excerpt does not show every tool. Write tools should be directed to an output path or a copy when preserving the source map matters. Source builds require the .NET 8 SDK, and CascLib.dll must remain beside the executable.