A Warcraft III map editor designed to be driven by Claude Code as much as by hand.
wc3-forge is a native Warcraft III map editor (Go + TypeScript, single Wails binary) with an embedded MCP server. The GUI and Claude Code talk to the same editor session — every edit you make by hand can also be made by an agent, and vice versa, and they share one undo stack.
Status: alpha. Read+write across most surfaces, wired through both the GUI and MCP: placed units and doodads (move / rotate / scale, plus create + delete), terrain (tile + height), a full Object Editor for all 7 definition kinds (units, items, abilities, buffs, destructables, doodads, upgrades — read + write custom and stock objects), and a complete Trigger Editor (GUI tree + Monaco code view + WC3 IntelliSense + GUI→Lua/JASS codegen + native JASS-map editing + Convert-Map-to-Lua + Test Map). Older JASS maps open, edit, save, and Test Map directly — no conversion required. Maps save in place, including packaged .w3x / MPQ archives. Some rough edges remain.
Three steps. Windows is the primary, released platform; macOS is supported via build-from-source (no prebuilt macOS binary, and the in-app updater is Windows-only).
1. Install wc3-forge. On Windows, grab a release (installer or portable zip) or build from source. On macOS, build from source.
On Windows (PowerShell):
git clone https://github.com/StephenSHorton/wc3-forge
cd wc3-forge
wails buildThe binary lands at build/bin/wc3-forge.exe.
On macOS (one extra step for CascLib):
git clone https://github.com/StephenSHorton/wc3-forge
cd wc3-forge
./scripts/build-casclib-macos.sh # one-time: compiles libcasc.dylib into scripts/casclib/
wails buildThe bundle lands at build/bin/wc3-forge.app. CascLib is dlopen'd at
runtime via purego, so the .dylib must sit alongside the binary inside
the .app bundle; the darwin/* postBuildHook in wails.json copies it
in for you. The dylib is .gitignored — every dev machine builds its own.
The macOS build is arm64 by default (matches the host); cross-build with
wails build -platform darwin/amd64 after running the casclib script on
a matching arch.
2. Register the MCP server. The MCP server is built into the wc3-forge
binary — --mcp makes it run as an MCP stdio server (a thin proxy to a running
editor instance). No Node, no extra install: point Claude Code at the same
executable you launch.
On Windows (PowerShell), pointing at an installed/built binary:
claude mcp add wc3-forge --scope user -- "C:\Program Files\wc3-forge\wc3-forge.exe" --mcp
# or a local build:
claude mcp add wc3-forge --scope user -- "$PWD\build\bin\wc3-forge.exe" --mcpOn macOS:
claude mcp add wc3-forge --scope user -- "/Applications/wc3-forge.app/Contents/MacOS/wc3-forge" --mcp(--scope must come before --; everything after -- is the command Claude
launches.) Verify with claude mcp list — wc3-forge should show ✓ Connected.
Legacy / dev: the standalone Node server
The original MCP server still lives in mcp/ and is the source of truth
for the tool catalog (the Go --mcp mode embeds a catalog generated from it via
npm run gen:tools). To run it directly instead of --mcp:
cd mcp
npm install
npm run build
claude mcp add wc3-forge --scope user -- node "$PWD\dist\index.js"Both servers speak the identical wire protocol and tool set, and discover running editor instances the same way (per-pid lockfiles), so they're interchangeable.
3. Launch wc3-forge and talk to it. Open the editor (build/bin/wc3-forge.exe), load a map (File → Open Map…), then in Claude Code:
What's the current map?
> map_status → "Fountain of Manipulation", 184 units, 2031 doodads
Move the gold mine at position 0,0 to where the player 1 start location is.
> units_list → finds creation_number 17 (typeid 'ngol' at -512, 384, 0)
> camera_set_view → pans to confirm
> units_move → applied
Save it.
> map_save → ok
The Agent Console (Ctrl+` in the editor) streams every bridge call live — bridge_ping, units_move, map_save, durations, params, results. Use it to watch what an agent is doing in real time.
152 MCP tools across these surfaces (the tool reference walks through them by surface):
| Surface | Tools |
|---|---|
| Map lifecycle | map_open, map_close, map_status, map_save, map_new, map_save_as, map_extract_to_folder |
| Map info | map_info_get, map_info_set (name, author, description, suggested players, lua flag; TRIGSTR-aware on localized maps) |
| Placed units | units_list, units_get, units_move, units_rotate, units_scale, units_set_field, units_create, units_delete |
| Placed doodads | doodads_list, doodads_get, doodads_move, doodads_rotate, doodads_scale, doodads_create, doodads_delete |
| Regions | regions_list, regions_get, regions_create, regions_move, regions_resize, regions_rename, regions_delete |
| Start locations | start_locations_list, start_locations_create, start_locations_move, start_locations_delete |
| Terrain | terrain_get_tile, terrain_set_tile, terrain_paint_tile, terrain_set_height, terrain_brush_height, terrain_brush_cliff, terrain_brush_ramp, terrain_brush_water, terrain_swap_tileset |
| Object definitions (read + write, all 7 kinds) | objects_<kind>_list, objects_<kind>_get, objects_<kind>_set_field, objects_<kind>_create_custom, objects_<kind>_delete_custom, objects_<kind>_fields_meta for <kind> in units / items / abilities / buffs / destructables / doodads / upgrades, plus objects_convert |
| Gameplay constants | gameplay_constants_get, gameplay_constants_apply |
| Imports | imports_list, imports_add, imports_remove, imports_rename |
| Models / minimap | models_import (OBJ/glTF/STL → MDX), minimap_bake |
| Triggers | triggers_tree, triggers_get, triggers_add_gui, triggers_generate_script, triggers_convert_to_lua, triggers_test_map, … (full GUI tree + Monaco editor + GUI→Lua/JASS codegen + Convert-Map-to-Lua + Test Map) |
| Selection | selection_get, selection_set, selection_clear |
| View + camera | view_get_mode, view_set_mode, view_set_doodad_category_visible, camera_set_view |
| Window | window_set_title (label your instance so parallel agents are distinguishable) |
| History | history_undo, history_redo, history_list, history_begin_group, history_end_group, history_abort_group |
| Diagnostics | diagnostics_get, diagnostics_arm |
| Multi-instance | sessions_list, session_select (point Claude at one of several running wc3-forges) |
All entity tools speak game coordinates (origin at map center, units = WC3 world units). All mutations flow through the same history stack the GUI uses, so Ctrl+Z in the editor undoes Claude's edits and vice versa.
You can run several wc3-forges at once — the bridge picks an unused port and each writes its own per-pid lockfile at ~/.wc3-forge/mcp/<pid>.lock. sessions_list enumerates them; session_select pins subsequent tool calls to one. Use window_set_title to label them so parallel agents can tell instances apart at a glance.
wails build
build/bin/wc3-forge.exe is the output. The postBuildHooks entry in wails.json copies the vendored CASC DLLs next to the binary so it's self-contained.
- Go backend + Svelte / TypeScript frontend in one Wails binary; frontend bundle embedded via
go:embed. - Two control surfaces, one editor: the GUI and the MCP bridge both mutate the same
forge.Sessionand emit the same change events. Adding a feature usually means adding it on both surfaces at once. - 3D rendering uses mdx-m3-viewer at the low level (MDX skeletal animation, BLP/DDS, batch shaders); terrain, cliffs, water, sky, and start-location markers are drawn by our own WebGL shaders layered into the same scene.
- Asset resolution is map-first, then CASC (Reforged/Classic install). Maps can override stock textures by importing files at the CASC path. Set
WC3FORGE_WC3_PATHto point at a non-default install. - Multi-instance is a primary use case: lockfile-per-pid, MCP
session_selectto pin, the OS window title carries the PID + a free-form agent label.
JSON-RPC 2.0 over TCP, NDJSON-framed on 127.0.0.1. Per-pid lockfile at ~/.wc3-forge/mcp/<pid>.lock (override with WC3FORGE_MCP_LOCK_DIR). Every request carries params._token matching the lockfile token.
wc3-forge is an independent Go reimplementation that draws heavily on HiveWE (Stijn Herfst, GPL-3.0) for WC3 file-format details, terrain/cliff/water rendering logic, and the MCP bridge wire contract. Source files note specific ports inline; see CREDITS.md for the full attribution.
GPL-3.0-or-later. See LICENSE.