emp_atomic is now available

The infantry upper level in blue is not present on your map.

 

That's because I didn't post the other half of the diagram, it runs over the admin roof and in two lines into the generator room and the train depot.

I'm going to knock holes between filtration and administration, and speed up transit between the core and filtration. Combine that with a more solid connection between basin and administration, and you should end up with a nice line of flags between northwest and southeast, but with the additional option of attacking from the side via your main base, or going for the enemy main base and cutting them off. Should help getting it more towards SOF-style 'encouraged focus' as it was a bit too mobile in the test. I was expecting people to do that already and they were trying to, so it almost worked, but I could add a bit more incentive and fix the basin which should make it work better.

 

Asserting that I'm unfamiliar with your map. I have said nothing that supports this claim. Its a false assertion, you should've known better than to argue on the basis that I don't know what I'm talking about. We can argue complexity all day long, but we probably just disagree on the criteria of complexity. I'm not sure what your comparison really establishes, other than that you like streetsoffire personally, and that it supposedly suffers the same flaws as your map. I can spend a while discussing streetsoffire with you, and derail the discussion by disagreeing on it, but I'll leave it for now.

Center_bottom room is indeed a very good example of only having one level. Administration building with the roof must be the second great example. What about the BE spawn area walk ways, is that also an example of "really only" having one level? You're being ambiguous on purpose, your skewed perception of your own map does not change anything. Theres more than one level. Either way, this argument is only directed towards the flaws of those specific areas, I never attributed it to the main concept of your map. It's just one of those things.

Base functionality like spawning and building vehicles? Armories, repair stations, radars? Nope sorry, you're completely wrong here. Duststorm allows you to build a base right next to theirs, spawning and constructing vehicles from there. Having an APC spawn on your map is not an equivalant. This is again a false assertion. I'm not even sure where in your logic you thought the comparison is between a refinery and a flag. You can't research on your map can you?

Want me to draw out a line from A to B on an open map and another in a maze-like map? False assertion. Other than that your map is nothing like duststorm, there is so much wrong with this argument that I'll leave it for what it is, false.

Straw man. Escort for instance, has spawns very close to action at every flag. The part where you have to "run around doing nothing" is when you spawn at the wrong spawn point. Suiciding solves this. Another example is district, not much running around there, unless you deliberately avoid action, which you can do by hiding in a corner. Other than that, no walking around "doing nothing". Commandetr maps have vehicles and buildings. You could buy a jeep or wait in base for a vf if you don't like walking around. False assertion.

Not sure what your point is, I only entered the elevator room twice myself. First time while the elevator was stuck, the second time I boarded the elevator to see where it would lead. I avoided it as well. You could be arguing that the elevator is bad design and that you did so intentionally, but I'm not sure how this serves your argument, it actually serves mine much better. You making novelty crap that creates bad gameplay and doesn't serve a good purpose, if any at all.

This paragraph right here proves your inability and lack of knowledge. You have no clue whatsoever, and your solutions are additions, while you should be subtracting. Common sense must be hard to come by.

I didn't confuse anything. Your actions speak for themselves. Argument from ignorance. Also confusing your personal opinion with veracity.

Then stop defending its gameplay and admit from the start you're just making a showcase map of extreme deviancy. Theres nothing wrong with that. I already made this point, you didn't need to explain yourself, it was very obvious, every area having a different feel, the awkward "artistic" lighting and everything. You should do what you like, but if you want to make a playable map, and improve its playability, you're approaching it the wrong way.

 

I enjoy all of them, and I would have liked to enjoy a good looking map like yours. I was one of the first pro-streetsoffire players and I suggested a lot of changes to Grizzly, I like it so much I even made props for his map, in the hopes that it would look better and people would like it more. I also think Crossroads is one of the best empires maps. As in, it works best for Empiresmod. You're assuming I'm not objective in the assessment of your map, either because I don't know it well enough, which is arguable if you take for granted that it hasn't been playtested enough, but once you go down this path of arguing, you will have to accept that you as well don't know the map well enough, even if you made it, since the premise is that it's not been playtested enough for us to know how it plays.

I never suggested I or anyone here is authority, I was implying authority as an entity that can teach you the finer details of level design, like a professional level designer, or some kind of guideline. As it is apparant that you break, either intentional or unintentional, most of the basic rules of good level design. My assumption here is actually about giving you the benefit of the doubt. As in, you seem like someone intelligible enough to have atleast read one or 2 blogs on level design, but simply choose to ignore them. I've seen some of your creative solutions and commend you for it. It was purely speculative in the sense that I believe that this is your main problem, you overestimate your talents/skills/experiences to a point where you jump into level design and do the process completely intuitively. Without considering known and proven methods. Other than that, I can suggest you things you should change, but thats not the point of this discussion, the list would be far too long, and convincing you is a waste of time, considering your lack of knowledge.

This probably isn't directed to me, I never said either, but I will comment on it. Your highly opinionated and false asserted drivel has failed at addressing my arguments. For me this is actually a very disappointing argument since you're so full of yourself that you fail to identify and assess my position.

 

I'm not making a showcase map, I'm making a map I like. Putting detail and 'artsy' lighting and different visual themes isn't the focus of the map, it's just what I do. I do that automatically.

Like I said, I enjoyed the test, which is surprising as I generally have no interest in playing my own maps. I don't think it really needs much changing, from what I saw in the test it's almost working, just needs a few bits and bobs adding.

Also would you knock the constant insults on the head please? If you need someone to scream at I'd prefer it not be me.

 

you're confusing cause and effect. You're making a map you like and it is obvious because of the detail and artsy lighting. Look at my original statement:

I'm glad for you that your map got tested, hurray for you.

 

I simply don't agree, I am quite sure only a few small changes are neccesary. Once they're in it should work very well. A few strategically placed holes in some of the walls and you should get a much faster map with more focus in the middle.

 

You're changing the subject again, and you don't even really know what you're disagreeing with. It's pretty pathetic really, you've talked down on people like mootant, saying they should stick to coding. I won't quote it, but you know what I'm talking about.

And here we are, discussing level design, and you can't seem to refute a single argument, or even form a good argument on anything.

Keep changing the subject, throwing red herrings and straw man, giving your baseless opinion and nonsense preference. It just strengthens the claim you have no place telling anyone, that they don't know what they're talking about.

You can disagree all you like, but you'll still be wrong.

Everyone can play Minecraft, very little people can design levels properly. You belong in the former, the latter is out of your reach.

 

I never thought I would say that but I totaly agree with mootant on this topic.

 

I'm not changing the subject, I'm saying I don't agree with you, I could explain exactly why I don't but you don't seem particularly interested in it, so I'm not going to.

You are writing paragraphs which are about 50-70% composed of you telling me I am a worthless human being, this is not really refutable, because it isn't an argument, it's an insult.

 

Yeah I would actually have put CVs in but hidden in a box somewhere off map, but I couldn't think of a simple and effective way to make them accessible. The map would benefit from a commander, but it would probably be a bit boring, and honestly a good comm can direct his team with a mic anyway. Trickster sort of took command of our team and it definitely helped, so yeah try doing that, it's a good idea.

It would support a commander mostly, at least outside of the buildings, but it's just finding a way to get people into it when they want. Best idea I could think of was having team-specific teleporters rigged up to little computers in all the bases which teleport them into the commander room for their team, and the exit button kills you. But that would be hacky as hell.

Hopefully the changes should make it more about the middle area, less running around capping flags and more direct routes to the middle.

 

You can try to bend it any way you like, but they are two different subjects. One involves your motivation, the other involves the playability of your map.

So either you don't agree on anything, or you agree on that I said it was unplayable. Which means you are in fact changing the subject.

I'm telling you you're worthless? I do recall you calling Grantrithor literally that. Remember? It was in the thread where you had this "holier-than-thou" syndrome.

Now, although I will admit that the personal rebukes were without tact. They're nowhere near 50-70%, the last few posts are statistically the majority of my paragraphs, and they're packed with falsifiable arguments.

Also, if anyone wants to make a bet with me on whether Chris can fix his map, I'm up for it. Anyone?

 

Hey dizzy and aaaa, you guys are getting off topic. If you have problems with dizzy's posts, as he said, there is the report function, as well as a PM system.

If chris wants the discussion to end, he can PM a moderator and ask for the thread to be locked, or he can ask for dizzyone to be removed from the thread. At that point it's up to the moderators.

I haven't played the map yet myself, but here is some response to the criticism:

Flags that have no purpose other than to be captured should not be on the minimap at all. This will prevent people from going to them to capture them if they serve no real purpose.

Honestly, I would stick some more spawn points in certain areas. Add an upstairs room or basement that serves no purpose and add the spawn points there. Make it easy to camp so that one team can force the other team to spawn further back.

If possible, have the diagram that you showed as the minimap rather than a picture of the overview. Possibly even have a picture with full bright or all ground surfaces changed to a dev texture. Dark maps need as much to distinguish different paths as possible, and a simplified minimap will serve a much greater purpose than a minimap of a dark map that you can't see anyhow.

Label what the flag does in the flag name. Make the cap point called [Bleeder Flag, .1 tickets a second] or something informative like that.

Add in some uncappable cap zones with unique names or some way to distinguish an area. It will make it simpler to give your position if the area you are in has a name, and especially if it's at the bottom of the screen as you run into the area.

For those naming conventions, I would suggest using what people start calling it in game. If they come up with unique names for areas in game that people understand, use those.



The map may be complex, but I think if you put quite a bit of extra effort into giving areas something more recognizable like the name of it in an uncappable box around the area, or possibly a unique color scheme for each section, it would greatly assist in making the map much easier to follow. Adding in spawn points are a great way to focus the action around the map, as well as giving teams targets to aim for. I'm not talking about the flags, I'm talking about camping outside spawn points waiting for people to try and come out. The flags won't be a focus if the spawn point is easy to cap. People will just cap the spawn until the other team stops spawning there. With how open the map is, I think adding 4-5 easily camped spawn points near flags will turn the game into something where the other team is forced to take alternate routes to regain the flag area because they can't get out of their spawn.

Moving objects with players suck with empires. The moving objects are server side and the player is client side. vehicles are server side so they work well with elevators. Just a thought.



Last thought: Maps that are cluster fucks aren't necessarily bad. Maps that are a single large clusterfuck are bad. If you can turn this into a map that has 5 simultaneous clusterfucks, it could work well. However, you need to focus it more by adding spawn points or something. I also thing that having a custom minimap rather than an overview shot will add a ton of simplicity to the map. Make it like a blueprint or something, like the yellow and red thing posted earlier.

 

After extensive discussion with various people about the map, I have decided to listen very carefully to my critics, and am pleased to announce a new direction in the map.

Instead of adhering to my previous design principles, which are clearly flawed, I instead intend to transform the map in a new and exciting direction. I will henceforth be removing all of the superfluous and unneccesary interconnections between the areas of the map, and instead will be focussing the map into a long, winding route. The route will be dotted with plenty of flags along the way, because as observed on maps like district and urbanchaos, lots of flags every few meters = better gameplay.

I am also getting rid of the core room, it is unneccesary eye candy and detracts from the gameplay of the map, I'm also removing a lot of the unneccesary details because I need the entity space for more flags.

I feel this will make the map much more dynamic and engaging, elevating it to a position where it is worthy of becoming an official map of a quality and popularity which may rival such maps as emp_slaughtered and emp_escort.

 

hahaha, good one chris, april fools


you taking criticism and all kinda blew it though

 

Knew it was april fools when I read "listen".

 

love how chris hugs the extreme

can only be 1 path or 12843 paths

 

More seriously, I talked it over with trickster and I figured out a way to add some more flags, hopefully without making the map too focussed on them, and also ways to improve player movement between a few areas, so it should work better. I'm going to start by adding four and cut it to two if that's too much, but we'll see. Mostly it should be the changes to the walls which make it work better though.

Need to finish the report though, so can't work on it for a while.

 

Meanwhile in gamingland, people are playing Simon's emp_forest on a regular basis.