You know that big red one with the wide, flat roof, that one... (I once built a radar up there...) -Sheepe
First: Holy crap. I love this map. I haven't played it, but I like the city, and I like fighting through various enviroments (the dam). Few things though: Lol, for hosting, look above your thread! http://empires.cw-hosting.net/showthread.php?t=399 Also, you showed where drivable vehicle paths were, and you drew through the water. Is it really that shallow? Because if you can just drive across the map, that kinda ruins it. I like the city chokepoint and the dam chokepoint. Only if MAYBE the map can be too easily controlled, should there be another path through the middle. If so, I suggest a buildable wooden bridge! Small enough to where only med tanks can go through, but it stretches from one side of the pond/lake to the other.
Yes, you can drive through the water, as well as build bases on the lake, but nobody has seemed to employ either. The strategic disadvantage of both is that attacking uphill is generally a losing scenario. The team uphill has great shots at the team downhill. Also the downhill team has a hard time getting back up the hills. This is really something that has fascinated me throughout the testing period. The gameplay is simply people competing for the 4 corners (each corner has two res nodes). Nobody cares about the lake and it keeps its functionality. Thank you for bringing this up btw I was hoping someone would figure it out I mean the minimap has those shallow paths in the water for a reason... Oh and sheepe you can get up on top of that roof, just not on the VERY top. I guess I thought it would be cool to have a roof over the roof :/
Yes that is actually like the third compile of emp_cyclopean. Very early stages screenshot. (Hadn't set up hammer for empires yet)
I played this map on a maptest server and it was good. Only sudgestion I woul make is to free the city up just a little bit, everybody was moving through there to get to the enemy, which is fine but there was almost NO room to build any sort of base with a barracs (sp?) in, it was really crammed, and even if you just want people to not build there at all, they will and it's just a pain. Otherwise it is fairly good.
Well, I played it for the first time, and maybe it was that there were only (at most) 5 people in the server at one time....i don't know... here: The game started out with me on NF and 2 people on BE, and so I used turrets to replace the numbers. But since the turrets were on a hill (The NF base is higher then the area surrounding it) they were easy targets. Even though they were Lvl 3, they could be shot without being able to return fire. In fact, because of the map's scale and long roads, any turrets I made were pretty much useless, except for the ones I built as an engy in certain spots. Me and Blitz ended up moving to the Northwest (at one point in the game we controlled the Northwest, the Main NF base, the Islands, and we cleared out the city). Our Island base was easily destroyed by Arty, all the defenses and walls we built stopping the enemy to the right of our main base (in beteween the base and the city) were just destroyed because they could stay out of range on that long road. We had turrets on top of the walkways near the exits out of our base, because I remember that was added in for extra defense, but they did nothing. After moving to the Northwest, at first it was easy to defend but with limited room to build, being cramped, and only 2 people, we eventually lost. I'd like to play it with real numbers, to see if that improves the gameplay, but if it doesn't then I'm not sure what to do...
I agree completely. The one thing I have noticed about the gameplay on this map is that both teams simply try to capture and hold the four strategic corners. Who holds these corners seems to shift ALOT during gameplay, not only on small servers but also on large ones, and though im not entirely sure why, I know it must depend on how the map is designed. Basically, I think the reason it shifts so much is exactly what you said Bojangles. The map is extremely large and as a result of that and how wide open all of the fighting is, there is really very little struggle. Instead of chokepoints and struggles and battles the map is basically an insane mishmash of different fights all around the map. Sure the turrets arent as effective, but in alot of wide open maps like duststorm and the what not... even a light tank with no upgrades can outsnipe a level three turret... you just gotta be good. Plus it helps when there are only four people in the server. :p I think the gameplay mechanics will be a bit more interesting with 16 + people on this map AT LEAST.
I like how in the city you can build an entire base, a still have plenty of spare room... plus the 3 dimensionality of it -Sheepe
personally I think this map is good enough to be official, it is certainly better than a few of the official ones out there has a much more varied enviroment btw it was me who beat Mr. Bojangl3s in the game he mentions Personally I think the artillery problem happens in all empires maps and not just this one so I wouldn't worry about that btw good work, I don't think it should be changed much, its a lot of fun as it is erm one suggestion ...maybe make the water more transparent so I can get a better idea of where the shallow water is and lighten the shallow water a little more on the minimap plz
Monkey, IMO this is one of the few maps where a simple tank can arc shots into a base and get any building destroyed, without the people inside the base ever seeing the tank. And when they go to defend, they can easily be spotted by the tank or its friends because there is a limited area the people in the base can leave (without jumping off the wall).
Well, I just had this huge response typed out but then, my power went out... while I was compiling!! But I think it went something like this: You have to forgive Monkey, Bojangles, as he has prooven exceedingly ruthless on this map if my memory serves me correctly. He may have even played the map more than I have. Yes, I agree completely, a base can be easily crushed by a convoy of tanks coming from either the city, or the dam or mountainous warpath. However, I think its quite difficult for tanks to come up the grade from the lake and fire into the enemy base. The elevation change from 'lake level' and the top of the land (not the top of the mountains) is an easy 1500-2000 units depending on what part of it you are looking at. I think this is what makes the map unique. You can position your tanks for maximum efficiency, and I believe that because of the fact that most servers that play this map have 2-4 people in them, everyone has the freedom to make a badass tank and go drive it wherever they want to and blow the other team up. Basically, I think the gameplay will run alot smoother with no less than 16 players.
The only problem I see with streetlights is that they would hinder the building of structures inside of the city.
