I made this map by building on emp_displacementgrid (I hope that's what it's for). BTW, how do you go about making cliffs like emp_canyon? That will look way better than just walling off the map with steep slopes like I currently have it.
emp_canyon has ugly cliffs basically its the same as floors like you did but only the displacements have to be facing sidewards
yes the emp_displacement grid was for you to use in building your map. You might want to just jump on vent if you have anymore questions like this, would be much quicker response and we can give you tips on things your probably not even aware of at this time.
Be sure to add the emp_restrict_mayama entity, or people will get headaches each time a server loads your map with Mayama in Spectator.
The map currently has one buildable vehile bridge and two indestructable infantry bridges. Currently trying to decide what to fill all of the flat space with, then where to put the res nodes. Oh, and blizzerd, is that nico robin in your sig?
i dunno, nico robin looks like a cowboy to me also put some useless buildings in the map to break up the openness, something like mayan temples or something
Try and anticipate where players will be drawn to in early game and when vehicles start to deploy. Usually, after the map has been played a few times, most players will know where valuable and important parts are and where the major battles and stalemates will be. These places should not be too easy or to hard to defend, or the map will become boring as each team immediately heads for the same areas every time. There should be a balance of places in the map where infantry have advantage over tanks and tanks have advantage over infantry. Direct lines of fire to the enemy base can have a really negative effect on a map, when tanks can rush directly across the map into a base. Tanks or infantry alone should not have an advantage on the map in general. Restrict engineer walls and possibly turrets in certain parts of the map to reduce choke points and prevent nadespam stalemates, but make sure to leave plenty of spaces all over the map for barracks and armories. Good classic maps seldom are settled by ticket wars. If the nearest place for a rax is 20 seconds walk from an anticipated battlefield, it can make an assault significantly harder, enough to change the balance of the map. Also, symmetry =/= balance. Perfectly symmetrical maps like crossroads are ugly and monotonous, also they really magnify things like skill stacks, where one team will win overwhelmingly just because they have a lot of players who have played your map a thousand times over, and symmetry also magnifies the unbalance between the teams, like the NF LT, the BE APC nadespam, or the HE/UML mark IIs. Good examples are maps like Emp_Slaughtered or Emp_Research which are far from symmetrical but have equal gameplay from both factions' perspective. As for mapping: If you're using a lot of displacements, use the DW button in the top toolbar to see what slopes players can climb and what slopes they will slide down. And if there are any displacement faces that are relatively flat, you can save a little bit of resources and turn them into power 2 displacements. Make sure to re-sew with neighboring displacements though. Also I have a few beach textures I used for a map a long time ago that i never released, and they would probably be useful to you. PM me and I can give you them.
last thing, I would suggest making the map go all the way to the edge with it, and then have that beach be in the 3d skybox. Other than that, I think it has quite a bit of potential. Just need to work on predicting the gameplay, and adjusting the map accordingly.
I've added some hills but I'm trying to figure out how to prevent them from looking flat. Does simply compiling with full lighting solve the problem or should I get more creative with textures (like I'm currently doing)
Right. I once played a map similar in design to this and it was horrible. Everyone went straight for the enemy com, if you didn't you lost. thus. The penisulars at the ends are far away, with a hurt in the middle of the water (drownin'). The first crossing is a bridge, passable by vehicles, difficult to attack, easy to defend. At the NW are all refs take the main base ones. The ground is ruff so no building except in small deliberate sectors. Should be room for the odd armoury elsewhere perhaps. the south islands are connected by a tidal barriar thing (purpose of the conflict, as omni always tells us) with a 2x ref in the middle. Buildables to allow tanks, either segments of the barriar itself or some ramps or something. Easiest route to get to the enemy. In start bases there are a couple of level 2s to stop early rushes.
I like that one rofl. Anyhow, a good way to go with maps like this is to have the 2 main bases have 2 directions to attack from, both relatively equal time to travel to, but one be infantry travel and 1 be tank travel. then make the infantry side difficult to assault with tanks due to terrain problems (in rofl's example, water). Say it takes 30 seconds to run into enemies on foot between the two bases, then i should take about 30 seconds for tanks to run into eachother when going around the water. I really do like it when maps put bases close together but separated by some form of natural barrier, because they tend to offer quite a bit more options to fight, and tanks aren't the only method. but tanks also gain a ton of fighting ground. the most important thing is to make sure it doesn't take 5 minutes just to run wherever you need to go, as that first 5 minutes where no one fights is rather pointless. Don't feel bad about streamlining the gameplay by placing that barracks that will inevitably be placed by both teams at the start. 2 barracks isn't horrible.
What if I had one fast route between the comms that didn't have any resources along it so that you had to decide between attacking and resource management?
NO. ABSOLUTELY NOT. NO. As I said, anyone with a brain will instantly attack the com. You don't decide between attacking the com, or as it's more commonly known, 'winning', and getting resources. That's just stupid.
nah, you give a point inbetween the base that is the same distance as driving around, so that when you don't have vehicles you don't have to walk for 5 minutes to get to the front of the battle field. I would say the general idea in rofl's post is great, but that bridge in the middle of the lake would need to be destructable or buildable and not built upon start, because given the choice to try and kill the enemy base and take refineries, most tanks will just skip refineries and attack the main base. I think it would be better to force them to go the long way around.
what about have it buildable, but with permanent bunkers on either side, which are flags in the same way as slaughtered's towers - IE an armoury. As far as forcing tanks far north or far south, yeah, would probably be best. Just put tank traps across the bridge, so that it is still large and open, but not passable by tanks.
You could go as far as to leave the bridge more or less open to tanks, but put spawn points on the bridge flags. This might work, but the tank infantry combat might also not turn out so well. May be best to leave a flat area for a barracks like slaughtered. As long as he keeps in mind the unknown force that drives players to only attack an enemy base regardless of what else he could be doing, he'll be in good shape. This is the reason there needs to be flat area to build bases at, because people tend to not really fight over refineries, rather they let someone kill them, wait for them to go away and then kill theirs and rebuild their own. It's kinda weird how people DON'T fight over a ref it there is no base next to it.
how about this layout for the bridges (the light areas are hills, though it's not 100% accurate yet)? Both starting points are towards the northwest, so vehicles have go around for a while
