Welcome to Paragon Paragon is a medium size symmetrical map that is designed for Team Based Gametypes such as Team Slayer, CTF, Assault, etc. The original design was simple; make an octagonal shaped map with a lower basement area. Weapons DMR X4 (1 spare clip) Needler X2 (1 spare clip) Needler Rifle X4 (1 spare clip] Plasma Pistol X2 Plasma Rifle X2 Shotgun X2 (No spare clip) Sniper X2 (1 spare clip) Rocket Launcher X1 (No spare clip) Plasma Grenades X8 Health Station X2 SCREENSHOTS Note: There have been some minor changes since the screenshots below such as; One way shield doors have been removed, Overshield and Active Camo have been removed replaced by two Needle Rifles and two Health Packs. Action Screenshots Thanks to anyone and everyone that has supported me in my Forging Career thus far. Also like to thank FTG and BWO for game testing support.
Well Done! Clealy a well designed map. Very pretty and smooth, and involves anything you need to play a good game of Slayer. I didn't hesitate to dowload it.
This looks awesome! I love the high use of struts in your map, they have always been one of my favorite parts! Honestly, I don't see anything I don't like from the screenshots, it looks well layed out and aesthetics are amazing. I will download and tell you what I think after a fly-through.
Struts are one of the main aesthetic components I use in my maps, and it does so much for me when implimenting it into the aesthetics of the map. On aesthetics, I've always tried to not overdo with it. All of my maps have aesthetics, but to have a great map, you need to balance out the aesthetics and gameplay so they compliment eachother. There have been many, many examples where the maps I've played on look amazing, but the gameplay suffers, and vice versa. Anyway, I hope you enjoy your fly through in Forge and Custom Games.
Oh my god, I found a keeper! Dang! This map is just awesome! The flow is perfect, with different circular areas going inward. I love the design because it is easy to get around and orient yourself but sight lines are not ridiculously long, even though the bases are a little easy to see across from each other. Maybe add 1 more strut section to the line on each side to make a bigger wall. Also, the shotguns are so close that I feel they will end up just becoming one shotgun with one spare clip quickly. Either make one in a central position or move them somewhere farther apart and replace with a non-combinable plasma weapon. Besides this, the aesthetics are just amazing, the map flows great, and most other weapons/objectives are placed well. 2 last problems: I saw at least 4 capture plates not labeled on the floor, and I don't know if these were aesthetic or just misplaced. Also, Z fighting (that flicker between 2 phased parts) was horrendous on your map, the biggest problem I saw. You can fix this by grabbing a part, moving it up one coordinate, moving it back down, and letting go before it moves all the way down. This will help any possible lag on your map, which there shouldn't be as it is so small, and will just move your map to where it should be. I would love to play some 2 v. 2 games on this at some point, so contact me if you ever want testers, I will see if I can bring anyone else along as well. Great Job, this was just awesome! [br][/br]Edited by merge: I found a few more problems, but let me first say that I like the use of many different pieces for walls, the resulting patterns look really nice. As I was jetpacking around though, I was killed violently by your vehicle man cannons. They look and sound cool, but maybe move them deeper into the walls so that jetpackers are not slaughtered too bad. The windows at the bottom level are also an issue to me. Being able to see the hanger, and even the rest of Forge World from them, breaks the illusion of being in a far away Forerunner facility, and I would recommend replacing the windows with walls of some kind. On a smaller note, the central KOTH hill was gigantic, unless it is meant to be a static hill, it is so big it would be impossible to control, maybe, I haven't played on it though. Only 2 health packs are not too few, but once again, they could be. Lastly, there was a medium railing in front of each bases objective. It sticks out kind of funny, so moving this in might just look better. Ok, thats it for my text rampage, I hope this map can reach its true potential, it is a great design for 4-8 player games!
I am currently working on a Paragon II map, and I am taking all of your concerns into consideration. I've already tried to lessen the z-fighting present on the map, and I thank you for telling me how to fix this problem. I didn't know how to do this before, and I'll definitely have it in the back of my head in the future. The four "unkown capture plates," are actually for Headhunter, and the map works with the gametype, but liuke you said, it showed up as "No Label," for some reason in Forge. With the vehicle man cannons on opposite sides of the map I tried to make anbient sounds while providing aesthetics, and I might have to either move them inward farther into the walls, or make them unable to see, but hear. With the railings, I'll remove them. There really wasn't any purpose, really. Actually, the original reason for these rails was to support the Sniper Rifle up against the walkway cover, but I moved the sniper spawns behing the walkway cover, instead. With the windows on in the Shotgun(s) Room, you can see the Coliseum. When I first made the map, my budget was hurting, and there wasn't much I could do. But now with the second version in progress, I do have an extra cash to throw around, about $900. So I'll work on fixing that, as well. I'll see what I can do with the Shotgun spawn. It is two Shotguns, but each do not have any spare clips, so it equals 1 spare clip if one player picks up all the ammo for it. I might just replace the Shotgun(s) with another weapon. I'm also considering adding more support weapons on the map, as well. And once again, thank you. Most occassions no one actually really gives me any constructive criticism or advice to make my map better, just either "Dude, nice map!" or "This sucks!" You know, those one liner sentences.
Your welcome! I try to give a lot of feedback on most maps, though I admit I did a lot more than usual here. Maybe I should join the Testers guild after all. If those are still saying no label then they shouldn't work for Headhunter, so if they do you can ship me off to the lunatic asylum now. I don't know if you want 2 shotguns, I suggest moving them; if you want the feel of 1, try to combine, I know the centerpiece is awesome though, so the 2 close-by ones could work out. Tell me if you need testers for V 2.0, I would be happy to help!
I found out the problem with the four unknown capture plates. What happened was when I was setting up the map for Headhunter, I accidentally placed some capture points down while in Basic Editing instead of Headhunter. I've now fixed that problem. I've tried to lessen the z-fighting as much as I can, but there still seems to be some framrate issues. Not as bad as it was, but it is still there. I've moved the vehicle man cannons in the side hallways away from the walls, and turned them upside down and place them underneath the map so you do not see them, but still hear them. In place of where the vehicle man cannons used to be is a stunt ramp turned upright at a 90 degree angle with the angle facing outward. I've removed the windows in the Shotgun Room (from which you could see outside the map, and replace them with double walls, so now it's not possible to see out of, or underneath the map. Still not sure what to do with the Shotgun...and still thinking about adding more weapons. I'm not quite finished, but I'll keep you updated.
Glad you see this is coming along! Other main causes of framerate lag are: -massive amounts of phased parts (all phased together that is) -Glass, as you can see both it and what is through it -Lights (Probably your biggest problem) -Also, there is more framerate lag when in forge because of s[awns, hills, etc... so this could be your problem as well. Honestly, I think you need no more weaponry on this map. That is in part why I thought of consolidating the shotguns into 1 with 1 clip left. I understand this just probably wont happen now, but what if you moved/added a plasma grenade to where they are now and moved the shotguns into the adjacent hallways, possibly where the plasma repeaters are now. Maybe you could even just swap Shotguns and plasma repeaters. It's up to you on weapons in the end, I will download the new version after you have decided.
I've moved the Shotguns to opposite ends in the adjacent hallways like you recommended. Now there are two Plasma Rifles and four Plasma Grenades in place of the two shotguns. I made the respawn time on the grenades longer due to the concern of grenade spamming around the lower levels of the map and around the "Now Plasma Rifle/ Plasma Grenade Room." If four Plasma Grenades is too much, I'll probably either put a longer respawn on them, or remove two grenades out of the four. With the framerate issues, I really can't replace the glass in the side hallways due to lack of objects, but I did remove the lights to see how much better the framerate would be, and there was a significant improvement. I also tried it in Custom Games, and the framerate has improved greatly. I think players will get the landmarks quite quickly (struts being red and blue, large walkway covers, etc.) so I hope there will not be any confusion with the absence of the red and blue lights. Hopefully players will know where they are on the map at all times without any difficulties. I've also added two more Plasma Pistols on the outside walkways near each side hallway to combat the Needle Rifle and plasma grenade spawns. Hopefully this will work out, so I'll have to try gametesting soon. Any other suggestions for weapon placement?
I will re-download and see changes myself tonight. It sounds like a lot of weapons were added, but I will need to see it first. I feel the lights will be a good choice, much better than removing the awesome glass structures. Besides, the colliseum has less framerate lag than other places, so at this rate you should be fine. I will reply back with thoughts afterward, and I will send you a friend request for future testing. [br][/br]Edited by merge: Hey, you need to re-post the map to your file share, the old version is still up and I want to see the changes.
I'm currently working on the finishing touches for Paragon II, and hopefully should be finished fairly soon. Most of the framerate issues have been taken care of, weapon placement has changed, a few aesthetic changes have been made as well.
Did someone say my name? I'm going to download this now, and take a look after I have dinner. After walking around the map, it looks very nice. However, I seeing some potential flow issues with the bottom floor, and I'd like to see these changes you've made to help the framerate and such.
If you see z-fighting all over the place you have the wrong version, a new version should be coming up tonight I think. Honestly, this is the third time today I have seen this name, though thank god the third wasn't another map named Paragon. That would have been freaky. By the way ONEARM, I am hosting a small custom games tonight, and I would like to test your map there. If it is ready, bring your map into our custom games tonight, it should start soon! See you then!
I got a chance to play this earlier today and I found the flow to be quite smooth once I figured out how things were laid out. Rockets were naturally placed in a wide-open space where I was sniped immediately after grabbing them. However, regarding the rockets I have this to say: I noticed that even after you get up on the ledge next to the piece that holds the rockets, you had to get on top of that in order to grab them. Perhaps you could lower that piece one or two notches so that you only have to get up onto the first ledge to grab them. This was an unexpected impediment to my movement. I blame this for getting sniped Edit: If you don't want to lower that platform the rockets rest on, I noticed you could probably just rotate it 90 degrees. That way you can just run passed it and pick it up as you go, which would be awesome. 2 other things I noticed were: spawns generally favored the lower levels (my teammate noticed this as well)and that when looking through the "glass cover" pieces, the frame rate took a major hit. I know this has already been pointed out, but you should still look for any solid piece possible that can be used as a wall (almost any piece can be manipulated to do so) and replace it. It's the only area I noticed frame rate took a hit and it'd be a shame not to fix it. That about wraps it up. Great job, hopefully I'll get to play on it again soon. Also, shameless plug for my new map, "The Hive": http://www.forgehub.com/forum/testers-guild/120045-hive.html
The V 2.0 worked really well man! Spawns were a little funny for team games but they were good for the FFA Crazy King we played. Turn those rockets 90 degrees like frozenlynx said, it sucks jumping twice for them. I honestly never got this framerate lag looking through the windows, but I wasn't there too often either come to think of it. Overall, your map is great for 2 v. 2 matches, I still love the Halo 1 vibe it gives off. Hope we can play on it again soon!
"Dude, nice map!" Lol jk. I'm so mean. Anyway, testing this on 2v2 was really fun. However: As i commented in the game, the rocket launcher holder (not the platform) was either too high or too big. As i was playing, i needed to jump just to grab rocket launcher. The crates don't really seem to blend in. I didn't comment on this. It's as though UNSC and forerunners are roomies. I felt as though there was no pull to the bottom of the map with the update of shotgun locations. I would suggest putting a stronger gun than the plasma rifle, rarely was anyone down there, and the other player didn't even know that room existed. Other than that, it's just a fact of fixing lag issues and you have yourself a pretty awesome map. Well done!
Paragon II is in the finishing stages, and will be released soon. There have been several improvements from the original, and all will be mentioned in the updated post.
I really like the looks of this map. the center piece is eye catching with the rocket and the alien space ship type thing towards the top center of the map, and the layout of the map looks really nice. The layout is simple, yet complicated. I know it's hard to understand what I'm tryin to say, but the design is great. I noticed a few framerate problems while in forge though. Hopefully that will be fixed? I haven't playtsted it but hopefully I can try it out. Great map.