Psh, I thought the map was awesome man, just overly large and open. I think you should consider downscaling and working on the problems from there. Paints: I get reminded of Rat's Nest when I see that design for some reason. It looks pretty damn sexy though. As far as problems go, the lower right connection is a little lengthy and the bottom room has some strange connections as they both come in from the same general direction. Not a fan of the line of sight on the right side either. I was thinking about making something inspired by Cold Storage although I'm trying to steer away from 1v1s.
I'm drawing a much cleaner version of my sketch. I'll try and find a solution to those things you mentioned as I finish drawing it out. Im just using Paint so it's nothing fancy or 3d just a lot better than taking a pic of a piece of paper. I'll post it soon. I dont mind. I didn't copyright the idea so I'm pretty sure it's okay. The circles at the bottom are silos, kinda like in Cold Storage. For cover, safe spawning and a place to lean a power weapon against. I'll probably make them out of ramp circular smalls.
You guessed right. It'll probably be a 2v2, maybe 3v3. I tried to scale the walkways to the size of 2 forge units. EDIT: All finished. This is a sketch for possibly my last map in Halo: Reach. The light grey represents the bottom floor, the dark grey represents the second floor, and the tan color represents the third floor. Green represents bottom floor also, but I wanted it to be a flat grass atrium. Also, the arrows represent which way is up on all of the ramps. Thanks to Auburn for pointing out some issues right off the bat. I've tried to fix them in this newer sketch, but I will wait until building the map to make any big decisions about changing it. I'm also asking for help to make it a co-forge. If anyone is interested, post below. I expect someone with lots of experience in competitive maps. If you've never made a co-forge, then forget it. It takes teamwork, you need to build together, not based on opinions. I'll still make the map, regardless if anyone gets in on it. Thanks guys.
I can definately say the design is reminicent of Rat Race after playing it yesterday. It was pretty fast-paced despite only playing a 1v1 and, although it doesn't show it on the schematic, lines of sight were determined well in game. The problems I had were the lower level of blue spawn, the lower floor at gl spawn, and some of the weapons. The first just seemed like a pointless area as it was a large pocket that left you in the open, there wasn't much reason to go to the second, and the gl had a massive clip, hahaha. I'm assuming that was by accident though. I felt like there was a bit of grenade spamming going on in that game as well. I think moving GL to lower green would benefit the map because its current position already acts as a quick means of travel without having to lose height while still posing a risk, but the aforementioned area recieves little traffic given the lack of valuable stuff. Also, perhaps a teleporter from blue spawn to the back area of gl spawn would be good too since, depending on you opponents position, you can be targeted again fairly quickly after going though. EDIT: I also think you should expand the plasma pistol hall up so that it connected to the ramp leading to the catwalk. That could add some more dancefloor and shrink that extremely risky stretch of gray there.
I tried building both of these on Reach, but one was a tad big and the other was a tad.... strange. I think I'll be trying one of these, if not both, in H4, and maybe the first one in Murder Miners. For this first one, it's all one map, but because it overlaps in the middle, I decided to draw out each half separately, each showing a different level of the middle. Just use the little red part as reference and overlap them in your mind, aligning each red octagon thingy. It's inspired by Countdown, the Pit, and Rat's Nest. Spoiler This one is a bit strange, I'm not entirely sure what I was thinking when I came up with it, but I'm glad that I managed to find paper and draw it before I lost the idea. Spoiler http://i1228.photobucket.com/albums/ee455/RorakKuroda/Misc/whatintheactual****.png
Nice to see a new face in here The zipline one is rather... lulzy Seems like the connections are super long and there are some campable areas (only two entrances at 90 degree angles..). The tac-jump-access-only area looks weird too. Is one of the entrances a drop down? If so, it looks like it needs a hard way in and out. The first one is as confusing as hell to look at. I know you added the red octagon thingy, but it's hard to judge LoS and verticality with two separate halves. I don't quite understand the bit near which you wrote "overlook on ramp." How do you get up there?
@RK The first one looks like a solid design, id like to see that, i see the h3 maps resemblance aswell, which would be a great bit of nostalgia in h4. How big would that be though? like vehicle capable? The second one is a cool idea i havent really seen a zipline used effectively in a competitive map, but it seems like there wouldn't be alot of room to dance around from what i can see, i can see it as a good 1v1-4v4 map
Heres my 'butifully' made sketch on an Upgraded Tribute: (Pardon the sarcasm) Light Grey: First Floor Dark Grey: Second Floor Black: Third Floor Red: Stairs/Ramps connecting the first-second levels. Green: Rocks Light Brown: Lower Floor Connections Dark Brown: Platform Connections (Third Floor Connections) This map will feature much shorter connections, essentially doorways to each room. The maps four corner rooms in the Orginal will have been replaced by two larger rooms, with three ways up to the upper level. There will be now three levels on the map. The ground level, which Includes the CA. The second level will the be the side walkways in the corner rooms, and finally the third level will be the platform. I'm not sure on what to do with teleporters just yet. But am straying away from them at the moment unless someone has a suggestion. Oh and sorry if the Picture isn best.
Forgewolf, the picture isn't the best is an understatement. I can't see the walls anywhere, but I'm sure it has them. You may want to try Google Sketchup if you haven't already: Trimble SketchUp It allows you to work in 3D spaces and is in general easier to visualize things from than Paint.
I already built the map but i figured I'd share my little paint sketch. Red = death pit Blue = gravlifts Green = teles Grey = over platform Dark grey = wall you can walk under from the lower platform You can see where I extended a hallway to block a line of sight from the power position, how weapons are used to attract people to the area and other stuff.
Heres a little something I was doodling around on for Halo 4. Sketched out old school style The Orange dots are teleporters and the blue is water/deathtrap Heres a version with arrows marking ramps and the height variations labeled with the lowest level as 1 and highest as 4 Spoiler its a little generic but I plan on adding some angles instead of everything being 90 degrees, lol.
@Zombie Got a power weapon layout planned yet? Just out of curiosity, are you planning on using a specific palette for forge? The circle area and the area across it (above the teleporter) look somewhat OP. From either location, one can control both ends of the teleporter (if it's two way). The bottom side of the map also looks pretty open - one could see all the way from that left platform to the right. Maybe an LoS blocker in the middle of that curved water pool area? EDIT: Lol, didn't realize what those thick black lines were for. Scrap the thing about the top. Bottom, maybe. Still too open
RK, a good map with a zipline would be the best thing ever. Sorry, I can't get a good grasp on the layout of the other. Wolf, I dun get yours either. Come before me again when your Paint skilz have hardened like SJ's, young apprentice of the arts. Blaze, it looks pretty cool, kind of like something you'd see in Marathon. The main problem I see from the sketch is the lack of viable paths as there just seems to a single defined one around the map. Also, there looks to be a lack of dancefloor in just about every area but sniper spawn. I think beefing up each area and adding some interesting positions on the outer ring of the map with the use of gadgets would do the map some good, sort of like Luna by Nexn. That's a pretty far out there suggestions though. ZV, the design of the bottom half of the map is awesome. I'm not familiar with 4v4s, but I can say that I'm not a fan of bottom pit area having solid LoS on both teleporters as well as height advantages. The single counter area doesn't seem as though it would be very effective either.
@Auburn Who is SJ? @Blaze I played a couple games on your map (my edits to SWAT gametype, so it wasn't the best mesh) and the dancefloor problem was a bit noticeable. The double gravlift was cool as it distinguished between the two methods of entry to the upper platform, which btw was the center of attention and would probably be more so in a standard MLG Slayer variant.
The tight spaces is the gameplay theme for the map. haha. The others in the map pack give a more roomy feel. I could've told you it wouldn't work for swat very well. Normal shields are required for if a player needs to escape. This also balances AAs. Jetpack having more mobility around the map but cannot run quicker around corners. Ofcourse the favored piece of the map was the top floor but in no way is it an over powering power position. With the small area of the platform combine with the small choices of exit routes and the quick mancannons as the entrance, it's quite hard to hold. Obviously it's not playing by the rules of map design exactly (or atleast of mainstream map design), I brake a good bit of rules though I made sure to balance the gameplay around it the best I could with maintaining the linear and vertical flow that I wanted out of it. I should have explained a little more than line of sights when posted the image. I even went out of my own comfert zone a little to make this, so I understand if people don't agree with some of it or like the gameplay.
Heres a simple sketch for plans for my new asymetric map. Just a note, not sure about the spiker, is that a power weapon and if it is, why?
Wolf, I would watch those long, skinny tunnels. Aside from that, I can't really tell what's going on. Key?
The triangles are the initial spawns. The squares with lines through them are pillars The lines in the walls with arrows are connections Whichever way the arrows are pointing shows a higher level. Dotted lines in the rooms help indicate a slightly higher/lower level in a room. The dotted lines on the tunnels show where they link to the pit with the CPU. The circle is the CPU The square is the spiker.
Not really a fan of the pillar cover, it looks rather lazy and slapped on. Also, what Auburn mentioned with the long connections. There also seem to be a couple roundabout spaces that could be abused with radar. EDIT: Could you shade everything in that's not actually part of the map? (Ex, walls, etc) It's hard to understand well at the moment.