How exactly does one make an official, competetive map, from the ground up? Where does the inspiration come from? Where does the competetive, official-looking appearance and layout come from? How does the creator make the weapons, powerups, and equipment go perfectly, smoothly, and well-balanced into the map? To be honest, I'm curious. I'd like to start making competetive maps, and I thought a discussion on this may help myself and others.
Well it might be just me, but i like to make my map have a aesthetic feel to it, and then i test out different weapon and spawn placement, equipment is usually what kills me.
Plan out your creation first, no what you want to make. Decide if you want your map to contain a switch (ie; elevator, door, etc.), and find exactly what amount of supplies it will take to implement. Incorporate that into your plans. Use interlocking to remove imperfections and also, if using Foundry's floor, try to merge the ends of whatever you're using as a ramp to an upper level slightly into the ground, to remove that annoying bump. That's all I can really tell you, the rest is up to you. Read the Forging 101 if you run into any problems.
the most important factor in playability and true competitiveness is play testing. You can make a map but the only true way to make it competitive and fun is to test test test and fix. -This means full scale games played on your beta versions or wtvr and getting peoples feedback.