Killzones inside the play area

I dont think there is a good spot to put a kill zone in a
map. All it does is mess up map
newcomers and destroys gameplay.

 

Those type of kill zones are very useful to discourage camping. They should be game specific for infection, for example, but generally never for objective games for reasons you point out.

 

Yeah, except not really.

 

hmmm... making the killzone gametype specific, thats something we will keep in consideration, if we do beleive that keeping the killzone is more beneficial than the punishment it brings.

Edit: i keep saying I, when i mean "we" sorry moth! >_<

 

Well, at least there ARE killzones. If there weren't, then camping would be more common and it would be quite easy to escape a map.

 

As I think about this I have more thoughts. A camping spot for infection should be zoned out as described. But if it lends to a nasty camping spot for any game type (e.g., sniper for slayer or CTF), then you cannot just zone it out for the reasons you describe. So...

Here is the thing you might consider. If a camping spot is not a natural part of the path a player would take - if it doesn't even come close to a reasonable person's intuitive expectation of a place to go to, and if it is very difficult to get to, then you should put a kill zone over it. But if a camping spot is particularly effective (sniper) and it is in the natural path one might intuitively follow and is relatively easy to get to, then it is a flaw in the map design. You don't want to ever require kill zones in areas that are natural places of travel by players.

 

Kill zones have made people lazy. Now instead of building maps without camping spots we just throw kill zones over them. When maps have irregular boundaries, or there are places outside the map that can be reached with a jetpack it's not bad to use kill zones, but safe zones should be enough to set the boundaries of a well designed map. It gives a terrible impression of a map to have death countdowns pop up while running through it.

 

Regardless of your intentions of the thread career, bringing it to the forums and including our names and map link will bring a bit of bad publicity and was... how you say a "**** move" . I even told you that when moth got back online we would figure something out about what you brought up, because we want to create the best experience as possible. i have some ideas that i would like the share with him, that would make it so the killzone could be removed and im sure he has some ideas aswell. We were aware and agree that it would be a pain if you were carrying a flag and you touched the killzone, which is why we had it placed so that you would basically have to be trying to touch it. its was not poor forging or without heavy thought, we are working really hard to get this map to be the best it can be.

 

huh?............

Exactly...

 

I'm not very good at designing competitive maps but shouldn't a good competitive map be playable in matchmaking?

If so putting a kill zone anywhere on a intended path of a map will be a bad idea, Because people who don't know kill zones reset objective items or People who don't know the kill zone is there it will unintentionally get there objective item reset which is very bad.

If it's really a problem camping spot make it so it's unwise to camp there. Grenades spawn outside,Fusion coil in there,Redesign part of map or something.

 

But you can't deny that they're necessary, particularly due to the many irritating physics glitches present in the Halo engine...

For example, an Infection map I'm working on has several tall towers that can't be accessed without glitching. However, glitch-jumps (i.e. buddy-jumping) can be used to climb them. Making the towers higher increases object count and brings me closer to the disco threshold. Fixing the physics-derp is not possible because I can't singlehandedly patch Reach, and there's no chance in hell of 343 touching the physics engine. My only recourse, then -- short of letting players camp these towers and near-instantly become invincible -- is to add softkills to pretty much every single vertical structure on my map.

Softkills may make some people lazy, but they are absolutely necessary when a Forger can't afford to make other sacrifices.

 

Pyro is the man i totaly agree. If we wern`t so lazy we`d just make maps without camping spots but no, we make them with. so really, theres not much to say here is there o-o?

 

This is the case where it is not on the typical path that one might intuitively find themselves on in the course of the game, so ya this would be an example of where you do want to use a soft kill. I was referring to the case where someone doesn't try to exploit the map in some strange way and it adversely affects the game play. In your case, it would be exploiting the map in a strange way and no one should expect to take a bomb up to the top of the tower and not be surprised to lose it.

so while there are two extremes that we all would agree are obvious, the area in the middle is where it is not so clear and it becomes a matter of opinion. But as a forger, I would ask myself how objectionable is this kill zone going to become in each game type supported by the map? That is really the only question one has to ask before they decide if they need to change the map itself or just throw up a kill zone.

 

I have a few things I would like to say about this thread and then I will be done reading about this. First of all this post was in bad taste on Panics part. He never needed to mention my name, Marcass' name or our map for that matter, to get the point across. Doing so results in negative advertisement for not only our map but our names. He has recognized that this was a poor move, apologized, yet has not edited the post. Which makes me disregard his apology completely.

OT: I agree with what you have said pyro, but I'm not sure people are understanding what the problem was. The section in question was a tac jump that we wanted to add in; it was not a necessity, it just added another dimension to the flow of the map. The problem with adding this tac jump is that you could jump up to it and then stand and not be seen from the above level. Sadly, there are jerks on halo and some people would utilize that in a negative manner, rather than a positive one. I personally have seen many tac jumps in maps that fall prey to the same flaw. I agree that a kill zone should not be placed there, and we have removed it. Marcass only placed it there as a test in the first place. I believe the camping problem should be fixed now.

 

For what it is worth, I totally disagree. The thread was focused on the subject matter, not your map. And I could never look at your map in light of this discussion, but on its merits alone.

By the way your Veridian screen shot looks very nice.

 

yes the subject was focused on the idea itself and not our map. but we were upset because it was made because of our map and mentioned our names and map. we dont want any bad publicity towards either of us or our creations, so we wanted clarify the situation from our perspective.

 

@ pyro - I agree that people sometimes are too lazy now that kill zones are available. But on the other hand, jetpack has made everyone's lives more complicated. And the large, open nature of Forge World encourages us to build larger and more ambitious maps, which necessarily results in some kill zone usage because it's not always practical to add all the external walls and ceilings necessary to keep players from exploiting a hiding spot or piece of high ground.

Personally I always build with a mind to keep players inside the intended play area, and try to physically close up hiding places/camping spots/etc. But other times it just can't be helped.

 

There is a lot of truth in all of what you said here. The jetpack has made things very complicated. I wish there was a way on the map properties to prevent jetpacks from being included in game types.