Detailed Guide to Incentives

​

Incentives are properties of an area that makes a player more inclined, or less inclined, to go there. They are crucially important to determining good flow and gameplay for a map, and are often overlooked. If incentives did not exist, players would be wandering maps entirely. The following things are a form of incentive:

• Weapons, equipment or vehicles
• Objectives
• The structural formatting of the area

These three factors all contribute to a player wanting to go to the given area. If you learn and understand this simple concept, it will be easier to design maps with better gameplay and better flow. My first example is on Guardian. Let's say you spawn on the elbow, either at the beginning of the match or even some point during the game.

You now have two choices: head over to green area and proceed from there, or head up to the sniper tower. Now, often one player may charge the camoflauge from elbow, but most players head over to the sniper tower. Why? First off, it contains 2 plasma grenades, a sniper rifle, and overshields. Second off, based on its structure, you are safer and you have a view of many more locations. From sniper tower, you can see top mid, bottom mid (the hammer spawn), the elbow from which you came, and even across the map to top gold. In terms of structure, sniper tower poses a significant advantage.

So how does this help in map building? When testing your map, consider where the major battles are taking place. In Guardian, going back to that example, a lot of the battles take place in Sniper Tower; more than likely any other location. You want your map to have good flow, and for each area to have its own pros and cons. Guardian has relatively good flow, but if the overshield was relocated somewhere else, such as top blue, or in there was no barrier on S3 (The ledge), the sniper tower would be much less of a hot spot.

If your map has one single area where the battles always seem to take place, observe it. If it seems to have a substantial amount of cover, along with power weapons, it may need to be toned down.

The second bullet, objectives, is a bit of a wild card. Consider where objectives spawn in the beginning of a game. Oddball is a good gametype to detect strong areas. If the ball spawns in an area with solid cover and power, the team that gets the ball will be able to set up relatively easy, plus there is no reason for the ball to move around the map at all. Even after the initial spawn of the ball, watch where it moves. Have you ever noticed that most teams will take the ball from top mid on Guardian, then attempt to set up in our symbol of power, the sniper tower? The ball serves as somewhat of a compass to seek out where teams are likely to set up.

Every gametype's objective is treated as an exponentially huge incentive. It is one big reason to enter an area. In an area as open as top mid on Guardian, with no weapons anywhere near, why would anyone go there? To get that oddball. It is such a large incentive that it can even override the fact that the area is completely open with no weaponry.

As for king of the hill, if you place a hill point (Remember, a large incentive) in an area with good cover or weaponry, what will happen? Well, to start, all of the battles will shift to that area as expected. Second, though, it will be extremely hard for a losing team to take over the hill when an enemy has it controlled.

Each gametype's objective serves as a different type of incentive, but to start, work with Team Slayer. Work on having each area relatively close in terms of value and incentive. Of course, each map is designed to have some power areas and weapons, so some places will always house more areas than others. But, what happens when that gets excessive in a single area? The rest of the map is barely used, and gameplay gets old and repetitive.

For another example of incentives, take my map, Tribulum. I wanted the way players spawned at the beginning of the match to be very similar to the way regular Foundry matches started. First, shown below, was the centerpiece. Many matches begin with players charging up a level of elevation to grab the power drain. Although I made a different structure, its properties (cover, weaponry) are very similar to Foundry's structure.

​

Next, I knew that at the beginning of Foundry matches, both teams had a sniper rifle at the back of the map that many players headed towards. One team had an incentive in the form of camo in the same direction. Entirely different structure and weapon, yet it had the same incentive value so many players headed in this direction.

​

And now, I simulated the other team's rush to the sniper. In order to make the map feel like Foundry, I made the match start have the same incentive values: one charge in the middle, and teams fleeing to the back corners of the map. In the other back corner was substantial cover, a way into the back base, and a set of plasma rifles. Not much in terms of weaponry, but the cover and the way into the middle base gave players a reason to go to the back corner.

​

So in those screenshots, the map looked nothing like Foundry, right? Yet, at the same time, because of the map's formatting, and the location of the weapons, I got an entirely different map to play just like Foundry. That is the power of incentives. You can direct the flow of gameplay and get games to play exactly how you want. All you need to do is pay attention to detail.

FAQ​

Why are enemies not considered incentives? Wouldn't the location of enemies change where you would want to go?
They would, but they are not considered an incentive for a few reasons. First off, the location of enemies is not something set in stone the way that weapon spawns are. Second, it is not something you can control in map design, so for the sake of this guide on forging and gameplay, it is not included.

You mentioned the properties of ball and hill objectives. What about CTF?
Fair enough. With CTF, just like with other objectives, you have to consider other incentives in the same area. If red team's flag spawns in a fortified area (Structural incentive) and by a laser (Weaponry incentive) while blue team's flag spawns with no matchable power weapon and it is more easily attacked, then red team would obviously have an advantage. You have to consider the other incentives in the same area as any objective. Essentially, objectives are multipliers. If one team has a slight advantage (Weapon or structure) by their objective, it is a huge advantage.

What about interlocking?
Next question.

I'm all out.
Good.

That concludes my guide to incentives. Incentives are both weapons and the map's structure itself. Studying them carefully can help you successfully balance and modify your map's gameplay to make it as fun as possible.

 

Thanks guys. This guide seems almost a bit unnecessarily detailed, but it puts all critiques into perspectives. "Needs more cover in ____ area?" That area doesn't have much structural incentive to go there.