Cipher Built on the side of the island that houses Paradiso's red base, Cipher is an asymmetric 2v2 map whose original design concept comes from the well-known Halo 3 map Chromatic by b0b43. The design concept that I pulled from Chromatic is a simple one, really. In Chromatic, the ramp that leads from bottom mid into the objective room has a pathway above it. This pathway, however, does not lead directly into the same area as the ramp does. In fact, the pathway connects two completely different areas of the map: red room and blue room. I wanted to take that design concept of having two paths in the roughly the same space that lead to two completely different areas. You can see that come to fruition on Cipher by means of the ramp that leads towards red team's plasma pistol and the pathway directly above that ramp. The pathway connects the two areas that house the concussion rifles, which do not directly connect to the aforementioned plasma pistol spawn. The rest of the map morphed around the simple idea of having the middle of the map be, essentially, a pit where a player would have to risk all height advantage and most of the their cover to get to the rocket launcher that spawns down there. I actually initially built the map's geometry in around seven hours one day, but somehow or another, when I later went to place spawns and weapons and the like, the map had gotten overwritten! I was pretty peeved because I really liked what I had built and saw a lot of promise in the design. So I sat down and, the design still very fresh in my head, rebuilt the map in four hours. And believe me, I was very careful in saving maps from then on. Gametypes* Team Slayer Free-For-All Slayer 3-Plots King Of The Hill Oddball *All played with just the Sprint loadout Weapons DMR - x4 Rocket Launcher - x1 Sniper Rifle - x2 Concussion Rifle - x2 Needle Rifle - x2 Plasma Pistol - x2 Plasma Grenade - x2 Map Images Download Cipher Oh, and special thanks and stuff to Rho for editing the images and to everyone who's tested the map and given me feedback, especially HiddenForger for his Tester's Guild feedback.
Nice. Looks like you made a great use of this part of the island, and looks very cleanly forged as always. My initial complaint is that the columns and blocks you have look a little... blocky since they do not connect to the ceiling. Have you considered extending them to the ceiling or are they meant to be open to jetpackers? I know you're all about the gameplay (a good thing) so I'm sure you made the decision for a reason, but you mentioned that all-sprint loadout is what you intended for the map. Anyways, this one's been in the works for a long time but I'm sure its worth the wait. I hope to get a game or two on it to leave more helpful feedback.
Ohhh man, finally it's up. I've been waiting for awhile for this to be posted, Ace. I have to say, this looks soooo nice. Your maps have always given me ideas, as I've learned a lot from your forging style. So, it looks like I'm going to have to download this one and learn from it, as well. I also love that your maps have simplistic layouts with no extremely flashy aesthetics. That obviously means you were going for gameplay and I've no doubt this one will play amazingly. I will have to get some games on this, for sure. Too bad you didn't post it earlier, it would've been a mighty contender in the FHFs'. Nonetheless, that isn't going to stop me from nominating next round. Keep it up man.
This map isn't much my style, but that certainly doesn't make it a bad map. On the contrary, I'd say that this is a really excellent map. It uses the natural geometry far better than most maps manage to do, and the structure of it is remarkably clean. And even though I can't seem to do well on this map, I've still enjoyed most all of the games that I've played on it. I still think your ceiling needs to be more interesting, though.
I found Z-Fighting on the map near the rock tunnel. Also, the rails on the map extend awkwardly over the edges of the blocks. I think you should move the rails back so they don't extend over the blocks so it would look nicer. The ceiling also needs some spicing up like Rorak said.
this would be a great map for the 2v2 playlist (considering its a 2v2 map no duh) You've probably just made my Top 10 maps when it comes to gameplay. You did an amazing job keeping it simple, but incorporating the natural aesthetics within it, not to mention the small tunnel. There's plenty of good cover and the bridge makes a great overpass for the pathway below it. Also giving it many different elevations was essential to a map like this and you nailed it dead-on. And the map is assymetrical but has its disadvantages and advantages on each side, giving it a balanced fighting environment. Usually i find issues with maps I come across, but I'm finding it difficult right now to point out anything wrong with the map. And for that, congradulations...
I have had other people comment on those blocks so I have tried raising them all the way to the ceiling before and they just looked awkward. Yeah, I really prefer simpler-looking maps in Reach because they look a lot better and they're more framerate-friendly. I did the railings like that on purpose... I thought it would add a little character. Maybe I'll see what I can do with the ceiling. I GUESS. Thanks man! And thanks to everyone else for the comments.
I had the honor of playing this today with Kuroda, Nibs, and Erupt, and it was very enjoyable. Easy to get down and forged very well. I really like the location that its in. I acutally didnt know where it was. I really dont have anything thing negitive about it, so yeah. woot
I'm happy to see people actually playing a map after it's been posted. Thanks longshot! Haha I think it was some fat kid named [DISCLOSED]. People say he's fat and stuff. But yeah I did finally release something again! Thanks for the support throughout this maps production man!
This map looks awesome. I love the way it's built into the terrain, and I always have a soft spot for interior/exterior maps. One thing though is that I can't stand the photo filter on your pictures...this is like the 5th map I've seen it used on. Are you guys all in on it or something?
Thanks. The editing of the photos is just kind of to present the map a little nicer. Some people just take a little time to put work into their map post. It's just a presentation thing.
Do you mean "photo filter" as in the thing you can apply in photoshop? Because that's a real thing. Or do you mean just the fact that the pictures were edited a little to make them look purty?
Wow, I've never heard of photoshop before. What's that? /s What I meant was that I've seen several maps, such as Purification and Verticaus (there's one more I can't think of) that have their pictures color corrected to a greener hue exactly like these. I just found it funny that all of you are editing your pictures the same way. On a side note, the edge blur could have been done better by using a masked radial blur.
I felt like the green hue was almost necessary because of how much nat. geo. was in the map. As for puri, I don't remember it being green. I'll be back. EDIT: Not really green: Also, not really green, but it's a similar look, and I get what your saying.
Purification is more blue-green because there's water I guess, but I still see green tints to it and what looks like the equivalent of a bleach bypass or something. Edit: Yeah, I think it's the de-saturated look I'm noticing more than the color correction.
I love the way you used the natural geometry. Not many can pull this off as well as you did. I also am a big fan of your asymmetric maps/style. I did so much asym. in H3 but have run dry on ideas for it lately but your stuff makes me want to do it more.
I've only had one 1v1 game on this so far, so although I can't comment too deeply on gameplay I definitely enjoyed the design. I enjoy the forging style, it's very 'pure' and gameplay focussed which is what I usually look for. I feel you on the corrupted save file thing, I just nearly lost my latest baby project. Fortunately I had an old version uploaded on my fileshare but it was a near miss. I'll try and post more detailed feedback on gameplay when I get the chance to run some larger games on Cipher.
This is a great map Ace. It has two simple elements that makes it stand out: simplicity and originality. The aesthetics are great, not overwhelmingly random pretty objects scattered throughout the map, but little touches to add to the theme of the map. The fact that is uses natural geometry just makes it feel like less of a forge map, which is ideal. Thank you for capturing Spectacle for me. The map ended up being a failure, but I learned a lot from it.
Wow, another competitive map from you Ace. That ramp that descends to the grass level looks nice in picture 8 I believe. I also like how the grass slopes up from the platform like it was eroded over time. Nice work!