Zinkenite

CP Zinkenite B3a

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Bakscratch

Finisher of Maps
aa
Oct 29, 2010
714
1,493
And if this doent make it into the game, then I will stop playing TF2 FOREVER!
 

Seba

DR. BIG FUCKER, PHD
aa
Jun 9, 2009
2,364
2,728
With those pics you can get infinisex for at least five years from any girl you want. Also probably some guys.

But how'd this truck:
MZadL.png

get there :E
 

Rexy

The Kwisatz Haderach
aa
Dec 22, 2008
1,798
2,533
No, actually, the truck was placed first, as I planned to extend the area, but now it makes no sense. Needs to be removed.
 

RaVaGe

aa
Jun 23, 2010
733
1,210
For me, a blend of grass on the floor will fit totally better than the blend rocks you got there.

And for the cristals, it seem out of place, just put them in a mine, but not in this outdoor setting.

And more grass

MORE GRASS

Otherwise, it's a perfect theme ! Keep it up this good job.
 

grazr

Old Man Mutant Ninja Turtle
aa
Mar 4, 2008
5,441
3,814
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1429764/zig pics/cp_zig_stage_a_160001.jpg

1 More space plx
2+2 These go hand in hand, the rock in question isn't so much providing any worth while cover as it is an obstruction of player movement. Putting something more substantial in the middle allows for some forward action. Which, given the amount of ground necassery for BLU to cover to get here, should be of much appreciation
3 Remove this, it's unnecassery and annoying.
1 Forcing players to take a specific route is rarely a good thing, especially when you taunt them with a ledge that may or not be able to be jumped up onto; it confuses players but more perminantly is just annoying terrain.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1429764/zig pics/cp_zig_stage_a_160002.jpg

In general i feel you should centralise the spawn. The distance to the far left flank in the tunnel is on the long side. This is mostly just a nit-pick as there are comparable paths in dustbowl and goldrush. It's merely the amount of time spent traversing land inside the spawn area. If you do centralise it, you'll probably wanna add some rocks to prevent direct spam on the spawn doors.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1429764/zig pics/cp_zig_stage_a_160003.jpg

This ledge is very annoying. All ledges of this size are annoying but it intrudes on the fighting space at a major choke.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1429764/zig pics/cp_zig_stage_a_160005.jpg

1 Constantly clips
2 Usually clips when approached from an angle, sometimes clips when approached directly
3 Sometimes clips when approached from an angle

It's my opinion you should align the ground displacement entirely, but if anything it needs to be clipped for smoothness.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1429764/zig pics/cp_zig_stage_a_160006.jpg

1 Flank cover
2 Body cover
3 Flank cover
1 Flank cover
2 Flank cover

This was the most offensive sniper position. The issue with this sniper spot and those that follow are that snipers aren't exposed and are always close to small and medium health packs. The strongest advantage by far has to be the fact that they only need to expose their head.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1429764/zig pics/cp_zig_stage_a_160008.jpg

1 Body/flank cover
2 Body cover
3 Flank cover
1 Spawn exit
2 Main route

Many offensive opportunities, many defencive advantages.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1429764/zig pics/cp_zig_stage_a_160014.jpg

1 Flank cover
2 Flank cover
3 Flank cover

Overlooking both BLU's spawn exit and objective. Very powerful support position when capturing or assaulting the point in general.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1429764/zig pics/cp_zig_stage_a_160016.jpg

1 Flank cover
2 Body cover
3 Flank cover
4 Flank cover
2 Secondary defensive route
3 Primary counter-assault route

Too many offensive opportunities coupled with too many defensive advantages, littered with health and ammo spots infront and behind location.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1429764/zig pics/cp_zig_stage_a_160017.jpg

Take what you will from this. It's a medium travelled spot made all the more easy to ambush/trap because of the ammo drop. Probably not the most exploitable location but these holes could probably do with either moving or being patched with solid geometry or nobullets.

Lastly i feel the hut doesn't actually add anything to the first area. It's not easily camped by BLU and the drops would be just as effective outside in the open like the item drops on the first stage of goldrush or badwater.
 
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Rexy

The Kwisatz Haderach
aa
Dec 22, 2008
1,798
2,533
I spent a lot of time going over your feedback grazr, unfortunately, you did it with an older version and almost all of the clipping issues you mentioned are already fixed in the newest version, which we played earlier on the server. There were a few things I've gone ahead and changed for a_18, based on your feedback.

Apart from that, I have to disagree with a lot of the issues you illustrate in the screenshots. Most of the places you mention as being particularly defensive, or offensive--when they're meant to be. Especially this screenshot, and this screenshot, where you mention that these are super effective positions, and this screenshot and this screenshot -- all of the above either have to do with attacking or defending the point, and all of which are deliberate, and centralized on improving gameplay. The layout was created by first placing both brushes and rock models, which were developed entirely for the purpose of blocking off and focusing gameplay.

My beef comes when you point out these places and have complaints about them, because 1.) they've been this way since the middle of February, tested and tested for months with little to no change because they've been positions that have worked well, and 2.) because they're absolutely intentional defensive and offensive positions. The places at A are meant to bolster red's ability to hold the point, and the places in the mid section are meant to give blu an offensive advantage to attack the point at B.

So now this puts me in a difficult position. If you'd mentioned these things a lot earlier--and by that I mean back in February and March when we were extensively testing this layout--then absolutely I'd get more opinions and more feedback about just the particular things you're discussing and determine if these were serious enough to consider major revision. But even still, I'm not blessed with this luxury of time, and I want to be objective about gameplay in this map. Am I wrong about my particular opinions of gameplay, and specifically, the issues you illustrated in your screenshots? I don't know. Layout is not my strongest aspect--but I was clear and certain to make gameplay my #1 priority before moving into the artpass phase. Even in saying that, I know that's not a shield I can hide behind and just deflect all the problems that this map has.

I guess what I'm asking for is 2nd opinions of grazr's feedback. Because I don't particularly agree with everything. And at the same time, if a player/s brings up issues they have with the map, I want to address and fix these things if they're legitimate claims--but I don't know what to think in this case.
 
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grazr

Old Man Mutant Ninja Turtle
aa
Mar 4, 2008
5,441
3,814
I wasn't aware this map got any public testing before you hit artpass. I was watching this thread and there was no map release. You seemed to dish out the map to 2 or 3 people to run around (which i thought was strange for a veteran mapper). This was the first version i managed to get a hold of.

I think you're also taking my feedback backwards. I was merely pointing out the effectiveness of snipers but they have too many defensive fall backs which make things unfair for non-snipers. Mostly that they only need to expose their head whilst players need to traverse a lot of open terrain to get to them. Then when they do they can run to medium/small health and ammo drops. If the snipers have to expose themselves more this would be less of an issue. It'd just be a matter of preventing players from climbing the rocks and/or making snipers leave their position for health and ammo rather than only having to turn around and trip over them.

In the last test there were about 4 snipers on each team and several complaints were made about how many snipers there were and how the game was not progressing. If your map causes players to reach for sniper then that speaks for itself.

You don't need massive changes you just need to add a few more rocks before CP1 or some other cover to allow BLU a safer approach to CP1 (Reference badwater, loads of rocks and one exposed route up the right). Maybe move a few health packs so snipers spend less time on the front line.

P.S. I wasn't saying this to be a dick, i told you i was gonna give you this feedback less than 2 days ago. If you didn't want me to, you should have said don't bother when we spoke about this right after it was tested. But you seemed to be happy to recieve this feedback, the nature of which we already discussed personally.
 
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tyler

aa
Sep 11, 2013
5,102
4,621
There was an impromptu with Zig probably every day, sometimes twice a day for several weeks.

Also... grazr's right, but it's also really trivial to flank all the snipers. The areas they cover are right out of blu spawn and there's really a lot of maneuverability. I've never had issues with snipers feeling overpowered on either team, against any sniper.
 
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Languid

L5: Dapper Member
Oct 9, 2009
240
256
probably too late to make any major changes for the contest at least

Disregard feedback, aquire 1st place
 

Rexy

The Kwisatz Haderach
aa
Dec 22, 2008
1,798
2,533
No, I want your feedback grazr. All feedback is important to me. I feel like in this case, I'm disagreeing with some items in particular that you're having issues with. As for testing...I don't know what to say, the map's been tested extensively, and has always been available for download, and we've played it quite a bit. Here's the skinny on the tests,

http://feedback.tf2maps.net/map/cp_zig_stage_a_17/
http://feedback.tf2maps.net/map/cp_zig_stage_a_16/
http://feedback.tf2maps.net/map/cp_zig_stage_a_15/
http://feedback.tf2maps.net/map/cp_zig_stage_a_14/
http://feedback.tf2maps.net/map/cp_zig_stage_a_13a/
http://feedback.tf2maps.net/map/cp_zig_stage_a_12/
http://feedback.tf2maps.net/map/cp_zig_stage_a_11/

A total of 121 played rounds. Only 16 and 17 had dense detailing, the rest of the tests had rocks and developer textures. Anything before a_11 was scrapped... it was an older layout that wasn't working, even though I tried to get it to work after 10 versions.

I've had snipers tell me the sniper spots were too easy to flank, and some snipers who told me the sniper spots were too powerful. I think in this regard I was a failure in realizing what potential things are exploitable, and I want to remedy this. It's sometimes difficult for me to accurately assess what's really an issue, and what is someone's opinion about something, something I struggle with. I don't think however, that saying because a team has 4 snipers that it instantly puts the map at fault--playing on any public server will tell you that people will stack on a class no matter what map is on--I mean, for one thing, sniper is the class I play 75% of the time, and that's just what I do.
 
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grazr

Old Man Mutant Ninja Turtle
aa
Mar 4, 2008
5,441
3,814
If that's the case and you disagree, that's fine. You say that you play sniper most of the time and you didn't think it was a big deal to have snipers on your map, whilst i don't play sniper, it's literally my least played class (check my profile), i'll find myself playing sniper on Zig. I thought you should know this and to at least keep on eye on it in future. The feedback was essentially to simply bring this to your attention. You don't have to act on it if you don't want to (obviously).

Mostly i said this as i figured some of these spots were (and you just admitted that they were) on purpose and this is the primary mistake of mappers regarding map balance and snipers. The general way it works is if you give a sniper a spot on purpose it inadvertantly becomes powerful because you give them all the things you want from a perfect sniper spot (It's harder for sniper players to judge, so i'm not surprised that as you play sniper most of the time that you're having difficulty figuring out what's wrong since this was done on purpose as opposed to a side affect/anomoly). You don't need to give the sniper anything, in fact you need to be constantly taking away (trimming fields of view, moving ammo to stop him camping to his hearts content, adding flanks to counter him and bring him to the action). The advice i would give to people balancing for snipers is to not consider him at all and they'll naturally find their own spots. The sniper doesn't need opportunities, he can headshot at any distance from any position as long as there's a direct LoS. By purposefully providing for snipers, ledges with substantial cover, flanks you naturally cover with your FoV, plentiful health and ammo so he doesn't have to move far, you've fallen into this classic trap (all be it in a less extreme way since you're a good mapper in general and understand the game mechanics more than the average mapper and avoided building obviously OP bunkers).

What it felt like to me was the sniper vs sniper you see on 2fort except without the bridge to cover none sniper classes making physical assaults. Which is why i suggested some cover in the middle of the main path to CP1. Or to move health so that they're not constantly a threat, but have periods of grace when they run off for 12 seconds to heal up around the corner.

Presumably you'll continue to develop this after the contest. After which you'll have more substantial feedback from which to act on. Naturally we'll be playing these a lot (I'm a judge).

Let me know if you want to be told when we're doing tests, i think i'm gonna bring back sunday gameday but for a couple weeks just run the contest maps.
 
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Rexy

The Kwisatz Haderach
aa
Dec 22, 2008
1,798
2,533
I don't feel like I want to argue the point anymore, as this is just getting long an drawn-out, but this is my last stab at it before I drop the subject entirely. When I said I did those things intentionally, I was talking about gameplay for all classes in general. You're the only one who is insinuating that I developed the map specifically to have strong sniper points, without thinking about the other classes at all. That is not what happened.

Don't you think that as someone who plays sniper so much, that I would understand more than most why snipers shouldn't have powerful positions?
 

grazr

Old Man Mutant Ninja Turtle
aa
Mar 4, 2008
5,441
3,814
I wasn't argueing, I accepted your position on the matter. I never said you didn't consider other classes and i never said you went out of your way to have a map with strong sniper points (mistakes are accidents). Why are you being so hostile and putting words into my mouth? You're completely misunderstanding what i'm saying and why. There's no need to slap me down when i was only explaining myself. I was in no way forcing an opinion on you.

Don't worry, i'll not be posting on this subject again. You know of this matter and you'll do what you think's necassery. That's all that was supposed to happen. I don't understand these retorts, you've become rather agitated over something you can choose to ignore...
 
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Rexy

The Kwisatz Haderach
aa
Dec 22, 2008
1,798
2,533
Grazr and I worked out or issues on the situation over chat. I'll be posting a_18 later today, and if all goes well, submit it to the contest entry thread.
 

Rexy

The Kwisatz Haderach
aa
Dec 22, 2008
1,798
2,533
Update to stage_a_18:

Stage_a_17 was a server-version playtest, fully detailed, mostly for visual feedback and minor issue troubleshooting. Stage_a_18 is a fully polished first stage. This should be equivalent to a beta version of a finished map. I'm merely keeping the file name simple and following the current convention--it makes no sense to call this a beta or alpha even, since it contains only one stage.

Total list of fixes and changes include:

Playerclipping fixes as demonstrated via feedback
Information Pictures
Cavewall Ssbump - maybe later!?
Crystal Collisions
Crystal Custers for A
Texture Crystals/Retexture?
Soundscape
Rotating Cloud Dome
Skybox Cards - trees
3D Skybox
Skybox variations of trees
Tree Clusters?
Skybox variations of rocks
Prop Fade Distance
Cubemaps
wire_fence_90_m collisions
Tree Collisions + LODs! (Now even LOWER POLY!)
Stalactite Collisions + LODs!
Window Models - remove phong
lightmapping
Spectator Cameras
Disable collisions on far items

If all goes well, I'll be submitting this version to the contest thread later today. I would like to get one test in to check for any breaking issues that were not caught earlier.

I would like to thank the following people for the support and good graces they've demonstrated throughout the months of this contest:

Languid, Supertoaster, Icarus, and YM, for layout feedback
yyler, supertoaster, for detail feedback
goombac, vincent, seba, grazr, leswordfish, frozen, wankhouse, for visual feedback
matt, for the godly info on vertex lighting
grazr, schwa, for gameplay feedback
yyler, littleedge, for clipping feedback
doom/sergis, for optimization feedback

A Boojum Snark for his FGD and Prop Library.

All the people who left map feedback via tf2m feedback system, and TF2Maps.net and the admin and site staff for hosting both the contest and supporting development by having regular tests, game servers, and all around the best TF2 community for map development out there.

I would also like to thank all of the people who participated in this contest, all the people who spent time developing and slaving away, so that we could all have good maps to play.

Check the first post for download and the full list of information.