Astarte A11

A11 Changelog:
- Rolled back to A7

- Let's just forget about A8-A10​

- Carried over the gamemode changes from later alphas to this version (30s return time, no CTF overtime)
- Carried over the obelisk on A too
- Moved B point forward a bit
- Redid the BLU's right side flank at A again (it still leads to the high ground, but it's more exposed and there are no one-ways)
- Moved BLU's forward spawn
- Increased A cap time to 18s
- Added cover to main exit of lobby at A
- Added a wall to BLU's right side route towards B to segment it off a bit more
- Some other stuff
- This might be the last version for the contest, as I'm kind of losing inspiration for working on this map, at least for now. I think it's in mostly a good spot (disregarding A8-A10). Not really sure what do with B or how to go about making routes at A suck less. Regardless of whether this actually is the final version, I'm glad that I finally made a map I developed past A3. There may or may not be an A12+.

A10 Changelog:
- Redid a significant portion of B again (but kept the same general structure)
- Replaced column on point A with an obelisk
- Removed well door on BLU's right side flank at A
- Fixed issue with RED not being able to block cap at B
- Added a forward spawn for RED
- Decreased A cap time back to 16s
- Smoothed out some displacements
- Added a bridge between BLU and RED's high ground at A
- Shuffled around/added/removed some health and ammo
- Fixed some clipping that thankfully I found before it was exploited in a playtest
- Some other stuff

A9 Changelog:
- Completely overhauled B again
- Completely redid A (with same basic idea, but hopefully executed better)
- Moved some stuff around/raised/lowered some ground in the A -> B outside area to block sightlines and make more interesting gameplay
- The only things left mostly unscathed are BLU's first spawn, BLU's first spawn courtyard, and most of the A -> B outside section.
- A cap time increased 16s -> 18s
- B cap time decreased 14s -> 9s
- RED can no longer see the flag through walls while BLU is carrying it
- Slightly altered some respawn wave times
- Increased setup time to 75s
- Increased time added after capping A to 4 minutes 30 seconds
- Fixed custom point icon assets being packed (what the fuck compilepal)
- Probably some other things I forgot

Version A8a Changelog:

- Changed some stuff around at B

Version that will be played in the May 3rd Gameday

A8 Changelog:
- Completely overhauled B point
- The shell of the old last is still there, including the entrances, but the interior is much different (and hopefully better)
- I have no idea how well this will play, I just wanted *something* different for the May 3rd gameday since I already knew people weren't big fans of B in A7.
- Reduced base B cap time from 14s to 11s
- Water nobuild zone outside of BLU spawn now affects teleporters and dispensers too (not sure what I was thinking when limiting it just to sentries)
- Water outside of BLU spawn no longer can extinguish players (I think)
- Added some extra cover for BLU outside of the lobby headed towards A
- Added a block near BLU's one-way at A to prevent people with mobility from superflanking RED (though they can still go underneath this path if RED isn't paying attention)
- Probably some other stuff too idk

screenshots coming later, it's almost 5am and i want to go to sleep

A7 Changelog:

• Fixed flag timer resetting when not intended
• Reverted the second flag spawning instantly, now spawns after 5 seconds
  • Turns out making it spawn instantly led to some pretty bad snowballs in some cases, though that could also be due to teams
• Added A/B point icon overlays to HUD
• Tons of minor displacement adjustments to make things smoother
• Experimental change: added a nook with a medium ammo underneath BLU's high ground into B
  • This is meant to be a better sentry spot on last for defending engineers, and is inspired by Gorge's B point
  • In the last playtest, I saw an engineer already wanting to build in this area (they built their sentry right in front of the area), so I'm assuming at least some people will be inclined to use it.
  • BLU can see into this sentry spot through a grate from above so they're not blindly pushing in
  • Other sentry spots at B were pretty much always spammed out since they were very visible from many angles or were useless because they didn't watch the point
  • If this is poorly received by most people, I'll probably just revert it to the way it was
• Experimental change: added a ramp from BLU's left side route into last up to the middle route's high ground
  • My hope is that with the newly added sentry nook for RED, BLU can use this to group up more easily on an advantageous position and mount a push in
  • This could create a confusing/overpowered amount of interconnectedness with the paths, could be not used at all, or could be seen as an annoyance. This is why I consider it an experimental change.
  • Should it play poorly, it's probably gonna just get the axe.
• Added a prop jump (yeah yeah I know prop jumps suck) to get up to BLU's high ground near their spawn
  • I don't want to add a ramp here, because I don't think it's needed.
  • I do want RED to be able to more easily control this area though, since BLU's rightmost route does lead completely behind RED if RED is holding in lobby.
• Added a crate with a sand slope leading up to it as cover/a perch spot for spies/any other classes who have a deathwish
• Made any roof overhangs nonsolid
• Many minor clipping improvements throughout the map
• Replaced the crates next to BLU's right side B path with a ledge
  • Meant to be a spot for sneaky spies/heavies/engineers to maybe surprise BLU as they come in
  • The crates that were here previously did literally nothing, this is just something a bit more substantial, but not super impactful (in theory)
• Removed a big chunk out of the ceiling pillar bridge thingy at last to help out jumpers
• Patched silly hole next to the pillar near RED's high ground at B to prevent annoying damage/deaths
• Pushed back resupply cabinet in RED's spawn to prevent defending demomen being able to easily spam point/resup
• More hinting/optimization work
• Lots of texturing/trimwork to make the map look/feel more egypt-y and similar to how it will be in beta
  • This is not a full artpass (yet)
• Several more minor changes that I've forgotten or aren't significant enough to be listed here

A6 Changelog:

• Various optimizations (hints/skybox brushes) in preparation for artpass/to not annoy jumpers as much
• Made 2nd intel spawn instantly after A is capped instead of after 5 seconds
• Added nobuild zones on intel spawn areas
• Gave previously dead-end full hp kit room near B a dropdown exit to the right
• Added another resupply cabinet in BLU's forward spawn to hopefully show people that the reason they can't build in there is because it's a respawn room
• Shuffled around some health and ammo
• Other various minor changes/tweaks

screenshots coming soon

A5A Changelog:

• Fixed a displacement seam on the right of A point
• Sized down the patch under the full hp kit near last to make it in line with the other patches on the map
• Changed up a few details on BLU's left-side route at A
• Got rid of a few completely unnecessary displacement faces on cliffs
• Fixed weird alpha blend on some cliff faces
• Added more skybox brushes on top of buildings
• Some other misc. changes in detailing and micro-gameplay

Screenshots from A5 are pretty much the same as A5A.

A5 Changelog:

• Changed things about A artpass (made trims less thick, added more detail, tried to make it resemble pl_oasis more)
• Changed the flags to have 5 second return times when overtime is initiated
  • Side Note: This was a bitch to implement
  • High possibility this is broken, I tried to test every case I could think of and they all seemed fine
• Fixed clipping on roofs behind A (thankfully before anyone exploited it)
• Added a cover wall with a window to the area behind A to block sightline from the courtyard area straight to BLU's forward spawn door
  • I am worried about this potentially obscuring too much vision/providing too much cover behind A, as its primary objective is to block sightlines, but I'll see how it plays out
• Added a landing to the big staircase at A (making it easier to get onto and off of the point)
• Lowered BLU's upper right-side route to A by 64 units
  • This proved to be too powerful a spot for BLU in the last test; this change makes it so that BLU is at a slight height disadvantage while walking out of the right-side room.
• Raised displacements underneath BLU's forward spawn to prevent fall damage while walking off the platform
  • The newly lowered bridge straight outside of BLU spawn also works to negate any possible fall damage from just walking out of spawn
• Moved small ammo pack from outside the column room at A to inside the column room
  • I've only ever seen anyone build here once even though it provides a pretty good defensible position and view of the point, so hopefully this ammo will encourage more engineers to build here
• Added patches underneath pickups in the left-side house from BLU spawn to A lobby
• Lowered BLU's upper left-side route at B by 32 units
• Removed small ammo from BLU's upper left-side route at B
• Moved 2nd intel spawn (after A is capped) forward to a more central location
  • I noticed during the last test that many BLU players just walked past/didn't notice the intel spawned on A after it was capped. Now, it is pretty difficult to miss.
  • I am slightly worried about this making things more difficult for BLU, as RED does like to hold the outer area a lot and could possibly hold the intel for a while, but BLU's high ground should be enough to counter it.
  • Alternatively, this could lessen the walk time to B for BLU so much that it makes the point trivial to cap. In that case, I plan to lengthen the cap time, potentially force respawn of RED after A is capped and give RED more height at B, but am holding off on that for now.
• Changed medium health/ammo in BLU's right-side route at A to small health/ammo
  • This makes it harder for engineers on both teams to set up in here (which I want to avoid because it's not a good spot to set up for RED, it provides a HUGE advantage for BLU, and any buildings in that room get destroyed when A is capped)
• Raised cap time of A to 16s
• Raised cap time of B to 14s
• Added another resupply cabinet to BLU's first spawn
• Pushed BLU's spawns at A back a bit
• Removed lower one-way from BLU's right-side route at A
  • This, hopefully, will allow RED to more easily halt a push from BLU as they push up the right side (they no longer have to go the long way through lobby and onto the right side route to meet up with BLU)
  • The door is still there for when this room becomes a BLU forward spawn
• Added pillar on point platform at A to block sightline from column room window to BLU's right side route entrance
• Added pillar in BLU's right side route to block sightline to the entrance of that room from the column room's exit onto the point
• Downsized/upsized and shuffled around various health and ammo
• Cut some extra space off of RED spawn
• Adjusted ramps in BLU spawn to prevent fall damage in spawn if you jumped off the top of the ledge
• Freed the bottle from its prison
• Other various minor changes

A4 Changelog:

• Clipped off window-ledge near full pack at B
• Blocked off BLU's drop-down leading to behind RED from their right side route until after A is capped (func_breakable wall that breaks when A is capped)
• Partial artpass of A (primarily to get a feel for Freyja's egypt textures and see how they look in the context of the geometry I've made)
• BLU forward spawn is no longer a one-way exit (though is still one-way when BLU are attacking A)
• Replaced powerade water from the oasis in BLU's spawn courtyard with a different water texture
• Fixed buildings being able to persist in BLU's forward spawn (now buildings in that room get destroyed when the point is capped)
• Changed BLU respawn wave time after A is capped to 3.5s
• Probably some other stuff -- this was a minor update overall as I feel the layout as a whole is playing pretty well now