Territory Control and Team Fortress 2

Apr 19, 2009
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Territory Control has always been the most interesting mode to map for in TF2. Also the hardest because of the nature of TC.

I was looking over hydro and it got me thinking. Does the main fault of TC lie at the mode itself or is it the layout?

I would draw up a in-depth analysis myself but I am too sleepy right now and I wanted to make this thread to remind myself to jot down my ideas when I wake up.
 
Jan 20, 2010
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I think it's the layout, personally. Although the randomness, length, and repetition of TC does not lend well to people wanting to play it. Personally, I've played Hydro quite a few times and I've only seen each individual base around 1-2 times each. Kinda sucks. :/
 
Nov 14, 2009
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Same as lemines. While looking through Hydro today for spytech stuffs, I realized that I have never seen the blu base. Ever.

Its really an amazing and well thought out area, but due to the GAMEMODE it is almost never seen.
 

sniprpenguin

L6: Sharp Member
Mar 14, 2008
266
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I think it's a little of column A, a little of column B.

The layout of Hydro can be very off-putting, with some areas having no flanking options. This leads to too many stalemates very often.

However, the game mode itself can be hard to map for. Why? You basically have to make 8 small maps and roll them together into one big package. Just doing one or two small maps can be a challenge, both balance and design-wise.

And actually, this thread reminded me that I was working on a swamp-themed TC map awhile ago. I'll go revisit it.
 
Jan 20, 2010
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Same as lemines. While looking through Hydro today for spytech stuffs, I realized that I have never seen the blu base. Ever.

Its really an amazing and well thought out area, but due to the GAMEMODE it is almost never seen.

Oshi- You agreed with me again today. :O
 

FaTony

Banned
Mar 25, 2008
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I personally think it's the best gamemode, loved it during TF2 beta. No stalemates. Everyone was learning the game. And yeah, diagonal rounds on Hydro need some alternative paths.
 

Knight-Errant

L3: Member
Mar 12, 2010
131
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I've always found that the last caps for Hydro to be a pointless one. Defending team is assigned to sit around and hope they can hold out for the length of time to get a comeback chance at winning in this game mode. With a near instant cap, it feels pointless to bother defending when the enemy team can just rush in before a sentry can go up. I understand the point of the final cap is to basically show the end of the map, last stand, end all be all. That the times for cap for final are quick, but so much so it feels like its almost not to bother playing at that point. Could use either a grace period for setup, a chance for the defending team to cap the attack's point, or a remove the final zone all together.

However, if I were to build a TC, I would want it to have 6 points, and the final zone could be attacked by two different directions depending on which was last capped. This would include letting the defenders cap the attacker's base.
 

Icarus

aa
Sep 10, 2008
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it uses the same cap times and walk times as Dustbowl

The problem is the broken spawn times in Hydro, stuck at instaspawn
 
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NoodleCollie

Stoat fiend
aa
Jul 30, 2009
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I'm thinking of trying developing a TC map, so this thread should be fairly useful.

For the central points, would a layout similar to Dustbowl 3-2 work? You've got the main choke point, the underneath flanking route and lots of hidey-areas for both teams. If each of the central points had this type of layout, it might work a bit better.

TBH I haven't played much of Hydro (although oddly I think it was the first TF2 map I ever played), but I reckon setup time on the final point would really help the defenders. I've never noticed that there's been no setup time (maybe because I've never got to the final point often) but if Dustbowl has it for the defenders, TC maps should have it too.
 

grazr

Old Man Mutant Ninja Turtle
aa
Mar 4, 2008
5,441
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I personally think it's the best gamemode, loved it during TF2 beta. No stalemates. Everyone was learning the game. And yeah, diagonal rounds on Hydro need some alternative paths.

Yea, we have to remember that the average TF2 player is something of an idiot. Hydro takes a while to learn so unless you play it frequently the confusion levels are pretty high. But when everyone knows what they are doing the map plays pretty smoothly besides the MASSIVE CHOKEPOINTS.

I think the issues go as thus:
25% layout, it's confusing and meanders all over the place. You have to spend a good 30 seconds figuring out which doors are locked, despite the biggest signs in the game telling you where to go. Also, i can never find the final point on the final stage.
25% player idiocy/ignorance does not help. Players know the map stalemates and 90% of the team plays defence as a result. Any successful assault is immediately squashed by freshly spawned reinforcements.
25% length of map. The map takes fucking ages to play through and this fatigues players. It's basically 5 cp drawn out.
25% the underpants gnomes.

Shmitz's Meridian is 200% more intuitive in terms of layout design. It's like the opposite of hydro, which unfortunately does mean the last point is impossible to cap instead of being impossible to defend :p
 

Icarus

aa
Sep 10, 2008
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Know what I think causes Hydro's Stalemates?

If you look through the vmf file, you can see Hydro was probably in production very early in TF2, and they might have stopped caring about it or just forgot about spawn times.

If spawn times could get any lower than zero, Hydro would have -16 second spawn times.

Negative. Sixteen. Obviously not possible in the game.

Really, It looks like they intended it to gradually go down and stop at 4sec spawns when there was 2 mins left on the clock.
Instead, Hydro just becomes an insta-spawn DM-fest at 3 minutes.

Makes me wonder how it would play if the spawn times were fixed :|
 

Freyja

aa
Jul 31, 2009
2,994
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The problem with hydro is its high cliffs and walls. it's hard to get a grip on which territory is in relation to the others, which makes it confusing on where you should go.

So layout.
 

gamemaster1996

L13: Stunning Member
Sep 30, 2009
1,064
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I think maybe why territory control was dropped may be because it may not have been too popular. But i think the main reason was that it was too difficult to win. Every time i play this gamemode I can sit there for about 2 hours and still neither team had won.
 

Manta_firefly

L1: Registered
Oct 23, 2009
18
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Know what I think causes Hydro's Stalemates?

If you look through the vmf file, you can see Hydro was probably in production very early in TF2, and they might have stopped caring about it or just forgot about spawn times.

If spawn times could get any lower than zero, Hydro would have -16 second spawn times.

Negative. Sixteen. Obviously not possible in the game.

Really, It looks like they intended it to gradually go down and stop at 4sec spawns when there was 2 mins left on the clock.
Instead, Hydro just becomes an insta-spawn DM-fest at 3 minutes.

Makes me wonder how it would play if the spawn times were fixed :|

The spawn times need reversing if anything. Here's the current scenario:

Red is slightly better than blu.

At the start of the round, respawn times are long, any kill is a large blow to the other team, so any slight skill advantage becomes mgnified into a quick steamroll.

At the end of the round, respawn times shorten to non-existence. Kills are near meaningless and no-side can press their advantage into a win, stalemate.

Reversing it would mean that early kills don't lead to steamrolls but the game will actually finish as the clock ticks down as late advantages become more exaggerated.
 

Trotim

aa
Jul 14, 2009
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Could anyone try and actually reverse + fix the Hydro spawntimes then? Or is there already a fixed version floating around somewhere (that isn't just tc_hydro_nighttime)?
 
Sep 12, 2008
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The problem with hydro is its high cliffs and walls. it's hard to get a grip on which territory is in relation to the others, which makes it confusing on where you should go.

So layout.

When you get to learn the map better the layout isn't that hard at all. It's just the path layout (sometimes even only two tiny routes - insane bottlenecks) that's causing serious gameplay problems, not the "difficulty" of the layout.
 

Waster

L1: Registered
Jun 28, 2009
20
13
I think the gamemode itself. Most has already been said.

Taking a look at hydro. There are 6 different battle areas that are hard to balance. But its even harder to balance the connections and chokes between the battleareas. Its simply not fun to play the map when there are 1 or 2 ways to the next area through some very tight chokepoints. Especially when the respawn timer is so low. So it always ends up in stalemate. And if not, then you are probably steamrolled in the first minute. Then you have to defend the last area, which is basicly defending a point of dustbowl without setuptime, crappy respawn times and the attack spawn two meters away from your point and they got five different attack routes.

I dont really see the need of territorial control if we already got 5cp. Where there is much more control how to balance the battleareas and the chokepoints and the captimes and respawntimes.