KotH Desertrush

Vodhr_

L1: Registered
Dec 23, 2014
4
0
cp_desertrush is a small KoTH map based around 3 buildings in the desert.

The first 2 are a 2 story building on either side of the map. The upper floor is where the spawns are located. The spawn rooms contain 2 supply cabnets, some detail props and a large window that faces torwards the Control Point. The bottom floor is a warehouse-like building full of detail props which currently has no real use. My idea is to have a tunnel that connect the two warehouses, providing a back door for spies and other flanking classes, but i dont know whether or not i will ever properly get it done.

The other is a tall building in the middle of the map that contains the Control Point. On the roof of this building there is a small healthkit and small ammopack and a large hole in the middle, that looks down on the Control Point. On the outside of the building there is a small healthkit and medium ammopack on either side of the outside walls. Inside the building there are stairs on either side for each team to walk to an upper platform of the building, where engineers could build or snipers/soldiers or other classes could fire from. There is a small healthkit and medium ammopack on these platforms. The actual Control Point is located on the ground in the middle of this building. There is a medium healthkit and small ammopack on either side of the control point.

There are 3 barricades on either entrance of the Control Point to make sieging it less difficult and defending it less easy. There is a medium healthpack and medium ammopack behind either of the foremost barricades.
 
Last edited:

radarhead

Basically? Kind of a Huge Mess
aa
Mar 6, 2013
1,045
625
Notice how many staircases you've strung together? Your map is WAY overscaled. One of those staircase models should be enough to move the player up one level. Also, that room with the barrels and the rooftop demonstrates how the large size of the map makes for gross amounts of prop spam that will cause lag for players.
 

killohurtz

Distinction in Applied Carving
aa
Feb 22, 2014
1,016
1,277
Not only is this map excessively huge, it looks like you've got at least 6 sets of pickups right around the control point, when there should be none (players should have to retreat some distance to find health and ammo). Also, the lack of buildings or variation in terrain height gives soldiers and demomen an advantage, since they can jump straight from their spawn to the point unobstructed. And I'd stay away from that tunnel idea - it will likely lead to easy spawncamping.
 

Seba

DR. BIG FUCKER, PHD
aa
Jun 9, 2009
2,364
2,728
The map is overscaled, too flat, and is 90% propspam. Take a look at viaduct or quarry to see how to make cool non-flat maps that aren't one big box filled with random props.
 

Zed

Certified Most Crunk™
aa
Aug 7, 2014
1,241
1,025
The height advantage over mid is so large that it's actually useless for anyone that isn't a demoman. Why the hell is everything so tall?
 
Last edited:

Doktor Richter

L3: Member
Feb 13, 2014
115
89
As others have said, your map is simply too big, in all three dimensions. Snipers will dominate, and most other weapons will do minimal damage, since damage in TF2 is based on distance to target. You should look at Harvest, which is the closest official map to yours in layout, and see how big the open areas and buildings are.

Other than that, though, you have a few other gameplay concerns you may want to consider before setting players loose on the map:

- The medium health on the point is technically closer to blu than to red. This might not seem like it would make a huge difference, but it could, in the right circumstance. A koth map should generally be perfectly symmetrical in terms of layout and pickups.

- The decks above the point not only allow demomen and soldiers to rain death on the point, but said demomen and soldiers are completely invincible up there. Snipers can't shoot them from afar since they're protected by the walls, nobody's going to be able to access the roof above them (and even if they could, the hole gives them a poor shooting angle), spies don't have any way to sneak up there without getting noticed, and anyone who tries to fight their way up the ramp will have to be glued back together in hell. On TOP of that, they have a health and ammo resupply right up there with them, and if things get dicey they can just jump down to the other ramp and climb up to the opposite side.

- The "edges" of your map aren't marked by anything in particular. No walls or fences or barriers or anything like that. Players fleeing towards the edge won't know how much more space they have to run before they hit an abrupt invisible wall.

- Other than the mile-high sniper decks and platforms above the point, the map is almost completely flat, with no height variation at all. This generally leads to uninteresting, repetitive gameplay.

You've got a bit of natural talent at laying out aesthetics and props and setting up a scene, but you might want to focus on how your map plays before you focus on how your map looks. If you need to change something, add something, remove something, or move something around, it will be much harder to do with a lot of complex props and geometry in the way. Again, look at the playable size and layout of Harvest, scale down your map to something about that size, then get some players to test it and work from there.
 
Last edited: